Results tagged “recipes”

To help welcome the beginning of fall last night, we chose to make one of our all-time favorite recipes--hearty potato soup. The recipe was our mother's, something she would make for us when we were sick as a kid--and even now it's something we make for close friends who are laid up with a cold or the flu, and definitely a recipe we'll someday make for our own children. To us, this soup represents the warmth and comfort of being home. And we can honestly say, it's from this soup that we first taught ourselves how to cook.

Seattlest recently challenged our culinarily inclined friends to a chili cookoff, which will take place this Sunday at Seattlest Katelyn's house. Last time we participated in a chili challenge, we were vegetarian and mostly interested in picking the right kind of bean and filler. (Tofu? Nutritional yeast? Fake beef?) But, chili is one of those things that everyone has a secret ingredient for. This time around, we're confident with our selection of pork, and are just looking for that special surprise kicker. Suggestions we've received in the last week range from peanut butter to molasses and chipotle peppers. What's your secret killer ingredient? Would you dare follow the Texas Chilli rules and make chili with no beans?

A new website, Foodista.com, Seattle-based and launched today, promises to do for food what Wikipedia has done for the rest of the universe.

So you thought it was going to be a lot of work, all this holiday cooking? We know, just thinking about it can be exhausting. The spirit of fussy Martha Stewart dueling with the ghost of drop-the-turkey-on-the-floor Julia Child? Top Chef duking it out with Iron Chef? Paula Dean versus Rachael Ray? It's enough to make you send for Chinese takeout.

"They're safe to eat!" Fish & Wildlife have okayed only the second razor clam dig of the season, we're told. "KXRO reports the digging will open Thursday on the afternoon and evening tides on Copalis and Mocrocks and will continue Friday through Sunday at Copalis, Mocrocks, Twin Harbors and Long Beach." If you're over 15, you have to have a shellfish license, and you have to stop after you reach 15 clams. Here are some recipe ideas to spring on people not allergic to shellfish like us.

Until the age of, oh, six months ago, the only pound cake ever to enter our sphere with any regularity was Sara Lee. You know the one: frozen, aluminum tin, red cardboard lid. As a child, we loved this cake. We loved its perfectly uniform spongy crumb, we loved its smooth, suede-like crust--reminiscent of the ice cream sandwiches that we also loved--and even now, we can’t deny that Sara Lee Moist and Delicious All Butter Pound Cake is certainly tasty. It’s just also sort of boring (and difficult to serve to our fellow chef friends with head held high).

Birthdays, anniversaries, promotions, and celebrations alike have at least one cool thing in common: cake. In this instance, it’s cupcakes. Recently, we celebrated a birthday, and the cupcakes (specifically the frosting) were too good not to share them with you! Our sister-in-law, the pastry chef extraordinaire, was the mastermind behind the dessert. She concocted the frosting and was willing to let everyone in on her secrets. She knows how to play with a recipe to make it just right. Make this frosting at the next social gathering, and you might find yourself on the Martha Stewart Show too!

Last year we went all crazy for rhubarb, but this year, sadly, we’re been rather silent on the subject. (Truth be told, we’ve been rather silent in general--but no more!) To mark our return to rhubarb (and posting), we’re talking about something too ambrosial to possibly ignore: Rhubarb-Vanilla Bean Jam.

For the home baker, morning pastries fall into two distinct categories: ones you should buy and ones you should make. The ones you should buy are generally anything in the croissant, danish, and doughnut realm. (We might revise that to say that an ambitious person could, if they wanted to spend hours in the kitchen or an apartment that smelled like McDonald’s, make these items; but generally, we’d leave those to someone else). However, certain other pastries, like muffins, popovers, and scones are unquestionably better when turned out fresh from your own kitchen. Though scones are among our favorites, we have yet to provide you with a recipe. Please accept our apologies.

(This fall we are combining our love of the football and our dream of learning to cook. On Sunday morning, following a trip to a local farmer’s market/major supermarket chain, we will be preparing a meal from the city of the Seahawks opponent. Then at halftime we will throw our badly burned hands in the air and make hot dogs.)

Things we love: The football, themes, and the films of Joan Crawford

Our land, this inlet on the western coast of the North American continent, is a fortunate one, endowed with natural riches and settled by people who do not confuse prosperity with moral superiority. Modesty becomes us; we do not flaunt our advantages.

These days, our usually memorable visits to the farmer’s markets seem to blend into one another. Faced with the same dwindling offerings week after week, we find that the squash and potatoes and apples and that had us all atwitter in November have lost their shiny newness and ceased to appeal. No one is to blame. It’s February in Seattle; and if you are one of us who make a stab at seasonal cooking, you are hurting.

Thirteen teams turned out for Seattlest trivia last night at the Old Pequliar. Want to see how you'd do? Here are all the questions. We'll post answers later today, along with a list of team standings and anything else interesting we find to say about the event.

Seattlest's favorite cooking show doesn't star Rachael Ray or Iron Chef Morimoto. No, we're partial to America's Test Kitchen, the public television sibling of our favorite cooking magazine, Cook's Illustrated.