Gastronomy 101

Follow my blog with Bloglovin   Earlier this year we made a much anticipated move and our new place includes a beautiful backyard! I had been growing a few things in boxes before and I am excited to expand into real gardening. My old boxes are still going strong, and filled with herbs and strawberries. I have also been growing vegetables and these feathery fronds above are carrots, which represent one of my first successes in growing fresh veggies to be eaten.  I am also getting fresh produce delivered from Farm Fresh to You to round out my fruit and veggie selection and keep me eating healthy.    Even though we haven't exactly been suffering from very cold weather this fall, the season always gets me in the mood for soup. Also, soup is a great way to take a lot of vegetables and create a meal that can be enjoyed over many nights. This is a good feature for our little household of two, so that we can enjoy all of our vegetables before they are past...

One of my favorite new things I've discovered lately is the bread baking column on Serious Eats. I love to bake more than any other kind of cooking so it's exciting to have a steady stream of things to make. Above are some corn and cheddar muffins . I made them with fresh white sweet corn from the farmer's market and some Vermont cheddar. These are great warmed up with some butter.

In order to understand Ludobites, you have to understand the people behind it. Ludovic Lefebvre sometimes looks like this: But more often he looks like this: His wife, Kristine, sometimes looks like this: But more often, looks like this: Ludovic Lefebvre is one of the top chefs in the world. Kristine Lefebvre was a high-powered entertainment lawyer and one-time contestant on "The Apprentice". In other words, they are both gorgeous and talented and you would think, therefore, extremely worthy of hate. But you would be wrong. All you have to do is spend one night at Ludobites, the pop-up restaurant they run together to understand that in reality these two are sweet, friendly, down-to-earth, fun and crazy in love with each other. All they want to do is hang out together, have fun, make food and extend their hospitality to anyone who cares to join in. Half Chicken, Chorizo, Poached Egg, Chanterelles, Saffron Onions Soubise What is Ludobites? Ludobites is a pop-up restaurant tha...

So I don't have any particular talents. I can do a lot of things, but I'm not really great at any one thing. Because of that I get way too proud of myself whenever I successfully do something and it's not messed up. I cannot believe it every time and it's like a miracle. (The reason for this is the many many messed up projects that will not ever appear on this blog.) So recently I have done a couple of things ALL BY MYSELF and they turned out good. I am so pleased with myself, I am showcasing it all here on this blog. Okay first, I am totally a farmer! I've been wanting a yard forever, but it's pretty clear that it's going to be a long time before I ever have one. So this year when a cool nursery opened up down the street, me and J. started a container garden. Besides the decorative plants, I decided to try to grow some vegetables. Guys, it worked! They grew! And for the most part, are still growing. It's amazing. You just put water on them every day, fe...

First off, sad news, everyone. The MUNCH LA food truck event for this weekend has been canceled. I'm unsure why, but at least it seems that it will be rescheduled, so I will be sure to look out for any new dates. Here is the official statement from the event: Due to unforeseen circumstances, MUNCH LA regretfully has to cancel its event on Saturday, September 18th, 2010. MUNCH LA deeply apologizes to our supporters for any inconveniences and we hope to reschedule our event soon. In the meantime, full refunds on tickets will be available. Please let us know if you have any questions and we will keep you posted. But now ... Good news, everyone! It's almost time for DineLA again! October 3 - 8 and Oct. 10 - 15, local restaurants will offer sweet deals to take advantage of. Lunches will be offered for $16, $22, or $28 depending on the place, and dinners for $26, $34, or $44 depending on the place. It's a great time to try places that ordinarily wouldn't be on your agenda for...

Ooh breaking news ... on Saturday, September 18, MUNCH LA will hold its first event - a food and fashion extravaganza featuring over 30 of L.A.'s famous food trucks as well as indie fashion vendors. The event will be from 11am - 5pm at Fairfax High. Sought after food trucks such as LudoTruck (Ludo Lefevbre's fried chicken), Let's Be Frank (gourmet hot dogs), the Dim Sum Truck and Tropical Shaved Ice will be there. The full list of trucks follows: Ahn Joo, Baby Bad Ass Burgers, Big Swirl, Calbi BBQ, Crepe n Around, Del’s Lemonade, Dim Sum Truck, Don Chow Tacos, Dosa Truck, Dumpling Station, Eat Phamish, Fish Lips, Flying Pig, Frysmith, Greenz on Wheelz, Greasy Weiner, India Jones, Kabob N Roll, Komodo, Lake Street Creamery, Let’s Be Frank, LudoTruck, Nana Queens, Slice, South Philly, Sweet Truck, Tropical Shave Ice, Vizzi and more. In addition, attendees can do some designer shopping, as Young Fabulous & Broke, Hudson Jeans, Wendy Glez Lingerie, T Bags, Dylan George, Pai...

Strawberry farmers are always on a quest to build a bigger and better strawberry. In strawberry terms, what that means is they want the perfect everbearing strawberry - one that produces a large amount of fruit for a long amount of time. Seascape berries were birthed at the University of Davis and they are an extremely productive variety of strawberry, and even better than that, have a very good flavor. Seascape berries are particularly suited to California, but will grow especially well in any cool region with a warm micro-climate. Not only is the berry one of the better berries for commercial growing and selling, but this year, researchers at Purdue have discovered that it may be able to go into space with astronauts. In attempting to discover which produce might be cultivated on a space shuttle, it was determined that Seascape berries require little maintenance or energy, are not sensitive to the amount of daylight available. In fact, what they found with the Seascape was that with ...