Weekly Tip Number Nine – The Key to Boiling Potatoes

Yet another Monday has arrived and it’s my favorite day of the week.

Why, you may ask?

Because it’s the day I share another one of my Weekly Tips.

Ready…. set…. go!

Celebrity Cooking Magazine

The Spring issue of Celebrity Cooking Magazine is out and guess who is featured alongside The Barefoot Contessa and Ted Allen?!

You’ll find two delicious recipes of mine from Great Food Starts Fresh, including my pan-roasted halibut with salsa verde and asparagus (pictured).

Simply grab your Latte and check out the digital version to flip through the entire spread. (Now that’s my kind of magazine!)

Picking and Choosing the Best Veggies

It’s the final installment of a series I did on shopping at your local Farmers Market with America Now and this one pretty much covers it all:

How to pick and store a range of fresh produce.

Latte knows, there is nothing worse than buying a delicious fresh fruit or vegetable and then a few days later seeing it wilted or bruised because of improper storage.

Too avoid that all together, I wanted to share these tips with you!

Vegas, Baby! It’s delicious.

This Valentine’s day Super-sous surprised me with a trip to Las Vegas.

Now, let me clarify that neither of us are big Vegas people. Gambling, smoking, crowds. These are not our preferred activities.

That said, we wanted a little getaway somewhere that was close, but outside of  L.A. and where good food and good deals abound. So… that’s how Vegas came into the picture.

Super-sous wanted us to eat delicious food on Valentine’s day. “Part of our culinary education” were some of the words used to explain the purpose of the trip.

Mission accomplished.

I do believe that we are now both Vegas converts.

We did not have one bad morsel of food. Not one.

For a very special treat, we ate at L’atelier de Joel Robuchon on Valentine’s day, Robuchon’s 1 star Michelin star rated restaurant in Las Vegas. (The less expensive version of his 3 star restaurant in Vegas.)

It may have been on the pricier spectrum of things, but it was worth every single delicious bite. It was a culinary experience to last a lifetime.

If you’re a serious foodie and you have a trip to Vegas somewhere on the horizon, I can’t recommend this restaurant enough. It was a splurge and one that everyone deserves to treat themselves to from time to time.

One of the extra special moments of the dinner was the celebration of our table-neighbor’s birthday. She and her husband spend almost every Valentine’s day/her birthday at L’atelier. We chatted each other up throughout the night and turns out that they know the Executive Pastry chef of the restaurant whom we got to meet (bonus desserts!). They even shared their special birthday cake with us.

It wasn’t the best lighting for pictures, but the obligatory food photos had to be taken. Even of Latte.

Bon Appetit.

 

Want The Best Carrot Ever? Check Out My Weekly Tip Number 8.

I had a friend tell me a few months ago that he didn’t like carrots.

When I asked him why, he shared his experience of, time and again, eating old, dried out, sugarless, pale orange carrots. He said he had never had otherwise!

I think we’ve all had a similar experience. It’s the kind of carrot that you have to immediately stop eating and find a brighter, sweeter one to replace that “off” taste in your mouth.

Well, thank Latte for learning from farmers who grow carrots how to pick the crispest, brightest, sweetest bunches off them all. And learning how to make that taste last for days on end.

When you learn how to choose the best, you’ll be hard pressed to speak about nothing but the wonders of carrots. That’s what happened to my friend.

He’s a carrot convert.

Win one for farmers. And carrots.

 

 

Say Happy Valentines Day with a Hot and Spicy Melty Chocolate Molten Cake

To all the lovers out there – food lovers, Latte lovers, love lovers…

Happy Valentines Day!

Dear Latte, it’s almost Valentines Day! How about chocolate truffles for your love?

24 hours until the big day.

This is where the season of chocolate in my cookbook, Great Food Starts Fresh, shines. Although it’s a year round season, there is something special about eating chocolate on Valentines Day. It’s a delicious tradition that I whole-heartedly believe in!

So, let’s indulge, shall we? Won’t you be my Valentine?

The Secret to Citrus

When Latte is not available, a nice glass of freshly squeezed orange juice is a great alternative.

But how do you choose the best citrus for your morning fix?

Check out my simple tips for selecting and storing fresh citrus.

Weekly Tip – Number 7 – Valentines Day Appropriate

It’s Valentine’s Day week; if you’re looking for a delicious chocolatey treat that’s easy to make, well, this is the weekly tip for you.

Share the love.

 

 

The War on Health

It was such a different time.

World War I. World War II.

The country came together to support the war efforts in many ways. One of which was that during times of war, everyone contributed via their food choices.

It was wartime and rationing and food education was a big part of supporting the troops.

Less meat. Less wheat. More gardening. More local foods. Less waste.

It was war, after all, and we were in it to win it.

What did the U.S. Food Administration do? They promoted the heck out of rationing. They educated people how to cook. They shared how to prepare meals using leftovers. They encouraged Americans to lower their consumption of  sugar and meat. They started the Victory Garden campaign. To gather together for the greater good. Yes, it was a different time back then.

Now we live in the time of abundance. Of convenience. Of consumption.

We have anything. Everything. And more.

But, there’s still a war going on in America. It’s not necessarily the one we can see outright. Our children aren’t running off to storm a beach in France, but they are making their way to their neighborhood fast food joint. They are doubling up on their sugar and fat intake at school.

There’s a war on health.

We are constantly being bombarded by the big food companies. By the media. By television programming. By the food industry lobbyists. Right here on America soil.

We’re fighting for the lives of our children and grandchildren. So they can live a longer, healthier life than our own.

It wasn’t a wonderful time – WW I or II. Oh no, Latte. I’m not trying to romanticize the past. But I do want us to go backwards. Just a little. Because sometimes progress isn’t always about moving forward. Sometimes we need to remember. Let’s rewind ourselves to a healthier time of eating. Back to the days of whole foods and gardening. Of teaching each other how and what to cook. Let’s ration our high fructose corn syrup intake and reduce those ingredients that we cannot pronounce or do not know why they’re in our food.

It’s time for us to rally to improve the health of this country. I believe we can live a healthier more delicious life without it feeling like a sacrifice. In fact I know we can.

It’s time to take a step backwards before we can forge ahead.