Coming Soon!!!

Why I am Rich

Dora and The Italians

Published story in San Francisco Chronicle

Christmas With M F K Fisher

Icelandic Tales

Rose Levy Beranbaum's new cookbook

Please note edit on Cookbooks part 2 posted December 11, 2008.

Cookbooks in The Kitchen of What's Happening now

part 2: Royal Icing, Mousseline Buttercream, Savarin, Chocolate Domingo Cake, Lemon Curd, are all favorite recipes from Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Cake Bible, that I have made over and over and over because they are the best of their kind. It's nice to make things that you do not get tired of. Maybe that is why some people give up!

Rose is a researcher, scientist, artist, and  cookbook author who talks directly to you. She has worked out all the problems.  We became friends because of a letter I wrote to her about 15 years ago.  She claims in her book that the Mousseline Buttercream frosting will hold up in very hot weather.  I trusted that, and staged a very successful wedding cake at Sequoia Grove Winery in very hot weather.  I sent her the pictures with the letter; in 2 days she called me from New York and we talked for an hour, and have been great friends ever since.  

When she comes to San Francisco there is always some amazing food adventure afoot. Daniel Patterson's (Coi Restaurant)wedding cake, dinner with Marion Cunningham, The Tasting Menu at The French Laundry, a tented first class 3 course dinner with Jamie Oliver in the pouring rain,  an all day excursion to visit the Della Fattoria bread company in Petaluma, and more!

I told her I was on tippytoes waiting for the new book due out in September 2009.  It will be very interesting to see how she views now, what is important in cake making, cake baking. Rose states,"..this new book is all the things that i've evolved since the cake bible (it will be 21 years!) but the cake bible still stands--almost everything is new including that delightful cradle cake!" 

We discovered along the way, a mutual passion for dress design, knitting, and crochet, actually fanatical would be the best word. It's almost folie a deux.

Cookbooks in the Kitchen of What's Happening Now

Part 1: The San Francisco Chronicle food staff listed their all time favorite cookbooks recently. Two of my favorites were on their lists: Deborah Madison's Vegetarian Cookery for Everyone; Rose Levy Beranbaum's The Cake Bible.

Deborah's book was published in 1997; I purchased it 10 years ago.  It has been so used that it is falling apart. Her tone in the book is the ever present teacher wanting to share everything she knows about cookery in the plainest way possible. Her explanations and descriptions make sense and are easy to understand. The best part has been plunging in on faith, and coming up with some spectacular dishes.  She gives you great combinations for flavor and texture.  Her section of pancakes and waffles is one of the best. I have made just about all of them.

A year ago I started buying organic produce from Mariquita Farms and was faced with a bevy of unfamiliar goods.  Deborah to the rescue! Now, tatsoi (baby bok choy), mustard greens, Italian parsley have made it to growing in pots on the rooftop garden....things I never ate before.  I do enjoy a good piece of beef, chicken, pork, fish, but the day to day cooking is continual experimentation with vegetables.  Grated raw beet salad! Shredded brussels sprouts with horseradish! Wild Rice gratin!