Vincent

Yesterday, Bill & I had brunch at a small Andersonville restaurant called “Vincent.”:http://vincentchicago.com/ Until Tuesday, we’d never known it existed. Tuesday, though, the folks behind the “Restaurant Intelligence Agency (RIA)”:http://hq.restaurantintelligenceagency.com/ ran a contest on Twitter for “a basket of dutch goodies” from Chrissy Camba, the Chef de Cuisine at Vincent.

Here’s how I think it works: every Tuesday, they feature a chef who is registered with them (or, at least, I think that’s a requirement), interview them over the course of the day, and then run a contest involving that chef. That’s certainly how it worked this time. In my case, they asked us to guess which celebrity would Chrissy Camba most like to cook for, with the hint of this celebrity is the nephew of a legendary film director.… Continue reading →

Cherry Almond Butter Cookies

Welcome to the inaugural post of what is guaranteed to be the smallest recipe category of MetaCookbook: “Wedding Recipes”.

It will be the smallest recipe category for two reasons:
# It’s necessarily time limited. The wedding in question is in October, and it’s May now.

# I’m not expecting to cook everything for our wedding. Most of the recipes for what we eat will probably not show up here.

Most of what I’ll post in this category will be cookies. So, I hope you all have a sweet tooth.

Growing up, I can’t remember a time that I didn’t know my father & mother had an “Italian Cookie Cake” as part of their wedding festivities. I even have a very vague recollection of seeing a single photo of their cookie cake.… Continue reading →

Two new recipe categories

Here at MetaCookbook, like many places around the web, we both tag our entries & put them into overarching categories. Today I made up two new categories, and changed the name of a third.

First, the name change. “Recipes” is now “Challenge Recipes”. As we said in the “About”:http://metacookbook.com/permalink/about.html this blog came about because we are challenging ourselves to use our cookbooks. Most recipes we post/discuss will end up here.

Occasionally, I get brave and make something all on my own. Bill does this rather more often than I do, but posts rather less often. If one of us makes & posts something from our own heads, “like my asparagus-mushroom risotto,”:http://metacookbook.com/archives/241-Tashas-attempt-at-Asparagus-Risotto.html we’ll park it here. There are some of these recipes currently residing in “Challenge Recipes” at the time of this writing, but I expect to have them moved by the end of the weekend.… Continue reading →

Tasha’s (attempt at) Asparagus Risotto

Cover of How to Pick a Peach, by Russ Parsons

One of the first things I wanted to do upon arriving home to Chicago was find some asparagus. I love asparagus utterly, and could probably eat it until I turn into an asparagus spear.

Luckily for me, asparagus season isn’t that long.

“Asparagus season isn’t that long” was actually my biggest fear upon arriving home too. I was terrified that three weeks gone from home, and a couple weeks of not shopping prior to that meant I’d missed out completely. Which would have made me quite sad.

So, of course, it only makes utter sense that we would get in about 8:00 pm on a Friday, and I’d be prepared to go to a Saturday morning farmers’ market. Where, thankfully, I found asparagus. I also found a couple of tomato plants, an amazing tamale (that isn’t New Mexican style at all), and some eggs.… Continue reading →

A comment about Bill

So, “Pioneer Woman is giving away some nice pots & pans today”:http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2011/05/pots-pans-2/ and if you want them, you should go enter to win.

Today’s contest is based on the question: “Who is the best cook in your family?” I thought you might want to see my response.

“I think he’ll be along to disagree with me at some point, but in my little family of two, my guy is the better cook.

I do far more of the cooking, and am starting to tackle harder & weirder things (like throw-together risotto the other night), so I may someday surpass him. But he’s a great deal better at throwing things together, knowing what flavors meld, how to cook things and what to do.

He’s the best, and I am very lucky.”… Continue reading →