John Catucci is my morning meditation.
During the pandemic, he gave me hope. He’s a comedian and he is funny – in a low-key way. He is endearing. The two TV shows he hosts — You Gotta Eat Here and Big Food Bucket List — are entertaining and educational. They are life-affirming. They are two of my favourite TV food shows. Read more…
Decadent Chocolate Chunk Cookies from “Peace, Love & Fibre”
“Dear Canadians, Fibre not only keeps you regular, it lowers your chances of developing breast cancer and heart disease. Add a salad to your day, eat a handful of nuts, switch to whole grains, eat some beans! Signed Your Body” – Mairlyn Smith. Read more…
Click on this – my podcast chat with domestic goddess Nigella Lawson recorded in Toronto in late 2015 – and you’ll hear her say that we are “kitchen cousins”: https://www.marionkane.com/podcast/chat-nigella-kitchen-cousin
She’s referring to several important things we have in common: A willingness to freely improvise when cooking; an acceptance of failure in the kitchen as a necessary path to learning, and a penchant for eating her dish of Squid and Orzo Pasta cold for breakfast.
Nigella and I have another important bond: a love of chocolate cakes. In her book “Feast,” published in 2004, there is an entire chapter – beloved my me – called “Chocolate Hall of Fame.” This collection of nine recipes includes her famous Chocolate Guinness Cake – delicious but tends to sink in the middle – Chocolate Gingerbread, also good, and Chocolate Malteser Cake that I haven’t yet made. Read more…
“Immaturity and hair dye keep me young.”
I’m repeating the title of this post for a few reasons: First, everything clever is worth repeating. It usually gets a good laugh – one of life’s giddiest pleasures, especially at my age. It’s true and unabashedly honest. It sums up what’s to follow – the announcement that I turn 70 in a few days. And last, it’s original.
I used to think I stole this funny line from my beloved heroine: the American journalist, author, screenwriter and director Nora Ephron. I steal a lot from that eminently quotable woman who died too young at 71 in 2012 from a rare form of leukemia. It’s hard not to steal from her because we seem to have parallel lives. I talk about her in the present because she lives on in my heart.
We both love food and cooking. We consider crushed pineapple mandatory in carrot cake, we like meatloaf – done right – and both have a recipe for cottage cheese pancakes. We both adore Julia Child and all that she’s about. Read more…
I was attending the recent launch for the documentary Semisweet at the Royal Cinema in Toronto’s Little Italy.
I had already watched the film twice at home and was telling its producer Lalita Krishna before the screening how its poignant ending had made me cry. “That’s the sign of a good film,” she replied softly. And I agree. Read more…
Two weeks in London (U.K.) last month wasn’t long enough to sleuth the hot ‘n’ happening food scene in that fair city.
In the 1950s and ’60s, when I spent formative years there, bagels and baguettes were a novelty In fact, my Canadian dad used to make a pilgrimage to Soho’s Berwick St. Market to find cobs of corn: an imported delicacy in those days that cost the equivalent of a dollar apiece. Sunday was the day for our visit to Zlotnick’s in the North London suburb of Finchley where we lived to purchase bagels – almost unknown in our white, white-collar, white-bread nabe – at that lone Jewish deli.
Today, London is a hot-bed of delicious chow – from the nutrient-packed, luscious Muesli pot at Pret a Manger to high-end stuff like snails at the new St. John Hotel. What’s more, corn is on almost every menu along with harissa, veal cheeks, smoked eel, burrata, lovage and other exotica. Read more…
A recipe mistake can be downright dangerous.
Take the case of Aunt Vertie’s Sugar Cookies: a confection that appeared in a 1991 issue of Gourmet.
Unable to find wintergreen extract, the magazine’s testers substituted wintergreen oil in that recipe: a substance sold in some pharmacies to treat sore muscles. Read more…
