Lickity Split: Versatile quick breads deliver full flavor fast
My grandma is a baking grandma. No matter what, when I go to her house, I’m greeted by a hug, a kiss on both cheeks and a plateful of whatever she’s making – pumpkin pie, peanut butter cookies or banana bread. I can’t go over to that house on a full stomach, it just isn’t…
Sweeter Than Honey: Honeybees pollinate dozens of important crops
If the calendar says September, fall must be on its way. Temperatures will drop, leaves will turn and farmers’ markets will overflow with pumpkins and apples. Those fruits of fall that give harvest festivals their color and crunch are the result of hard work months earlier by that industrious insect, the honeybee. Spring may be…
Soaked in Flavor: Bread puddings please whether they be savory or sweet
While some view bread pudding as an efficient way to put stale bread to good use, local chefs see bread pudding as a reason to create stale bread – unless you are Carolyn Downs, owner and pastry chef of Cyrano’s in Webster Groves. Eschewing the ingredients listed in most cookbook recipes, Downs is a firm…
Prized Ingredient: Chefs and epicures look forward to the winter truffle season
By mid-September, a hunt will be afoot in the forests of Italy – a hunt for the second-most-expensive food in the world: white truffles. Learned gastronome and aspiring restaurateur B. Poremba of St. Louis knows one of the tartufaie, or truffle hunters, who’ll take part in it. “[When a friend was a teenager,] his father…
Review: Starrs in St. Louis
Here’s a hypothetical situation for you. Say you added a liquor license to your coffee roasting business 27 years ago and started selling wine. You built the wine shop into a powerhouse in your city. Let’s also say that later you added a kitchen facility to service a private dining room and a gourmet takeout…
Review: El Scorcho in Maplewood
Longtime readers may remember me chiding the local press — myself included — for prematurely praising up-and-coming neighborhoods. Two years ago, when writing up Boogaloo, I knocked Maplewood for being more sleepy than slick, contrary to what many local writers claimed. In 2005, Maplewood didn’t deserve the “hip and cool neighborhood” attention it garnered. Well,…
North Oakland
• Fill a cocktail shaker with ice. Add the vodka, liqueur, pomegranate juice, a splash each of fresh lime juice and ginger ale and a dash of bitters. • Shake well to combine and strain into a martini glass. 1 oz. Pearl pomegranate vodka 1½ oz. Pama pomegranate liqueur 1 oz. pomegranate juice Fresh lime…
Revolucion
• Rim a highball glass with sugar. • Fill the glass with ice, add the pineapple juice, rum and vodka. • Add a splash each of lime juice and simple syrup and stir. • Garnish with a piece of fresh pineapple, a lime wedge and a maraschino cherry threaded onto a toothpick and serve. 4…
Apple-glazed Carrots
8 to 10
Che Guava
• Rim a highball glass with sugar, then fill with ice. • Add the vodka, orange liqueur, guava nectar and juices and stir. Top off with a splash of club soda. • Garnish with a lime wedge and a maraschino cherry and serve. 1 oz. vodka 1 oz. Patron Citronage orange liqueur 1 oz. guava…
Lemon Pavlova with Fresh Berries and Raspbery-Mint Syrup
1 10-inch diameter Pavlova, about 6 servings
This western’s got the guns, horses, saloons … and macho sensitivity
After screening 3:10 to Yuma, a fellow critic rolled her eyes in my direction and laughed at what a “testosterone-fest” the movie was, what with the guns and the fights and the guns and the explosions and the guns. I shrugged it off. It’s a western, I figured. Whaddya expect, pilgrim … Meryl Streep as…
Break up the drive to wine country at a laid-back cafe
I fondly remember the days when a trip to our area’s wineries included packing a picnic. These days, many wineries don’t allow outside food, leaving patrons spending more cash just to have a little cheese and sausage. One way to curb hunger pangs is to stop for something to eat along the way. Wine Country…
Mother Nature dealt a hard blow to this year’s apple crop, but all hope is not lost
Oh, the crisp bite and sweet tang of a just-picked Jonathan. Or the mellow spiciness of a Golden Delicious right from the tree. Fall is nirvana for apple-lovers, but 2007 will be different. The roller coaster of last spring’s thaw-freeze and a subsequent mid-summer drought drastically reduced local apple crops. Fewer apples and varieties will…
Wine judges’ stronger credentials give competitions greater credibility
Back in January, we reviewed how wine competitions operate. But what about the people who decide which wines are singled out for honors? I have been judging wine (and beer)competitions since the late 1970s. Wine quality is light years ahead of what it was then, and the accountability of judging has kept pace with that…
Early Risers: Panera bakers man their ovens while the city sleeps
Most St. Louis Bread Co. devotees likely think little of how the pretty, brown loaves end up neatly stacked in their chrome bins and glass display cases each morning. For all we know, that crusty, chewy goodness is the delicious tidings of a benevolent Dough Fairy, whose sole mission is to bestow tasty carbs upon…
Gregory’s Creative Cuisine gets creative — and nutritious — with school lunches
In 1989, Gregory Mosberger launched Gregory’s Creative Cuisine, starting with various size parties. Over the years the business branched out and now caters private parties, corporate events, backstage eats at Verizon Wireless Amphitheater and school lunches. Wait … school lunches? There aren’t many caterers willing to venture into the hallowed halls of local elementary schools,…
Pavlova is a dessert so light and tasty, it soars
By the mid-1920s, Russian prima ballerina Anna Pavlova had become the equivalent of a modern-day superstar. It was said of her widely recognized talents, “She does not dance, she soars as though on wings.” How apropos that another fan (an Australian chef or perhaps a New Zealander) should, in 1933, invent the world’s most airy…
Signature cocktails are the life of the party
Wine and beer will do, Champagne is always acceptable, basic mixers will suffice. But there’s no trendier way to spice up a party than with a special cocktail created specifically for the event, whether you’re planning a last hoorah for summer or are looking forward to the celebration-heavy season ahead. Creating cocktails may sound intimidating,…
