tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-80406030493894236952011-09-25T07:07:42.837-04:00Learn cooking and treasure sources of food; teach and leave generously for the future.Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.comBlogger221100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-27992872377065357872012-10-25T22:05:00.000-04:002011-07-25T06:40:44.976-04:00

Humans are hardwired to learn cooking. The nature, variety and origin of food calls us to find, grow, care for, cook, and eat it -  to play with, paint, write, and sing of it.  As with music and language, genetic (nature) and practical (nurture) matters contribute to our capacity for, response to, and practice of our culinary heritage. The ease with which people eat evermore readymade foods

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-27485359177259778532011-09-23T19:57:00.007-04:002011-09-24T10:50:34.524-04:00

In the seventeen months between October 1978 and May of 1980, I toiled in the confectionery kitchen between Winter Street and Temple Place (opposite Park Street Station) of Baileys of Boston, Ice Cream and Confections. The main store of the seven Boston area retail stores - which included a greeting cards department in addition to an old fashioned ice cream shop and candy counter - was upstairs,

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-72449236873987708382011-09-11T09:56:00.004-04:002011-09-15T07:11:43.361-04:00

I recently had the pleasure to receive notice from Mr. Agas Ramada Setiadi about what looks like vanilla heaven: his organic vanilla plantation in Java. His web site is truly wonderful - but see below for ordering in USA-showing his healthy looking farm, organized and clean facilities, beautifully photographed products and processing steps, and historical, botanic, and culinary information about

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-10163956872067790662011-08-27T08:56:00.002-04:002011-08-27T20:58:31.061-04:00

     I love storms, rain. It's difficult to relate with negative comments about stormy weather. Of course, there can be some inconveniences - too much rain in too short a time ruined my tomatoes last year and I empathize with other's more serious losses.      But the excitement of a storm, the smell, watery reflections and varieties of rain, wind, snow, and skies energize me - even if it is only

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-7946210748558381232011-07-24T21:05:00.002-04:002011-07-29T17:03:16.339-04:00

Yes, the meat is eventually labeled as whale meat from a different, more sought after, species and purchased at supermarkets, high levels of mercury notwithstanding. The animals are slaughtered in a brutal manner, at a rate of about twenty thousand individuals annually. The film, The Cove, alleges certain facts that seem to be in dispute - such as that dolphins are culled before the slaughter to

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-33358244530825273372011-07-18T13:33:00.003-04:002011-07-25T06:39:46.616-04:00

     The enthusiasm of my friend Korbin Duley at Cuipo.org prompts me to post once again after long quiescence here at Culinary Heritage. After years of seeing signs along highways proclaiming that some fast food joint "adopted" a highway I have issues with this use of the word, adopt, even though I am glad that the process contributes to cleanup. Something temporary and too commercial about it,

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-20565329325038198532010-08-01T14:08:00.001-04:002010-08-01T14:18:35.164-04:00

     I finally saw this film, about a year after it came out, and am undecided wether Nora Ephron is riffing on or sucked in by the vapid celebrity chef aura that surrounds so many cooking related television shows (and best sellers) that involve egos out of control, rude behavior, and poor decision making. Going gaga over celebrities does not appear related to a commitment to the art and science

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-33368538031613760232010-06-13T12:05:00.001-04:002010-06-13T12:19:00.771-04:00

   Topsoil - the priceless foundation sustaining humanity - has been of interest and concern since the Mayan and Egyptian empires and earlier. Thomas Jefferson, George Washington Carver, Helen Caldicott, and Mark Kurlansky are a few of the more well known who have voiced alarm at what any wise farmer could tell us: topsoil, good clean dirt, is - by far too many people - not accorded the respect

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-86456314028732015042010-04-17T12:27:00.002-04:002010-05-16T08:52:31.139-04:00

At Home Depots, garden supply, and hardware stores across the country alarmingly large piles of things like "Grubex", fertilizers, herbicides, and other poisonous materials in 40 pound bags are displayed. Homeowners are causing untold amounts of pollution, spread of toxic wastes, groundwater contamination, and harm to pets, children, pregnant women, and fireflies - to name a few.  I see little

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-17614053688677528512010-03-25T19:14:00.002-04:002010-03-26T06:34:28.474-04:00

Listening in the car to Terri Gross, NPR's amazing interviewer of interesting people, the other day with Science journalist Maryn McKenna on the show, I knew I had to write something here. Ms. McKenna led me to ponder once again in amazement at the sheer idiocy demonstrated by governments that fail to connect the dots when it comes to food and poisoning the earth(and much more). The basic point

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-26549866010009712432010-02-20T10:39:00.004-05:002010-02-21T08:41:46.501-05:00

Do you drink coffee? Do you know your choice of coffee - wether over the counter, off the shelf at the market, or in a restaurant - has global significance? As you inhale those aromas that account for much of coffee's appeal during your next cup, consider how your beans got that flavor. Beginning in the 1970's, traditional cultivation of coffee in the shade of trees began to give way to growing

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-46033131522620738302010-02-12T19:48:00.001-05:002010-02-12T19:53:08.614-05:00

My son was recently holding forth on a subject in the way that only sweet, hedonistic, clever, eleven year olds can, excitedly describing amusingly absurd ideas about online shopping. He likes to look at Amazon.com and other online shopping sites and understands that books and cd's and toys and electronic gadgets can come into one's life (dramatically appearing at the door!) by tapping certain

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-79429909106503046502010-01-29T07:32:00.000-05:002010-01-29T07:32:13.172-05:00

There are many reasons for feeding wild birds - it makes observing them and learning easier, they are beautiful, it interests house cats, and so on. A less commonly cited reason is compensation: I live on a plot of land in a house where, in times past, woodland provided habitat for the birds. It just seems fair to give back something since even though I personally did not clear the land I am

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-8274814610702725242010-01-16T20:52:00.002-05:002010-01-17T18:43:52.824-05:00

I am now beginning to get excited about my friend Ruihua coming back from China at the end of this week. She will have been gone over a month, and I've been house sitting, but now words we exchanged before she left may bear fruit if she brings back some pepper. Plus, I miss her; and she always is so happy after being with her parents and sister that I feel happy for her too... and sad I guess

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-29682668759341927282010-01-14T19:45:00.007-05:002010-01-14T19:54:02.455-05:00

Given the religious and mythological cosmologies I'm familiar with, especially native American, I have come away from my three viewings of Avatar pondering the impact this film might have - globally speaking. On the one hand, it is just a film: plastic layers coated with metallic patterns of digital information, dependent on a fragile combination of technologies that project a tale and a setting

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-89122466900073319812009-12-20T12:26:00.005-05:002009-12-21T09:27:33.217-05:00

Consistently excellent? I'm highly critical of my work as a chef. Even as I regularly receive excellent informal reviews from guests who come to the kitchen to say, "fantastic! thanks!", or find another way to comment on a particular thing or the overall meal, by telling the servers or sending an email -  I also rate myself by guides to cuisine, like Michelin's guide. It's similar to keeping

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-8775246697019063452009-12-11T07:18:00.005-05:002009-12-26T09:34:21.133-05:00

Another great speech by Mr. Obama as he accepted his Nobel peace prize in Oslo. And yet, something is so glaringly odd about this (besides that he is a "war" president getting a peace prize) made even odder by the BBC et al glossing right over it. A big fermata of analysis. That is if he is, as he says, practically compelled to wage a "just war", to protect America, and if he is, as he says, 

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-1684906470353363052009-12-04T20:19:00.001-05:002009-12-04T20:23:23.824-05:00

I love the concept of a bakers dozen, or a free licorice stick passed over the counter, or that extra layer of giving - packing the moment with pleasure that can come with a gift, a purchase, a performance, or a meal. With my wedding cakes, it is that extra-intense element, perhaps pistachio marzipan leaves or chocolate espresso buttercream rosettes. It is a form of - often unexpected - good

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-62249685729597130502009-11-20T19:23:00.005-05:002009-11-21T21:16:23.862-05:00

Nancy (France)  Photograph by David Geller, 2009 If I had fabulous wealth and could send one of my many resourceful and highly skilled retainers on a mission to find an image that bespoke love of the farmer for what the earth gives in return for tending the garden, I would be thrilled to have this sent back from the field. It is a tapestry that delights not only the eye but

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-6520107978953183772009-11-14T12:54:00.012-05:002009-12-04T20:51:41.230-05:00

It was 1968; an intense year. The reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., and Senator Robert Kennedy were murdered. News of the My Lai Massacre was unfolding and other horrors of war in Vietnam were shown on the news each night. The Beatles' White Album had just been released. New shows such as Star Trek, Laugh-In, Green Hornet, and The French Chef were on our television. I was eleven years old - the

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-27181941511614464402009-11-10T14:38:00.022-05:002009-11-16T21:07:06.239-05:00

The eggs come first. The Country Hen eggs are my  favorite store-bought egg. I've used them in countless  recipes, and in most of my wedding cakes. They are  very much worth the extra price because the quality  is eggscellent. We drop big  money on our cars all  the time - the refrigerator section is not the place  to go cheep.    In the picture is also a cast iron pan with shallots -  for

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8040603049389423695.post-86668756855374205592009-11-07T12:45:00.005-05:002009-11-14T14:45:25.021-05:00

I am strongly influenced by my mom's garden. She and my dad bought land and built a house on a plot that was originally the "back" yard of the oldest house on their street. There was a grape arbor there I remember well- with grapes full of flavor but puckery and with a large seed. I vaguely recall that the rest of the yard was a maze of tracks between bushes, worn by the play of neighborhood kids

Rachelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09132210955443078469noreply@blogger.com2