Flavors 518

Check out I'm featured in the From Scratch Club podcast this week. Also, I wrote a post about chocolate covered espresso beans .

Check out my post on From Scratch Club !

I went on a farm tour and did a guest post on From Scratch Club. Check it out!

I wrote a post for From Scratch Club! My friend made me, Joy the Baker, and Shutterbean BOOM BOOM POW t-shirts.

I went to the Bennington, VT Farmer's Market today. They are open on Saturdays and Tuesdays. You may remember when I tried to go in November and it didn't work out .  I love Vermont so much. I went to the anti-hydrofracking concert at The Egg a few months back, and they mentioned how Vermont had a ban on hydrofracking. That's a good thing, since it seems like easily one of the most beautiful places on earth. It would absolutely break my heart if anything were to ever happen to that state to diminish its natural beauty (also there doesn't seem to be any gas deep down there, so it wouldn't seem likely hydrofracking would occur, but its nice their priorities are in the right place). Oh, Vermont, doughnuts , cheese , and produce! How can you not love it completely? My former coworker has a farm, it is actually called the True Love Farm , and she posted on facebook about the Tuesday Farmer's Market which reminded me about it. It was small and adorable, but I did ...

Now, it is well established in the 518 blogosphere that All Good Bakers is delicious. We've got derryX , the From Scratch Club gals, Albany Jane , Jen is Green , DelSo , Capital to Capital - just to name a handful. Scott and I also tried their foods before at the Albany Wine & Dine Festival . From my point of view, I'm not so much in the market for baked goods as I am usually looking for friends who I can drop off rugelach or cakepops at their houses because I have made too many of something that sounded interesting. It is funny that baking things has pretty much become my hobby considering that I'd probably be fine with a diet of oatmeal, chicken noodle soup, penne alla vodka and BLTs. Most nights I'd rather have a small bit of sherry before bed than a slice of anything sweet. But, my interest in baking has grown so much in recent years that I have a couple of times read Dorie Greenspan in the bathtub. I think that says it all right there. Baking things m...

We spent the weekend in NYC, and I hung around until yesterday to get to see the Pioneer Woman at the Barnes & Noble in Union Square. We had a fun filled weekend which included Rangers/Islanders at Madison Square Garden, Colicchio & Sons , a pub George Washington frequented , Brooklyn Flea , and then I went to Alice's Tea Cup with my friend (more specific run downs of these activities may follow). I guess what I really just wanted to say though is how happy I was to come back to Albany at the end of it. New York City made me feel after a weekend just like I had felt after 4 and a half years - that it was dirty, expensive, and crowded. A few weeks on the radio I heard Kristi talking about what she liked most about the Capital Region . She was trying to defend the photo of Sheridan Avenue on Jeopardy where the associated question was "What is city plight?". But instead of coming up with ways we could help people in that neighborhood, all she could come up wit...

Today I went to a food swap in Troy. I am sure from my own experience organizing a cookie exchange that getting that all organized is not as easy as it looks. I got a New York state cookie cutter at The Hungry Fish Cafe this weekend and decided to make a speculoo cookie recipe from Around My French Table by Dorie Greenspa n . Check out what I made, and I'll mention what I got for it! Check out the packaging I made and the signs for my table display: There were over 40 people there at the Oakwood Community Center in Troy. It was super fun. You can't believe the creativity and skill people show in what they come up with to make. I did notice that the people who made alcoholic things were most popular. It seems like if you made infused vodka you get to choose between all the canned tomatoes. Also, I could not have expected that there would be so many vegans! It was weird that it kind of felt like speed dating or a high school popularity contest. The girl w...

Tonight was a party at my house! I decided to invite some ladies over. I made a lobster avocado salad with mangos in it from a Disney cookbook my coworker bought for me last year as thanks for dogsitting and kept asking me if I made anything out of. It was from the Napa Rose Restaurant from the Grand Californian Hote l . I'm not necessarily a Disney fan, but it was a gift and the salad was very good. I served the salad in Chinese ravioli wrappers, an idea I got from the Big Flavor Cookbook . It dawned on me how much Chinese ravioli wrappers can be used in entertaining, including desserts. You can bake them in a muffin pan for twelve minutes and stuff them with whatever you want. I made chilis stuffed with cheese from the Cuisines of Mexico by Diana Kennedy , and I think they turned out great. I also served these on cooked Chinese ravioli wrappers so that they would not be difficult to eat. I believe the key to cocktail parties is making everything as easy to eat as possibl...

I love the idea of the Fussy Little Blog's alternative Times Union Best of Albany ballot, and I wholeheartedly endorse trying to ensure that the list isn't swamped by mediocre chains. Combined with the fact that we're relatively new to the area and lack the expertise to judge a lot of the categories, my presumption is to defer to Daniel's choices. However! Being the kind of asshole individualist who proudly resists outings to event movies, I can't resist a few cranky exceptions, even though I know it works against the thrust of the exercise. The biggest one, as I point out in comments, refers to Trader Joe's. It's not that it wouldn't be useful to have one here. But I also find it really overrated, at least for my own purposes. It does have well-above-average frozen and pre-packaged meals, but essentially I never eat them. And if you don't, TJ's isn't terribly exciting; I do like the cheap house olive oil and quinoa and a few ...