When I first discovered Doña María’s Ready-to-Serve molé sauce I was really, really skeptical. Molé, a spicy chocolate sauce, is one of those things that I’ve tasted done really, really well and really poorly. And, quite frankly, my expectations were so low that I actually reserved some of the sauce and only made half my [...]

QUICK TIP: Just Say No to LaChoy. Look, I’m sorry; I know there are plenty of wonderful people out there who work for LaChoy and all, but if you want real Asian, Chop Suey ain’t it. (I feel the same way about American-brand Mexican food). Now, bear in mind that this is coming from a [...]

Curses! I hate when I forget to take a photograph of the completed meal, and this chicken makhani (Indian Butter Chicken) was absolutely freaking phenomenal. It was, without question, one of the most amazing meals I’ve made at home. And yet, no photos. But I have pics of the biryani, which was also fantastic.
CONFESSION: You [...]

Okay, this recipe doesn’t make me terribly clever. Plenty of people have done this before, but boy do I feel like a genius for trying it and succeeding.
This was actually an improvisation on my part, but it worked out really well. When a local silicone cooking tools manufacturer had their outlet sale they had a [...]

Spaghetti Squash casserole is one of my signature dishes and definitely one of my favorite to make, especially when cooking for the week, when I spend a full day cooking and spread the leftovers over the course of the week. The flavor of this gets even richer when made the day before!
I love starting with [...]

CONFESSION: I love cookbooks. Like LOVE cookbooks, even though I rarely use the recipes as described. I like browsing through for fun, getting ideas, learning new techniques I can apply elsewhere. Sure, I use the internet to find recipes on occasion, but my first stop is almost always my shelf of cookbooks. And that’s where [...]

Who knew a crappy little hole-in-the-wall restaurant would have one of the best meals out I’ve had in a long time? My friends and I had dinner at Taste of Lebanon in Chicago before seeing our friend Don play Tom Cruise in a reenactment of Legend at the Neo-Futurists Theatre and were treated to a [...]

CONFESSION: I am hugely skeptical about tofu that claims to be something else. Unless it’s made by Quorn. Then it’s cool.
That said, it’s not a surprise I’m not terribly impressed with Smart Strips Chick’n Strips. They simply tried to make them too much like chicken, which is awesome in its own way, I guess, but [...]

CONFESSION: I hate prepping tofu. I’m a huge tofu fan but extremely picky about density and texture. That’s why, whenever we visit Mitsuwa, our favorite Asian grocer, we load up on their fried tofu. Mitsuwa has large slabs of already fried extra firm tofu with vegetables embedded in it that take all the work out [...]