Just the Appetizer

Maybe it’s my imagination, but I’m pretty sure there’s a sign that appears on my back whenever I’m around a food market of any sort that says, “I know food, so ask me.”

I find myself constantly fielding all manner of queries like:
How do you cook those? [Pattypan squash – any way you cook zucchini.]
How can you tell when to eat the shells? [Peas versus snap peas – pea shells are much thicker and tougher.]
How do you eat that? [Fontina Val d'Aosta – with my hands.]
What does that taste like? [Buffalo – NOT like chicken.]
What ARE these? [Ramps – wild leeks.]

I’ve been answering questions like these – not to mention a whole bunch of much stranger ones – for more than 15 years as a food writer and for a heck of a lot longer than that as a hobbyist cook and inveterate recipe clipper.

But I’m a lot like you – no fancy training, no one doing all that slicing and dicing (not to mention dishwashing) for me, no expense account budget. I eat and cook in a real food world that is at once more accessible, more cluttered, more confusing and more treacherous.

I worry about whether the next mouthful of salad I eat will make me sick. Or whether the chickens that produced my eggs were treated well. Or whether the salmon I buy has added food coloring. Or whether those heirloom tomatoes are really worth the price. Or whether anyone will notice that I’ve just indulged in a huge hunk of bread – OK, so it was half-a-loaf.

I think you worry about these things too, and I know the avalanche of sources to help you sort them out can be confounding and even contradictory. My goal here is to help you navigate the food around you. Help you figure out what’s fresh, what’s new, where to get things and what the heck to do with them once you have them.

This blog will inform you about the food experience that is state of Connecticut. You may think it’s just one big suburb wedged between New York and Boston, but with 5,000 farms, more than 100 farmers markets, uncountable numbers of farm stands, an active fishing industry, specialty food manufacturers, and some pretty darn creative chefs — food here is approaching a qualitative pinnacle not to mention a quantitative critical mass that is more than the average harried food shopper has time to fathom.

In the last few years I’ve visited a lot of farms and farmers markets. I’ve talked with a lot of farmers, food producers and chefs. I’ll sort out all their information for you. I’ll let you know what’s in season (ramps and fiddleheads will have to wait until next year, strawberries are just about done, garlic scapes will stick around for awhile and cherries are on the way). I will provide how-to’s, recipes, or at least suggestions on how to deal with whatever it is you just bought. And I’ll field your questions, suggestions and anything else that will make this a must-read before you buy, cook or eat.

I am a big believer that common sense solves a multitude of problems – especially when it comes to food. And that’s what this is all about.