Mom's Kitchen Handbook

Pick up nearly any box of ice pops in the supermarket and you’ll find more ingredients on the label than in your favorite face cream. That’s not right, people! There’s no reason frozen treats need be much more than fruit, juice, and perhaps a small dose of plain old-fashioned sugar (unsweetened lime pops might not [...]

While tuna was a lunch box staple in my house growing up, eating it these days feels like tiptoeing through an environmental and health minefield. Many varieties are considered a big “no no” according to the folks at Seafood Watch because of overfishing and the methods used to haul in the goods. Perhaps more pressing [...]

After years of freelance writing focused on a broad range of food topics, everything from eating for pregnancy to Afghan cooking, nothing has been closer to my heart than Mom’s Kitchen Handbook and the various projects that have sprung from it. This has been supremely second nature from the beginning, as though I’m exactly where [...]

Being called upon to cook for family gatherings is a source of anxiety for my stepsister Meagan. Our family is populated by a disproportionate number of food professionals: my brother (Michelin star restaurant chef), sister-in-law (pastry chef), sister (former line cook), myself, and my dad who, although he has never been in the food business, [...]

If you could bottle summer in a pasta sauce, this would be it. All the “best hits” from the vegetable garden come together under one proverbial roof: corn, summer squash, tomatoes and basil. In fact, because it relies completely on the quality of the ingredients, it’s a one-season dish. Try making it in November and [...]

One of my nutrition professors in graduate school said that when she served hot dogs at her five-year old son’s birthday party she also doled out Vitamin C tablets. The thought was that the chewables would offset the impact of the nitrates in the weenies, an additive some research has linked to cancer. I haven’t [...]

Summer berry season is precious and fleeting. It can be pricey, too, particularly if you are buying good-quality organic berries. So it pays to take care of those beloved reds and blues. Here’s how:

A handful of years ago, I asked my babysitter Sara to pick up some heavy whipping cream for a butternut squash soup I had planned for supper. When I went rummaging around the fridge later in the day for that half pint of cream, I landed instead on a large canister of Reddi Whip. With [...]