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I keep coming back to the book Huckleberry . I had a feeling this would happen when I first read it . I haven’t baked my way entirely through the Muffins chapter yet, but I did find out just how delicious the Chocolate Chunk Muffins are. And, I don’t know how I haven’t baked the Blueberry Brioche or made the Brown Rice Quinoa Pancakes yet but I will eventually. Lately, I’ve been flipping back through the pages of all the savory dishes for breakfast or brunch. The photos of the sandwiches cause serious cravings. The Fried Green Tomato and Spicy Slaw Tartine and the Smashed Avocado Toast with Hard-Boiled Eggs and Anchovy Dressing will need to happen soon. But then, I remembered this lovely tomato cobbler that Barbara showed on her blog back in April. Roasted cherry tomatoes were topped with biscuits made with a mix of whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, and cornmeal. I had pretty, little Juliet red tomatoes, Sungold yellow cherry tomatoes, and local heirloom cornmeal, and the time was...

It had been ages since I’d done any baking, and this was a great recipe for a return to it. I saw these bars in Food and Wine magazine back in April and made a mental note that I must try them. Anything of or related to s’mores is an easy sell on me. Whether it’s fancy s’mores with homamde graham crackers and marshmallows with divine varieties of chocolate, s’mores cookies , or any other similar concoction, I’m game. I deemed the 4th of July a good occasion for all-American S’mores Bars and brought these along to a party. The recipe is from Cheryl and Griffith Day of Back in the Day Bakery fame, and it’s definitely a keeper. I had my fears going into this project. I wasn’t sure the meringue would hold up after the bars were cut. I was sure I’d have drooping, sliding meringue that wouldn’t stay where it belonged on each bar. I was also a little uncertain about the fudgy chocolate layer since it’s baked just to the point of jiggliness. Again, I imagined a possible runny mess upon cutt...

In my last post, I apologized for all the salads lately. Of course, I blame this on the temporary kitchen. As long as we’re living in our temporary home waiting for our new home to be finished, I’m going to lack interest in spending time in this little kitchen that doesn’t have enough countertop space. I’ve been cooking mostly quick and simple things that don’t require much room to prepare with only a few forays into baking. Below is a photo of the current state of my new kitchen. It’s still very unfinished, but I can’t wait for the day when I can start cooking in it.  In the meantime, here’s another dish that was simple to prepare and one that came packed with big, spicy flavors. This is from The Slanted Door book by Charles Phan, and this is a book I purchased back around the holidays. I read the book right after purchasing it and marked a lot of pages of things to try. I tried the Crab with Cellophane Noodles for my birthday in March and loved it. I’ve been meaning to try the V...

It has happened again. Researchers have discovered that Google’s ad-targeting system is discriminatory . Male web users were more likely to be shown high paying executive ads compared to female visitors. The researchers have published a paper which was presented at the Privacy Enhancing Technologies Symposium in Philadelphia. I had blogged about the dark side of Big Data almost two years back. Latanya Sweeney, a Harvard professor Googled her own name to find out an ad next to her name for a background check hinting that she was arrested. She dug deeper and concluded that so-called black-identifying names were significantly more likely to be the targets for such ads. She documented this in her paper , Discrimination in Online Ad Delivery. Google then denied AdWords being discriminatory in anyway and Google is denying to be discriminatory now. I want to believe Google. I don’t think Google believes they are discriminating. And, that’s the discriminatory dark side of Big Data. I have n...

Do you know what’s happened? Including this one, I’ve just given you five posts in a row about salads. Apparently, I don’t call it salad season for nothing. I promise to bring something else to the blog soon and maybe even bake something. But for today, here’s another really great salad for beautiful tomatoes. I received a review copy of The Broad Fork by Hugh Acheson and immediately appreciated the book’s intent. Acheson was inspired to offer ideas for cooking with several common types of produce from farmers’ markets and CSA’s, and of course his humor is injected throughout the book. There are about four recipes each for 50 different seasonal items, and they’re the kind of interesting recipes that get you thinking of new ways to use these ingredients. I’m wishing our local season for artichokes wasn’t over yet now that I see the Pickled Shrimp, Crisp Artichokes, and Butter Lettuce dish and Shaved Artichokes, Bay Scallops, and Preserved Lemon. For summer corn, there’s Perfect Pan-Roa...