I didn’t feel like cooking but I did anyway – partly because there were 2 pomegranates on the counter. Rollin’ around like sassy little things. So pretty, so bright eyed, so desperate to mingle.

This seemed easy enough. I had fennel leftover from the citrus salad. Ripped straight from the pages of Bon Appetit, a quinoa-fennel- pomegranate salad was born. Layers and layers of flavor: lemon, cumin, herbs. Oh reader, it was quite a parade.

A spectacle of color. A flashy lunchtime retreat. This was a dish ready for its close up.

I don’t have much energy. I’ve still got whiplash from the last few days so I’ll make this brief.

1. First there was the Ryan Adams concert: a sea of plaid shirts and strategically tousled hair. I ran into my best friend’s ex-boyfriend and I may or may not have snubbed him. I’m a protective little cuss. Which led me straight into my seat where I alternated between body jerking and wild blinking. It wasn’t New Age dancing. It was after 9 pm and I was trying not to fall asleep.




2. Then there was Sunday dinner where we hemmed and hawed over what we’d eat on our trip to the mountains. Who cares about hiking and sight seeing when there are four days to obsess about what goes down our gullets? I’m making North Carolina pulled pork, thanks for asking, which I plan on coddling all day like a baby.



3. Finally, there was this asparagus, which while warm and vibrant green couldn’t have been any more boring. So, this vinaigrette did the trick – a quick emulsion of pureed sesame seeds and oil. Some lime and rice vinegar. A bit of soy sauce. You can argue about economics and taxes and the physical size of Mitt Romney’s head but no sane person could argue with a sesame vinaigrette. It would win the popular vote in all 50 states.

Generally speaking, anytime you find your dinner splattered on the walls, under the lamp shade and down your shirt you can bet there was something wrong with the recipe. But before you start pointing fingers, just know that I was something like 20 years old when I used fennel for the first time. Not knowing how to deal with it’s strong, liquorice flavor, I paired it with some veggies, rice and called it a day. It tasted like gasoline.

My boyfriend at the time, a generally well behaved pre-med student with a very tidy Clifton apartment, GQ magazines stacked by the wall and a giant collection of watches, had an unusual reaction. There, in the center of his dining room, he gathered his food in the palms of hands, tightened the congealed mess like a snowball and launched it clear across the room, sending it straight into the bay window where it smacked and puttered down to the floor.

Immediately, finding great humor in this incident, I counteracted with a missile of my own … which I directed aptly to the top of his head, where it had a glorious cascading effect, dripping down his face, down his shirt, to his shoes. And so began fennel war 2002.

I didn’t use the stuff for half a decade after that.

But people! Things are different now. My boyfriend, now my husband, still eats my food … willingly … without throwing it! Come to find out, fennel is really pretty simple to use, and really tasty – so long as you pair it with the right ingredients. For instance, citrus and fennel are perfect mates. Oranges take the edge off, fennel removes any overbearing tartness.

So, we eat this salad now with fancy forks and nice linens and without having to spend 45 minutes prying fennel out of the couch cushions.

I’ve got a secret, folks, and it’s born from the kind of raw emotion that divides nations, ruins presidential campaigns, sabotages relationships. I hate to admit it but my secret burns even hotter than John Edwards in a hotel room … and even though it’s so, so wrong, I hope you’ll understand.

Selfishness, greed, power. You wouldn’t know it but it’s all right here in this recipe.

Last week had me alone in the kitchen – left to my own devices. Dustin was cat napping after 30 hours on the job and my stomach was telling me something had to be done with all of our tomatoes. But what to do? Winter tomatoes taste watery and dull. Unless of course, you roast them slowly or sauté them gently in a pool of olive oil. Which is what I did … along with a heavy hand of minced garlic.

A sauce like this has an unspeakable beauty, a distinct richness and creaminess that comes from tomatoes and olive oil mingling at a low temperature. Once the tomatoes become the consistency of jam, you fold in the cooked pasta and squirt lemon on top.

But now, reader, we get to my tragic downfall as a human being. The part where I reveal my true colors. Oh the innate selfishness that is mine!

As I downed the last noodles in my bowl, I heard Dustin thump out of bed and squeak across the hall, clearly marching towards the smell of garlic and tomatoes. But as his footsteps neared closer and closer, I couldn’t stomach the thought of sharing what was left. Quickly, I turned to the pan, emptied the contents in my bowl and darted to the living room.

“Got anything for lunch?” he asked, innocently rounding the corner, looking like he’d had one hell of a long shift at the hospital.

“Sorry.” I said. “I only made enough for one.”

Say what you will … yes I am that girl with the messy hair and the half-wrinkled shirt who is often thinking four steps ahead without remembering to wear cute shoes. But when it comes to cooking, I’ve got priorities.

It’s late over here – or should I say really early – and that’s a nice thing because the house is still and even though the wind is loud and scary out there, I’ve got my husband and dogs tucked safely upstairs. Which means, I’m okay for now to write you a little love letter about roasted smashed potatoes.

Of course, it’s not a chef’s recipe … in fact … you don’t really need a recipe (but I’ll give you one anyway). The idea is to roast a bunch of new potatoes and to smash them with the back of your knife, then crisp them in a skillet with butter. They’ll crackle and spit over the high but don’t be put off, you’ll have the last word in the end.

Which of course, means you’ll get creamy roasted potatoes with all the benefits of crunchy, caramelized skin. A hint of thyme will set it over the top so long as you use the fresh stuff. And as always, season with salt and taste as you go.

For me, this side dish ensures a rare and simple, even peaceful dinner with my husband … who for whatever reason has decided to let me be what I’m gonna be, hair and all, love of potatoes and beyond. A marvel which has confirmed my longstanding suspicion that us cooks have something on the rest of the world. We’ve got dinner.

And finally, a loose end: I was on 55KRC this past Sunday talking about blogs, books and videos. I was asked how I made the transition from design to writing and my answer had something to do with this blog, curating content and creativity. But the more I think about it, if you’re all the way to the bottom of this post and you’re still reading, the real answer has everything to do with you. Thanks for giving me that.

A savory cook doesn’t like to measure. Prides herself on creativity, spontaneity, judging temperature by sound, flavor by taste. A pastry cook prides herself on accuracy, on regiment. She is patient and organized and finds big reward in tiny little measuring spoons. For a long time I couldn’t identify with the latter … until last week when I found sanity in a cookie.

So why have I interrupted your day … hijacked your Facebook page, broken your twitter feed with this recipe? Because this cookie has tequila in it PEOPLE! And it’s got lime and salt which makes it newsworthy, in my opinion.

Don’t worry, you can go to work after eating one AND you can drive AND you can still talk without slurring.

Unless you’re like me and you eat so many of them you have to lay down flat. And you profess you’ll never have another cookie, shortly before going into the kitchen to have another cookie and then you fall asleep with crumbs on your shirt.

Sorry guys, I’m taken.

You may already know her as the heavily inked, bombshell mixologist at Japp’s – re-energizing Over-the-Rhine with every stir, shake and pour. But Molly Wellmann is more than a local celebrity … and she’s way more than tattoos and ‘tude. Get to know her here, in the pilot episode of Cincinnati Deconstructed – filmed and directed by Michael Holder and written and produced by yours truly.

Our intention is to give you an intimate, behind-the-scenes peek inside the unique personalities that define the food and drink scene here in Cincinnati. We hope you’ll come along with us for the ride.

If you like what you see, please make sure to let us know by commenting, tweeting and/or posting on Facebook! Your feedback is really important to us – and will go a long way in determining how many of these we’re able to make in the future.

Thanks everybody – and cheers to Molly Wellmann – we’re so lucky to have her here in our city.

You have one day left to live. Where do you eat tonight?

Well, not in a restaurant, that’s for sure. I’d be with my family and I would hope someone I love would cook me something. I’ve never been a sheer sensation-seeker; my peak food experiences have always been about the context in which I’m eating: when it’s a surprise, an adventure, a tradition, a shared experience, or cooked by my mother or my daughters or my best friend.

You’re about to get surgery and it’s possible that you’ll come out with no ability to taste anything. Where do you eat out?

I’d want to exercise my ability to taste to the fullest, and indulge in a wide variety of exquisite tastes. I think I’d go to Jean-Robert’s Table, because of his generosity and the charm of his food. Over the years I’ve come to really like him as a person and a chef, just as so many others in Cincinnati have, and food from someone you like is always best, right? Especially when it’s as graceful and delicious as his.

Worst reaction from a chef and/or reader about an article you’ve written?

It’s surprising how seldom I get a bad reaction. Probably the worst was on the first day I worked at The Enquirer, though it wasn’t about an article I wrote. I was taking over the restaurant reviewing from Chuck Martin, who was staying on as the food writer. He played a message from his phone for me; someone saying “Chuck Martin, I hope you choke on a chicken bone and die.” I had to wonder what I was getting into.

Then there was my favorite letter to the editor shortly after I started, berating me for calling a steak “beefy.” What next? he asked. “Chicken-y chicken?” I took that advice to heart. I was freaked out a little early on by positive reactions, too. The first restaurant I reviewed for the Enquirer was Riverside Korean. There was a line around the block the night my positive review was published, so I knew right away how seriously I had to take this job.

Favorite disguise?

I don’t really do disguises, and if I did, I wouldn’t tell you!

Most underappreciated chef in the city?

I admire the chef/owner of The Brandywine Inn in Monroe, George Bernas, so much. He does things the old-fashioned way, his way and he sticks to that. He struggles in his location a little, I think, so he doesn’t always get a chance to stretch, but he does things right.

I think Toon Yongkanaysin at Beluga should have been more celebrated for how good the food was there. She’s now got her own Thai place, Zab Thai, with Cindy Yantarasri, who was one of the owners of Beluga.

I think Laszlo Molnar at The Iron Skillet is quite talented. He can do a lot more than schnitzel; I wish he got more positive feedback for it.

I feel like I never give enough credit to the chefs at Boca, like Jono Fries, who are overshadowed in the public eye by their boss, David Falk.

Other than eating out at a ton of great places, what’s the best part about food writing?

I love, love, love meeting people who are totally into what they do, whatever it is: Renee Koerner and her local caviar; Chuck Pfahler and his coffee, home brewers, the Fab Ferments folks, Sarah and Mark from Blue Oven and just about any organizer of a farmers market. Also the chefs and cooks who work so hard with some kind of ideal beyond making money in mind. Their passion, which sometimes can seem crazy, makes everyone’s life richer. I love to follow them down their path in the process of writing a story. They awe me.

Thing that most people don’t know about you?

Oh, I don’t know, I’m an open book. Maybe that I like to get down to funky music?

Maybe I write because it’s impossible to be what I’m not when my words are marching across the screen, crossing their arms like a pissed off teenager and demanding the truth. I write, I guess, ’cause it feels honest. I imagine, in a cross universe of vegetables, that’s how red cabbage feels.

Humble in presentation (unlike those trendy little foxes, kumquats!) and never afraid to keep it real (despite its bitter reputation). This is a recipe I came by and couldn’t resist because it turns something really earthy and simple into a sophisticated, dignified, completely balanced side dish.

It’s just a cabbage recipe, after all, and there’s actually no heat involved in the cooking process. A tablespoon of kosher salt forces the leaves to wilt –– prepares them to suck up the flavor in a vinaigrette made with lots of lime, a little bit of Dijon mustard and oil.

First there’s crunch, then brightness from the vinaigrette. Finally, a karate chop of sesame seeds. You’ll ask yourself … am I really eating cabbage here? Voluntarily?

And the answer would be yes. Because cabbage doesn’t have to change to be delicious. Paired with a few simple ingredients, it can let its natural bitter notes shine. And it can finally be admired – even craved – just for being itself.

Think you know Cincinnati chefs? Chances are you don’t know Jose Salazar – recently voted “People’s Best New Chef: Great Lakes” by way of FoodandWine.com. I spent some time with him in his award-winning kitchen at The Palace (in the Cincinnatian Hotel) where he’s carefully and methodically building his empire. Now, ready to win $50 dollars for a fabulous meal at The Palace?

To win, simply download (and hopefully read) this pdf interview and do one of three things: 1.) Comment on this post 2.) Tweet or retweet the link 3.) Comment and/or share the link on Facebook. Please make sure to leave your full name and email address and one winner will be selected from random.org. Contest ends in one week – on January 6, 2012. Ready, set, go!

Download my exclusive interview with Jose Salazar (pdf)