From the afternoon’s market in downtown Santa Cruz, I tossed corn kernels and split cherry tomatoes for a minute or so in a hot pan, sprinkled salt, minced garlic, and Parmesan on top, and seared large scallops like extruded new moons in the empty buttered pan. A pulse of Lisbon lemon, also from today’s market, [...]

My close friend Karen moved to Brooklyn a little while ago, and she has transformed her apartment into an aerie—and one that hosts frequent dinner parties. When I was visiting Brooklyn two weekends ago, she threw one of her parties (reason enough to book a flight), and she let me help her prep the food [...]

I am surrounded by tall trees I can see from windows all around the cabin in Santa Cruz, but early in the morning, birds tap at the windows, urging me out into the day and toward even larger trees— butterflies flutter about too, landing where I can watch them slowly open their wings slightly, drawing [...]

Spider webs spin while I cook in the cabin, and Wednesday night, silvery filaments flashed across the open doorway to the deck as I stirred red burger onions in a pan, Adding rice to toast in the oil with the onions for a minute, I deglazed the pan with half a cup of vermouth (white [...]

When yogurt crosses over to the savory side—not merely tangy or as a counterpoint to sweet, interesting things happen. Yesterday afternoon, I stirred a little tahini and a few cloves of minced garlic into Saint Benoît Yogurt (sometimes I crisp chickpeas with cumin and sprinkle them on top when I make this) and spooned it [...]