Potluck Favorite

By Marsha Fottler - Every home cook who frequently gets invited out to group celebrations should have a repertoire of about five go-to dishes suitable for potluck parties. Ideally, these dishes should be ones that can be enjoyed at room temperature and have enough structure to stand up to being displayed on a buffet table for a length of time. No wilting salads. You want a recipe that feeds 10-12 and it’s always practical...

Gluten-Free Cooking Goes Global

By Marsha Fottler - May is National Celiac Awareness Month, a good time to learn more about this autoimmune disease and the gluten-free food revolution. There are some three million people in the United States who have celiac sprue. They require a gluten-free diet. Until recently dining out was a nightmare for these people since gluten-free meals hardly existed and chefs weren’t knowledgeable about adaptive techniques....

Summer Holidays – Get Grilling

By Chef Judi Gallagher - As a New Englander, Memorial Day weekend always meant filling the grills with charcoal, seasoning the steaks and deciding whether the cold rain would hold off or if we would have to move the picnic table into the garage. The menu seldom varied. There was always Mrs. Calhoun’s tuna-macaroni salad, my Mom’s potato salad made with Hellman’s mayo and chopped hard-boiled eggs, red onion and celery....

Celestial Summer Shortcake

By Susan G. Purdy - Everyone loves tender buttery shortcakes, including this baker. Quick and easy to put together, you can serve them warm with coffee for breakfast. Add 1/2 cup of currants or a cup of berries to the batter and call them scones (to whom they’re related), or split and fill them with your favorite seasonal berries and whipped cream to create a celebratory dessert. Another reason you will love this...

April Holidays – Happy Raisin Day

By Anna Dantoni - In the food world there is a month, week and a day that celebrates every food you can think of and April is no different. Besides Passover, Easter, Earth Day and Arbor Day, there are many more daily excuses to cook and enjoy specific foods on “their” special day. You probably never heard of most of them, except for serious religious holidays. Specific foods have become associated with these days as part...

Use The Herbs You’re Growing

By Chef Judi Gallagher - Herb growing is so popular that I routinely see fresh herbs flourishing at residences in my town in big beautiful containers that display a mix of herbs or I see them in raised beds, in little pots on window sills and in big serious gardens that are carefully segmented for those herbs that need shade and for those that require sun. Restaurants too are keeping kitchen herb gardens and some of their...