Snap Pea Shiitake Mushroom Tofu Stir Fry

When I threw together this snap pea, mushroom and tofu stir fry, I had in mind that warmer and lighter days were around the corner. I had visions of taking long walks through Central Park wearing light sweaters and my favorite pair of ballerina Crocs. But alas, we are expecting snow tomorrow. It's a bit of a cruel April Fool's Day joke that Mother Nature is playing on us, but hopefully it will be the last one for a while.

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Tom Kha Gai Chicken Coconut Soup with Lemongrass

I've been monitoring the aftermath of the Japanese earthquake, and my heart weighs heavily for those enduring tragedy and uncertainty from that disaster. I've only been in one major earthquake in my life, Loma Prieta in 1989, which registered 6.9 on the Richter Scale. And while that was considered a big one for California, it is in orders of magnitude smaller than the one in Japan. In fact, because of the logarithmic measurement of the Richter Scale - meaning that the magnitude goes up exponentially - the 9.0 Japanese earthquake was roughly 900 times stronger than Loma Prieta. That's astounding considering that Loma Prieta was able to topple the upper deck of the Bay Bridge and ignite several fires throughout San Francisco. I can't imagine the damage nor the human tragedy that Japan must be sustaining at this time and my heart goes out to them. 

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Pan Seared Duck Breasts with Mushroom Sauce

This wonderful pan-seared duck breast recipe is a follow-up to the duck confit recipe that I posted last June on using all parts of a duck. Shame on me for taking 8 months to complete the second half of the post. Discipline has been my strong suit, and gets harder these days as I am more tired than a Whole Foods paper bag reused 10 times over.  I have only 9 more weeks until my due date, and lethargy has set in early.

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Rustic Caramelized Onion and Chanterelle Quiche

This morning I woke up to the warm memory of a dream that I had from a distant past. At the time, my current husband was just a promise, someone who I had met less than two months before. In the dream I was sitting in his sun swept living room looking out into a rare clear blue sky over the San Francisco bay.  While it was the same house Keefer was living in at that time, in the dream we were just moving in, the place was bare, furnished with only a white twill sofa. Situated next to me was an infant roughly six months old.  I wondered who this little stranger was, so calm and peaceful in his carrier.  Then all of the sudden, Keefer walks into the room from playing a game of catch with a five year old boy. Who are these kids? I remember asking myself.  They were two people who I had never met before... and yet, they were so familiar.

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Chicken Liver Porcini Pâté with Pistachios

What do you think of when you hear the word chicken liver? I am sure there is a wide spectrum of responses. I grew up eating pâté in delicious banh mi sandwiches without ever knowing that what I was really eating was liver, which is probably why my response to this question falls towards the favorable end of the spectrum.  For the holidays I made a luxurious pâté from Nikki Stitch's cookbook Delicious Days. Nikki is a food blogger and cookbook writer in Germany who will be releasing a new book soon. I've cooked through most of the recipes in Delicious Days, so I'm looking forward to seeing what she has in store in the next book.

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Truffle Mushroom Risotto

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FALLING IN LOVE WITH ROSEMARY CHICKEN AND WHITE WINE SAUCE

Have you ever had a dish at a restaurant that was so good and so simple that you couldn't wait to go home to try to replicate it? Perhaps a scrumptious farmer's market salad? Seafood pasta? Creamy, savory, bacon-y mac and cheese? Or if you're really ambitious, cracking the code to a restaurant's secret recipe for chocolate chip cookies? I've encountered many meals that have inspired crazy adventures in the kitchen where I tenaciously guess, test and tweak recipes over and over again until I achieve the same inspiring results. Many end in utter failure and a handful so close, it makes all the trials that much more worthwhile. It's kind of like falling in love, and trying to replicate everything that brought you to such a heavenly state. I know, the recipe may not love you back, but you've simply got to try.

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FUNGI FAR WEST

Fungi Far West has to be one of the more unique and exotic vendors that I have encountered in America. I'll admit I haven't tried all of the mushroom varieties showcased, mostly because I haven't been able to keep up with Fungi's frequent rotations of the new and usual. So if you have experience with any of these mushrooms, especially the uber-expensive truffles, please do share with me your tasting notes.

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Chinese Braised Oxtail Stew Recipe

When I was younger, my mother refused to allow me to cook. She desired no help in the kitchen, moreover did not want any of her children learning how to cook, instead she insisted that we focus on school work. I'm not sure if she lacked the patience or if it she did not want us distracted by the labor involved with cooking, looking back it was probably both.

Consequently none of her three children know a single recipe for the dishes they grew up consuming, and the culinary skills they have developed as adults are independent of what they have learned from their childhood.

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