Food tips

Is a spiralizer necessary? I got one to review, but truth be told I’m unconvinced. It turns out there are lots of ways to get strands and ribbons from vegetables and fruit. The most common kitchen tools, a grater and a vegetable peeler work remarkably well. I'm also a fan of the  mandolin  which can be used to make many more types of cuts.  But if you really enjoy creating these textures and want a single gadget, the Deiss Pro Julienne & Vegetable Peeler is really a three in one. It’s great for peeling potatoes and carrots, but it’s also good for creating those slithery ribbons and shredds for salads. It also has a nifty feature on the side that allows you to remove the "eyes" from potatoes without resorting to a paring knife or use it to create a peel strip from citrus fruit.  I’ve been using this gadget on zucchini. I use the larger ribbons with chunkier pasta and the shreds with skinny noodles. I blanch the zucchini for a minute or two with the pasta, to get...

When I think of the wines of the Alsace I think white wine. After all 90% of the wines produced in the Alsace are white. But there’s growing interest in one particular red wine, Pinot Noir. This is a recent development, in part due to changing climate conditions. The Alsace already has a staggering 15 different soil types and now it has a longer growing season. Limestone and clay ensure that Pinot Noir will develop the right acidity and tannins. Good Pinot Noir never happens by mistake! I recently enjoyed a wine dinner with a number of different bottles of Pinot Noir from the Alsace. They had all the characteristics I expect from Pinot Noir—notes of strawberry or raspberry, smoke, leather, sometimes spice, fresh acidity. Some were fresh and vibrant, others more complex and earthy.  But the wine I enjoyed the most? Allimant Laugner Crémant d’Alsace Rosé. It's bright with strawberry and lemon, and deliciously fizzy and can be found for under $20. I love sparking wines and Brut ...

Chef Rachelle Boucher shows off our cherry jam If you’ve been to the store or maybe the farmers market recently you might have seen cherries. The sweetness of bing cherries is both intense and fleeting. Cherries don’t last long after being picked, unlike apples or oranges. That's why I'm glad to be a part of the Canbassador program. The past few years I’ve received a crate of fresh sweet cherries from Northwest Cherry Growers . Every year I experiment preserving something different. I’ve prepared cherry barbecue sauce , canned cherries for pie, put up bourbon cherries, made cherry  vanilla  shrub and even dried and frozen cherries. This year I decided to make cherry jam. It turned out to be a very special cooking experience for me because I wasn’t in my kitchen, but over at the Miele showroom in San Francisco, with my pal Chef Rachelle Boucher. She kindly invited me over to do a little cooking. To be honest, working with Miele appliances will spoil you. Here’s how it went an...