It's no secret that Dirt Candy is my favorite restaurant in this city. Not only is the food outstanding - each dish is executed with a level of thought and skill that you'd find in four-star restaurant kitchens - but when we're there, it's like being at an old friend's place.  So needless to say I was pretty excited when I learned that the very talented chef/owner of Dirt Candy, Amanda Cohen, was working on a cookbook.  And that cookbook, which was a long time in the making, is finally out (it was released in late August).


But it's not like any other cookbook you've read (or, probably more accurately, used, because let's be honest, most cookbooks don't get read from front to back, much less in one sitting).  This one is, to the best of my knowledge, the first graphic novel cookbook.  It's funny, offbeat, wacky, snarky, sentimental, and above all, informative.  I read every word on every page of this book (and yes, in one sitting), which is something I can't say for any other cookbooks on my large and overstuffed bookshelf - and I loved every page of it.  Amanda's distinct voice comes through so clearly and if you don't laugh at least a few times, then you have no sense of humor, and if you don't learn anything about cooking, well, then you should go back and read it more carefully.

Chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream is one of my favorite flavors, but I realized the other day that it's always the same - vanilla ice cream with chocolate chip cookie dough.  A little boring, huh.


I, along with a handful of bloggers, was recently asked to create a recipe using the egg-free cookie dough recipe from The Cookie Dough Lover's Cookbook (and was also sent a free copy of the book), and I immediately thought of revamping this classic ice cream flavor using some of my favorite flavors.

The Fourth Annual NYC Food Film Festival begins tomorrow and continues through Sunday. In addition to films about food, there are so many great food events, ranging from a Southeast Asian Street Market by Brad Farmerie (of Public) to a sold-out Food Truck Drive-In under the Brooklyn Bridge in the Dumbo neighborhood of Brooklyn.



It's the latter to which I'm giving away a pair of tickets. The Drive-In is this Saturday, June 26, from noon-10 and will be the largest gathering of food trucks ever!  Some of my favorites - Wafels and Dinges and the Red Hook Ballfield Vendors - and many many more will be there, and short films will be shown from 1-4 and then again from 8:30-10.  The event has been sold out for weeks, but, because I don't know how to read my calendar properly, I can't use the two tickets that I have to it and am giving them away to one of you!

The guys who brought us The Brooklyn Beer Experiment (which I entered), The Brooklyn Cheese Experiment (which I missed because I was on my honeymoon), The Brooklyn Chocolate Experiment (which I swept – I was awarded 1st place by both the audience and judges!), and The Brooklyn Taco Experiment (which I missed because I was out of town) are back with the next installment in the wonderful Brooklyn Food Experiment series – The Brooklyn Brunch Experiment!  And, of course, I am entering this one, so keep reading to find out when and where it is so you can come out and eat my amazing entry and vote for me to win some awesome prizes.



There’s an impressive lineup of judges, and as in previous experiments, there will be awards selected both by the panel of judges and the audience. Prizes this time around are big – grand prize winner gets two round-trip tickets on JetBlue, someone else will go home with a Cuisinart stand mixer, and much more.

The Brooklyn Brunch Experiment is on Sunday March 28 from 12 pm - 4 pm at The Bell House in Brooklyn. To my NYC readers – please come and support me! Every single one of the previous experiments has sold out, so make sure to get your tickets in advance and to get there on time. Please note the earlier start time of noon (previous experiments have started at 1 pm). Your $20 advance ticket gets you lots of great food and an added bonus is that a portion of the proceeds will go to ovarian cancer research. You can get tickets here or from the box office at The Bell House.

On the heels of the Brooklyn Chocolate Experiment, Nick and Theo bring us the Brooklyn Taco Experiment this Sunday at 1 pm at none other than The Bell House in Gowanus.



Alas, I will not be there to defend my titles, as I will be in Baltimore, but for those of you who are around, you should either enter or attend (note: advance tickets are sold out, not a surprise. There will be a limited number of tickets available at the door but you should get there early – like around noon).

The guys have really upped the ante on this one – grand prize winner gets two RT tickets to anywhere in Mexico courtesy of Aeromexico and 1st place wins $150 cash + private tour with Cesar Fuentes, introduction to Red Hook taco vendors and free lunch with 3 friends at the Red Hook Tacos stands.  I really hope that whoever wins makes a pork-free taco (pork is the easy road – a good chef doesn’t have to rely on it) and then takes a trip to Oaxaca and takes a ton of cooking classes. Oh wait, am I projecting?  Maybe.

Good luck to all of those who enter – I’m looking forward to reading the recaps while eating my entry that I had to withdraw because of this weekend’s trip.

To celebrate the holidays, Bon Appetit magazine is holding a virtual holiday recipe bakeoff. They've invited food bloggers to submit their best holiday recipe and it's up to readers to decide which ones are the best in a variety of categories.

From Bon Appetit: Readers will vote for the tastiest-looking treats in each dessert category—cakes, cookies, pies, and more. The Bon Appétit Test Kitchen will bake the top scoring dessert in each category and select an overall winner. The winner will receive a trip for two to New York City and dinner with Bon Appétit Editor-in-Chief Barbara Fairchild and Restaurant Editor Andrew Knowlton.

I've entered my Pumpkin Tiramisu, which I've made the traditional Italian way with ladyfingers,  and pastry cream but revamped for Thanksgiving to include pumpkin, bourbon, and maple syrup.


Voting began on November 1 and ends on December 13, so please head on over to Bon Appetit's site and vote for me!

The guys who brought us the Brooklyn Beer Experiment (which I entered) and the Brooklyn Cheese Experiment (which I missed because I was on my honeymoon) are back with the next installment in the wonderful Brooklyn Food Experiment series – The Brooklyn Chocolate Experiment!


The categories for this one have been expanded – food has been split up into sweet and savory – and, of course, I have already secured my spot in the sweet category. [I have an idea of what I’m going to make, but it needs some testing over the coming weeks.] There’s an impressive lineup of judges, and as in previous experiments, there will be awards selected both by the panel of judges and the audience.

The Brooklyn Chocolate Experiment is on Sunday November 15 from 1 pm - 5 pm at The Bell House in Brooklyn. The previous two experiments sold out, so make sure to get your tickets in advance and to get there on time.

To my NYC readers – please come and support me! Your $20 ticket gets you lots of great food and excellent homebrews and an added bonus is that a portion of the proceeds will go to ovarian cancer research. You can get tickets here or from the box office at The Bell House.

On Saturday August 23rd, New York magazine is throwing a Highbrow BBQ at Solar One in Manhattan from 1 pm – 5 pm. I wish I could go, but my brother is getting married that evening down in Baltimore, so obviously I can’t go (it would be probably be a bit uncouth for me to show up late to my only sibling’s wedding). But that means that one of my lucky NYC-area readers will win a pair of tickets to what promises to be a really fun event, and two one-year subscriptions to New York Magazine, to boot.

So what’s the deal with this BBQ, you ask? Here are the details:

What: Highbrow BBQ

• All you-can-eat food (yes, there will be plenty of food for vegetarians, otherwise I wouldn’t want to go, now would I!)
• All-you can-drink beer for the 21+ set (so long as you provide proof of age)
• A BBQ contest to be judged by CJ (click here for details)

Who: Former Top Chef contestant Chris "CJ" Jacobson (who happens to be one of my favorite Top Chef contestants) and a full-set performance by Islands (one of my current favorite indie rock bands)

When: Saturday, August 23rd, 1:00pm - 5:00pm. (Rain date August 24th, same time.)

Where: Solar One, East River waterfront at 23rd Street, Manhattan

How much: Tickets are $25, but one of you will get a pair for free!

Is that it? Nope, a 46 issue New York magazine subscription is included with each ticket.

Admission is all ages but ID will be required for drinking.

Even if you don’t win tickets, you should totally check this out – there will be great music, tons of free food and beer, a lovely location on the East River, CJ from Top Chef, and a free year of New York magazine. Not bad for $25, if you ask me.

To be entered to win the pair of tickets, leave a comment with:

• Your first name
• Your location
• Your email address (in the format name at domain dot com, for example, mine would be raspberryeggplant at gmail dot com), and
• Your favorite BBQ item (mine would be grilled corn with lime juice, ancho chili powder, and crumbled cotija cheese)
  

All comments must by posted by 10 pm (EST) on Thursday, August 14th; I'll email the winner by Friday morning. You must live in the NYC area to win these tickets, and please be over 21 – otherwise all the free beer will go to waste!

Good luck!

A few weeks ago, I received a copy of Raghavan Iyer’s book 660 Curries. As the title might imply, the book contains hundreds of recipes for Indian curries. What the title doesn’t imply, though, is that the book contains recipes from all regions of India, and not every recipe in this book is for what generally comes to mind when you hear the word “curry.”

The book opens with an introduction to and recipes for the foundation of curries: spice blends and pastes. Contrary to popular belief, there is no such thing as generic “curry powder” (so go throw away that bottle of curry powder you bought in the spice aisle in the supermarket), and Iyer does a wonderful job of providing recipes for and explaining the uses of many regional spice blends. What follows are literally hundreds of recipes that are organized into neat categories: appetizer curries, meat curries (I obviously skipped over those 160 pages), vegetable, lentil, and paneer curries, fusion curries, and side dishes. Indian food is incredibly diverse – dishes from Tamil Nadu are completely different from those you would find in Goa – and this book not only includes recipes from all the regions of India, but also explains the differences between the cuisines of the regions.

While I don’t think that this book is the ultimate guide to Indian cooking, I do think that it is an excellent resource for people who love Indian food and want to learn about regional Indian cuisine as well how to cook dishes that go beyond the narrow purview of the local Indian restaurant.

So, to that end, I’m giving away three copies of 660 Curries.

Here's how it works: starting today and for the next two weeks, I will post the recipe for and my comments and thoughts on one dish from the book. I'll post each recipe on Monday (actually, the first one will be posted tomorrow), and I will be giving away one copy of the book each week.

To be entered into each weekly drawing, all you need to do is leave a relevant comment on the post for the weekly recipe – maybe what your favorite Indian dish is, or what your experiences with Indian cooking have been, or anything along those lines. I’ll randomly select a winner on the Sunday of the following week. Just make sure that you

1. Leave your comment by 9 pm Eastern time on that Sunday, and
   
2. Provide either a link to your own blog (where I presume I would be able to find your email address) or your email address in the format name at domain dot com – for example, I’d be raspberryeggplant at gmail dot com (Leaving your email address this way instead of in traditional format helps prevent spammers from finding your email address and adding it to their list. I don’t want you to get spammed. I care about my readers!)

This is my first giveaway of any kind, and I’m excited about it! Good luck!