I grew up eating biscuits.

After my mother went back to work, they started with a box of Bisquick more often than not.  But she had the proverbial light hand and her biscuits always came out of the oven fluffy and tender with a golden crust that crunched ever so slightly at first bite.  We frequently ate biscuits as shortcake when strawberries were in season.

Sadly, I didn’t inherit my mother’s delicate touch and have always used a food processor to make biscuits — until now. “Southern Biscuits,” by Nathalie Dupree and Cynthia Graubart (Gibbs Smith, 2011), gives such clear and detailed instructions on the gentle art that my handmade biscuits almost meet my mother’s standards today.  And as much as it pains me to admit, they’re far lighter than anything I’ve ever made in my trusty Cuisinart. (more…)

It’s only natural to envy Patricia Wells.  The American journalist has lived the fantasy of many a food lover since she moved to Paris in 1980.

As the restaurant critic of the International Herald Tribune for 27 years, she made her living by eating and writing about some of the best food in the world.  Now she splits her time between Paris and Provence, teaching small groups of students how to shop, eat and cook like a French woman.  Hard life, eh?

The rest of us are grateful that Wells shares her good fortune in a string of  terrific cookbooks, starting with “Bistro Cooking” (Workman, 1989), which revealed the secrets of the small family restaurants of France for soul-satisfying dishes such as celery remoulade and pot-au-feu.  Now, just in time for the salad days of spring and summer, William Morrow has released “Salad as a Meal,” her ninth collection of recipes. (more…)

Meet my new favorite cookie.

I know, I’m a fickle cookie lover, easily distracted by the latest flavor sensation.  I’ve rarely met a homemade cookie I didn’t like.

But this combination of toffee and chocolate chips has my number.  It’s chewy and nutty at the center with crisp edges and the buttery flavor of toffee playing off  bittersweet chocolate chips. One just leads to another and another and….. (more…)

A cookbook needs to be more than a compendium of recipes to catch my eye these days.  My shelves already are overflowing with encyclopedic tomes and the Internet covers almost every culinary base if you make careful choices.

What I want is a cookbook with personality, one I can curl up with on a rainy afternoon as well as take into the kitchen for a marathon session with the pots and pans. It should offer a new way of looking at food and act as my trusted guide in the kitchen.

That’s a tall order and few new cookbooks measure up. So I’m not going to offer my own variation on The Ten Best Cookbooks of 2010 here.  Instead, I’m showcasing the handful of offerings that qualify as keepers in my kitchen. With the exception of Dorie Greenspan’s irresistible best seller,  I’ve focused on the works of Bay Area authors. (more…)

Homey chocolate chip and oatmeal cookies are all very well for the rest of the year.  The holidays, though, cry out for something spectacular.

It takes an over-the-top cookie like these chocolate cherry hazelnut bars to stand out among the fanciful sugar cutouts, elaborate spritz and spicy gingerbread men found on platters at every neighborhood party and office pot luck this time of year.

I usually try out a new cookie every year during the holidays, but this recipe has become a standard.  It’s always a hit on the cookie platter and it makes great gifts, too.  The fact that it takes only minutes to pull together only adds to its charm. (more…)