Spaghetti and meatballs. I made the Italian meatballs from Joy of Cooking, and they ended up nothing like I’ve ever seen them in a restaurant or a movie. I chopped up an onion in a food processor and mixed it with a half cup of parmesan cheese, some garlic, bread crumbs, an egg, tomato paste, and…

We had brunch with family at Ted’s Bulletin in Merrifield. The waiter convinced us to order the cinnamon roll, which is meant for the whole table and is the size of a chicken pot pie. I ordered the crab cake eggs benedict as well as a kitchen-made pop-tart, which the restaurant is known for. They…

We went over to our friends’ house to see them off before they moved out of town. I made chocolate chip cookies and brought over takeout Vietnamese: bún with pork and spring rolls, and chicken bánh mì. The ideal chocolate chip cookie, which I strive to create, is soft enough that the body of the…

Lace cookies. As advertised in the recipe, they are thin as snowflakes and disintegrate in your mouth. With snowflakes on my mind, I pictured something intricately held together and weightless. However, the main solid ingredient used is oats (just a tablespoon or so of flour). They look like flat oatmeal cookies and taste like caramel….

I mashed up some canned tomatoes and cooked them with broccoli, tofu, and ancho chiles. My idea, and I don’t know if it was a good one, was to make a stir fry flavored like a taco. I suppose I could have added sour cream and cilantro too. I’m still not good at distinguishing separate…

Chicken with spring onion kimchi. Spring onions (some might call them scallions) are a good choice if you really want to bring out the kimchi flavor. Unlike cabbage, they tend to hold together instead of collapsing inside the jar. (Photo: Festa Major de Gràcia, Barcelona.) >> March 10 << March 8  

It was an exasperating day at work and also the day when spring arrived, all of a sudden and hyperactive. I decided to go home and make blueberry muffins. I’d frozen a bunch of blueberries last year and I finally realized I’d have to use them soon before it was summer again. For the muffins,…

I made crepes for breakfast, following the advice of The King Arthur Flour Baker’s Companion that you should let the batter rest at room temperature for an hour. I used a small nonstick skillet, the same pan I use for omelets, because of course the crepe and the omelet are two small variations on the…

I made beef stew and used some tomatoes to flavor the broth. Cutting up the chuck steak feels like slicing into marble, to me. (Photo: Facade of a brewery, Duluth, Minnesota.) >> March 7 << March 5

Dinner at Peking Gourmet. It hasn’t changed since I first went there ten years ago and probably much longer than that. It’s the same wait to get there in traffic and the zigzagging around to find a parking spot, the same tables in a long narrow corridor with a faded carpet and elaborate lanterns from…

Soft molasses cookies. At first it seemed wrong that they were so soft, and I’d expected them to taste like ginger snaps. You take them out of the oven when they’re still bubbling and look half-done. But they turned out to be very reliable cookies that can last for more than a week, and they…

Patatas a lo pobre con huevos rotos is made with eggs, potatoes, and onions. With ingredients like these, you might expect it to be a simple recipe for simple tastes. It is not. This is a delicate preparation that’s quite difficult to make successfully. You need small, fresh, waxy potatoes, which can be hard to…