Stories

They know when you leave your house.  They know when you return.

They know when you have company.  They know when your company left. 

They know if the brown truck delivered today or yesterday and how many packages were left on your doorstep. 

Yes, your buttinsky neighbors, you know the ones; THEY KNOW EVERYTHING...about you.

Ever have the feeling that the minute you set foot outside, someone is peering at you from their blinds across the street or watching your every move from the shadows of a doorway?

It's horrible isn't it?  That feeling of reconnaissance surveillance in your own yard.  What's wrong with these people?  They need to get a life.

When it comes to serving wine with seafood, we want the wine to marry with the delicate flavors of the fish. In other words, the wine or the fish should not upstage each other in any way. Remaining complementary is key.

Retaining a refreshing palate with wine acidity and working with the flavors from rich and buttery sauces accompanying fish can be challenging.

Most dry white wines will work but it's good to keep some things in mind. Paying attention to the flavors of shellfish or fish you are serving will help guide you in your choice of varietal wine.

Overall, lots of fish have the same basic, gentle taste. A fish like tilapia comes to mind. So with tilapia or any other similar white fish there are lots wines to fit the bill. Choosing wines aged in steel rather than oak, wines like unoaked Chardonnay, Albarino, Pinot Gris, Sauvignon Blanc and Gruner Veltliner will reward you with a nice acidity, cutting through the heavy, buttery sauces commonly served with these types of fish.

When it comes to lobster, crab and scallops, the sweetness pairs nicely with the flavor profile of an oaked Chardonnay.

When I was a younger man, I was quite the spendthrift blowing through tons of money that I didn't actually have. Like many others of my generation, I lived way beyond my means on a series of credit cards that I would repeatedly max out the credit limits on and end up slaving away, some times for years, in an effort to pay off. When I first moved to New York in the late 80s to attend the NYU publishing program, I did so with visions of Jay McInerney's Bright Lights, Big City dancing in my head. I eventually landed a job at Random House and wasn't daunted by the fact that it only paid $13,000 a year because in my mind I was on my way to living the life I had always dreamt about.

Sharing a tiny three bedroom apartment in Soho with four friends from school, my portion of the rent was a whopping $700 a month. Despite the expense, we lived happily on ramen noodles and a shared jar of peanut butter, and gorged on occasional freebies we would scam via work or friends who tended bars and waited tables. President Reagan was in office and it was a time of conspicuous consumption, and though my friends and I lived virtually below the poverty line, we still managed to make every night seem like New Year’s Eve. We made friends with the doormen at our favorite clubs and scored a permanent place on their guest lists with tons of free drink tickets to boot. It was a time to "see and be seen" and looking the part was very important. Thankfully the gaunt look was in because no one I knew could afford to eat. And when we weren't drinking our dinner, the Grand Union Supermarket on University Place took credit cards (practically unheard of at the time) keeping us in noodles and PB&J sandwiches in an attempt to add nourishment to our skeletal frames.

From the L.A. Times

When most cooks read "season to taste," they automatically reach for the salt shaker. That's not a bad start: A judicious sprinkling with salt will awaken many a dull dish. But if you stop there, many times you'll be missing a key ingredient. Because just as a little salt unlocks flavor, so can a few drops of acidity.

Add a shot of vinegar to a simple stew of white beans and shrimp and notice how the seemingly simple, earthy flavor of the beans suddenly gains definition and complexity. Do the same thing with a soup of puréed winter squash and see how a dish that once was dominated by rich and sweet now has a round, full fruit character.

Though the results may be similar, salt and acidity work slightly differently. Salt is a flavor potentiator -- in other words, it works chemically to make other flavors taste more of themselves. Acidity works as seasoning by giving a dish backbone or structure, which allows other flavors to stand out and shine.

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