Serious Eats shows us how to make something good and delicious.

Smitten Kitchen does Matzoh Ball soup. And as we know, soup is good food. Especially on a cold rainy day like today.

David Lebovitz makes fresh pasta.

You want great Sichuan in Manhattan? Peep Legend on 7th Ave between 15th and 16th Street.

I’ve been four times in the past two weeks and can recommend almost everything that I tried. I especially liked:

Sichuan Cucumber

The Green Beans with Ground Pork

Sichuan Spicy Ma Pa Tofu

Dry Spicy, Tasty Diced Chicken with Ginger and Peanut.

Photo Credit: Serious Eats, from their fine slideshow of the place.

Say you’ve got an empty cone–and for the sake of this argument, let’s pretend you like cones–what kind of ice cream would you put in it?

[Photo Credit: A Day that is Dessert]

Three days ago I received a package from Pat Jordan. Twenty pounds of pecans from the pecan trees in his backyard. Unshelled. The son of a bitch didn’t have the decency to include a nutcracker although he had a few suggestive hints how the wife and I could get them open. He did attach a note, however:

“To Whom it May Concern:  Send pralines and pecan-bourbon pie to Susan and Pat Jordan, Abbeville, S.C. ASAP.”

My pal.

[Photo Credit: Simply Recipes]

In 1974, when I was three years old, my grandparents returned from a trip to Florida with a gift for my mother and my aunt. They carried it in a box, a few small branches of an orange tree. My aunt planted hers and it died immediately but mom, who has a way with plants and flowers, potted the branch and it  grew into a small bush. For years, it didn’t produce any fruit. Then, a few, small yellowish oranges appeared, too sour to eat.

Still, mom brought the orange tree with us when we left Manhattan and it survived a divorce, a new marriage, and five homes.

In a recent e-mail, she explained:

I had close-to-death encounters with this one: once going on vacation and finding it all dried up, I put a plastic tent over it and misted it to bring it back to life. Another time one of the cats peed in the dirt and nearly killed it. I had to wash the roots and repot the tree. I kept my fingers crossed on that one, I can tell you. Before we left Croton, a bug infestation, the tree got covered with scales. I hand picked the bugs and spay each leave on the top and on the bottom…

The tree survived and then flourished once mom moved up to Vermont two years ago.

I never knew you could eat the fruits. Then in a catalog recently, I read that a calamondin is a cross between a clementine and a kumquat.

This fall, as by conspiracy, the tree was covered with the biggest fruits ever. (The Vermont air and the Vermont compost…) So I decided to try to make marmalade. I added an orange to brake down the tartness of the calamondin, and bingo. Delicious, tart but nor sour, clementine-parfumed marmalade. The natural pectin in the fruit worked like a charm. All I needed was sugar and cute little pots.

She needed more than that. Patience, devotion, love. Mom’s got it. Got it in spades. It took close to forty years but she never gave up on her little plant, and I can’t wait to taste the marmalade.

The good peoples at Food 52 have some ideas about how to flip butternut squash into something special.

My dad used to make fun of me for mixing cultures in the kitchen like when I had Genoa salami and sliced cornichons with Dijon mustard on a bagel from Zabars. I never saw anything strange about it. That in mind, thanks to the wonderful food blog Three to One, check out this good combination:

There are few things in this world that I love more than quality prosciutto and a good croissant is something to savor.  Yes, please.

It’s winter cold today for a change. Nothing would hit the spot better than a bowl of chicken soup.

[Photo Credit: Taste with the Eyes]

From the Serious Eats 10 Best Bites in NYC, 2011 gallery, comes this incredible-looking fat fuckness: Cookies and Cream Sundae at Dessert Club Chakalicious.

I sure do love me some cucumbers.

[Photo Credit: frOzenpizza]

Oh, it ain’t over…

Couple of more days of drool-worthy sweetness before that New Year’s resolution diet kicks in.

[Photo Credit: A Spoon Full of Sugar]

Yet another fine reason to sweat my mom’s home town.

From the New York Times: Brussels: The Chocolate Trail.

[Photo Credit: Birgit Whelan]

My sister’s slammin’ Christmas cookies.

There she is–my twin!–to the right, pictured with the wife and the nephew.

What makes the world a better place? Fresh bread. Everything about it. The smell, the feel, the taste. Nothing more simple but as deeply satisfying as a loaf of warm bread.

[Photo Credit: Minato]

Awww, bacon, via Three to One.

Oh, baby, Serious Eats gives us the best soup dumplings in Chinatown.

Peep, don’t sleep.

Sweet treat.

[Photo Credit: I Wash You Dry]

Come winter, I just love a Clementine–sweet and tart. Always good to have a box of ’em on hand.

[Photo Credit: Kelly and Tiramisu; Painting by Jason Waskey]