French Peasant Beets

A coworker of mine recently purchased a Rebel T2i, same camera I have, but chose to get the 50mm lens rather than the standard 18-55mm, the kit lens, and I have been seething ball of jealousy since seeing his first few pictures. Such clear quality in such low light! Every picture I took of these beets was met with disgust and so, after a quick check of my bank account, I gave in to desire and ordered a 50mm lens for myself. Can't wait!

No 50mm lens yet, but Picasa has instagram-style editing now!

For now, however: last Christmas I was given the Food52 cookbook, "140 winning recipes from exceptional home cooks" - a collection of winning recipes from Food52's weekly contests. Have you visited Food52 yet? Please take the time to pop over now. Amanda Hesser, of the immense and amazing The Essential New York Times Cookbook, and Merrill Stubbs, who assisted Amanda with the ENYTC, created Food52 first as a vehicle to create the "first crowd-sourced cookbook in 52 weeks" but it has since grown to a community where cooks of all caliber share recipes, tips, debate food news - there's even a real-time hotline to help you along any recipe's journey. Seriously, check it out.

Pickled Grapes!

Hello there! I know it's been a while - like "one year" a while - and even before I disappeared I had trouble keeping up with regular posts. What can I say? Adjusting to life back in the States was difficult, especially the whole "working and writing a cooking blog" part. And some other parts, too, but that is for another post on another day. Today, though, is about pickles, sweet, delicious pickles.

I first noticed this recipe from Smitten Kitchen while living in Kuwait, where fresh grapes were either unavailable or expensive enough to keep thoughts of recipe experimentation far from my mind. These days in Texas, however, grapes of all varieties are dripping over produce displays and I thought to myself, "Yes."