From the category archives:

The Yum-Yum Club

How to indulge your chocolate fantasies — and stay slim (Video)

October 7, 2009

It may not sound possible, but it is. To see how, I invite you to view today’s ultimate chocoholic video. It was filmed at a chocolate tasting on a Sunday afternoon in Berkeley, California, at the home of Naomi Friedman. Friedman has a business called Cooking with Naomi. She gives cooking lessons, food tours (follow [...]

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The Portuguese wine potluck, Berkeley (video)

September 9, 2009

Portuguese peri-peri prawns, chicken, and chicken livers, are three delicious reasons to visit Durban, South Africa. Given that Durbs is my home town and favorite African city, my contribution to the Portuguese wine bottling and potluck at Subterranean Cellars (click here to see and hear Tim Patterson and Roger Campbell talking about the wines we [...]

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Portuguese wine-bottling potluck, Berkeley (video)

September 6, 2009

A sunny day. A home winemaker. Rather, make that two home winemakers. An assortment of guests who have in common that they like to prepare food; eat it — and eat well. The party was at Subterranean Cellars, which comprises the garage, basement, yard and sometimes also the living room of winemaker and wine writer [...]

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Breakfast with Bread

July 5, 2009

Wonderful company for Breakfast at Wimbledon. A heated Arizmendi sourdough half-baguette didn’t cut it. Is it the sourdough that doesn’t warm well, or is it the oven that doesn’t keep temperature? Success follows with a heated Acme sweet baguette — crisped on the outside (verging on cremated — intense game Federer / Roddick; distracting) and [...]

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Sex and the singular woman — three

June 30, 2009

Liz told us how she was attracted to Danny DeVito, which made us all laugh. And then we settled on Jeremy Irons for his intensity and that fact that, as Fay put it, he looks like he’s been there and done everything. “But how do you think you would feel 15 years down the line [...]

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Sex and the singular woman — two

June 29, 2009

“Do you think it’s possible to retain the spark in a marriage? To keep liking each other long-term?” I asked, curious to know how others did it. You know, you start out with the fires lit. The challenge comes in stoking the embers. “Yes. If you marry your best friend, have a full life of [...]

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Sex and the singular woman — one

June 28, 2009

There were 10 of us. All women, together for the evening for no special reason other than to exchange ideas on the sorts of things that women seem to talk about when they get together. The meaning of existence, the state of the world, our sex lives and so forth. I don’t recall what led [...]

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Eyeball eggs and moldy legs — three

June 27, 2009

We all have our individual food stories. They can involve time and place — and sometimes people we love. My father. He was uncompromising and remote. And I believe I have him to thank for what — for many years — was my love-hate relationship with food. Food was his passion. His hobby. His obsession. [...]

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Eyeball eggs and moldy legs — two

June 26, 2009

My father knew how to suck eggs. Raw ones, through toothpick-sized holes he would pierce on the pointy sides in the shell. This sucking feat reliably made both my mother and me gag. Fortunately, when he was doing breakfast, he gave me my eggs cooked. Only this particular day, I didn’t feel even slightly fortunate. [...]

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Eyeball eggs and moldy legs — one

June 25, 2009

PICTURE the scene. My first vivid food memory. A string-bean kid about five years old, fair hair braided into two long plaits, alone in the dining room and seated at a large, oval, wood table. The shiny sort you can’t put your coffee mug on because it marks. If someone were to draw the scene [...]

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