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Heirloom Kitchen, a cookbook review

Who doesn’t love heritage recipes?  Cookbook author Anna Francese Gass started her collection by carefully recording her own mother’s Italian recipes.  (Which is quite a feat in my opinion! I’ve been trying to do the same with my mom, and my mom is just so uncooperative.  lol!) That dedication eventually led Gass to record and collect the recipes of other women who have immigrated to the US, and released her collection as Heirloom Kitchen: Heritage Recipes and Family Stories From the Tables of Immigrant Women.

The book is divided by locations:

  • Europe
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Central and South America
  • Middle East

The book is beautifully done.  There’s a mini-biography on each of the women who contributed their recipes, and a lot of tantalizing food photos.  I think there’s a good mix of recipes the general public is already familiar with, and recipes that are unfamiliar.

Here’s a sample of the recipes you will find in this book:

  • Arancini (Italian rice balls)
  • Chocolate-Hazelnut Spread
  • Borscht (Beef and Beet Stew)
  • Siberian Pelmeni (Pork and Beef Dumplings)
  • Schmorgurken (Ground Meat with Braised Cucumbers)
  • Spanakopita
  • Cullen Skink
  • Chicken Tagine
  • Winter Melon Soup
  • Poul Ak Nura (Cashew Chicken)
  • Palaw (Beef and Rich with Carrot Raisin Dressing)
  • Tahdig (Scorched Rice)

For this review, I wanted to make the Winter Melon Soup (because yay! Cantonese represent!) but I wasn’t going to have a chance to stop by an Asian market anytime soon.  Since I’m a sucker for quick breads, I ended up making the Jamaican Toto which is a spiced quick bread (aka cake) with coconut and raisins.

Had I been a total novice, the bread would have been a disaster.  The ingredient list is: butter, brown sugar, all purpose flour, baking powder, ground nutmeg, ground cinnamon, vanilla extract, grated coconut, and raisins.  Do you spot anything missing?

There’s no liquid.  There’s no egg. I’m willing to believe that the original recipe might not have had egg, but it had to have had a liquid.  It’s just tasty sand otherwise. I re-read the ingredients and the instructions about five times when I realized something was wrong.  Key ingredients were missing.

I went ahead, randomly grabbed buttermilk, added one egg, and finished the recipe.  Looking back I should have researched other Jamaican toto recipes online. It looks like I should have been using evaporated milk or coconut milk.  (I was in the kitchen soon after getting up from bed. I was not thinking at 100% capacity. I went on gut instinct instead.)

The texture of my final product did not look much like the photo in the book.  (I’ll blame the buttermilk.) So I want to give it a second attempt in the future.  More importantly though, it tasted delicious! (I may have eaten a third of the loaf in one day.  Oops.) So, I definitely want to try making toto again but probably with a different recipe.

The takeaway?  I recommend this book with caution.  The next time I pick out a recipe, I’m going to compare it with other similar recipes before starting.  (I still want to make the winter melon soup recipe. I ran it past my mom for her opinion. My mother makes a different variant of the soup, but said it looked correct.)  I don’t know how well this book was edited, how the recipes were compiled, or how much recipe testing went on. But when all is said and done, I really like the format and the theme of Heirloom Kitchen.  And I think it’s a great source of inspiration.

 

Reference Links:

http://www.annasheirloomkitchen.com/buy-the-book 

http://ediblecapecod.ediblecommunities.com/recipes/byron-scarlett-s-coconut-toto-cake
(a different toto recipe but this one makes more sense than the one from the book)

Disclaimer – I kindly received this book from Harper Design for this review.  I’m not getting paid for this post. The views and opinions expressed are purely my own.

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The Prairie Homestead Cookbook, a cookbook review

I wasn’t quite sure what to expect when I received a review copy of The Prairie Homestead Cookbook: Simple Recipes for Heritage Cooking in Any Kitchen by Jill Winger.  By name alone, I was expecting a lot of comfort food recipes just because that’s what I tend to think of when I think of stereotypical American cooking. And while there are comfort food recipe in the book, I feel like the soul of this book is more about cooking building blocks, and taking the DIY route in the kitchen.

The book is divided into these chapters:

  • Country Breakfasts
  • Hearty Mains
  • Farm-Style Sides
  • Home Bakery
  • Old-Fashioned Sweets
  • Homestead Sips
  • Prairie Pantry Staples
  • Herbs and Veggies
  • Eggs, Milk, and Meat
  • Stocking the Larder

 

Here are some recipes that you can look forward to:

  • Baked Eggs with Cream and Chives
  • Homemade Bacon
  • Homemade Chorizo
  • Old-Fashioned Sausage Gravy
  • Wyoming Burger
  • Cheddar and Herb Meatloaf
  • Saucy Spiced Beef and Onions
  • Old Homestead Pie
  • Chicken Poblano Chowder
  • Parmesan Roasted Cabbage Steaks
  • Herbed Crescent Rolls
  • Sourdough Crackers
  • Old-Fashioned Gingerbread with Caramel Sauce

 

The Herbs and Veggies, and the Eggs, Milk, and Meat chapters of the cookbook are the homesteading chapters, chapters which I wasn’t expecting at all.  Herbs and Veggies are pretty much what you might expect. It’s an introduction to gardening outdoors, more with a focus on raised beds. I basically live in a city with very little land space so I don’t have much use for information that isn’t about container gardening.  The chapter finishes up with a vegetable growing guide, covering the most conventional vegetables that you’d find consumed in North America.

The only information in the Herbs and Veggies chapter that I personally found worthwhile is the homemade organic garden spray recipe.  It makes me willing to try growing kale again (which is pretty easy… until it’s infested with bugs which also happens pretty easily).

The Eggs, Milk, and Meat chapter is about raising chickens, cows, and goats.  While I could technically raise chickens where I live, I’m really not about to.  (Let’s be honest. I don’t even own house pets because I’m cheap and lazy that way.)  Nevermind cows and goats for a city girl like me. Since I have zero experience with raising livestock, I will be fair and refrain from making any comments or critiques. I don’t know how useful the provided information is, and I probably never will.

It was the homesteading chapters that I saw first when I first flipped through this book.  I doubted how much this book would be useful to me. But the recipes? Now that I’ve had time to ruminate over the rest of the book, I think the recipes themselves are useful to have.

I made the creamy tomato garlic soup recipe as my inaugural recipe.  As the warm weather eases into New England, I am suddenly hankering for soups and all things slow cooked.  I want to enjoy all of it as much as I can before it gets too hot to cook much of anything.

I was really happy with my results.  It’s a very rich tomato soup. The ingredients are: butter, onion, garlic, all purpose flour, a bit of sugar, dried basil, sea salt, black pepper, chicken stock, fresh/home-canned/commercial canned tomatoes, heavy cream, and cheese for garnish.  Swap the heavy cream with evaporated milk, and you have a very pantry friendly recipe. It’s almost too rich for me, so I’m thinking about swapping some of the butter for olive oil too. But the flavor and texture is good and comforting.

I thought I’d put the book down once I was done with my recipe test and move onto my ever-growing backlog of “to try” recipes.  But there’s something to be said about a cookbook with a lot of basic recipes, because I write this review, I have her simple roast chicken (using the slow cooker option) cooking now.

While everything in the book sounds reasonably tasty, it’s Winger’s more basic recipe that I’m more drawn to.  In addition to the roast chicken I’ve got going, I want to try the roast beef, the slow cooker pulled pork (which I almost made but ultimately decided to carry home a whole chicken than a pork shoulder), the cast iron skillet bread, and the cream of wheat (key ingredient?  Actual whole wheat berries).

All in all, I’m happy to recommend this cookbook.  It might not be for everyone, but it’s handy to have.

 

Disclaimer – I kindly received this book from Flatiron Books for this review.  I’m not getting paid for this post. The views and opinions expressed are purely my own.

 

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Vegan Meal Prep, a cookbook review

Meal prep is a topic near and dear to my heart.  I’m often prepping 4 days of breakfast, lunch, and dinner on Sundays.  I try to go for meatless for breakfast and lunch, mostly because I know that I should amp up my vegetable intake in general.  You would think about after three years of meal prep (more or less) that I’d have it down to a science, but I really don’t.

Breakfasts tend to be the same recipe, week after week, until I can’t stand it anymore.  Lunches can go either way. They are variations of the same basic recipe or simple-but-new-to-me recipes.  Dinner is the one meal that I give myself more time and freedom for experimenting. I’m often flipping through recipes all week long, trying to decide what I am willing and wanting to make that weekend.  And sometimes, I end up in a mild panic and just use a tried-and-true recipe when I’m too indecisive and running out of time.

I’ve always wanted a cookbook that did all the thinking for me, which led me to pick up a review copy of Vegan Meal Prep by Robin Asbell.  Asbell’s latest cookbook is basically detailed step-by-step meal prep instructions, from start to finish.

The book is split into three major sections.  “Setting Yourself Up for Success: Five Weeks of Vegan Meals” is the first section.  The highlight in this section, in my opinion, is Vegan Nutrition Basics. Asbell is pretty detailed: listing sources of protein, omega-3, calcium, iron, and zinc.  It’s a pretty good one stop reference if you’re fully vegan.

The second section is “Meal Prep 101: Planning, Shopping, and Prepping.”  This is where you’ll find the overview of the five week meal plan, shopping lists, and the prepping instructions for each week.

The third section is “Let’s Get Cooking! 125 Vegan Recipes”, which is broken down into these chapters.

  • Vegan Staples
  • Breakfast
  • Lunch
  • Dinner
  • Salads, Dressing, and Sides
  • Desserts and Snacks

Here are the recipes that I’m most interested in trying:

  • Whole Grain Baking Mix
  • Lemon Pecan Muffins with Apricot Cashew Spread
  • Smoky Tempeh Taco Meat
  • Sweet Potato Chickpea Cakes
  • Barley with Vanilla Apples and Spiced Sweet Potato
  • Blueberry Breakfast Squares
  • Farro and Kimchi Bowls with Kale and Sesame Dressing
  • Farro Salad with Apricots, Carrots, and Spinach
  • Tempeh, Brown Rice, and Roasted Veggie Wraps
  • Tempeh Pasta Salad with Tomato and Avocado
  • Black Bean and Sweet Potato Curry
  • Black Bean and Squash Chili with Dumplings
  • Matcha-Glazed Pistachio Blondies
  • Peanut Butter Raisin Cookies

The things I liked most upon first impressions were the tips, variations, and “to pack for lunch” blurbs that frequently show up on corners of the recipe pages.  I also like how the ingredient lists are generally not intimidating nor filled with hard to find items.

The only critiques I have are two.  I wish nutritional information were listed.  I’ve seen other meal prep books that do. But for the purpose of mixing and matching for people who might be trying to watch their sugar intake, etc., it would be handy to have.  The other issue I have is the order of the recipe section. The whole book is planned around the five week meal plan/schedule but the recipes are in order by course. At least within each course type chapter, recipes are back in order by schedule and marked with which week/day the recipe belongs to.  If you’re planning to mix and match, then recipes ordered by course type makes sense. But I think if you’re planning to use the book as written, then having the recipes ordered by course type makes less sense.

In neither a “pro” nor a “con” comment, all of the recipes are meant to make about 4 servings.  So while I had originally planned on following a full week of recipes for this review, it quickly became apparent that this wasn’t feasible for me.  I am not trying to feed a family of four (But you might be!),

I ended up testing two recipes: Baked Marinated Tempeh, and Breakfast Protein Cookies with Dates and Pistachios.

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Breakfast cookies

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Both were easy to make.  I’ve made breakfast cookies before but it never occurred to me to use dates and pistachios.  I tend to use a lot of raisins. (In fact, I didn’t have time to get dates for this recipe so I used golden raisins which I think are milder in raisin flavor than the more familiar thompson seedless raisins.  Please don’t hate me for substituting.)  The cookies have good protein content, due to the sneaky addition of tofu, and don’t taste too sweet.  Having said that, the cookies actually use more sweetener than my typical baked oatmeal, and I don’t think you can reduce it as the maple syrup acts as part of the wet ingredients.  (Well, maybe you could increase the tofu?  Maple syrup and tofu are the only wet ingredients in this recipe.  Vanilla doesn’t count.  And like I said, it doesn’t taste too sweet so would reducing the sweetener be a futile exercise?)  The portion size is 3 cookies, and it seems to mostly sate my morning hunger.  (But I have a really high appetite in the mornings.  Sometimes I want more food.  Your mileage may vary.)

I liked the baked marinated tempeh too.  It never occurred to me to use apple juice as part of the marinade before.  I decided to mix up the baked tempeh with leftover marinade (which I cooked with cornstarch thinking i could use it as a sauce) and some cauliflower rice.  The natural tempeh flavor was not too strong in this recipe, so I think I’ll use it again in the near future. (However, the cooked marinade plus cauliflower tasted like… fish?  It’s a subtle enough flavor that I will push through it, but yeah, I’m never doing that combination again. lol!)

Overall, I recommend this book for anyone who wants to do more meal prepping, want a reasonable food budget, and have more than one mouth to feed.  Oh, and if you’re just trying to up your veggie intake (like me). I do have the minor reservations as listed above, but that might not bother you as much as it does me.

 

Reference Link:

https://www.robertrose.ca/book/vegan-meal-prep-5-week-plan-125-ready-go-recipes

Disclaimer – I kindly received this book from Robert Rose for this review.  I’m not getting paid for this post. The views and opinions expressed are purely my own.

 

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Simply Hot Pots, a cookbook review

Someone I know recently said to me, “Really, you need a recipe book for hot pot?? Lol just throw stuff in!”

Well, yes, I could do that.  At home hot pot (aka nabe)  with friends and family have always been chicken broth or dashi up until now.  But you know what? That gets a little boring sometimes. Just because it’s hot pot, it doesn’t mean that there isn’t room for creativity!

It is that creativity that caught my eye with Amy Kimoto-Kahn’s newest cookbook, Simple Hot Pots.  Maybe it’s because she’s a fourth-generation Japanese-American, but Kimoto-Kahn doesn’t box herself in with traditional recipes.  She doesn’t ignored them, but there’s a lovely collection of non-traditional recipes that I think deserve attention.

The book is divided into these sections:

  • Broth bases, sauce, and more
  • Pork hot pots
  • Chicken hot pots
  • Beef hot pots
  • Seafood hot pots
  • Spicy hot pots
  • Vegetable hot pots
  • Specialty hot pots
  • Side Dishes
  • Desserts

As I said above, there are traditional flavors in the book like basic dashi and basic shabu-shabu broth.  But I think the stars of the show are going to be the sesame miso broth, creamy corn broth (see more on this below), Japanese curry broth, tomato broth, Thai coconut curry broth, and Vietnamese broth.  Other honorable mentions that aren’t traditional in Japanese cookery but I have seen in hot pot places are the Mongolian broth, Korean Kimchi broth, and Macanese broth.

I also appreciate the flavor pairings that Kimoto-Kahn puts forward to go with the broths.  That tomato broth? Use it for the mussels with spicy tomato nabe recipe. Kimichi broth? Match that with Korean short ribs, because that’s a tried and true pairing.  At any rate, they both sound delicious.

I legitimately love everything I’m reading in this cookbook!

To “test drive” the book, I knew I wanted to try one of the unusual recipes.  I ultimately decided on the Green Vegetable Nabe, which uses the creamy corn broth, the sesame miso sauce, asparagus, kale, bok choy, and broccoli crowns.  

The corn broth contains onion, corn kernels, nutmeg, chicken stock, milk, cream, and miso.  The result? It reminds me of mac and cheese… but without the mac or the cheese. lol! My favorite mac and cheese recipe to make is a Martha Stewart one and it includes making a roux and flavoring it with nutmeg.  It’s the same building blocks of flavor. So this broth recipe gets us part way there but without all the heaviness of a real mac and cheese recipe. It’s sweet from the dairy and the corn, but not overly so.

And pairing it with a vegetable nabe?  It was really delicious. I didn’t want to stop eating the broccoli except that I had to or else I’d have no veggies in the fridge for the rest of the week.  A worry I had while making the nabe was that maybe the broth would scorch the bottom of the pot from the natural dairy sugars. As far as I can tell, that didn’t happen.  (Though to be fair, it might be because I was making hot pot for one.  I’m not sure how the broth would hold up after longer simmering times.)

The sesame miso sauce was good too but I have to admit that I messed it up.  (Which is kind of amazing because it’s a simple sauce.)  I was having a bad kitchen day where I was constantly dropping things and just generally being a klutz.  On top of that I was trying to rush (because I was getting hungry), one will do things like miss the instructions that said to blitz the sesame seeds into a powder or suddenly forget one was making a half batch of sauce!  Even with all my stupidity, I manage to make it work. (But I’m think I’m going to blend up the leftover sauce so that it can at least look more like it’s supposed to.)

I can’t recommend this cookbook enough even though I’ve only tested two recipes.  (Well, one recipe and one inspired recipe.) I’m trying to decide what other things I want to use the creamy corn broth with.  (Sweet potatoes, mushrooms, ham, chicken? Not necessarily altogether.) I think I might be making the tomato broth next while it’s still winter in these parts.  

Kimoto-Kahn has done a wonderful job of making hot pot more interesting, offering a variety of styles and flavors.  And, I am all the happier for it.

 

Reference Links:

http://www.easypeasyjapanesey.com/

Amy’s website – I also recommend this.  A few of the book recipes are cross-posted on her blog.

https://www.quartoknows.com/books/9781631065675/Simply-Hot-Pots.html

 

Disclaimer – I received this book from Race Point Publishing/Quarto for this review.  I’m not getting paid for this post. The views and opinions expressed are purely my own.

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One Hour Dairy Free Cheese, a cookbook review

I have a weird fascination with faux cheeses.  In case you’re not sure what I’m referring to, I mean products made with nuts and nutritional yeast, and label themselves as cheese for people who are vegan or dairy free.  It might be because, while I like cheese, I am not obsessed with it. I have friends who can eat nothing but cheese for days and they’d be happy.  Me? Not so much. I like mozzarella and queso fresco, but I’m not interested in feta and really dislike goat cheese.

To be fair though, it’s less of an obsession and more of a “how close does this taste like the real thing?” curiosity.  Or maybe even, “could I like this better than the real thing?”  (I would love a goat cheese replacement that I liked.)

I’ve made faux cream cheese and faux grated parmesan, both of which were really tasty and I plan to make again.  But this time around, I thought I’d try a Claudia Lucero recipe.

First of all, Lucero is a cheese maker of the traditional kind.  I didn’t realize until I had a copy of her new book in my hands, One Hour Dairy Free Cheese, that she’s also the author of One Hour Cheese, a book that I’ve been meaning to pick up a copy of (and has been sitting on my Amazon wish list for over a year now).    I won’t lie, her background makes me want to experiment with her faux cheese recipes even more! In my head, I think if a cheese maker can make a faux cheese that she’s proud enough to put into print, then surely the recipe has some merit.

Here’s a quick rundown of the book.  The chapters are divided between:

  • Chapter 1 – The Basics: Equipment, Ingredients, and More
  • Chapter 2 – Wheels, Blocks, and Rounds
  • Chapter 3 – Melts and Dips
  • Chapter 4 – Schmears and Spreads
  • Chapter 5 – Shakes and Grates
  • Chapter 6 – Inst-Cheeses
  • Chapter 7 – Just for Fun
  • Chapter 8 – Make It Yours
  • Chapter 9 – Basic Fermentation
  • Chapter 10 – Bonus Cultured and Aged Cheeses
  • Chapter 11 – Cheese Platter Pairings

One of my favorite features of the book is that every recipe seems to include substitutions, variations, and follow-up recipes.  For example, the ingredients for the Lemon Garlic Feta are listed as blanched almond flour, water or dairy free yogurt, sauerkraut, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, tapioca starch, red wine vinegar, sea salt, garlic, oregano, white pepper, lemon zest, and agar agar.  Don’t have almond flour? Lucero offers ideas for using almond slivers, cashews, macadamia, or sunflowers instead. No sauerkraut? Fake it with onion and lactic acid. No nutritional yeast? Still not a problem, because you can use garlic, tahini, or miso. Then, the recipe variations included are rosemary feta, and kalamata peppercorn feta.  Once the feta is made, you can use it in her recipe for Spicy Beet Salad.

For recipe testing though, I went with the simplest recipe in the book which was the One Bowl Ricotta.  It only has four ingredients and a fifth optional ingredient. I used blanched almond flour, sea salt, lemon juice, water, and miso for my batch.

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Faux cheese on cracker

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In some respects, while the easiest, this recipe could be the worst to start with.  I think for someone who has experimented with faux cheese before, this one might seem almost boring.  I tasted it straight, and I tasted it on a cracker. The flavor was quite mild. It probably would have tasted better with lactic acid and dairy free yogurt, but I didn’t have those on hand.  (And again, I was purposefully going as easy as possible.)  But for someone who hasn’t experimented with faux cheese before, it’s a fantastic beginner’s recipe.

While I don’t think it’s the best faux cheese I’ve made, it’ll probably be the one I’ll end up making the most.  It’s just so easy that I’m not sure I’ll be able to give it up, especially if I’m making something for my vegan or lactose sensitive friends.  It’s also given me momentum to experiment more with faux cheeses, and given me the inspiration to work with less familiar ingredients to make a more convincing product.  I am not saying this lightly.  I even ordered some lactic acid online this week just to make more faux cheese.

So, yeah, I highly recommend this book.  I’m not sure which recipe to test out next though as they all sound good.  (Oooh, maybe I’ll make the Margherita Pizza Melt once my lactic acid arrives at my house.)  If there’s a recipe in particular that you’d like to see me make, just drop me a line with your suggestion!

 

Reference Links:

https://www.urbancheesecraft.com/collections/cheesemaking-books/products/one-hour-dairy-free-cheese

https://www.workman.com/products/one-hour-dairy-free-cheese

Disclaimer – I received this book from Workman Publishing for this review.  I’m not getting paid for this post. The views and opinions expressed are purely my own.

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Soup Swap 2019

Soup Swap 2019 has come and gone.  I’m currently unable to find online evidence but I think I attended my first swap in 2008.  Holy cow!

I haven’t managed to go every year but I’ve been to a lot of them.  And I think there was a year or two where there was no swapping to be had because the host was working on a master’s degree.  

This is the earliest mention on this blog that I could find:

https://awesomesauceeats.wordpress.com/2009/01/28/chinese-black-sesame-soup-dessert-soup/

 

But I know the first thing I ever made for Soup Swan was French onion soup.  I remember crying through 5 pounds of onions and vowed “never again!”

For those not in the know, Soup Swap is a gathering to boost our spirits in the heart of the winter season. All of the attendees bring six quart-sized containers filled with a frozen homemade soup/stew of their choice. If you’re really ambitions, you can bring twelve quarts and secure yourself two picks per round.  All of the soups are lumped together in a spot in the room. Attendees pick out a random number, and proceed, in their numbered order, to explain what they brought in. The dear host likes to call this the “Telling of the Soup.” You can also win bragging rights for best telling.  Once the telling completed, the guests then take turns, in same numbered order, picking out a new soup container to bring home. To be fair, the dear host likes to run backwards during the last two rounds. So, you bring over six quarts of your soup, and you bring home six quarts of someone else’s soup.  It gets a bit competitive and a lot of strategic after the first round because there’s usually 12-14 flavors available, only 6 quarts per flavor, and some flavors are extremely popular.

And true story, I’ve been enough times to soup swap that I printed out my own inventory sheet this year.

I am proud to announce that this was the very first year where I got ALL THE FLAVORS I WANTED!  This was probably definitely only made possible by my severe dislike for cilantro. (A couple of the very popular flavors had cilantro in the ingredient list.)

This year, I made a pumpkin curry soup with black beans.

And here were my “winnings.”

 

I’ve had the Green Monster and the Porq-ue soups so far.  Tonight, I’ll be having the Eatin’ Big Time. I can’t wait.  🙂

If you want to make the pumpkin curry soup that I did, it’s a Libby’s Pumpkin recipe.  The only difference was that I added canned black beans, rinsed and drained, at the end of cooking.  If you want to make six quarts of it, just multiple the recipe by 3.  I will say that I think your results will heavily depend on the quality of your spices.  I am personally fond of Penzey’s house curry blend.

https://www.verybestbaking.com/recipes/28476/pumpkin-curry-soup/?recipeSortBy=Relevancy&keywords=pumpkin+soup

https://www.penzeys.com/online-catalog/penzeys-curry/c-24/p-3037/pd-s

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2018 in review

I have a lot of thoughts about 2018, but since this is a food blog, I’ll keep it to food related things only.

Here are my highlights:

1. Eating bugs with the Nordic Food Lab!

 

2.  Curry biscuit sandwich.  I’m still trying to figure out the right recipe for home re-creation.

 

3.  Ok, this one isn’t food related but it was definitely a highlight – a workshop with Dr. Jacob Harden.

 

4.  This Bon Appétit salad recipe:

 

5.  Finally making Kenji Lopez Alt’s vegan ramen recipe.

 

6.  Meeting Yvette Van Boven.

 

7.  And Kakawa Chocolate House finally opened their MA location in Salem.

 

What were your favorite food memories of 2018?