Gourmandise
Janice Okun
“Home—Heart—Hearth,” a cookbook published by the Town of Sheldon Historical Society in Strykersville to mark the bicentennial of the town, has been selected as the 2008 Mid-Atlantic regional winner in the 19th annual prestigious Tabasco Community Cookbook Awards Contest. Over 1,000 copies have been sold and the McIlhenny Co. marked the occasion by awarding $500 to the Historical Society.
The thoroughly researched book —compiled by Mary Ann Metzger, Betty Reisdorf and Marilyn Smithley— was compiled as a fundraiser for the School House Museum in the Town of Sheldon. It contains wonderful old-time recipes and plenty of old-time wisdom.
Get your copy by sending $21 to the Town of Sheldon Historical Society, P. O. Box 122, Strykersville, NY 14145.
And by the way, the deadline for submissions to the 20th annual contest is Sept. 25.
Cheapandgood
We knew vinegar had many uses, but the tips we recently found on the Vinegar Institute’s Web site sent us running to buy a larger bottle of the white distilled stuff.
• For fluffy egg whites, soak a paper towel with 1 to 2 tablespoons of white distilled vinegar. Wipe the mixing bowl and beaters or whisk with the vinegar-soaked paper towel, then dry with a cloth or paper towel prior to whipping egg whites.
• For fluffier rice, add a teaspoon of WDV to the boiling water before adding the rice. The rice will be easier to spoon and less sticky.
• When poaching fish, soak it beforehand in a vinegar-and-water solution (no more than 20 minutes). The fish will be sweeter, more tender and hold its shape better. You can also add a tablespoon of WDV to the fish-poaching water, which will help keep the fish tender yet firm.
Allabout chocolate
Prize-winning chocolate expert and creator Benjamin Desmartins will tell you everything you always wanted to know about chocolate at a lecture and tasting to be held at 7:30 p. m. Thursday in the Bulger Communication Building on the Buffalo State Campus, 1300 Elmwood Ave.
His presentation, proposed by the Delegation Generale of the French Embassy in Washington, D. C., as part of a French culture promotion project, will be sponsored locally by the Alliance Francaise de Buffalo and the Department of Classical and Modern Languages at Buff State.
Young and innovative, Desmartins has been awarded top prizes at the Salon du Chocolat in Paris and regularly participates in professional shows throughout Europe.
He will speak and then entertain a question-and-answer period to be followed by a chocolate tasting. Tickets are $15 for the general public. For further information, call 886-0886 or e-mail mvs52@verizon.net . Kids cooking
“Ready, Steady, Spaghetti” by Lucy Broadhurst is a bright new recipe book with ideas about cooking for and with children. The book is written in a sensible tone with no cutesiness and no “talking down.” The directions are crystal clear.
Some of the recipes—like a Fresh Fruit Smoothie —are so simple a 5-year-old could follow them (with a little help maybe); others like Sticky Chicken Drumsticks are a bit more complicated, but all of the recipes are for the kind of food kids like.
The book is published by Andrews McMeel and costs $19.99.
Quotable…
“As a child, my family’s menu consisted of two choices: take it or leave it.”
—Buddy Hackett
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