Carol Peterman's Profile

Great list of books. If you're ever in Seattle make sure to stop in Jessie's Cake Spy store. It's adorable.

Yay! I have everything on hand to make this today!

I love savory muffins for breakfast, but have never made a cottage cheese muffin. Must remedy that before morning!

I'm a big fan of Bon Ami & Barkeeper's Friend as well as the Full Circle scrub brushes.

AButler - my best tip for grill grates is to put them in the oven on self-clean. You get a clean oven & clean grill at the same time!

Congratulations on your book! I look forward to reading and cooking from it. I think of "entertaining" as "socializing." It can be anything from inviting a friend over to share an experimental cooking adventure to finger foods for 40 or a sit-down dinner for 10 or most commonly a couple of friends over for dinner and board games.

What a great story. I'm in the same mindset of French cooking right now thanks to Dorie Geenspans's new book Around My French Table. It's all about wonderful casual food with no fussy tournage technique to be found. I'm waiting for the Salted Butter Break Up cookie dough to chill so I can bake it (baked as one big piece! easy!). I’ve been drooling over the photo of these cookies since I got the book.

Looks so good! As soon as we get some warm weather in the NW I'll be trying it. I make a CocoaMatcha, which is good hot or cold. The cocoa adds a nice bitter coffee-like element. http://u.nu/8wtt4

I feel really lucky to live in the NW where nearly every store sells whole Alaskan Salmon. I've pickled sardines, but never cooked them. I will give that a try.
Phoxx - the Malaysian style presentation sounds lovely. When I've had whole fish larger than my pans I have cooked them on a cooling rack set in a large sheetpan and add a foil tent if I want to steam it. It works great as long as your oven is large enough!

I love pulling together a meal from bits and scraps in the fridge. My two standby solutions for an odd mix of stuff is to sauté and scramble with eggs, or add salsa and wrap it in a tortilla. It's amazing how random foods can become a quick meal with these two techniques. My other favorite way to keep veggies from getting old is to juice them. I actually never buy fruits and veggies for juicing, but use my machine as a quick out when I fear I won't be able to use what I have before it goes bad. I have juiced some wild concoctions in the morning before leaving on trips. Anything that could go bad while I'm gone goes in and thankfully I usually have apples and fresh ginger on hand which always makes my mystery juice taste good.

The special project of designing and building a new kitchen cart/island isn't going to happen this year, so my alternative project isn’t about kitchen infrastructure, but about breaking out of my cooking ruts by create a habit of cooking something each week from my stash of dry goods in the pantry. I have grains, beans, assorted Asian noodles, and other interesting things that just languish on the shelves. First up, the adzuki beans I bought who knows how long ago and have never used.