Earlier this year, I wrote a review for a local restaurant that still haunts me. Writing a review prompts the writer to decide: Do you recommend the place or don’t you? Well, in this case, I didn’t -- and the owner of the restaurant was quite displeased when the review was published. She was so displeased, in fact, that after receiving several angry emails I actually asked if perhaps we should take down the review. My editor (rightly) replied, “No. It’s a review – that’s how it goes.” So, why did this outcome bother me so much? I have "Yelped" a hundred or more restaurants, and never really …

It's 8 am. I'm soaked to the bone from the relentless rain, covered in mud, and I'm hugging the side of a hill with my face planted dangerously close to some stealthily bare poison oak sticks. My heart is racing and I'm praying nobody has seen me. The station wagon (whose rattling tailpipe has alerted and prompted me to hit the decks) passes by slowly on the road above, its longhaired and bearded operator oblivious to my presence in the oak heavy, brambly landscape below him. From the smell of pot and Stevie Wonder wafting out the driver's side window, I doubt he would have cared I was there…

For the first time in ten or so years, I am not responsible for Thanksgiving dinner. My mother (who cooked dinner for a family of five every night for 18 years and did it so well I actually thought she enjoyed it) was more than happy to hand over the reigns once I took an interest in cooking in my teens. I've cooked Thanksgivings for my family, and for strays in years where I lived outside the Bay Area, and I've always loved it. Or wanted to love it. Thanksgiving is ridiculously stressful. No matter how much you love to cook, how meticulously you plan, how well try to prep it. Every year, I …

I rarely set foot in a Safeway these days, but that's where I found myself last week, searching for a 9" x 13" baking dish after breaking mine in a dramatic and expensive bread pudding accident. I've been absorbed in a number of home projects recently, so between finishing the summer canning and helping a friend with some recipe development I've had little contact with the outside world. In fact, my trip to Safeway served as a shocking reminder of how close we are to Halloween. There was candy as far as the eye could see. On the shelves, on the end caps of the aisles, and in the entryway of …

My boyfriend and I have been playing a little game this year called 'How little food can we buy?' Step one was planting a garden this past spring. It was my first genuinely committed effort at growing my own food. I have a past checkered with half-assed potato beds and potted herbs, but never a real garden. I was still a slave to the produce aisle and, though in the past I was delighted not to have to buy basil, it was mostly a fun novelty when I was able to use something I had grown.   This year was different. We were determined not to buy another head of lettuce. It wasn't really a question…

Many people would describe me as a food snob. And maybe I am. I won't eat hamburgers unless I know the meat comes from an ethical and responsible farmer. I won't buy fresh tomatoes out of season.  The choices I make regarding food are as personal and important to me as the choices many people make when dressing themselves or deciding what car to buy. And yet, despite this so-called snobbery, my heart sank when I learned that the Koffee Klatch - a funky, no frills Fairfax institution and a staple of my childhood - was closing its doors after 43 years in business. Every Saturday morning from …