Ham Sandwich Indicted!

Thanks to a tip from fellow food writer and friend, Libby from  Cooks Like She Talks , Shawnie (of Manges! Mangi! ) and I were invited to a cheese tasting hosted by NYC's famous Murray's Cheese Shop. Anyone who spends any time with us knows Shawnie and I are suckers for a good creamy brie or a pungent, tangy blue -- and have driven 13 hours one way for a cheesy experience (see our road trip to  Rhode Island  last summer). A quick trek across town to meet the Murray's team and savor their wares was a no-brainer.   Murray's , if you're not familiar, is New York City's oldest cheese shop, founded by Murray Greenberg in 1940.  Over the years, Murray's developed a reputation as a premier cheesemonger, featuring a rotation of over 300 cheeses and their very own aging caves below their main store in Greenwich Village.  More recently, they have been building a partnership with regional grocery stores to share their love of cheese with the whole nation, s...

Making salsa has become a summer ritual for me--it's a perfect way to preserve those delicious tomatoes that are piling up at farmer's markets, and the flavor combinations are incredibly flexible and open to interpretation. Our hot central Ohio summer has provided us with great peppers as well, and there's really not a better way to make use of them. This year, as I am living without a functioning kitchen, my salsa making happened during the last of a series of canning classes I taught at Oakland Nursery.  Over a dozen folks came out to chop, dice, and put up a dozens of jars of salsa and tomato jam.  Twenty pounds of tomatoes later, everyone went home with a couple of jars of delicious tomato products.  Just for fun, we also did a heirloom tomato taste test, taking advantage of huge variety of colors, flavors and textures available. Over the years, I've tried and tweaked several salsa recipes, but find myself using one from Mary Anne Dragan's Well ...

Mention Pittsburgh and food, and chances are someone will bring up Primani Brother's sandwiches or Iron City Beer (oh, and maybe you're familiar with Heinz' products).  And while those are Pittsburgh icons in their own right, there's more culinary action going on in The Steel City than just giant sandwiches, bottles of IC, and ketchup.  One of the best spots in town to get a true sampling of Pittsburgh food culture is along the northern side of the city on the Allegheny River, in a warehouse filled district known as The Strip. Conveniently located on the Allegheny River, The Strip became an industrial hotbed in the 1800s, as iron, steel, glass, and aluminum mills sprang up on the shoreline. By the turn of the century, produce wholesalers began moving into the area, with auction houses and warehouses flooding the area.  Fast forward past an actual flood, the decline of railways, and the proliferation of grocery stores, and the produce merchants in the area dwindl...