Clearly on a bender to create my favorite restaurant recipes (look down to the recipe below using your best Brady Bunch bow). I offer you an concoction from the duh why didn’t I think of that file. First a lesson in peas, even though we’re ending the fall pea season – peason for you hurried types. Snow peas are flat, sweet, have an edible pod and make appearances in stir-fries and salads. English peas require shelling but oh the pea flavor shouts “springtime” from the mountain tops. Sugar snap pea,s our star today, are sweet, hence the name, an offer an optionally edible shell. Easy peasy right?

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Nobu Malibu is a coastal restaurant scene for very cool, rich people. We are not those people. But, we are hungry food types who crave what we can’t, what we shouldn’t, what we mustn’t have. And making it all more tempting is that this Nobu is different from the others – (Las Vegas Nobu that would be you). Set in new breathtaking digs with an infinity view of the Pacific, the executive chef Gregorio Stephenson crafts signature, sublime dishes for this location only.

Lunch – daylight, not requiring stilettos I don’t own, or the size 0 I’ve never worn (even as a baby) or the Swiss bank account payout I don’t have.

Could it be that a midday meal could deliver all the promise of this west coast gem? Wearing our hippest clothes and beachy wave blow-dries, going for that I’m underdressed on purpose look, we ventured on a late summer day to this destination restaurant. And – oh my god – was it worth it – even for the second mortgage I took out to pay for it. Mini tuna tacos, lobster ceviche on limestone lettuce, and field greens with grilled shiitake mushroom that was to cry for.

The savory salad is simple and yet, utterly rewarding.

I went on a mission to recreate it. After a few attempts and help from the master himself, I think I have it for you. read more

The heat is on, friends.

These guys named it the ingredient of the year. LA’s most popular food trucksplashes it into their top sellers. The rooster brand, brewed and manufactured in Rosemead, CA (home of the best Chinese restaurants in Los Angeles, btw), has its own cookbookand like good LA divas, has a movie in the works.

Many hot sauces are just that – heat – something to scorch your mouth or mask bad food. Sriracha gives a rounded out flavor with hints of sweet, savory & smoky goodness flanking the heat. Sriracha provides zing that elevates pedestrian foods – hello cauliflower – and enlivens bland edibles – I’m talking to you eggplant. And then there are Bloody’s, mayos, omelettes, marinades, soups, spreads, pastas – you get the picture.

So, we were all happy with our rooster booster, then Gwyneth came along with hercookbook denouncing the chemicals in processed brands and I was all come on Gwyn, do we really need to cook our own batch? And she was all, Sher, what would Walter White do? read more

It’s not that chicken satay is fast the first time you make it. It’s that you make a giant batch and the next time you retrieve it from the freezer and it’s ever so easy when you need things easy. And when you need things easy is the time when you really want a savory, zingy, protein-packed pick me up.

I know places likethismake decent satays, as do many other carryouts, but remember our mantra:

“om…when i make it myself I know what I’m eating…om.”

Our satay begins with a marinade loaded with aromatic ingredients. This sad stalk of lemongrass came from a spice jar that I tempted to reconstitute with warm water. The Thai gods cursed me. Guilty, I bought two bundles of fresh lemongrass this morning at the farmer’s market to root and plant – good luck with that. Also, saw chef Curtis Stone milling about, alone, at the market – was he looking for the Vegemite booth or someone to recognize him? I mean this was the Santa Monica farmer’s market, the mecca for all organic, precious dirt food in a city where celebs are a dime a dozen – I apologize, we were uncrumpling our pocket dollar bills and sampling mouse melons – don’t ask.

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We’re not dessert people.
We never order our own desserts, yet eat our fair share using the extra spoon. We play a game of toss & eat these cookies around the family room most nights during Colbert. Rolled cookie dough resides in the freezer should a need for warm milk & cookies arise, you know to impress playdates.

See, we’re not dessert people.

So, when a bunch of lemon verbena and yellow peaches found their way into my kitchen for no particular reason at all – and I couldn’t find a way to make a soup or stew out of them – this dessert happened. Peaches and cream with a twist.

Enhancing two basic dessert elements – the season’s best fruit and whipping cream – to another level without much hassle, you have a dessert worthy for a party or every night – and those of you who know me, know I’ll serve a fruit dessert for breakfast.

Here’s all you need.

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