Krik's Picks

Since retiring in July, I’ve had to start planning things to have for lunch. When I was working, I’d either have a lunch meeting, or I’d eat in the cafeteria, or I’d skip lunch (especially if I’d had a good breakfast that day). I might still choose to skip lunch, but that would mean my wife would have to eat lunch alone, and she’d prefer not to. So I’ve been planning leftovers and other dishes that I can quickly heat up for lunch. Now that it’s October and the weather is getting chilly, soup is a logical choice. This week, I decided I wanted to make a cheese soup. I had an ulterior motive. I may have mentioned in a previous post that I had a particularly robust crop of Serrano peppers in my garden. They were ripening faster than I could use them. So I went looking for a recipe for homemade pepper sauce. I settled on the recipe I found on the Food Network web site from Emeril Lagasse. (Click here: Homemade Red Hot Sauce .) Here is a photo of my beautiful Serrano peppers. I followed ...

My wife and I arrived in New York on a Thursday afternoon. We were looking forward to a long weekend of good food and jazz music. We did our typical prep for our trip, looking up restaurants in the neighborhood of our hotel ( Omni Berkshire Place , Midtown East) and checking menus and online ratings. For our first night, anticipating that we would be tired from traveling and not yet very familiar with our locale, we picked a restaurant that also had music. La Mediterranee was a 6-block walk from the hotel. We liked the menu (French bistro) and on Thursday nights, in addition to the house piano player (French and American standards), they also have another guest combo. Because we had had a late lunch, we delayed our reservation until 8:30. We arrived in time for the last few minutes of the house pianist’s performance. Sipping a cocktail and listening to him, we could tell that he really enjoyed performing. He played with intensity and enthusiasm that was easily conveyed to the dine...

I kinda thought that I was all done celebrating retirement. But when the offer came to host a dinner in my honor, I didn’t hesitate to accept. When asked for suggestions about a venue, I offered a couple of tried and true favorites and then added Burch Steak & Pizza . I hadn’t been to Burch but wanted to give it a try. So I was pleased when the host picked that as the restaurant. As the date approached, I asked a few acquaintances about their opinions. I discovered an interesting division of opinion. There are some people who are totally unimpressed by Burch. It’s not that they think it’s bad. But the attitude is that it’s an expensive meal and the steaks are not that special. On the other hand, I talked to others who really loved the place. My observation is that those views are not really as divergent as they may seem. The main area of agreement is on the sides and starters. Most of the people I talked to raved about them, even to the extent of (the naysayers) suggesting that...

All right, so I’m retired. Every once in a while, my former colleagues find that they need to consult to get some background or perspective on a working matter. And I’m happy to oblige, as long as lunch is included. So it was that I ended up at the Capital Grill in Minneapolis for a very pleasant business lunch. My colleague wanted to touch base on a few matters, and he also needed to check out the Capital Grill as a possible venue for a future business dinner. Suits me just fine. I probably had lunch at the Capital Grille in DC more often than in Minneapolis. By and large, the chain is a good, reliable steakhouse and a nice place to have a lunch meeting. As I perused the menu, I was intrigued by the addition of a three-course lunch menu that I don’t recall seeing (at any location) in the past. That’s what I opted for, as did my colleague. Course 1: I started with a special soup, squash bisque with crab. Excellent. Course 2: I was wavering between the luncheon steak or a lob...

I think it’s been about 25 years since I successfully grew tomatoes in my garden. I used to have great success with tomatoes as well as zucchini, snap peas, string beans, even one year Brussels sprouts. And roses, too. I grew beautiful roses. That was in our first house in Minneapolis on Vincent Ave. I had a great garden then. I think that’s at least partially why my son has become an enthusiastic gardener. It reminds him of his childhood when he would go down to the garden and pick fresh vegetables. Now his kids do the same thing. (A short anecdote: I also had a lot of success growing peppers, especially jalapenos. Our neighbor to the south was a very nice man, I suppose about the age of my parents. He was nice but a bit of a curmudgeon. In one of the houses abutting our backyard was a nice young family, just a little older than us. One of their kids was a bit of a rascal; nothing really bad, just noisy and rambunctious. One day the curmudgeon slyly picked a jalapeno and gave it t...

In yesterday’s post I commented that despite having a pretty good experience at Pig Ate My Pizza , my wife and I likely wouldn’t trek to Robbinsdale just for pizza. The main reason is because we like the pizzas we make at home better than any restaurant pizza. So for example, this photo is of a pizza that we made a few weeks ago. You can find pizza crust recipes basically anywhere. The recipe we use is from the New York Times Natural Foods Cookbook . I guess its out of print now. Our copy is copyright 1971. We probably got it as a wedding present in 1974. The pizza crust recipe is very basic, just flour, water, yeast, and olive oil. We like it because it produces a crisp crust that doesn’t interfere with the toppings we put on. We topped this particular pizza with fresh Roma tomatoes from the Minneapolis farmers market , fresh basil from our garden, and supermarket mozzarella cheese (from Cub ). We most often make pizza on Sunday nights. After a busy weekend, we usually just wa...