Cooking

Every Monday during Mom’s last three years living in her duplex, except for the several Mondays she was out of town, I took her a batch of home-cooked dishes, often the products of my incessant recipe testing. If you’re a Community Cookbook regular, you know that she must have sampled quite a variety of dishes.

Looking for a way to take your baking to the next level? Try rye flour, a sneaky way to add complex flavors, a tender crumb and a little nutrition, especially in sweet baked goods.

Cinco de Mayo is on May 5. It is more than a holiday celebrating a military victory in the distant past or a single culture. At a deeper level, it’s a celebration of the human spirit and of mankind’s quest for freedom and dignity. Cinco de Mayo isn’t just a once-a-year holiday; it’s a process and a state of mind.

Rhubarb, the perennial vegetable with its characteristic red stalks, is primarily available in a short window of spring. It can be baked, pickled, poached or otherwise cooked and still retain the delightfully tart flavor it’s known for. Often, it is paired with sweet strawberries to tame its sharpness.

Since food writer Molly Stevens published her cookbook “All About Braising” in 2004, she’s often wondered why it still resonates. To this day, she regularly hears from readers old and new, which is a good thing, because Stevens says she never tires of talking about braising.

Spring in the Inland Northwest is an invigorating time of year. The warming temperatures and increasing daylight hours are melting the winter doldrums away. The vast, rolling fields of Eastern Washington and North Idaho are turning green with emerging crops of wheat and other grains, potatoes, lentils and beans. Farmers are fully engaged in the new growing season.

The answer to “What’s for dinner?” usually revolves around the choice of protein, but it doesn’t always have to. While we tend to think of sauces as a condiment or supplement to the food at the center of the plate, a good one can easily be made the star.

There’s nothing like a fried chicken sandwich to put a giant smile on a sandwich lover’s face.

Mardi Gras heralds the start of the Christian Lenten season with its 40 days of prayer and sacrifice culminating in Easter Sunday. Shouldn’t there be a kind of Mardi Gras-style celebration at the end of this long, austere process?

If you’re feeling burned out by your daily cooking routine, you might reflexively try to pare things down, using fewer ingredients and bare-minimum recipes, but cookbook author Jerrelle Guy does the opposite – she adds something. She was able to reclaim her joy and creativity in the kitchen by sprinkling a little extra flair into her meals, tapping what was already in her pantry as inspiration to make everyday food feel special.

What do America’s national parks taste like? In Northern California, perhaps it’s the earthiness of forest mushrooms and sweetness of crab meat. Along the Southern border, maybe the basso of pine nuts and tang of cactus paddles. And in the East, how about … a whole lot of country ham? That delicious thought came up while Nina Elder and Melissa Knific were researching their 2026 book, the ...

I’ve asked my husband to use a mesh splatter guard, or to sauté meat at a lower temperature, but he is set in his ways. (And I love him dearly, so will not ding him for this.) Do you have any advice for how to sear, blacken or char meat without creating so much splatter?

About halfway down Shop Street in downtown Galway, Ireland, there’s often a crowd outside Chipeen, where they serve hundreds of pounds each day of what they call “proper Irish chips” – chunky peeled potato batons cut thicker than a typical American fry. Crispy and golden outside, with a fluffy interior texture, Chipeen elevates these chips beyond a side dish to make them a meal – and nothing could be bad about that.

Although the Lunar New Year started on Feb. 17, any day of the year is a good day to celebrate Asian food, especially when noodles and spring rolls are involved.

There are a variety of nutritious, dairy-free ways to add body and creaminess to soups. Beans and potatoes are two ingredients primed for the job. If they’re already in the soup, simply smashing some of them against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon can do the trick. Mashed, or pureed, white beans or potatoes can also be added stealthily to soups that don’t typically include them – such as tomato or broccoli cheddar – for creamy thickness. Plus they’ll contribute fiber, essential nutrients and, in the case of beans, a protein boost.

A cup of chamomile tea. A glass of warm milk. The classic turkey sandwich. Certain foods and drinks have a reputation for making us sleepy.

It’s that time of year again to paint the town green and raise a pint or two o’ Guinness to the good Saint Patrick and the Emerald Isle. There’s a little Irish in all of us when St. Patrick’s Day arrives, and there are plenty of opportunities throughout the Inland Northwest to participate in the celebration.

If cooking dinner every night feels repetitive and downright exhausting to you, you’re not alone. If you’re ready to simplify your weekly meal planning, skip last-minute grocery runs and still enjoy delicious, home-cooked meals, meal kit delivery services and online grocery delivery are your go-to solutions.

I am not over the cottage cheese trend yet, because I never needed to get on board with it. For me, cottage cheese isn’t a fad. It’s a mainstay in my refrigerator and has been for as long as I can remember. As a child, I sat at the kitchen table with my grandfather noshing on bowls of it mixed with sour cream and sliced banana. My grandmother stirred it with hot egg noodles, butter and caramelized onions for dinner. I’ve been making cottage cheese pancakes for years, as well as using it in dressings and dips to add creamy texture in a healthier way.