Food: November 2009 Archives

If we're talking nosh, there's no item perhaps more quintessential than pastrami on rye. The one pictured above hailed from a plate served up at Langer's, a deli that has been a longtime favorite of locals, but has now been praised for offering up the best of its kind in the whole country. The accolade comes from writer David Sax, whose pursuit of the pastrami--and other deli delights--was profiled recently in the LA Times.

If you're excited about Thomas Keller's return but can't get any reservations, there is an alternative. TK's new cookbook, Ad Hoc at Home, is now available. Although his previous books (The French Laundry Cookbook, Bouchon, Under Pressure) were notoriously difficult and demanding, this one is being billed as "the long-awaited cookbook for the home chef (that happens to have a blowtorch lying around)." If you can overlook the occasional five hour soffrito, most of the recipes are quick and easy to make (like his chocolate chip cookies). As mentioned in the LA Times, Ad Hoc at Home is a great primer on cooking.

Michelin star collector Thomas Keller has been causing a stir with the opening of Bouchon in Beverly Hills, an expansion of the Bouchon Bakeries in Yountville, Las Vegas, and New York City. Bouchon Beverly Hills is slated to open on November 18, 2009 in the Beverly Hills Gardens building located on Cañon Drive. The opening chef is Rory Herrmann, who previously headed up the kitchen at Per Se.

Here in Los Angeles there is a valued relationship between the food on our plates and the ground from which it comes. From weekly stops at favorite farmers' markets to digging in at a local community garden, the bounty of the land and its role in our eating lives has a profound meaning for many Angelenos, and Americans. Local Chefs are eager to share how they use the market to influence their menu, like Grace and BLD's Neal Fraser and Ford Filling Station's Ben Ford, while some, like Border Grill and Ciudad's Mary Sue Milliken and Susan Feniger have partnered with the LAUSD to help reinforce the importance of garden-based learning and to be conscious of what we eat. The politics of eating has become a local focal point, thanks to Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa's championing a Food Policy Task Force this summer as we celebrated 30 years of farmers' markets in L.A.

This will likely be one of the hottest reservation scrambles of the coming weeks: As hinted earlier by Gayot.com (scroll down), Chef Ludovic Lefebvre will be popping up in December for a limited engagement of LudoBites (LAist Review) at Culver City's Royal/T.

              

Evan Kleiman's love of pie began when she was a little girl. A native Angeleno, the Angeli Caffe Chef/Owner and KCRW Good Food host grew up in Silver Lake, and remembers her family getting their baked treats from Sarno's bakery. It was a family tradition to get one of the bakery's rum cakes to celebrate a birthday, however Kleiman soon yearned to branch out. "At some point in my early childhood I started requesting a pie for my birthday," she explains. "And in spite of the fact that my birthday is in July I requested an apple pie." Her request soon led to her having hands-on kitchen time and a long-running tradition: "I went from requesting them to making them," she adds. "Now I still have a birthday pie every summer but I have berry or peach."

Jaden Hair is a food blogger, television personality, and photographer. She writes for Steamy Kitchen, TLC, and just came out with a new cookbook, The Steamy Kitchen Cookbook: 101 Asian Recipes Simple Enough for Tonight's Dinner . Jaden grew up in Los Angeles and has since become a regular guest on Daytime NBC and a writer for the Tampa Tribune in Florida, where she lives with her family. She recently made an appearance on the Today Show to talk about how to make Korean-style burgers and Kimchi Fried Rice.