Changing of the Blog

After sharing 113 meals with you, I’m running out of steam. While I remain on the look-out for interesting recipes and will continue to post them, the blog will encompass tips, observations, and news items that I hope you’ll find interesting.

Pantry: My pantry staples now include a minuscule package of squid ink, a $3.00 investment that transforms plain rice into a delectable black risotto. Sazón Goya Con Azafran is another flavoring favorite. A few pinches act like magic on anything from vegetables to stews.

Cheese of the Month: Roaring 40’s Australia

Roaring 40's Blue Cheese hails from King Island, south of Tasmania. The island’s rich soil and lush pastures account for its unique dairy industry. The cows of King Island are renowned for producing the sweetest, creamiest, purest milk, leading to an array of fine dairy products and award-winning cheeses among them the Roaring 40's Blue. The cheese is named after the ferocious westerly wind that blows between the latitude of 40 and 49 degrees, creating havoc along its way.

Made from cow's milk, Roaring 40’s Blue is a full bodied, slightly nutty cheese, with a pleasant after kick. The rindless cheese is matured in black wax casing which helps retain its moisture. Quite incidentally, it also adds to the appearance of this macho cheese.

I served the Roaring 40’s along-side two other cheeses which were of different origins and also had unique pedigrees: Nocetto di Capra, is a soft-ripened, velvety cheese made from Orobica goats, which are indigenous to Bergamo, Italy, and Abbaye de Belloc, a dense textured, tangy cheese made from the red-nosed Manech sheep (an old local breed) by the Benedictine Monks at the abbey of Notre-Dame de Belloc in the Pays Basque.

The wonder is that these remarkable cheeses ended up at the cheese department of Zabars on the upper West Side.

Good news for upper Eastsiders: On Saturday, April 30th from 10-3, the 82nd Street Greenmarket will play host to the Recycle-A-Rama paper shredding truck--an easy way to dispose of old documents and papers you don’t want anybody else to read. Check: Uppergreenside.org.

And now, something unrelated to food: my friends Nimet and Sue Habachy will hold their semi-annual Egyptian Craft Sale on May 3, 4, 5, from 11 am to 8 pm at the Christian Education Center, on 7 West 55th Street. The sale features one-of-a-kind items, hand crafted from scraps and trash heaps by young Egyptian women. The Habachy sisters have championed this cause for many years.