Back to (Better) Basics

January is a great time for basics. After the excess and glamour of the holiday season (read: prime rib roast and rainbow rave cookies), the simplest no-fuss recipes can feel downright refreshing. Which is why we’re particularly excited to share Sohla El-Waylly’s recipe for roasted salmon, the sort of basic recipe you can turn to…

How to Host a Proper English Pub Lunch

The chef Margot Henderson was 10 when she catered her first party, a birthday celebration for her younger brother Robin, then 5, in their hometown, Wellington, New Zealand. “Our mother was a complete health nut who would feed us apple cider vinegar and honey,” recalls Henderson. “I wasn’t going to let my brother suffer like…

How to Be a Better Cook

There are plenty of practical reasons for learning how to cook: saving money, controlling what you eat, knowing precisely what’s in your food. I’m in it for the impractical. I love making a 27-ingredient mole negro when a craving strikes, hosting half a dozen friends on the fly on a weeknight, transforming peanut butter into…

New Year, Very Old Restaurants

Happy new year. January is usually a month of fresh starts and new chapters. But to tell you the truth, I’m not ready to face the future yet. I don’t know if it’s the short afternoons, the feeble sunshine, the chafing wind or just a creeping dread of what might be down the road. But…