A Chocolate Fondue to Remember

The summer after college, I worked briefly as a shoe model. By briefly, I mean that I was fired after one day. I had sublet a basement room somewhere in the hundreds on the West Side of Manhattan, and my belongings, mostly books, remained unpacked, in duct-taped boxes stacked around the bed. I had to…

Red Sorghum Opens in Long Island City

Headliner Red Sorghum The 1930s romanticized movie-set look of China, with fringed hanging lanterns, vermilion accents, wicker and greenery, has come to Long Island City. The elaborate new restaurant from Vincent Lin and his business partner, Mandy Zhang, who also own Blue Willow in Midtown Manhattan and Ye’s Apothecary in Chinatown, and their executive chef,…

Superpunchy One-Pan Eggplant Adobo

Substituting vegetables in traditionally meat-centric dishes is one of my favorite hacks — whether mushrooms for beef, zucchini for shrimp, or, as in Kay Chun’s new take on Filipino adobo, eggplant for chicken. It’s a brilliant swap: The eggplant stays just firm enough to hold its shape, but gets suffused with the tangy flavors of…

Plush, Perfumed Pepperpot

Good morning. Time was, a goodly part of my correspondence was with readers annoyed with me or with The New York Times for publishing recipes calling for ingredients unavailable to them, either for reasons of geography or because they didn’t wish to stray beyond the aisles of their local supermarket. Online shopping and better supermarkets…