This week it's all things Italian but not in Italy. Instead of heading east to Rome, we're going south to Buenos Aires where the descendants of two million Italians have settled. Food writer Rich Lang is our guide.
We'll go inside the dairy with Soyoung Scanlon, California's new star cheese maker who has celebrity chefs kissing the hem of her apron. She follows the milk and her mood, not the market, at her Andante Dairy in Santa Rosa and it shows in her cheeses.
This week it's Cuban Miami with Glenn, Raul, and Jorge. The "Three Guys from Miami" love to eat, they love their town, and they give us advice on where and what to eat, including airport food worth the trip. The recipe for Roast Pork is from their book Three Guys from Miami Cook Cuban: 100 Great Cuban Recipes with a Touch of Miami Spice.
If you've always suspected that taste goes beyond science's big four of sweet, sour, salt and bitter your instincts are right. This week we're looking at umami. It's what food types call the "fifth taste." Our guest, David Kasabian, tells us how to use this wunderkind to make everything we eat taste better. Coq au Vin Nouveau, from The Fifth Taste: Cooking with Umami by David and Anna Kasabian, demonstrates the principle.
Joe Queenan, that quirky observer of the human comedy, takes us his England this week. It's a place of people driven by good-natured insanity, where home cooking thrives, and the steak and kidney pie requires a pneumatic drill. His book is Queenan Country: A Reluctant Anglophile's Pilgrimage to the Mother Country.
This week we take a look at the new kitchen science that has haute restaurant chefs rethinking everything, taking foods apart and putting them back together in ways we can't imagine. The instigator is our guest, chemist Hervé This, author of Molecular Gastronomy: Exploring the Science of Flavor (Arts and Traditions of the Table: Perspectives on Culinary History.) The Sterns report from Eddie's Supper Club in Great Falls, Montana, where the secret marinade is key to their renowned steaks. Then Lynne shares her Guide to Marinades, including several delicious recipes.
This week it's a look at a new way to buy wine and it has everything to do with knowing the importers and distributors. Neal Rosenthal of Rosenthal Wine Merchant joins us to talk wine importers and who to look for on the label. The Sterns are eating herring "cremated" and "sunnyside up" at Cypress Grill in Jamesville, NC. David Rosengarten brings order and tranquility to that baffling liquid: sake. He shares his recipe for Salted Seaweed Salad with Lemon and Freshly Grated Ginger from his latest book, David Rosengarten Entertains. John Willoughby of Gourmet magazine has ideas for what to do between meals in London. For starters, there's cooking classes, shopping, and a secret garden. The New York Times gardening columnist Ann Raver has new veggies for us to try and shares her picks of the best seed sources. We'll check in with Rick Field, the inventive pickle maker behind Rick's Picks, and Lynne takes your calls.
We're off to Australia where it's summer now and the food scene is hot. Aussie star chef Bill Granger tells us where and what to eat in Sydney. His book, Bill's Open Kitchen, is full of uncomplicated and tantalizing recipes like a Glazed Duck with Pear and Rocket Salad. Before taking off for some retail therapy at the Kittery outlets, Jane and Michael Stern fuel up with the Clam-O-Rama at the Maine Diner in Wells.
Chinese food authority Grace Young joins us this week with the story of China's famous pot and shares tips on how to achieve the perfect stir-fry. She leaves us a recipe for Chinese Broccoli with Ginger Sauce from her new book, The Breath of a Wok: Unlocking the Spirit of Chinese Wok Cooking Through Recipes and Lore.
This week our guest is Barbara Kafka, one of the masterful cooks in the food profession. When Barbara digs into a subject she takes no prisoners. She's created her own short list of cookbook classics with titles like Roasting, Soup, and Microwave Gourmet, and each one is a complete education. Now, she has ideas for bringing more veggies into our lives with her new book, Vegetable Love. She leaves us her recipes for Parsnip Ice Cream and Greek Island Potatoes.