This week's guest could be New York's next star chef. He's Suvir Saran, author of Indian Home Cooking. His food is all about clear, singing flavors and simple, light dishes. Tomato Rasam is a fine example.
It's our annual Thanksgiving show and we're bringing you a banquet of recipes, stories, a cut of history, and new looks at feasting inside and outside our borders. Food authority Joan Nathan talks real American food today from home kitchens across the country. Her recipe for Braised Butternut Squash with Mustard Seeds, Chili, Curry Leaves, and Ginger is from her new book, The New American Cooking.
This week it's a blast from the past - the macrobiotic diet - with Jessica Porter, author of The Hip Chick's Guide to Macrobiotics. Jessica has a fresh take on that 1960's phenomenon.
Tod Murphy is a man who's giving restaurant chains a run for their money. His Farmer's Diner in Barre, Vermont serves up good, cheap food from local farms. The system is a winner that could take "local" national.
This week it's a newspaper that gets it. America is food obsessed as never before, yet newspapers across the country are slashing their food sections down to a few recipe columns off the wire amid a mass of ads. And forget local coverage. An exception is the San Francisco Chronicle food & dining page. Executive food and wine editor Michael Bauer joins us to talk the plight of the food page. The recipe for Pomegranate and Spice-Braised Pork comes from the Chronicle.
We're taking a look at Zinfandel, the mystery grape swathed in controversy, its origins lost in the mists of time. Wine historian Charles Sullivan, author of Zinfandel: A History of a Grape and Its Wine, joins us to unravel its questionable past.
This week we're creating spaces for entertaining. It's not about remodeling, it's about working with what you already have. Our guest is architect Sarah Susanka, whose latest book is Home by Design: Transforming Your House Into a Home.
This week it's a look at Antonin Carême, the world's first celebrity chef. Abandoned by his family at age nine to starve on the streets of Paris, Carême overcame impossible odds to achieve wealth, fame and an unheard of independence. In the process he reshaped French cuisine. His biographer Ian Kelly, author of Cooking for Kings, tells the story. Carême's recipe for Orange Flower and Pink Champagne Jelly takes us back to the 19th century when he cooked for kings.
Indian food expert Madhur Jaffrey joins us this week with the tale of how curry turned global. It's all about India's caste system and Britain's lust for empire. Madhur shares her recipe for Cilantro Chicken from her latest book, From Curries to Kebabs: Recipes from the Indian Spice Trail.
This week, our guest Trevor Corson, author of The Secret Life of Lobsters, takes a new look at endangered sea life. It's story of underwater feminism, renegade scientists, and amorous crustaceans!