Best Cookbooks of 2011, Holiday Beer, Glogg

Guest Interview

Market Report ()

Amelia Saltsman, author of the Santa Monica Farmers' Market Cookbook, gives us an easy recipe for homemade applesauce. This applesauce is not sweet, but instead is meant to be paired with savory foods like latkes or grilled meats. Her recipe is on the Good Food Blog.

Danielle Dupuy and her family own Ventura Fish Company, a family-owned business based out of Ventura, California. Their boat has been out fishing for four weeks in between Southern California and Hawaii and will bring in the catch from this month's expedition Saturday, December 17 at the Ventura Harbor. They will also bring fresh fish from this catch to the Wednesday Santa Monica Farmers' Market on December 21. The catch should include ahi tuna, opah and swordfish.

Guest Interview

Texas Drought ()

Todd Staples is the Agricultural Commissioner for the state of Texas, which is in the midst of the worst drought in the state's history. Ranchers are selling off livestock because of the inability to feed them. Hay has become expensive and rare, and ranchers are paying almost three times what they did before the drought and shipping it in from as far away as Florida and the Dakotas.

Guest Interview

The Baco Finds a Home at Baco Mercat ()

Chef Joseph Centeno, the executive chef at the Lazy Ox Canteen in downtown LA, recently opened Bäco Mercat. Jonathan Gold describes the bäco as a flatbread, about the size of a papusa, with inventive toppings like pork belly, beef carnitas, romesco and salbitxada or merguez sausage, harissa and goat cheese.

Bäco Mercat
408 S Main St
Los Angeles, CA 90013
213-687-8808

All of Jonathan Gold's restaurant suggestions are on the Good Food Restaurant Map.

Guest Interview

Holiday Brews ()

Hallie Beaune and her partner, Christina Perozzi, are the Beer Chicks. Beaune talks about her favorite holiday brews of 2011. She likes to purchase the holiday beers now when they are available and keep them in her beer fridge to open in the summer months or perhaps drink during next year's holiday season. You can purchase all of Beaune's suggested beers at the Eighth Street Bottle Shop, which is in the Golden Gopher in Downtown LA. You can also find gift boxes there including boiler maker combinations curated by the Beer Chicks.

Hallie's Picks for 2011 Holiday Brews
4 Calling Birds: The Bruery, Placentia, California
The fourth beer in The Bruery's special ‘Twelve Days of Christmas' series, this beer integrates gingerbread spices into a robust Belgian-style strong dark ale. Notes of licorice and banana bread linger with dark fruit, molasses and bitter chocolate. 11% ABV

Gift of the Magi: The Lost Abbey, San Marcos, California
This massive Golden Ale is fit for a king, brewed with Frankincense and Myrrh for a spicy finish and balance to full-bodied honey sweetness 9.5% ABV

Scaldis Noel: Brasserie Dubuisson Freres, Belgium
This once a year holiday seasonal from Belgium shows a burnished ruby-copper color and a spicy aroma with notes of caramel and marzipan and peach. The taste is round, with hints of anise leading to a long warming finish. 12.5% ABV

And if that isn't enough for you, check out more of her picks in this article.

Guest Interview

Best Cookbooks of 2011 ()

Celia Sack is the owner of Omnivore Books on Food in San Francisco. She recommends her favorite cookbooks of 2011. 

The Mozza Cookbook by Nancy Silverton
The Fearless Baker by Emily Luchetti and Lisa Weiss
Plenty by Yotam Ottolenghi
Tender by Nigel Slater
Bi Rite Market's Eat Good Food by Sam Mogannam
Super Natural Every Day by Heidi Swanson

She also recommends two quarterly publications: Canal House Cooking and Lucky Peach.

You can listen to outtakes from this conversation on the Good Food Blog.

Guest Interview

Artisan Pizza in Five Minutes a Day ()

Zoe Francois and Jeff Hertzberg are the authors of Artisan Pizza and Flatbread in Five Minutes a Day. The book includes recipes for pizza dough, a variety of flatbread doughs and even a brioche dough with which they make sweet pizzas.

Guest Interview

A Swedish Christmas ()

Deep End Diner Eddie Lin visits the 28th Annual Swedish Christmas Fair at the Shrine Auditorium. He eats pea soup, pancakes, lingonberry jam, Swedish meatballs and, of course, glögg, the mulled wine that is popular in Sweden this time of year.