Last month my husband attended a business dinner with colleagues, and because the out-of-towners didn’t want to take home a doggie bag, he was able to snag half of someone’s roasted chicken dinner for me from Harvest in Cambridge. Score! The herbaceous and pungent chicken and garlicky side of romanesco, as it turns out, was delectable. I don’t mean delectable because it was “free” – which is totally a thing – but delectable ON ITS OWN. I had to know what this dish was. A litt

This is the lemon cake for people who don’t typically like lemon cakes. I know, because I’m one of them. My friend Sarah recently celebrated her 30th birthday, and I wracked my brain for at least a month beforehand to come up with the perfect birthday cake for her. She’s an accomplished baker in her own right, so I didn’t want to make something she’d typically make herself. Then it hit me like a ton of bricks: LEMON! Sarah’s husband isn’t the biggest fan of lemon desserts, so

Growing up, my perception of green beans was grim: they came from a can looking a sickly dark green and flopped when you touched them. Don’t even get me started on the smell. And in casseroles, they were even worse. I didn’t fall in love with green beans until my early 20s, during a meal at Trattoria L’Incontro in Astoria, Queens.  The greens were rich and nutty and snapped when I bit into them. They took on the delicate flavor of the butter and and balsamic glaze they were c

I have a confession to make: I don’t generally like lemon desserts. Give me your creamy, your chocolate, your vanilla-based confections – I’ll take anything soft, buttery, and caramelized. Lemon can so often overpower, it vanquishes all other flavor, from cheesecakes to sugar cookies. Bleh. But not this time. A few weeks ago, my friend Danny came to me with a deal: he’ll do my taxes for me (an odorous affair) in exchange for an anniversary cake for his wife. He wanted a mock