If you ask me, great coleslaw is created with good knife skills and a short list of easy-to-find ingredients. Equal importance being placed on both ingredients and the cut of the cabbage. When cabbage is cut into ribbons that are too wide, the slaw ends up awkward, heavy, and daunting on the fork. If the pieces are too long, cheeks get dirtied with dressing-soaked cabbage sticks - awkward and messy...

Not to be a contrarian, but the standard deli-issued potato salad isn't really my thing. Potatoes as the center-point of a salad? Sounds great, I like the general concept. But all the mayo and mush you get with many American potato salads I can do without. I thought a grilled potato salad might be a fun alternative. My game plan: throw as many of the salad ingredient as possible on the grill, whip...

A few nights ago we made the first grilled pizzas of the summer. With fog enveloping San Francisco, Wayne and I bundled in our best jackets and scarves and clambered up the steepest hill in the neighborhood, our bags packed with an assortment of pizza toppings. Our friends Aaron and Malinda have an outdoor oven in their backyard and the plan was to give it a good workout. A parade of pizzas commenc...

I was waiting for the perfect day to give this blackberry limeade recipe a try. Time and again, bundled in blankets on fog shrouded San Francisco afternoons, I'd whine to Wayne that we should move somewhere with a proper summer. Visions of my hand wrapped around a frosty glass of a jeweled-toned refresher like this occupied a disproportionate amount of my daydreams. No more. With temperatures roari...

This is my take on tortilla soup - a full-bodied, spicy vegetarian broth envelops a nest of baked tortilla matchsticks. Tiny roasted tomatoes along with a bit of goat cheese lend tang and texture, and flecks of sun-dried tomatoes bring depth and richness to each bowl. Many tortilla soup recipes call for egregious amounts of shredded cheese, but I've found that a bit crumbled goat cheese lends just...