When chef Thomas Ciszak was growing up in Germany near the Dutch border, it was common to see people buy a whole pickled herring from a street vendor, pick it up by the tail and down it in a single gulp....
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At Valley Shepherd Creamery in Long Valley, they are getting out the clippers. About 700 sheep need to be sheared this month, and you're welcome to pitch in. Sheep are giving birth, too, and you are welcome to cuddle the newborn lambs. And then, not least, there's the cheese....
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As crocuses pop out of the ground this time of year, at Polonia Bakery in Passaic, traditional Polish Easter babkas pop out of the oven in even greater profusion, and are gone just as quickly....
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Coal and wood are the two most traditional fuels for pizza ovens. Each has its proponents, but in this era of gas ovens, neither is easy to find. A new restaurant makes pizza in both a coal oven and a wood oven. Try both kinds, and you be the judge....
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Chestnuts make most of us think of street vendors hawking the hot, blackened nuggets during the holidays. Or Nat King Cole (more recently, Justin Bieber) singing, "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire, Jack Frost nipping at some rum." Okay, the lyrics didn't go quite that way. The point is, there is much more to chestnuts and what you can do with them than our associations suggest....
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As a Jersey native, chef Barbi "Red" Newman has eaten her share of Philly cheesesteaks. But ever since her days as pastry chef of Chicago’s Ritz Carlton Hotel, Newman's heart has belonged to another city's hot sandwich--and now she's bringing it to New Jersey....
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Spencer Rubin has been thinking like an entrepreneur since he was six years old, when his dad would take him fishing and Spencer had the idea of selling the dishes they made with their catch. Now, at 26, the Montclair native not only is the founder and managing partner of Melt Shop grilled cheese restaurants, Forbes magazine has certified him in its annual list of "the entrepreneurial, creative and intellectual best of their generation."...
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Symbolically, I mean. Still, it's a nifty new twist to the same-ole-same-ole, and it does involve dipping something relatively large in a vat of molten chocolate......
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Maybe it takes a man who was a picky eater as a child. ("I hated everything!") Maybe it takes a man who skipped his 2002 Rutgers graduation to go to Italy, and who came back telling everyone, "I need to learn how to cook." Whatever it takes, Dan Richer--owner of Razza in Jersey City and Arturo's in Maplewood--now bakes bread and churns butter that you don't blink an eye to pay $4 for. We caught up with him after a recent trip to Italy....
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Whoever wins the game on Feb 3, gourmands have to like the spread—and I don't mean the point spread. I mean the beer, wine and food spread suggested by the two home cities. Here are some ideas from all-pro Jersey chefs and wine experts....
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That was one of the more striking ideas floated last week by the owners of DeBragga & Spitler, the venerable meat purveyors, during a tour of their big, new facility in Jersey City. The owners, Marc Sarrazin, 57, and George Faison, 56, age beef in two refrigerated rooms. But they are anything but chill about the state of food production, particularly meat production, in the U.S....
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Dominique Filoni, executive chef of Avenue in Long Branch, grew up in the south of France foraging for wild leeks, exotic mushrooms and snails. He has never hunted for truffles. “It is a very secretive process," he says. "And very competitive as well.” ...
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Denise Cerreta, an acupuncturist in Salt Lake City, used to run a café in the front of her clinic to make ends meet. One day in 2003, she made a decision. "A huge energy came over me," she recalls. She had been thinking about "letting people price their own food," according to what they could pay. "The next person who walks through the door..." she told herself. A decade later, the consequences of that decision, here in New Jersey and elsewhere, are astonishing....
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Dana Marchione majored in Italian at Rutgers, spent two semesters studying in Italy, and moved there after graduation to teach English and work as an au pair for an Italian family. When she returned to the States, she missed the food and the language tremendously. Then one day, on the street in Hoboken, she overheard a young man speaking her beloved language. She turned, their eyes met...and well, that man is now her fiance. “I guess now I know," she says, "why I spent all those years studying.” ...
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Few holiday meals are as elaborate as the traditional southern Italian Christmas Eve festa known as the Feast of the Seven Fishes, or La Vigilia, meaning The Vigil. For more about the feast, a recipe and my tribute in verse--and you thought I only cooked prose!--you'll just have to click....
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The devastation Sandy wreaked along the Shore has been well documented. But the superstorm also pushed the Hudson River over the sea walls in Hoboken and Jersey City, damaging homes and businesses, including a large number of restaurants—many still recovering....
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We’ve had Black Friday, Small Business Saturday, Super Sunday and Cyber Monday, so why not a whole week devoted to delicious food gifts made right here in the Garden State? Call it NJ’s Delicacy Days. Dig in, folks, now you can eat local and give local…...
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We Americans may feel we invented the deliciously flaky pies that will adorn our Thanksgiving tables, but like the Pilgrims themselves, the concept of sweets or savories wrapped in dough actually came from across the Pond. Thanks to the Pie Store in Montclair, all you have to do serve one of these heritage creations is warm it up th your oven....
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Val Traore, CEO of the Food Bank, is blunt. “Food drives are helpful but money is better as we can get truckloads of nutrient-dense food from other parts of the country for pennies on the dollar. I...
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The last sound I heard before the lights went out at 5 pm last Monday, October 29th, was the sizzle of a little boneless leg of lamb searing on my stovetop. It had been marinated in wine and fresh herbs, and it smelled marvelous. As it always does, that sizzle held so much promise, but this time it was not to be....
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