This site used to be an up-to-date place to repost some of my Boston Globe regional restaurant reviews along with many of the pieces I wrote for my food column The Dish at Boston.com. Although both outlets have shut down, Restaurants is still a good place to look for Boston area eateries, especially those on the South Shore. Dishing is a page for reflections about the limitless ways people and food connect; to help us see the hunger, providence, and love that feeds life. I’ve also begun gathering other cooking-related information here: items I love at super markets–mostly Trader Joe’s; new dishes that are exciting my friends; reliable cooks to follow; simple plates of food (for when you’re tired); herb and spice combinations I’m learning to use; and whatever other eating related ideas come my way: lucky for us, they’re endless.
I remember with the greatest love and amusement the years my mother spent struggling to keep track of what foods her three daughters liked.
One would eat hot dogs, but only with catsup, while it was mustard or nothing for another. Plain pasta for one, sauced for the other two. One of us liked only the yolks of eggs, another only the whites: buttered corn, plain corn. Until six, I wouldn’t touch cheese: after that, only American cheese, which in our house came to be known as Joni cheese. (Click title to read more.)
Every Thanksgiving for all the years of their marriage, my parents would get up very early to wrestle an enormous turkey into the oven so it’d be cooked before the sun set. They filled our holidays and every day of our lives with an abundance of food as though it was nothing – as though it was truly their greatest pleasure. (Click title to read more.)
Chef Brian Houlihan has really topped himself this time. On July 4 (2019) the restaurateur slung a banner from the former Red Parrot in Hull unveiling his newest restaurant’s new name, The Parrot, and opening its doors. Never mind that three of the enormous restaurant’s reconfigured dining areas were still under construction: The expansive ground floor beach bar dining room was ready and Houlihan was in the kitchen. (Click title to read more.)