My mother's brother, Louie, or Luigi, Rotello, like almost all his five siblings, married non-Italians. In my mother's case, it was a Jew she wed, and in Uncle Luigi's, it was a longtime Yankee whose ancestry goes back to the Mayflower. And Chris and Louie made a … [Read more...]
Cooking with Chef Kevin Long at Tosca
Wondering what would be special for holiday eats, I called one of my favorite chefs, Kevin Long, to see what he was doing. “I thought oysters with a pomegranate mignonette would be kind of fun,” said Long, when I walked into Tosca in Hingham one afternoon last week. The chef … [Read more...]
Ginger Betty rocks gingerbread 365 days a year
I’ve always liked hearing about people who loved something when they were kids and kept loving it year in and year out and ended up turning it into something big and beautiful as adults. That’s what Beth Veneto, aka Ginger Betty, did with a love of gingerbread she discovered … [Read more...]
Uncle Luigi’s Turkey: the best recipe
I was at the market the other day and noticed two different women asking the butcher how to make a turkey. Which is funny since most of us make them every year yet somehow forget what to do. I used to be that way, but not anymore. Here’s a tried and true recipe that results in … [Read more...]
Better holiday eating without losing a thing
The holidays are here, and everywhere you go or look the focus is on feasting. Fabulous foods tantalize from the covers of magazines while the workplace and marketplace are filled with holiday treats. There are platters of cookies at the hair dressers; food samples at the … [Read more...]
Brown rice
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 … [Read more...]
Festa della Madonna della Luce
Last Sunday a small pine grove in Hingham erupted in picnic tables covered with food and hundreds of people. The little-known annual celebration was the 51st local Festa della Madonna della Luce – the Feast of the Mother of Light. It takes place every year on the late August … [Read more...]
