Last time I was at Sur La Table I saw this interesting little herb grower. It uses a hydroponics technique to grow herbs quicker. There is a spray bar which mists the roots with water and nutrients. There is a larger version that looks similar to the AeroGarden, however this compact version looks like it [...]

The nice folks at Smith’s Edge just released a line of knife sharpeners for the kitchen and they were kind enough to send me a few of the models. I am a big fan of sharpening, which I admit is a rather dorky, but still a useful pursuit. The manual sharpeners that they sent are [...]

The most important thing to know about knife sharpening is that there is no “best” way to sharpen a knife. There are tons of different sharpening techniques and tools, but that does not matter if you never sharpen your knives! The best way to sharpen is to find the technique that you actually use so [...]

J.K. Adams 1430 Route 30, Dorset, VT Part of: Vermont 08 – Cheese & Tasty Things Tour After reading all of the recent posts it may seem like all that Vermont has is cheese. This is completely untrue. They actually have two things–the other is maple syrup. To make lots of maple syrup you need lots of maple trees, [...]

This is my second ice cube post this week–can you tell it has been hot in Washington, DC? All comments on the weather aside, isn’t this ice cube tray awesome? I got it at the Lego store in the mall and it makes little Lego brick ice cubes. Since it is only the top [...]

This year’s Ataulfo mangos just hit Whole Foods. The texture of these mangos are not as delicate as the champagne mangos, but they are full of flavor. We used our OXO Mango Pitter, and it is still making the cut. The slicer makes it really simple to cut up a mango. It may leave a [...]

I have been a big fan of cold brewed coffee since I first tried it. I learned about this method from a Washington Post article on the Toddy, which is a great device for cold brewing coffee. The article described the smooth, but full flavored cup that cold brewing produces and I had to give [...]

I got the great Adagio Start Set for my birthday this year. The starter set includes 4 tins of tea, a book on tea and the awesome IngenuiTEA teapot. You can get the starter with green, black or flavored teas. The teapot is the real star here, it is designed for loose teas like the [...]

Mango are delicious! Preparing Mangos is a pain in the ass though. It takes a bit of work to split a mango with out hitting the seed or having a lot of waste. Luckily OXO has released a gadget to solve this pressing problem. The OXO Mango Splitter works by passing an oval shaped knife [...]

After much debating we finally got the KitchenAid Pro 600. It is a 6 quart mixer that can supposedly hold 14 cups of flour, and the largest mixer that KitchenAid makes. The decision was between this mixer and the Viking 7 quart mixer. The Viking mixer is the same mixer as the ones from Hamilton [...]

I have a rather large collection of knives, they are my “handbags”. They look so nice on the shelf and I can image the perfect use for all of them. I got my first real knife about 5 years and have been acquiring ever since. I have not been so good with keeping them sharp though. [...]