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Monday, November 27, 2017

Greek to Me & MyHeritage Special Offer

Do I look Greek to you? I don’t think I do but my dad and my uncle both have olive skin and brown eyes, as did their mother who was sometimes misidentified as Italian. Recently I got a chance to try out one of those DNA tests and it estimated my ethnicity at 89.1% Ashkenazi Jewish, 2.2 Balkan and 8.7 Greek. The Ashkenazi and Balkan are not surprising but the Greek is. Of course, Greece isn’t all that far away from Romania and I know that some of my ancestors did come from Romania.  If you would like to either take one of these DNA tests or give one as a gift, MyHeritage is offering the kit for half off the normal price, just $49 today only and you can get free shipping by going to https://www.myheritage.com/dna  and using the code MHCOOKINGWITHAMY Whether or not I’m Greek is up for debate since DNA tests cannot definitely determine your ethnicity , but they are fun. Also have I mentioned I love Greek food? Unfortunately many Greek restaurants in the US have rather limited m...
Monday, November 20, 2017

Giovanni Italian Specialties by Tony Gemignani

I have a soft spot for all things Italian. I love the language, culture and especially the food. When I first moved to San Francisco (after living in Italy) I lived on Telegraph Hill and I did a lof of my shopping in North Beach, which has traditionally been San Francisco's Italian neighborhood, dating back to the early 1900’s. I loved being able to speak Italian in the delis and buy fresh pasta and focaccia and a bit of Pecorino Toscano—just as I had in Florence. But North Beach is changing and Italian delis in particular have been in a decline all over the city.  So I’m really pleased to see that a new Italian shop has opened up in North Beach. It’s Giovanni Italian Specialties by pizza impressario Tony Gemignani and is named for his 3 year old son. The shop is jam packed with high quality ingredients and prepared food. They are making extruded pasta on site and offer fresh pesto and jars of imported ingredients. Because it’s across the street from Washington Square Park...
Saturday, November 18, 2017

Istanbul & Beyond Author Robyn Eckhardt

Istanbul & Beyond  has been named as one of the top cookbooks of Fall 2017 by Epicurious, Publisher's Weekly and Tasting Table. But the reason I’m so excited about it is that I’ve had wonderful food on my two trips to Turkey. There is so much beyond just the typical kebabs you find in Turkish restaurants in the US. Recently I spoke with author Robyn Eckhardt about the book.  How many years did the cookbook take to write and how many trips did you make to Turkey?  We started research in 2011 and turned in the manuscript 5 years later. Probably about 13 or 14 trips, our first trip was in 1998. We were living in China and moved back to the Bay Area and I began studying Turkish and then we started going almost every year for 2-3 weeks. At this point I can talk to anyone in Turkish about anything food relatied.  After all that research, how did you decided what should go in the book?  I focused on things that were not in other books, I wanted to highlight things that w...