Coffee buyer and master roaster Kevin Knox, co-author of Coffee Basics, joins us with a guide to roasts and brewing methods, tells us what the pros are drinking now, and reveals a few surprises, too. To top it off, Lynne's decadent Espresso-Ricotta Cream with Chocolate Espresso Sauce is the perfect partner for a rich cup of joe.
This week it's a look at why we prefer some foods more than others with Dr. Julie Menella of the Monell Chemical Senses Center. Dr. Menella studies taste preferences in infants and explains why one kid won't eat broccoli and another hates carrots.
We're eating Appalachian this week with food writers Ted and Matt Lee, two brothers who rented a pickup truck and headed for the back roads of Eastern Kentucky in search of the elusive pawpaw fruit. Along the way, they discovered that good food is more about human ingenuity than rich resources. Read more about their adventure in the article, "On the Appalachian Trail" in the March 2002 issue of Food & Wine magazine.
Can you be addicted to sugar? We'll find out when Robin Edelman joins us on this week's show. Robin is the nutrition editor for Eating Well magazine and author of the article "Sweet Addiction" in the Fall 2002 issue.
This week Lynne talks with Paul Draper, CEO of Ridge Vineyards, and the winemaker who elevated California Zinfandel to world-class status by shunning market-driven, high-tech methods in favor of ancient techniques. The resulting wines are simply the essence of refinement, intensity, and complexity.
Art historian Carolin Young, author of Apples of Gold, Settings of Silver, takes us back to 1753 and a seduction supper with Casanova himself. In those days, romantic dinners were an art form, and this one has an interesting twist. It's all about who is seducing whom.
Restaurant critic John Heckathorn takes us to Honolulu, one of Lynne's favorite food cities, for an insider's dine-around and guide to eating like a local. In a town notorious for high prices, John's advice and restaurant picks guarantee great eating for little money.
We'll take a look at small-batch bourbons with Kentucky bourbon maker Frederick Booker Noe, the grandson of Jim Beam and one of the pioneers in this new take on American whiskey. Forget bourbon and soda—this is stuff you'll want to leisurely swirl and sniff before taking a sip. Some experts claim these whiskeys are right up there with the great brandies and single-malt scotches.
Chef and author Anthony Bourdain described his first book, Kitchen Confidential, as an "obnoxious and over-testosteroned" account of his life in the restaurant business. Still, the book remained on the New York Timesbestseller list for weeks. Now the food world's outrageous bad boy is at it again with his new book, A Cook's Tour, the chronicle of his planet-circling jaunt in search of the ultimate meal. Mr. Bourdain likes his adventure with a generous dose of risk and an occasional touch of the bizarre—like dodging Cambodian minefields to have cocktails in Khmer Rouge territory and eating poisonous blowfish in Japan.
This week we're off to a region of Italy only 20 minutes outside Venice—yet known and visited by few. The wonderful cuisine here could be called a fusion of "Northern Italian Soul" meets the Arabian Knights. The greatest varieties of wines in all of Italy come from the area, and the scenery is pretty good too. It's Friuli-Venezia Giulia, and our guide is none other than culinary explorer Fred Plotkin, author of the new book La Terra Fortunata. Fred shares a few undiscovered wine bargains from the region and a recipe for Polenta With Five Flavors, a dish containing most of the classic foods of central Friuli.