Cooking

Most of us have directly experienced the trauma of recent price increases in the fast-food world. Those prices make today’s recipes for takeout burgers seem particularly appetizing. Depending on your fondness for, or dare I say addiction to, takeout burgers, these recipes may even offer a timely lifeline.

Each year, tracks from musical artists of all types vie for the coveted “song of the summer” title. If there were an herb of the summer, that crown would always be snugly rested atop basil’s head.

SEOUL – In the United States, Everything but the Bagel seasoning is a favorite from Trader Joe’s, known for the savory goodness it adds to foods from salmon to waffles. But in South Korea, the trendy topping is generating a different kind of buzz as fans realize it’s actually contraband.

I have a salad fantasy, and it goes something like this: I open my fridge and am greeted by so many prepped ingredients, cooked and raw, that I can treat my kitchen like a fast-casual restaurant. I’ll pick out my base greens, the toppings, crunchy bits and dressing, ask myself whether I want bread with that, and sit down to a fresh meal that’s exactly what I want to eat at that moment.

The Spokane County Library is hoping to create a bridge between teenagers and cultures from around the globe – through their stomachs. Moran Prairie Library is hosting the first session of “Making Snacks from Around the World” at 3 p.m. on Friday, July 12.

Poached salmon will always hold a spark of romance for me because it was the first dinner I ever made for my husband, roughly this time of year 30 years ago. It wouldn’t be a stretch to say we fell in love over that meal of buttery, flaky fish draped in a cool, creamy yogurt sauce.

I can no more remember the first time I tasted a three-bean salad than I can remember the first time I breathed. It’s always been there, at every picnic, every cookout of my life, as unchanging as the air.

The best time of year has begun in earnest. Forget summer; it’s berry-picking season. Depending where you live, the strawberry crop may have passed its peak, but strawberries are just the beginning of a monthslong abundance. In June, blueberries, raspberries and blackberries began to ripen, and they should be available in excess for much of the rest of the summer.

Two hundred and forty-seven. No, that’s not my weight or age. It’s not my IQ. Lord knows, past experience has proven that time and time again. It’s not the dollars in my retirement fund, although it’s pretty close to that. Thursday is the 247th Fourth of July since the big one in 1776. Although armed hostilities had broken out a year earlier with the battles of Lexington and Concord, it was on that day in 1776 that the Declaration of Independence proclaiming America’s separation from the British Empire, was presented to the American public. The peace treaty acknowledging America’s independence was signed seven years later, in 1783.

Grocery shopping for a single person is hard. It’s something I’ve more or less had to do all of my adult life. When I lived with roommates, we would occasionally share things we cooked and would split kitchen staples, like oils and seasonings, but otherwise we focused on feeding ourselves when we made trips to the grocery store. Now that I’ve been living alone for the past few years, shopping just for myself has only become more challenging.

My family moved often while I was growing up, living in small apartments and even occasionally on a sailboat, so our entire kitchen inventory – including a saucepan, skillet, stockpot and wok – could fit in one box tucked into the back of our Chevy hatchback. We could cook pretty much everything with those pans, since they were easily adaptable for tomato soup, blueberry pancakes, steamed crabs, fried rice or any other hankering we might have.

Deciding what to make for dinner is as much about the time and energy one can muster as it is about the ingredients on hand. That’s why Yasmin Fahr’s gorgeous new cookbook, “Cook Simply, Live Fully: Flexible, Flavorful Recipes for Any Mood,” is divided into chapters based on levels of motivation to cook.

We’re in the season for backyard barbecues and dinners. These dishes can help fill out the menu. Smoked Sausage Dogs with HD Sauce offer a perfect sandwich for hot dog and sausage fans.

A few months ago, I fell down a rabbit hole while trying to learn about poaching.

Sunday is Father’s Day, that day of the year set aside to remind us that dads are something special.

In her stellar first cookbook, “Amrikan,” Khushbu Shah takes aim at one of the tropes of Western food writing: describing a foreign dish by tying it to an American equivalent, however much of a stretch it might be. Take pav bhaji, toasted bread (pav) topped with mashed, seasoned vegetables (bhaji), for example. She writes: “People like to describe it as ‘Indian sloppy joes,’ and while visually they have similarities, the taste could not be more different.”

This recipe brings together quintessential spring ingredients – asparagus, spring onions and fresh herbs – in a way that reflects the essence of the season. 

These chilled pies are light and refreshing, perfect for the hot, dry summer months typical of the Inland Northwest. There are two of those ubiquitous pudding/whipped topping desserts. Thank you, Mr. Jell-O, and thank you, Mr. Cool Whip! I like to make two pies: My favorite, Strawberry Fluff Pie, and its close cousin, Lime Fluff Pie, made with the same recipe. They look impressive side by side, fluffy red and fluffy green. It’s always interesting to see how many people can resist trying both.

Most seafoods are richer in nutrients than land-based meat, but the shrimp species that Americans consume are low on that list, near the bottom with cod and tilapia.