Do you cook for yourself or your family every day? Do you love food and cooking blogs, and tips to make your food prep more efficient and more fun? We talk to the down-to-earth, Jessica Merchant, about her blog, her books, her methods and her practical approach to good cooking. She is a popcorn machine of ideas. Listen. It’s on Tip of the Tongue.

Ellen Kanner has written a terrific book full of wonderful, flavorful recipes that are all vegan. She writes for the person who is using some prepared or canned food. This makes the book perfect for those putting a toe in the vegan waters. And for those who have eaten a vegan diet for some time, it offers new recipes with available ingredients that can pull you out of the dinner doldrums.

Ellen Kanner

Vegan Pimento Cheese (from Miami Vegan, with permission)

8 ounces raw cashews soaked overnight*

3 tablespoons nutritional yeast

1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar

1 teaspoon paprika

1/4 teaspoon turmeric

2 pimentos—canned or jarred workfine—plus a little of their juice

a squeeze of fresh lemon juice (about a teaspoon)

sea salt and fresh ground pepper totaste

optional adds:◊splash of hot sauce or pinch cayenne

1/2 teaspoon white miso◊

1/2 teaspoon garlic powder

Instructions

•Drain and rinse cashews. Pour into a food processor and whiz or pulse until you’ve got a thick paste.

•Add remaining ingredients: nutritional yeast for cheesiness, apple cider vinegar for the littlest bit of acidic edge, paprika to deepen flavor, turmeric for a little bit of earthy funk and to nail that adorable pale orange shade, pimento—you cannot make pimento cheese without pimento

•Blitz it all together for 3–5 minutes or until it’s luscious, totally smooth with no graininess from the nuts, and you’ve achieved that particular pimento cheese shade

.•Squeeze in fresh lemon juice and taste. Add any optional ingredients—the miso, hot sauce, and/or garlic powder. Season with sea salt and fresh pepper, and taste again for balance

.•Serves 4 to 6

* Got nut allergies? Substitute 1/2 cup sunflower seeds and 1/2 cup pumpkin seeds for the cashews

Roger Lee answers your questions about no and low alcoholic drinks and bars. He talks about the restaurant industry and how it is changing. We talk about tipping and labor issues front of house and back of house. We even talk about protein bars, sustainability, and local produce.

Roger is a lawyer with Stubbs, Alderton, and Markiles, LLP in Los Angeles. CA.

You can find out more about what Roger is doing and what he thinks here:

and here:

Here are some insights from Revere Auctions’ Sean Blanchet about the Splendid Collection auction. The auction has selections of many objects and writings that belong to Lynne Rossetto Kasper, long-time host of the podcast, The Splendid Table. You can listen to the conversation about what is available, why it is happening, and what might interest you.

Lynne has had an extraordinary career, but fans of The Splendid Table will enjoy the personal items that are available, such as dish towels and napkins. There are lovely copper pots as well as lots of books, many of which are signed with a dedication to her. She has notebooks, and papers that are annotated with post-it notes. Even just the auction catalog is an extraordinary look into a respected food historian’s readings, cooking, and thoughts. Before The Splendid Table she was a writer and cooking school teacher.

Welcome to subscribers. I would love to hear from you. Do you listen to The Splendid Table? Will you be bidding on this auction?

Interested in restaurant criticism, the decline of alternative weeklies, and the rise of influencers? Is food a real part of the cultural landscape or is it just fun? What and who can we rely on for ideas, not just information like hours of operation and the name of a place? James Beard Foundation Award winner Besha Rodell has written a memoir about her food life, Hunger Like a Thirst. Listen. It’s on Tip of the Tongue.

Read her New York Times work. The Brisbane Times.

We talk to a founder of the Museum of the American Cocktail, Tim McNally, about the wine and spirits industry. A wine writer who spent much of his career judging wine, he is the perfect person to ask about the state of the industry today.

He is a writer, and his book about the Sazerac is wonderful.

Want to know more? Listen. It’s on Tip of the Tongue.

Tip of the Tongue is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Tim McNally

Let’s not overlook the role of women and home entertaining in the story of the cocktail. Nicola Nice tells the story of how women brought the cocktail home, as a part of regular entertaining - how they entertained during Prohibition and into the cocktail party era. She explains it in fascinating detail in The Cocktail Parlor: How Women Brought the Cocktail Home.

Nicola writes about these themes regularly in her blog, The Hostess Diaries. She describes it as “a blog dedicated to the culture of cocktails and hospitality, as told through the lens of women’s history.” It is a perspective about drinking and drinking culture, especially as it is related to drinking cocktails, that shouldn’t be overlooked, if you are interested in the cocktail and its history.

Remember those sour mixes in your parents’ home bar? And bartenders used them too. Those mixes gave sours a bad name. We talk to Philip Greene, the author of the new book, Sours: A History of the World’s Most Storied Cocktail Style, about this and other things Sour. Phil is one of the founder’s of the Museum of the American Cocktail, and has written a number of books about the cocktail. Listen. It’s on Tip of the Tongue.

Philip Greene

You can read the story of the Lion of Baltimore cocktail on page 130 of Sours. Here is the recipe for the cocktail created by Phil Greene. Make the drink, and sip it while you read the story.

2 ounces Jamaican dark rum (such as Smith & Cross or Appleton)

1 ounce sweet vermouth (Dolin or Martini work well)

3/4 ounce fresh lime juice

1/4 ounce orgeat

2 or 3 dashes Dale DeGroff’s pimento bitters

Combine all of the ingredients in a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Shake well and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.