The Culinary Seduction

Is this what your last meal was like?

On a scale of 1 to mind-bogglingly hot, how tantalizingly seductive are the meals that you eat throughout the day? Is yours a monotonous act of fork-to-mouth chomping, bearing no real resemblance to the culinary ritualistic masterpiece that rightfully should grace your dining table at least once a day? While your thoughts may invariably stray to Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke and their infamous late night refrigerator raiding scene from 9½ Weeks, your dining experiences don’t have to get that risqué. However, if the word excitement dares not enter your vocabulary when you think of dining, then you, my friend, are in need of a culinary intervention.

Diet is More Than a Four-Letter Word

There’s something inherently cleansing and rejuvenating about confessions. They can impart upon the confessor a sense of freedom, a releasing of burdens or a shift in moral turpitude. So in the spirit of admission (absent flagrant immorality, of course), here is my purifying confession:

I am on a diet.

Keeping You Hydrated: The "Intelligent Water Bottle"

A couple of weeks ago, I went to my mailbox and discovered a lumpy package inside. The mystery package was addressed to me from an addressee that was unfamiliar to me. Naturally, my suspicions were heightened. I hadn’t ordered anything online recently, my birthday had already come and gone and, as far as I knew, I wasn’t expecting anything from anyone. I brought the package inside the house, lay it on the dining room table, considered what could possibly be inside, then put the guessing game to rest by grabbing a pair of scissors and carefully cutting along the top seam.

My Love Affair with Food Continues: Callaloo

Whether it has been by planes, trains, automobiles or boats, I like to fancy myself a well-traveled woman. My journeys have taken me to three of the seven continents where I’ve explored such far-flung places as Dubai, The Netherlands, Belgium, South Africa, Italy, points far and wide throughout the Caribbean and more. I’ve even been known on occasion to indulge in staycations of the mind, courtesy of my HoMedics SoundSpa machine, where at the press of a button  I am instantly soothed by the sounds of the rainforest, ocean, a thunderstorm, a summer night, rain or a waterfall.

The wanderlust within has also unearthed the gourmand within and, as such, food has been a major component of my travels. Entire chickens have fallen prey to my voracious appetite. I’ve pressed my lips to ostrich steak in Johannesburg and lived to tell the tale. And nowhere else in the world would I be able to find a better hand tossed thin crust quattro formaggi pizza than in Venice, Italy. 

5 Great Ways to Picnic in Style

Pick your spot . . . and picnic!

Summer has arrived and we’re full-on in the thick of things. Now that the heat is on, nothing screams summertime quite like a picnic. So turn off the oven, get out of that steamy kitchen, find yourself a shady patch of grass outdoors, spread out your blanket and get ready to indulge in a relaxing bite on your terms. And who says you have to schlep to the park looking like a homeless person with mounds of paper and plastic bags? Now you can waltz away to the lake, an outdoor concert and, yes, even a clearing in the middle of the woods in style with a chic yet functional picnic basket.

Picnic baskets have come a long way from the little wicker contraption that your grandma used to have. With so many types from which to choose‒chic to fashionable, elegant to throwback, and more‒one thing is certain: your goodies will never get bored when they’re toted around in one of these.

Kudos for Taking a Stand . . . Even if it's a Stupid One

Photo: Mackenzie Keegan

So there’s this food truck in NYC . . . 666 Burger (a/k/a Satan’s Burger; hey, I didn’t name it “666” – uh, that’s the mark of the beast, ya know…they’re the ones who say “The burgers are so delicious they’re evil.”), and they concocted this hideous creation called the “Douche Burger.”

To be honest, I’m appalled that I’m even giving up prime blogging real estate for this, but I found the story funny . . . in an asinine, sophomoric sort of way, that is.

Call the burger the “anti-rich-establishment” burger, if you will, but these guys over at 666 Burger decided that they had just about had enough of all of the over-dressed, froufrou burgers and decided, in protest, to create this ridiculous Douche Burger. It’ll only set you back a mere $666.00.

It's Not Just a Job, it's an Adventu..., um er uh, a Career

....it's what I do

I just had the funniest conversation with my aunt. Actually, it wasn’t exactly funny as in the retelling of an uproariously hilarious joke, but rather funny in the sense of an irritating height of peculiarity damn near its pinnacle.

Don’t get me wrong; I hold no grudges against my aunt. Although I haven’t spoken to her in quite a while and it’s been years since I’ve laid eyes on her, she’s not considered a stranger in my life. There’s no family discourse or major dysfunctional triggers that would compel her to do or say anything deliberately off-putting. Unfortunately, she did.

Nature's Least Malevolent Fruit

It has to be said that I do love my husband, Maarten, dearly. But . . . (yes, there’s always a but…) he has this vehement antipathy that is secretly threatening to blow our marriage wide apart. He harbors a suspiciously strong aversion to one thing in particular while, conversely, I actually love it. Not love as in the “I want to marry you and be the mother of your saffron-hued children” sense, but enough of a feeling of fondness that I’m not opposed to resorting to my occasional secret stash, scouring the internet for different ways to use it to my advantage (please don’t get this misconstrued; it doesn’t say “ways to take advantage of it…”) and quietly coveting it when I see someone else in possession of it.