Category Archives: Holidays & Celebrations

Fire Food & Drink – A Memory from 2013

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This post is a reprise of a delicious memory from many years ago, when my husband and I were celebrating the 36th anniversary of our meeting, and Fire Food & Drink in Shaker Heights, Ohio, my favorite restaurant, was still open. You might think of this entry as a tribute: To a man, a marriage, and a memory. 

I met my husband-to-be on a snowy, romantic February 18th many, many years ago. And it may sound corny, but it was, in fact, love at first sight. Or at least first weekend. So when I heard that Doug Katz was making a “Meatless Monday vegan dinner” the same week as our “meet-iversary,” my sweet husband cleared his schedule and I made a reservation right away!

You may or may not know that I am not a vegan. I’m not even a vegetarian. But I love real food, and I love creative cooking, so that’s why I wanted to spend an evening at Fire food & drink. It was going to be a special night. Continue reading →

Gratitude 12/25/2022

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Today, friends around the world are gathering to celebrate, and I am thinking about gratitude. It’s a good time to look around and take stock.  

I was born an optimist. I always see the glass half-full. I always turn lemons into lemonade  — what else would you do with them? While it is true that I have, unsurprisingly, had my share of bad days, with a few very bad days thrown in for good measure, I will be the first to tell you that they have made me a better person, and a better doctor as well. Once, when a friend sent me a “positivity challenge,” I smiled to myself because, as far as I’m concerned, it’s never been positivity that was the challenge!  Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Cauliflower Latkes

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At our house, the ingredients for potato latkes have been collected on the kitchen counter, and our guests will begin to arrive around 4:30. It’s hard to imagine getting tired of potato latkes, but here’s a recipe for something a little different that you may be excited to try later this week if and when you’re ready for a change. Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Weekend After Thanksgiving Soup

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This recipe is perfect for getting back on track after Thanksgiving. It will take most of the day to cook, but just 10 minutes to throw together. Some years we actually start it while we’re cleaning up, and leave it to cook slowly all night long. Except for the scallions and ginger, there’s a good chance you already have all the other ingredients. The only labor-intensive part of this recipe is the time spent looking through the bones for bits of meat. But don’t feel the need to go looking for every last piece. Whatever you have will be enough. If you don’t see much turkey on the carcass, that’s fine too. Since most of the flavor comes from the bones themselves, the broth will be delicious whether or not the bones are stripped clean. Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Red Lentil Soup for Rosh Hashanah

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Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, begins tonight at sundown. High Holiday foods tend toward the sweet and the circular: sweet to represent our wishes for a sweet new year, and circular to symbolize the seasons that run one into the next, round and round, year after year.

So it is traditional to eat many different kinds of fruits, especially apples, prunes, pomegranates, dates and apricots; and sweet vegetables such as beets, carrots, sweet potatoes, and leeks (sliced into rounds, of course), as well as black-eyed peas and lentils. And lots of honey, especially for dipping bread and apples. Continue reading →

Grandma Rosie Hits a Home Run (the holidays are coming!)

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Today I want to share a recipe that is a wellspring of memories. The women, the teamwork, the heavenly aromas, the busy kitchen, the arriving family, the great big table, the special dishes, the silver. And the food. Simple recipes with amazing flavor. Here is my Grandma Rosie’s recipe for vegetarian chopped liver, which she made the way her own grandma did, with a wooden bowl and mezzaluna. If you’ll be using a food processor instead, which is probably the case, read to the very end for those instructions.

I have exceptionally fond memories of sitting at the kitchen table with the grownups while they worked to prepare the food, listening wide-eyed as they debated the relative merits of various ingredients and their provenance, chattered about errant siblings, and bragged about their above-average children and grandchildren. I remember feeling very grown up when I was finally old enough to take a place in the lineup. When my chopping arm got too tired to continue, I would pass the bowl, usually to my mother, an aunt, or one of my grandmothers. Continue reading →

Grand Celebration

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Our brand new grandson was born into our family this past week, after which my son-in-law named it “Birthday Week,” not only for the fact of his own birthday and that of his newborn son, but also because we celebrated the first birthday of the infant’s newly promoted big sister! Birthday week!! In celebration of this newly expanded family, the week basically consisted of one wonderful meal after the next, all of which reminded me of a post that I wrote once upon a time about the meals at my parents’ small farm in the Watchung Mountains of New Jersey. The years have passed, and my own parents are gone now, but all our beautiful babies have been named in memory of my mother and father, and that has been a gift of its own. Continue reading →

How to Make a Life

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Connie and her husband Duane were my parents’ closest of friends for upwards of 40 years. They drove to Cleveland from their home in the hills of northwest New Jersey to crawl into bed with my father in his last days, to whisper their love for him, to share some memories, and to be, as always, the best friends they could be. My parents shared thousands and thousands and thousands of memories with Connie and Duane throughout the years. Their shared love for their Afghan hounds and Belgian sheepdogs, their joyful July 4th celebrations, hundreds and hundreds of weekly Sunday dinners, restaurant meals, New Years Eve parties, Thanksgiving graces, glasses of light red Beaujolais, local and national dog shows, chaffeuring one other, Zooming together, housesitting, and endless games of Trivial Pursuit. How do you make a life? How do friends and neighbors become transformed into family? This is how. Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Delicata Squash

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We have been roasting a lot of delicata squash this past month, sliced open, seeds scooped away, and sprinkled with olive oil, salt and cinnamon. I can eat delicatas for breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and still never tire of them. I love the delicate flavor, the gentle skin that doesn’t need to be cut away, and the sweetness of the orange flesh. This way of preparing delicata squash is about as simple as it gets, and somewhat of a contrast to my first introduction to delicatas. Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Red Lentil Soup for the New Year

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This coming Monday evening, as the sun slips below the horizon, we will begin our celebration of Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Rosh Hashanah dishes traditionally tend toward the sweet and the circular: sweet for a sweet new year, and circular to represent the seasons that run one into the next, year after year, around and around. Instead of the usual braid, even challah is twisted into rounds at this time of year.  Continue reading →