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November 2001
November 3 - November 10 - November 17 - November 24
(How to listen)
November 3: Espresso | Listen
(Repeat broadcast)
This week we'll meet the family responsible for the modern-day espresso machine. Dr. Ernesto Illy, head of the family's coffee dynasty in Italy, explains Italy's coffee culture and tells us what a really fine cup of espresso should taste like.
Jane and Michael Stern are in Milwaukee eating soul food at Mr. Perkin's Family Restaurant where the turnip bottoms are "better than any vegetable should be." To help us determine what kind of turkey to buy for the holidays Christopher Kimball, editor of Cook's Illustrated, stops by to report on the results of the magazine's turkey taste test. We'll go to Ketchum, Idaho, for a Basque sheep festival, and from Appalachia we have a story of cornbread and biscuits. In the second half of the show Lynne takes your calls and gives us her recipes for Three-Generation Thanksgiving Turkey and Herman's Cornbread Stuffing.
Featured clip: A Turkey Taste Test with Christopher Kimball
November 10: Friuli-Venezia Giulia | Listen
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.
Jane and Michael Stern are across the pond as well, eating Couscous Royale at Relais des Six Boules, a French version of the truck stop. Who but the Sterns goes looking for road food in France? Beer expert Stephen Beaumont, author of Premium Beer Drinker's Guide, reports on Lambic, an eccentric style of commercially made beer. Movie critic Rex Reed reminisces about eating with Tennessee Williams. Lynne has a trivia question about baby food and cotton candy and leaves us with her recipe for Dark and Moist Gingerbread.
Featured clip: Lambic beer with Stephen Beaumont
November 17: Happy Thanksgiving | Listen
It's our annual Thanksgiving show and we're celebrating with one of America's most beloved authors: poet, novelist, and screenwriter Jim Harrison. You may remember him from Legends of the Fall. We'll be talking with Jim about food and its role in our lives, a subject he covers with passion and wit in his book, The Raw and the Cooked: Adventures of a Roving Gourmand.
Jane and Michael Stern are eating seven sweets and seven sours at the Dutch Kitchen in Frackville, Pennsylvania. We'll hear about hard apple cider, an old-time American alternative to wine, from Steve Wood of Farnum Hill Ciders. British writer Jim Crace looks charity square in the eye in a story from his book The Devil's Larder. Gourmet magazine editor Ruth Reichl tells us what the holiday might be like in New York City this year, we have a guide to brining turkey from Cook's Illustrated magazine, and Lynne shares Thanksgiving cooking tips and her recipe for Moroccan-Inspired Turkey.
Featured clip: Hard apple cider with Steve Wood
November 24 | Listen (Repeat broadcast)
Diana Kennedy, the British woman who introduced America to authentic Mexican cooking and started our love affair with the chile pepper, joins us this week to share the Mexico she knows so well. Diana's latest book, The Essential Cuisines of Mexico, is a treasure. So is her recipe for tortillas filled with mushrooms Empanadas De Hongos.
The always original Jane and Michael Stern are in Charleston, South Carolina, eating at The Wreck, a restaurant that's hard to find because it's housed in an old bait locker and has no sign. Joshua Wesson, wine maverick and seeker of the unexpected, has been tasting wines from Canada and stops by with a report. Our favorite "slightly neurotic" foodie, Scott Haas, recently traveled to New York City to dine at Restaurant Daniel where deep pockets are de rigeur. He tells us if it was worth the trip.
When we heard of a new spa at the Hotel Hershey where they use chocolate in the treatments Lynne rushed to the phone to get the details. She was intrigued by the chocolate fondue body wrap. We'll listen in on her conversation with spa director Jennifer Whaland Smith.
Featured clip: Joshua Wesson on Canadian Wines
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