KRCU's A Harte Appetite

You don't have to be from Africa to appreciate couscous. The late Craig Claiborne, for example, called it one of the dozen greatest dishes in the world.

The Instant Pot is fundamentally a pressure cooker, a device invented way back in 1679 by the French physicist Denis Papin.

The pomegranate, that beautiful fruit with the jewel-like red seeds, has recently exploded on the culinary scene. Which is appropo for a fruit which inspired the name a hand-tossed explosive, known as the grenade.

In Scotland, their oatmeal, or porridge, is a hallowed dish, celebrated every year at the World Porridge Making Championship in the village of Carrbridge.

Where would you find the most authentic Chicken Kiev? Probably Ukraine. The definitive Peking Duck? Certainly Beijing. The perfect Swedish Meatballs? Obviously Sweden. Or maybe Ikea. And where would you go to find the ultimate Greek yogurt? That's not so easy a question to answer.

Though watercress has been an English tradition at high tea and even in school lunches for years and years, the truth is, relatively speaking, the Brits are newcomers to the plant.

Even before people thought of putting it in food, lavender was casting its spell. It has been cultivated since the beginning of recorded time.

Whipped cream, after all, is one of the most decadent preparations of all time. For that matter, even when not whipped, cream, as an ingredient, cannot be beat.

Hula Pie is the signature dessert of an Hawaiian Restaurant chain and originated at the company's first restaurant, Kimo's in Old Lahaina Town in Maui.

When life gives you lemons, make lemonade, the old adage says. That's good advice, but there's an assumption underlying it that ought to be challenged. What's wrong with lemons? A life without them -- from the culinary perspective -- would be sour indeed.

Pretzels, some historians contend, may be the oldest snack food known to humankind.

Contrary to popular belief, corned beef and cabbage is not the national dish of Ireland. You won't find it on menus there except in places where there is a lot of tourist traffic. Some food historians even go so far as to question whether the dish is actually Irish at all.

Spain has given many gifts to gastronomy, like paella, manchego cheese, and the world's greatest ham. But no less noteworthy are churros, or Spanish donuts.

Of all of the iconic dishes of the Deep South none is more iconic than banana pudding.

I think it was Moliere who observed that, "Some men eat to live while other men live to eat." I know which category I fall into. I love food, glorious food.

A mug cake is a single serving of cake made by quickly stirring up batter in a mug and nuking it in the microwave. It apparently came to widespread public attention in a YouTube video back in 2009.

Red velvet cake was all the rage years ago, but its popularity has faded since the 1970s amid safety concerns about the red food coloring in use back then to tint the cake.Perhaps it's time to bring red velvet cake back.

Where would you find the most authentic Chicken Kiev? Probably Ukraine. The definitive Peking Duck? Certainly Beijing. The perfect Swedish Meatballs? Obviously Sweden. Or maybe Ikea. And where would you go to find the ultimate Greek yogurt? That's not so easy a question to answer.

Cake mixes have some real advantages over home made. For instance, they're much more forgiving. Over-beat the batter and they still bake up fine. Under-beat it and the result is nonetheless perfectly acceptable. Take a box cake out of the oven sooner than you should and all will be well.

Though watercress has been an English tradition at high tea and even in school lunches for years and years, the truth is, relatively speaking, the Brits are newcomers to the plant.

Hula Pie is the signature dessert of an Hawaiian Restaurant chain and originated at the company's first restaurant, Kimo's in Old Lahaina Town in Maui.

The mustard plant is fully deserving of accolades. For centuries its been used as a food, flavoring and folk remedy. In fact it was so important as a medicinal herb to the ancient Greeks that they credited their god of medicine for its creation.

In the culinary world one letter can make a big difference. Take, for example, the distinction between macaroon and macaron. Though identical words except for one extra letter "o," the confections they refer to couldn't be more dissimilar

Where would you find the most authentic Chicken Kiev? Probably Ukraine. The definitive Peking Duck? Certainly Beijing . The perfect Swedish Meatballs? Obviously Sweden . Or maybe Ikea. And where would you go to find the ultimate Greek yogurt? That's not so easy a question to answer.

Though watercress has been an English tradition at high tea and even in school lunches for years and years, the truth is, relatively speaking, the Brits are newcomers to the plant.

Even before people thought of putting it in food, lavender was casting its spell. It has been cultivated since the beginning of recorded time.

Whipped cream, after all, is one of the most decadent preparations of all time. For that matter, even when not whipped, cream, as an ingredient, cannot be beat.

Hula Pie is the signature dessert of an Hawaiian Restaurant chain and originated at the company's first restaurant, Kimo's in Old Lahaina Town in Maui.

You may have never heard of Nephi Grigg, but if you've ever eaten a meal at a grade school cafeteria, you've probably been served his signature culinary invention.

Still there are iconic dishes we remember fondly, and perhaps the most legendary culinary memory of school days is the unfortunately named Sloppy Joe. Everyone knows what they are, yet it's difficult to determine their origin.

The Joy of Cooking is something of the odd duck in cookbook publishing. It's a general interest book, has virtually no glossy photographs, and it was not written by a celebrity. But it has endured for decades because its authors treat readers not as pupils, but as friends.

The Romans believed cinnamon was sacred and every Roman emperor stocked cinnamon in his treasury. The Romans weren't the only ones who valued cinnamon. The ancient Egyptians used it for witchcraft and embalming.

Rose Levy Beranbaum, in her book, “The Pie and Pastry Bible,” a volume which I've read religiously, says, “There are two kinds of people: cake people and pie people.”

A 3.5 ounce serving of spinach contains more iron than the same sized hamburger patty. Not bad for a food that is 91% water.

Feta cheese -- sometimes referred to as the princess of cheeses -- is every bit as admirable as any other Greek invention, and it is surely just as ancient. It is likely as old as Greece itself.

Delmonico's was the first American restaurant to have a printed menu, the first to offer a separate wine list, the first to have tablecloths, the first to offer a private dining room and the first to provide an orchestra for background music.

No wonder the carrot is the second most popular vegetable in the world after the potato—not bad for a plant which, according to the Oxford Companion to Food, “had an unpromising origin.” It is, after all, merely a refined version of a common weed—Queen Anne's lace.

The French think they're superior to us when it comes to clothing, wine, and food -- not to mention romance! And, admittedly, they do have a way with each; and perhaps nowhere is French sophistication more evident -- at least in the culinary world -- when it comes to pancakes.

From a culinary perspective, every season is joyous, but for me it's always spring, at least in my kitchen. That's because my favorite item of kitchenware is the springform pan. The function of the pan is to make it possible to take out of the pan a cake which is too fragile to trust to the conventional method of turning it upside down and keeping your fingers crossed that it comes out in one piece.

As California restaurant critic Merrill Shindler observes, "Like politics and religion, nobody agrees about the one true chili." It's a dish that's easy to get into an argument over.

Every culture feeds on the belief that eating certain dishes on New Years Day brings good fortune. Perhaps the Chinese have the most New Years food rituals. They take two weeks to ring in the new year and during that time literally everything eaten is considered auspicious.

It turns out, that the question "what is a sugar plum?" is not that easy to answer. I found at least eight distinctly different definitions of the term. Some citing chocolate, some fondant, and others coriander as a chief ingredient.

Over seventy-five years ago Irving Berlin wrote what has become the most recorded song of all time: "White Christmas." It's easy to understand how Berlin, born in a town near Siberia, could feel nostalgic about a winter snowfall.

German lebkuchen the Cadillac, or the Mercedes Benz of spice cookies, was probably the first cookie traditionally associated with Christmas. Lebkuchen may also very well be the oldest form of cookie know to human kind.

Research shows that the traditional depiction of the first Thanksgiving may not be altogether accurate. In fact, whatever happened at Plymouth 400 years ago, it may not have been the first Thanksgiving at all.

Contrary to conventional wisdom, putting together a Thanksgiving Day menu is not particularly challenging. After all, the fundamentals of the holiday meal are hardly open to debate.

Over the Millennia civilization has progressed and so has breakfast cereal. Among the earliest of modern cereals was granola, still a staple today, although these days you have to be careful with granola because some of it is little more than cookies masquerading as health food.

Though easy to prepare and extraordinary to taste, what is truly remarkable about salmon, I've discovered, is its life cycle. Completed against overwhelming odds by means not yet fully understood.

Just about every major holiday in America is associated with its own signature version of what Jonathan Barlett, author of The Cook's Dictionary and Culinary Reference, calls those "sugary confections that feed our sweet tooth, rot our teeth and lift our spirits." At Christmas it's the candy cane, on Valentine's Day it's the chocolate heart, for Easter it's Marshmallow Peeps and come Halloween it's candy corn.

I'm sure you are familiar with Gouda cheese, arguably Holland's most famous, accounting for over fifty percent of the total production of cheese in that country and these days as ubiquitous, even in this country, as Kraft singles.

Recently the Ritz, the most famous hotel in the world, reopened its doors after a $450 million renovation. Situated on Paris' Place Vendôme, where dukes and princes used to live, the accommodation is no less palatial than any royal residence and those who are able to afford a room there (running as high as $25,000 a night) surely must feel like a king or a queen, which was the goal of the hotel's founder, César Ritz.