Welcome our newest contributing editor, Melissa Clark "Food Writer and Author"

We are so excited to welcome the amazingly talented Author and Food Writer, Melissa Clark, as a contributing editor to Miami Food Review™!  Melissa will be sharing some of her delicious recipes, as well as her tips and ideas on great dining places. Melissa will share her new discoveries, and the passions and insights they’ve inspired in 32 books she has published.  We also have some really fun projects planned! 

Melissa Clark writes about cuisine and other products of appetite. After brief forays working as a cook in a restaurant kitchen, and as a caterer out of her fifth floor walk-up, Clark decided upon a more sedentary path. She earned an M.F.A. in writing from Columbia University, and began a freelance food writing career.  She recently joined the staff at the New York Times where she writes a weekly food column called A Good Appetite. She has also written for Bon Appetit, Food & Wine, Every Day with Rachel Ray, and Martha Stewart, amongst others.

Her acclaimed cookbook, In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite., came out in the fall of 2010 with essays and recipes based on her popular column.

Clark's most recent book, Cook This Now , a personal collection of seasonally driven, inventive comfort food, came out in October 2011, published by Hyperion.



Clark, just grilling up her regular breakfast

Photo: Melissa Hom - See more at: Grub Street New York

All told, Clark has written 32 other cookbooks, many of them in collaboration with some of New York’s most celebrated chefs including Daniel Boulud (Braise), David Bouley (East of Paris), Claudia Fleming (The Last Course), and Bruce and Eric Bromberg (The Blue Ribbon). A book of dessert recipes, The Perfect Finish, written with White House pastry chef Bill Yosses, came out in June 2010. Her collaboration with chef Peter Berley, The Modern Vegetarian Kitchen, received both a James Beard award and Julia Child Cookbook award in 2000.

Clark was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York, where she now lives with her husband, Daniel Gercke and their daughter Dahlia.

Melissa's Kitchen "Where her magic happens" see more..

Photo by: Noah Fecks

 

Melissa was recently interviewed by Epicurious.com one the leading websites in the world about cooking, recipes, dining, and everything a foodie loves.  Here is part of that interview:

A Conversation with Melissa Clark                                                    

The Cook This Now author talks about her favorite cookbooks and explains why she loves the farmers' market by Lauren Salkeld

 

 

T here are few writers in this world who have their name on as many spines as Melissa Clark. Food journalist and New York Times columnist Clark is the author or coauthor of an astounding 32 cookbooks, including titles written with culinary legends Daniel Boulud, David Bouley, Claudia Fleming, and Bill Yosses. Lately, she's devoted her time to writing her own books: Cook This Now: 120 Easy and Delectable Dishes You Can't Wait to Make is Clark's second solo project and follows In the Kitchen with a Good Appetite. In this latest tome, Clark offers a more practical approach to seasonal cooking, one that balances a passion for shopping the farmers' market with a working mom's busy schedule. On the eve of publication, we sat down with Clark to discuss the book, her favorite ingredients from each season, and why she's so devoted to her local farmers' market. Clark also offers up some of her favorite cookbook titles, and shares two recipes from the new book, Carroty Mac and Cheese and Cumin Seed Roasted Cauliflower with Salted Yogurt, Mint, and Pomegranate Seeds.

Epicurious: How did you get your start as a food writer?

Melissa Clark: I started out trying to figure out a way to combine my two loves. I always loved writing and knew that writing was going to be part of my career choice. I had this crazy childhood where my parents loved to travel all over France and every summer we would go there and house exchange. So we would exchange our house in Brooklyn for a house in some little country town, and we would stay there for the month of August. All we wanted to do was eat. So it was this crazy childhood combined with a love of writing, and I just knew there had to be a way to put them together.

When I was first starting out there weren't a lot of obvious options for how you could combine writing and food. There was M.F.K. Fisher so of course she loomed large in my mind. And there was restaurant criticism, which I knew I didn't want to do. So I thought I could kind of write like M.F.K. Fisher but I just didn't see how to really make a living out of that. In order to buy time, I thought, let me go to school again, so I did an MFA in writing at Columbia and while I was there I started a catering company. I had worked in kitchens and restaurants in college and high school. When I graduated from Columbia [in 1993], all of a sudden we had tons of Web sites that needed content providers and I started writing about food online. That was really the beginning of it and then it just grew. I was in the right place at the right time with the right skill set and the right passion.

Epi: You've collaborated on cookbooks with so many talented chefs. What have you learned from these experiences?

MC: So much. I feel like I've been tutored by the best chefs in New York, in the country. I've worked with Daniel Boulud, David Bouley, Claudia Fleming, Bill Yosses. When you write someone's cookbook you basically have to learn his or her style so it's like having a tutorial and that's been really influential in my cooking. But the biggest lesson I've learned is that there's no one right way to do things. Daniel Boulud roasts his chicken completely different from David Bouley and they chop onions in totally different ways and they have different philosophies about when you add the oil to the pan and when you salt. And Bill Yosses and Claudia Fleming are both incredible pastry chefs and they do things completely different. Some things are the same but what I've really learned is that there are very few hard-and-fast rules when it comes to cooking. It's very freeing for me as a cook, and one thing I try to do in my food writing is give people the freedom to go out on their own.

Epi: What are your favorite cookbooks?

MC: I'm sort of a serial monogamist when it comes to cookbooks. I will take a cookbook and love that cookbook to death. I'll read it all the time; it'll be sitting next to my bed; I'll cook from it. And then I'll be like, oh, but here's a new cookbook. The book I'm so into right now is the Fleisher's book, The Butcher's Guide to Well-Raised Meat. It's my favorite book in the world—this week.

Then there are some classics that I always find myself going back to when I need to look something up or I'm uninspired. It doesn't happen that much but sometimes I'll look at a bunch of beets and I'll think I've done everything with beets that I could possibly do. But then I'll go to one of my favorite books, Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian. It's a really old book but when I get bored, I read what Madhur has to say. She has such a different frame of reference that it inspires me to get out of my rut.
Another favorite of mine is Anya Von Bremzen's New Spanish Table. I'll go to her book and I'll get inspired. And her recipes always work. That is a terrific book. The Jewish holidays are another time when I'm so bored with my old food. I'll go to Claudia Roden's Book of Jewish Food—that book is just fantastic.

For dessert books, other than Claudia Fleming, I'm a big Rose Levy Beranbaum fan and I use her Cake Bible. And Dorie Greenspan's Baking. And Nick Malgieri's How to Bake, I think I go to the most. It's clear; it's concise; he gets to the point; he tells you what to do; he's always right—that's a really important baking book for me.

Another favorite, for when I just feel like getting inspired, is Nigel Slater. I love the way his mind works and it's similar to my style but different enough.

Epi: Why did you decide to write this seasonally driven cookbook?

MC: I do so much cooking for other people when I'm testing recipes and working on cookbooks, but when I'm cooking for my family it's always seasonal. It's what I got at the farmers' market and I'm always trying to make it interesting. When you're really cooking seasonally, you're up to your ears in a certain ingredient for a very short amount of time and you get bored and you do the same thing over and over again. What I try to do in my cooking and what I really wanted to do in this book is to show you how to expand what you already know. You know how to roast cauliflower—you've probably done it a million times—but how do you stay interested when you have cauliflower for six straight weeks? And so I roasted it with Indian spices. Again, Madhur Jaffrey—what spices would she use? And then I topped it with salted yogurt and some pomegranate.

This book is really a diary of what I eat. I wanted it to be accurate and to really show what I do. There are things that I'm very comfortable with that might be a stretch for some people—like green garlic. The second I get green garlic in my hands, I use it every day until it goes away. So I'll do a recipe that is very seasonal, but being realistic I'll also show people how to use regular garlic. But just because this dish is in the April section of my book doesn't mean it won't taste delicious in September if you can adjust for things. So it's a very real, hopefully very user-friendly, way to eat seasonally.

Epi: What are your favorite ingredients from each season?

Read More http://www.epicurious.com/articlesguides/chefsexperts/interviews/melissa-clark-interview-recipes#ixzz2M3HWtChr

   

 

Visit Melissa Sites Blog at:  www.MelissaClark.net