Category: Links (Page 1 of 2)

I was searching for recipes from Djibouti when I came across the blog Global Travel Adventure.  The bloggers are cooking 195 meals from 195 countries in 195 weeks.  That’s very cool and similar to my International Food Project, through which I set out to cook every cuisine from the world.  Alas, that proved a much greater task that I envisioned (in part because I didn’t have kids when I started), and eleven years later I’m almost done with the “C”s (98 cuisines in all).

Part of my problem is that when I began I was committed to do a full menu for each cuisine: appetizer, main dish, side dishes and desserts.  That worked well for dinner parties, and I had quite a few the first couple of years, but once I had my children the words “dinner parties” disappeared from my vocabulary.  It’s been years since I’ve had one.  A few years ago I gave up on the idea of full menus and instead decided to do several main courses, that I could serve during several weeks.  I still kept the idea of doing desserts, which slowed down the process as dessert has never actually been part of our daily dinners.  So finally, I’m giving up on desserts.  I’m making a list of all the desserts that I should cook, and perhaps one day I’ll make them.

Another problem I’ve had is that, in general, I haven’t wanted to go on to the next cuisine until I was done writing up the preceding cuisine – but I don’t always feel like writing.  That meant that sometimes I’ve put off doing anything for this projects for months at a time, and then I’ve had to re-cook the dishes from the cuisine I failed to write up.

Every so often I tell myself that I will commit to this project again.  I’ve done so this week (thus my search for Djibutean recipes), but alas, I don’t expect to last that long at it 🙁

So, if you’re looking for recipes from around the world, I recommend you check out that blog.

Open Fence, a service that provides coupons from local retailers, is getting better and starting to recruit more restaurants in San Leandro and surrounding areas. You need to register to use the service, and they only have a limited number of coupons – so please only print those you know you will use.
Note that in some cases you may get a bigger discount through restaurant.com. As usual, google “restaurant.com code” before buying a restaurant.com gift certificate, as they often have them for up to 80% off.
The restaurants in SL participating include:
Linguini’s Pizza & Brew / Pasta & Vino, 50% OFF Pasta Entree! (Dinner only)
Aroma Cuisine of India, Half Off Lunch Buffet
The Englander Pub, 15% OFF Dinner or Lunch
Tito’s Mexican Restaurant, $5 Off $25 Purchase or More
Sergio’s Pizzaria, $5 OFF $25 or greater purchase (before Tax)
Vo’s, 20% Off
Paradiso, Two Free Desserts with the Purchase of Two Entrees
Joaquin Deli, 15% off your purchase
Tropix Caribbean Restaurant, 20% OFF!
Al Attle’s California Cheese Steaks, 1 Free Sandwich w/ purchase of 1 Sandwich
Chang’s Gourmet Asian Cuisine, 20% OFF of purchase greater than $20
Dick’s Restaurant and Cocktails, 20% Off – Minimum Purchase of $10.00
Pelton Cafe, $2 OFF Purchase of $10 or Greater
Porky’s Pizza Palace, Porky’s Family Value Meal Only $26.96 or **Monday-Wednesday Pizza Special
Palomares Cafe, 15% Off
Taqueria El Gordo, 20% OFF! – Menu / Specials (58)
Best Burger, Free Drink! (with purchase of any Burger)

Mike just pointed me to a new (for me) San Leandro food blog: San Leandro Cooking Examiner. It mostly includes recipes, so it’s not that San Leandro specific, but it’s nice to see another San Leandran with a blog.

The Caribbean Recipes website has changed formats & style – and seems to have more recipes than ever. I just checked it out for Antiguan and Curacaoan recipes I’m planning to make this week. Anyway, if you like Caribbean food, this is one site to check out.

I also got an e-mail about Learn Cooking, a British website that teaches you how to make basic stuff. I took a look at it, and I found it quite useful. I use the Joy of Cooking for basic information about how to cook new stuff, but, truth be told, I do prefer online sources.

Just got an e-mail about another site for San Francisco restaurant reviews. It’s Foodnut.com and it focuses on the city and the Peninsula. It provides lots of pictures of the establishment and the dishes, as well as prices and photos of the menus. You can browse restaurants by type and price.

I just came about with the My Recipes website – which features recipes from Cooking Light, Southern Living, Sunset, Coastal Living, Cottage Living, Real Simple and Health magazines, among others. I don’t read any of those magazines, but for that matter, I also don’t read Gourmet or the other magazines featured on my favorite recipes website: Epicurious. The recipes are also rated (though fewer of them are rated than at other sites), though so far of the two recipes I made from the site – one that was rated excellent resulted in the most inedible piece of meat I’ve ever had the displeasure to have in my mouth. Still, the website is worth exploring and trying out.
The two other websites that I use regularly while looking for recipes are All Recipes, where most of the recipes have been entered by regular people, and The Food Network, whose recipes are often too complicated for my taste.
Do you know of another recipe website that also has thousands of recipes and user ratings/reviews? If so, please comment here!

As you probably know, I love to cook international foods, and one of the places where I get recipes, in addition to invaluable information about how and what people eat is the Cultural Profile Project from Citizenship and Immigration Canada. The project provides a myriad of information about the cultures of each of very many countries. Included here is information about their food, what they eat, when and so forth. It’s definitely worth checking out if you are interested in what others eat – and those others, of course, can be your neighbors.