Ben Starr

The Ultimate Food Geek

Category: Side Dishes

  • Dandelion “Honey”

    Either you love dandelions, or you hate them.  If you hate them, it’s probably because you spend so much time trying to rid your lawn of them.  If you love them, it’s because the big, soft, bright yellow blossoms and supremely blow-able puff balls bring you back to childhood.  Or perhaps you’re one of the…

  • Garlic Cheddar Biscuits

    I’m no fan of chain restaurants.  And I am happy to announce that I’ve NEVER eaten at a Red Lobster.  But any time Red Lobster surfaces in conversation, I’m always puzzled by the response that I universally hear from people who have eaten there. “ZOMG, their cheddar biscuits are SO GOOD!” It’s like Olive Garden…

  • How to Cook a Pumpkin and Turn it into Puree

    In the fall, we’ve got pumpkins coming out our ears, and it just pains me to think that 95% of the pumpkins grown in this country are simply carved for Halloween and then tossed into the trash.  Sometimes people buy 4 or 5, carve only one, and let the rest sit on their front porch…

  • Smoked Mozzarrella, Eggplant, and Mushroom Fritters

    The inspiration for this recipe came from the book Artisan Cheesemaking at Home, which is a FABULOUS way to get hooked on a new hobby.  Before I even started making my own cheese, though, I had to try this recipe.  The only problem was that I didn’t have most of the ingredients it called for,…

  • Candied Ginger

    Every tried to buy candied or crystallized ginger in the spice rack at the grocery store?  It is ridiculously overpriced…a single small bottle can cost upwards of $10, which is silly because you can make your own for about $10 a POUND. To get started, you’ll need: 1 pound of fresh ginger root To make…

  • Mind-Boggling Life-Altering Earth-Shattering Mac and Cheese

    It’s everyone’s favorite food.  And I confess, I even get excited about eating a fake-orange bowl of the artificial stuff from the box or at a restaurant.  Who doesn’t like macaroni and cheese? The problem is that we get accustomed to this impossibly-creamy texture that we get served at chain restaurants, which contain processed cheese…

  • Homemade Sriracha (fermented red pepper sauce)

    If you have a garden, like me, and have more than a couple of pepper plants, chances are in the early fall you’re INUNDATED with so many chiles that you can’t give them away fast enough.  What on EARTH do you do when you’ve got pounds of hot peppers? If you’re me, you preserve them…

  • 1-Hour No-Knead Yeast Dinner Rolls

    Bread.  It can be a problem with dinner, because sometimes you just don’t have 4-5 hours to prep contemporary yeast bread or roll recipes.  You all know that I prefer to use long, slow fermentations with my yeast breads to produce incredible flavor and crust.  But that requires me to start the bread the day…

  • Colcannon (Irish recipe for St. Patrick’s Day)

    An instructional video is at the bottom of this recipe. Colcannon is an Irish classic.  They’ve been eating it for centuries.  Normally it’s a mixture of mashed potatoes and kale that would commonly be eaten with pork.  But in my version, the kale gets replaced with red cabbage, and I mix the pork right in. …

  • Transforming Thanksgiving Leftovers

    So it’s the day after Thanksgiving and your fridge is exploding with a mangled turkey carcass, half a pan of stuffing, gobs of gelatinous cranberry sauce…and you’ve got no idea what to do, right? Don’t microwave another paper plate filled with stale leftovers. Transform the leftovers into something different and better! TURKEY MEAT Tamales  Coming…