Hooray for Friday!
It’s Friday!!! It’s been a short week and we’ll have another short one next week since we will be closed on Wednesday. I think I could get used to these shorter weeks! Especially, if we could always...
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The Last Sweet Tastes of Summer
What a beautiful morning! Such vivid colors in the sky and crispness in the air! This is my favorite way to start a day. And what a great lunch we have to look forward to! It’s simple and tasty.Here’s...
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7000 Years Old Lunch
Kind of a lazy morning with the cool and cloudy weather, isn’t it? You know what I mean, the kind when it’s nice to stay in your pajamas for a while and drink coffee and read! However, it’s time to...
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Summer is back!
Good MorningOy, feels like summer is back. But it looks like we’ll cool off again by Thursday. So I’m not going to get too crazy.Today, Chef Andrew will take over the next 10-day menu plan. He’s...
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Sloshy Days
It’s going to be rather sloshy for the next few days and I’m okay with that. I have very high hopes of delicious Autumn weather being behind these wet weather systems. This year’s Politics of Food...
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Lesson on Korean Cuisine
Today, Chef Andrew has planned a menu borrowing on tastes from Korea. I feel the need to give you an alert that almost everything today has some form of sesame in it. However, we will have some of...
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Debris
Did you ever have a sandwich filled with debris? If not, perhaps you’ve never been to New Orleans. I think the debris sandwich can only be found in New Orleans and possibly only at one restaurant...
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Roasted vs BBQ Chicken
When I first moved to New York from New Orleans there was one food that I had problems with. At my first job,in the corporate training offices of Alexander’s Department Stores, my boss would often...
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Cooking French in Asia
10082015 Good Morning!Today Chef Andrew is returning to his Asian cuisine portfolio with a menu that has an emphasis on Vietnamese cuisine. Speaking of Asian cuisine, how was that West Lake Beef Soup...
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The Eyes of Texas are Upon Us
“The eyes of Texas are upon us” today. On day 2 of her menu plan Chef Katie heads down to her Texas roots for our lunch today. From what I’m smelling so far, it’s going to be a really good one!With...
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We're Eating from the Roof!
I know it’s only 2 work days since we turned the clocks back but because daylight comes so early now, I feel like I’m running late for work!Lunch today has subtle touches of Greek influenceAn...
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The History in Gumbo
We will not be serving a "soup course" today because the hot entrée is a type of soup! We have Gumbo for lunch! It will be another “lunch in a bowl”. Gumbo is a lesson in culinary history and a...
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Jumping onto a New Food Trend
Woo hooo! It’s Friday! I’m very happy about that. It's been a really long week since we worked on Sunday. I’m also very happy about today’s lunch. There is a foodie trend happening in New York...
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Global Cuisine
It's been an interesting week of lunches with food from different international cuisines. Monday we had Italian food, Tuesday was the cuisine of India, both Thursday and Friday featured the cuisine of...
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It's Wash Day!
Today is “wash day”! Or at least that’s what Monday always was in Louisiana, the day when all the laundry was washed, hung to dry, folded and put away. There may have been a little bit of ironing as...
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Cheers to Chef Akira!
Good morning!A few years ago we had a very talented chef from Japan working with us. Akira Onizawa taught us so many things about various techniques used in Japanese cooking that are not part of our...
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Ringing the Bell
Ah ha! Feels like Spring today! Heh heh. Well, anyway, not as cold as yesterday. Now I look forward to the return of longer hours of daylight.For today’s lunch menu Chef Jose has chosen to do his...
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Jose's Old Clothes
Yesterday’s trip to the New York Stock Exchange was so much fun. It’s a fascinating place and totally lacked the frenzy and screaming that I was expecting. Still it’s a very impressive place and you...
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Loving the Flavors of Asia on a Winter Day
There are at least 3 people around the country this morning celebrating having won around $550 million last night. They will share the largest lottery win ever, around $1.6 billion! You probably know...
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Wooo Hooo! Give me another cup of Broccoli Soup!
Good Morning! Hurray ! The rain is coming to wash all the remaining mess away! The streets and sidewalks will be back to “normal”. Time for another snowstorm!The soup today is the Broccoli Soup. I...
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A Day for Staying in Bed!
Kind of a cold and raw morning, huh? It’s a perfect day for staying in your jammies, snuggled in your warm bed. But, alas, it’s Wednesday and we all need to be here today!For today’s lunch Chef Katie...
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Good News on a Chilly Day
We have some good news that might just warm your heart a bit. Oscar Benavidez who washed our pots for 6 years, went to culinary school, and has been working as a line cook for 2 years, has been...
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Vegetarian Entree, Si and Cuban Sandwich, Si Si!
Good Morning! What a nice PA Annual Tea yesterday. Congratulations to all of you who were recognized for your long service at Calhoun. It’s wonderful that we have such a dedicated staff of...
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South of the Border, Down Mexico Way
For today’s lunch Chef Oscar is taking us south of the border. Here’s what he has in mind for lunch today:We’ll have one of my all-time favorite soups – Tortilla Soup! I was explaining to Oscar this...
View ArticleBack to School -- it's Time!
5 Ideas for a Week's Worth of Lunches, Plus 2 New Recipes!While I’m not a kid anymore, I do feel the pull of back-to-school during August. As a kid it meant getting brand new school supplies…a book...
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This is how we do it--Best School Lunch Program
It’s that time again! Welcome back to school – officially! I hope everyone had a lovely summer with lots of time to relax, reflect and get ready to hit the books again. Let’s have fun this year! To...
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How do you make a Reuben Sandwich?
We have such a good lunch today. Here is what we’re working on in the kitchen: Starting off, we have our delicious Chicken Soup! The chicken stock for our soup, which includes 120 pounds of golden...
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Persian Lunch
I spent 24 years of my life working for an airline. That experience gave me the opportunity to travel to some 60 countries during those years. What I always remembered most about each country was the...
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Laissez les bontemps roulez!
Today is the last day of Chef Ilya’s first menu plan for this year. Thanks Ilya for some really delicious lunches! But, I think he’s saved the best for last. Here’s what I mean: There won’t be a...
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Healthy Soba Noodles!
I hope all of you had a fun and safe Halloween and didn’t eat too much candy. Yesterday our Calhoun kids had some of the funniest, cutest and scariest costumes ever. However I do believe that the...
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History of Louisiana's Cuisines
t’s time for a history lesson this morning. As you know by now a couple of us in the kitchen are from New Orleans and we are very proud of the tradition of great food that is enjoyed there. The...
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The best way to understand the heart and soul of any culture is through...
Yesterday when some of the LS students came through the lunch line they questioned why I would serve Mexican food on the day after Trump won. While that took me by surprise, it also made me realize...
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Tacos from Argentina? Yes!
It’s Friday! I’m really happy to come to the end of a very difficult and emotional week. It will be nice to have some time for relaxation and reflection. And, I think it’s going to be a pretty nice...
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Chef Jose is Cooking!!
I want to thank our Intern, Marcus Gonzalez, for some really delicious meals the past 4 days. I’m still amazed at how well he performed his first time to cook for so many people. He was very well...
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So Thankful!!!
So hard to believe that we are about to observe the Thanksgiving holiday already! As they say, “time flies when you’re having fun!” And fun is one of the ways I like to describe my job. It’s so nice to...
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"I've got Coffee in my Pocket!"
Every morning I stop at Zabar’s to pick up a coffee to bring to work with me. If I’m wearing a jacket, I have a way of putting the coffee in my pocket so that it stays right side up and doesn’t spill....
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Let's get healthy!
I’m so happy that it isn’t raining today. I was worried that I was going to mildew! Plus this weather hasn’t helped the illnesses going around. This may not be the coldest winter but it sure seems...
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Loooziana Cooking!
What a great concert last night…celebrating Steve! If you missed it, you really missed it! And it was so nice to see so many alums and parents there who I haven’t seen in years. What a nice community...
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Rainy Day
Rainy day. I love cooking on rainy days. Perhaps it’s because the aromas tend to hang in the humid air. It’s also comforting to smell good food being cooked when the weather is inconvenient and...
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A Day without Immigrants
It’s been a very busy morning. If you’ll recall, yesterday was an important day for our country’s immigrant workers to show their importance to our everyday lives. On “a day without immigrants”,...
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Scraggle Food Mulligatawny?
It looks like we are into another warming trend only to eventually make another u-turn back to colder weather—again. Maybe even snow on Friday or Saturday? Too bad we can’t be sure because today’s...
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Lunch is already smelling good this morning! Or is that a fresh batch of...
Sometimes in the morning, usually while I’m waking up to the radio playing, I hear something that sticks with me for a while. Today was such a day. The radio announcer was talking about a light rain...
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Wash Day!
Let’s go Rangers! Clap- Clap. Clap-clap-clap. There was some really exciting and fun hockey on TV this weekend. It’s nice to see the NY Rangers head into the semi-finals of the playoffs. Uh, yes. I...
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Great Lunch + Cousin Brucie is coming!
I’m so excited today. My favorite cousin is coming to Calhoun this evening. The fun thing about my cousin is that he’s your cousin too! Does that make us related? Who knows….maybe. Of course, I’m...
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Happy Teacher's Day
Happy Teacher’s Day!!!“It is the supreme art of the teacher to awaken joy in creative expression and knowledge.” — Albert EinsteinI believe that’s what our wonderful Teachers at Calhoun are so good at....
View ArticleSnuggle morning!
If there is ever a morning when it would be so nice to stay in bed, today is one of those days. Imagine all snuggled up in your sheets and pillows, a cool damp breeze blowing in and you are laying...
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You've got to love September!
I’m enjoying this streak of beautiful days so much. I’m reminded of a couple of lines from a poem, “September” by Helen Hunt Jackson, in which she said:“By all these lovely tokensSeptember days are...
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Quality of Ingredients
A couple of years ago, I had the opportunity to visit it with a graduate of Calhoun who, for the past few years has been cooking in the kitchens of some of the best restaurants in New York, After...
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Viva Mexico!
For today’s lunch we’re returning to Mexican Cuisine. While we think of Mexican cuisine as tacos and enchiladas, Mexican cuisine is as complex as other ancient cuisines, such as those of China, India...
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Why is our food sooo good?
We came in this morning to the aroma of roasting pork shoulder which had been in the oven, slowly roasting all night. I immediately told Jose, “this morning for breakfast I’ll take some pulled pork on...
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