Tagged: WFAEats

  Eating out. We do it when we want to meet up with friends, have a particular craving or just don't want to mess up the kitchen. But dining in restaurants is also a community building practice and has evolved over time. Charlotte has a rich and interesting restaurant history and we'll explore it. Restaurant Week is coming up so we'll visit with its creator and also with Molly O'Neill. The nationally known cookbook author and food writer explores the link between food and community and she's back in town for another Place at the Table event. Make a reservation when Charlotte Talks.

Recently I shared a cookbook that my Dad gave to his mother at Christmas 1936. The old book is an endearing collection of hand-written recipes and clippings from magazines and newspapers.

The first recipe I tested was a dish clipped from a 1936 newspaper - "Pepper Chuck Steak," subtitled "Brookfield Sunday Dinner." The silhouette illustration drew my attention - a skier tumbling down a slope, obviously falling for this dish.

One of the best - and most exclusive - restaurants in Charlotte is one you’ve likely never heard of.

There’s no bar, no valet parking, no sign. It’s tough to get a reservation, and you can forget sweet-talking your way in or bribing the maitre d’.

It’s the Greenway Restaurant at Central Piedmont Community College.

We’ve got a winner!

We asked you to tell us about your favorite cookbooks, and we tantalized you with the chance to win one of the books we featured on our holiday list.

FrancieChaos Dunlap is our winner. She will receive a spanking new copy of Preserving Wild Foods: A Modern Forager’s Recipes for Curing, Canning, Smoking and Pickling, by Matthew Weingarten and Raquel Pelzel.

With the holiday season in full swing, frantic gift-givers may be running short of ideas. Here are some new cookbooks sure to delight any appetite.

Armchair travelers will swoon over the exotic Burma: Rivers of Flavor by Naomi Duguid. It’s thick with intriguing recipes and gorgeous photos.

The Bouchon Bakery Cookbook by Thomas Keller, Sebastien Rouel, et al.; is a big, beautiful “coffee-table” book of pastry delights with luscious photos by Deborah Jones.