Gherkins & Tomatoes

Gherkins & Tomatoes

Meditations and Photographs about Food, Cooking, and Life

Main menu

Skip to content
  • 365 Days – Photo-a-Day Gallery
  • About Gherkins & Tomatoes
  • Culinary History Resources
  • RECIPE INDEX

Archives

Show Grid Show List

Post navigation

Artist palette film grain rs

A Bare Table is Like an Artist’s Canvas

May 16, 2013 by Cynthia Bertelsen

There’s something about tables, big, little, or bare – and those bare ones  in particular – that make me want to festoon them with food I’ve cooked, like floral garlands at a grand wedding. I feel an urge, too, to seat people on the equally vacant chairs, saying, “Come on now, sit down a spell, and let your worries fade away like the mist on a hot summer morning.” Well, maybe I wouldn’t say it exactly that way, but the […]

Categories: Art, Beans, Cassava, Chile Peppers, Corn, Latin America, Photography, Potatoes, Pumpkin, Tomatoes, United States, Virginia • Tags: Beans, Cassava, Chiles, Corn, Photography, Potatoes, Squash, Tomatillos

4
Pellagra skin

The Curse of Corn: Pellagra

July 20, 2012 by Cynthia Bertelsen

  To be continued … 

Categories: Archaeology, Corn, Southern Food • Tags: American South, Corn, Pellagra, Southern cooking

what-mrs-fisher-knows

Ladies of the Pen and the Cookpot: The Other Mrs. (Abby) Fisher

September 13, 2010 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Before M. F. K. Fisher, sometimes known as plain Mrs. Fisher, there was Mrs. Abby Fisher. And Abby Fisher’s personage couldn’t be more different from M. F. K. Fisher than if a novelist like Flannery O’Connor dreamed her up. The author of what food historians long believed to be the first African-American cookbook,* Abby Fisher counted on others to actually write What Mrs. Fisher Knows About Old Southern Cooking in 1881.** As a former slave from South Carolina she went […]

Categories: American Cooking, Cookbooks, Corn, Recipes, Southern Food • Tags: Abby Fisher, African-American Cooking, Cookbooks, Cooking, Cooks, Corn, Food, Recipes, Southern cooking

4
A Farmers' Market

Ecstatic in Farmers’ Markets (with a List of Cookbooks at the End)

September 8, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Not too long ago, driving through the flat land of northern Illinois, I passed near Galena, a charming Victorian town nestled among bluffs and rolling hills near the Mississippi River. Just before arriving in the town, along scenic Highway 20, several small farmers’ markets beckoned. Now, truth be told, my hands tingle and my blood thunders through my veins when I spot a farmers’ market on the side of the road or in the middle of a busy town. The […]

Categories: Corn, Food Columns, Recipes • Tags: Bibliographies, Cooking, Corn, Farmers' markets, Food, Galena, Recipes

Corn-on-the-Cob

Corny Delights

August 27, 2008 by Cynthia Bertelsen

Pig fodder? I don’t think so. Some Europeans refer to corn as pig fodder and use it accordingly. For many Americans, particularly those who grew up on farms or whose parents tended back-yard vegetable gardens, like mine, no summer food tastes better than corn-on-the-cob. Lots of butter and grainy tongue-puckering salt, for me, corn-on-the cob spells S-U-M-M-E-R and I don’t apologize for it. I’ll wrestle a pig any time for the pleasures of corn. Corn, golden gift from the New World to the […]

Categories: Corn, Italian Cooking, Recipes, Southern Food • Tags: Cooking, Corn, Food, Recipes, Southern cooking

1

Post navigation

Food forms the very essence of life, from the fruit fly to the elephant, with humans in between. So much of what we do revolves around cooking, eating, and the finding of food. Here you'll discover stories, meditations, and photographs celebrating the places that we call home. And, of course, the food that garnishes it all.

My book, due out September 15, 2013

Looking for Something? SEARCH

What’s Cookin’ Here

  • A Bare Table is Like an Artist’s Canvas
  • “Stew’s so comforting on a rainy day.” *
  • Singkong, Manioc, Mandioca, Mandió, Tapioca, Yuca: Singing the Praises of Manihot esculenta (Cassava)
  • The Promise of Apple Blossoms

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 406 other followers

On the home page, click on the pictures to go to the posts. Or click the little boxes in the upper right-hand corner to display posts and first paragraphs.

What We’re Talkin’ About Here

Africa All Souls' Day American Cooking Art Barack Obama Bibliographies Book Reviews Bread Christmas Cookbooks Cooking Cooks Cuisine Francaise Culinary History Day of the Dead Eggs England English Cooking Fish Food Food History Food Photography France French Cooking French cuisine Gardens Haiti Halloween Herbs India Italian Cooking Italy Julia Child M. F. K. Fisher Monasteries Monks Morocco Mushrooms Paris Photography Provence Recipes Southern cooking Virginia White House

Who’s visiting?

Beautiful Blogger Award

Reader Appreciation Award

Blog at WordPress.com. Theme: Customized Gridspace by Graph Paper Press.
Follow

Get every new post delivered to your Inbox.

Join 406 other followers

Powered by WordPress.com