The Splendid Table: Conversations & Recipes For Curious Cooks & Eaters

Britain's beloved columnist Nigel Slater joins us this week to reflect on cooking at home. He talks a kinder, gentler English Christmas and shares his Christmas Day Roast Goose, Juniper Sauce and Apple and Lemon Purée from his latest book, The Kitchen Diaries: A Year in the Kitchen with Nigel Slater.The Sterns report from Las Cruces, New Mexico, where they're digging into warm tortilla chips with "Christmas" sauce and stacked enchiladas at Nopalito. Cheese expert Steve Jenkins says skip the cookies and leave a plate of cheese for Santa this year. Steve's picks and go-with sips will put Santa is a very good mood indeedAmy Sedaris, author of the hysterical I Like You: Hospitality Under the Influence, has entertaining tips, including how to make money at your parties! She leaves us her recipe for Cluster Haven's Pepper Mill Cheese Ball. Beer historian Alan Eames shares a curious Norwegian fairytale about a young woman brewmaster and her journey with a large barrel of Christmas ale, and the phone lines will be open for your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:December 23, 2006

This week our guest, Andrea Nguyen, takes us to Vietnam for a look at the culture and lore behind a cuisine that began 4,000 years ago with a prince from the sea. Andrea leaves us her recipe for Chicken and Cellophane Noodle Soup from her gorgeous book, Into the Vietnamese Kitchen: Treasured Foodways, Modern Flavors.The Sterns' penchant for prison gift shops led them to some great hush puppies and shredded pork sandwiches at Hocutt's Carolina Barbecue. It's right across from the big house in Moundsville, West Virginia. We have the obscure but excellent in holiday mail order gifts from Francine Maroukian, author of Chefs' Secrets: Insider Techniques from Today's Culinary Masters; then, we flip to inside a food mail order warehouse — Zingerman's — where the rush reins and it's all about controlled chaos.Ray Isle, senior wine editor for Food & Wine magazine, reports in with his favorite wines and spirits of 2006, including a knockout red for $7.00! Dan Oko ponders the doggie bag dilemma (the original commentary appeared in the November/December issue of Mother Jones), and Lynne shares some olive oil picks, passes along the recipe for Ernie Crippin's Lefse, and takes your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:December 9, 2006

This week novelist and wine critic Jay McInerney joins us to talk "wine characters" he loves. From the brilliant to the beguiling to the outrageous, it's a look at those folks who are making wine fascinating right now. Jay's latest book is A Hedonist in the Wine Cellar: Adventures in Wine.Jane and Michael Stern are dining at Hamburger King in Shawnee, Oklahoma, where great burgers with a theme song all their own are the order of the day. Master baker Dorie Greenspan gives us a master class in cookies and chocolate just in time for holiday baking. You'll want her World Peace Cookies, Grandma's Sugar Cookies and Café Volcano Cookies on your table this year. Dorie's latest must-have book is Baking: From My House to Yours.We go to Bali for the story of how a legendary spice center is struggling with modern times. New York Times columnist Marion Burros talks the latest in grass fed beef. We'll hear about this year's gift for the wine geek who has everything: Custom Curling's corkscrew with royal connections and, as always, Lynne takes your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:December 2, 2006

Award-winning chef Susanna Foo shook up the traditionalists at her Philadelphia restaurant by marrying international cooking techniques and American ingredients. The result is delicious food that's fresh, light and approachable while staying true to Chinese culinary traditions. An example is Mandarin Potato Salad with Cellophane Noodles from her new book, Susanna Foo Fresh Inspiration: New Approaches to Chinese Cuisine.At the White River Fish Market in Tulsa the Sterns prove that great fresh fish in the middle of the Great Plains isn't an oxymoron. Josh Wesson has the dirt on biodynamic wines. It's the new wave in winemaking that's all about stewardship of the land and environmentally aware production practices.We'll meet David Ansel, a guy with a big pot and a bike named Old Yellow who became the Soup Peddler of Austin. He leaves us his recipe for Bouktouf from his new book, The Soup Peddler's Slow & Difficult Soups: Recipes and Reveries.Stump the Cook is back! The popular segment from a few years back has Lynne trying to turn five things from your fridge into a great dinner dish. Who will win? Jim Leverentz, owner of Leeners, talks things fermented and preserved, and Lynne takes your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:November 12, 2005 (originally aired)November 25, 2006 (rebroadcast)

Lynne is here when you need her the most, just a phone call or e-mail away. Don't miss one of the liveliest call-ins of the year. It's Thanksgiving triage at its best. Guests include Chris Kimball of Cook's Illustrated magazine and PBS's America's Test Kitchen, our regular wine wit Joshua Wesson, Seattle Chef Tom Douglas and many more.Broadcast dates for this episode:November 23, 2006

Thanksgiving opens the season for hospitality. Between now and January we'll carve turkeys, swap cookies, light candles and be terribly social. There's no better guide to the art of hospitality than restaurateur Danny Meyer. Every night for twenty years he's entertained guests at his eleven eateries in New York City. He joins us with tips to get us through the season with style and grace. Danny's new book is Setting the Table: The Transforming Power of Hospitality in Business.It's a cross-country trek for Jane and Michael Stern as they search for the best pies from coast to coast. Sally Schneider weighs in with a guide for sides. She leaves us her recipe for Root Vegetables and/or Potatoes with White Wine and Shallots from her new book, The Improvisational Cook.Neurologist and synesthesia expert Dr. Richard Cytowic brings us the magical side of feasting when he explains The Man Who Tasted Shapes. The term "Indian corn" takes on new meaning when a long lost little ear finds the way home to its native Abenaki Nation. We have the story. Finally, it's Lynne's annual update in her quest for the ultimate roast turkey. This year's entry is Fast and Crisp Roast Turkey Scented with Apple and Basil.Broadcast dates for this episode:November 18, 2006

At 29, our guest Julie Powell was stuck in a mind numbing job and feeling defeated, aimless and depressed. In one eureka (some would say deranged) moment she decided that her salvation may lie in cooking her way through Julia Child's Mastering the Art of French Cooking. She set out on August 25, 2002; a year later she emerged, battered but with her psyche intact and her soul renewed. Her book, Julie & Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes and 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen, is the chronicle of her journey as well as a tribute to Julia. Julia Child's Leek and Potato Soup is a classic.It's divine lemon ricotta pancakes and homemade peanut butter for the Sterns at Hell's Kitchen in Minneapolis. Beer guy Steven Beaumont talks his favorite innovative beers from wild and wacky brewers who like to fly outside the flock. We'll head out to an Iowa farmhouse where a French woman cooks to her own drummer. It's communal suppers with a message at Simone's Plain and Simple.Tea authority Bill Waddington warms us up with the forgotten teas: neither green nor black, they're oolongs. If tea isn't for you, warm up with an haute take on the ultimate comfort in a cup: Mocha Voodoo from Hot Chocolate by Michael Turback.Broadcast dates for this episode:October 29, 2005 (originally aired)October 7, 2006 (rebroadcast)

This week it's a French moment back in 1976 that turned the tide for California wine. Our guest is former Time magazine correspondent George Taber, author of Judgment of Paris. He reports on that moment when the earth moved in the Napa Valley. The Sterns are eating at Harmon's Lunch, a monomaniacal luncheonette in Falmouth, Maine with a two-item menu; and Lynne reports on her own "Sterns' moment" at Polehna's Meat Market in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.Gourmet magazine's John Willoughby has tasty ideas for that wunderkind of the Pacific - the coconut - including a recipe for Fish Masala. We'll go to Decorah, Iowa for a look at real grassroots biodiversity in practice at Seed Savers Exchange. New Orleans journalist Pableaux Johnson, author of Eating New Orleans: From French Quarter Creole Dining to the Perfect Po'Boy, talks food folks and a culinary heritage surviving Katrina.Lynne shares the recipe her luscious Fresh Heirloom Tomato Soup with Cream and the phone lines will be open for your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:September 24, 2005 (originally aired)September 30, 2006 (rebroadcast)

This week it's bliss and total control for coffee lovers. We're talking home coffee roasting with Kenneth Davids, author of Home Coffee Roasting: Romance and Revival. He has tips and sources for home coffee roasters for the truly java obsessed.The Sterns report from Billings, where they're eating fabulous beef burritos at Sarah's and shopping the city's first-class saddle makers. Quince lover Sally Schneider reveals the one thing you need to know to enjoy the most sensual fruit in the market and leaves us her recipe for Sweet and Savory Quinces in White Wine and Honey.San Francisco Chronicle food writer Olivia Wu tells us everything we need to know about buying shrimp - what to avoid and what to scoop up - and shares her recipe for Steamed Spot Prawns with Ginger & Scallions. Indian Master Chef Vikas Khanna turns food into visions of palette for the visually impaired. Learn about his book Ayurveda: The Science of Food & Life on www.vkhanna.com. We'll hear about sit-down dinners in farm fields across America from the folks at Outstanding in the Field, and Lynne takes your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:September 17, 2005 (originally aired)September 16, 2006 (rebroadcast)

Why would a successful New York magazine editor willingly take six months off to become a slave in a restaurant kitchen? Our guest, Bill Buford, editor of The New Yorker, answers that question in Heat: An Amateur's Adventures As Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany.The Sterns are on Boston's north shore eating the local favorite, roast beef sandwiches, at Nick's Famous Roast Beef in Beverly. Lynne keeps to the sandwich theme by sharing her recipe for Last of the Tomatoes Commemorative Sandwich. Forget the rusty grill and a rickety table! Designer Deborah Krasner stops by with the latest in outdoor kitchens. Is this the next "must have" on foodies' wish list?We're day tripping from Austin Texas with Gerald McLeod and his One Tank Wonders. Think pie happy hour and a German beer garden. The high priestess of Television Without Pity stops by with her take on the new season in food TV. Matt Richtel reports on McDonald's attempt to use drive-through order takers located in India; and, as always, the phone lines will be open for your calls.Broadcast dates for this episode:September 9, 2006