Ben Starr

The Ultimate Food Geek

Tag: French

  • Sourdough Buttermilk Beignets

    Ah, beignets!  France’s answer to a donut, only without a hole, and rarely round.  Single-handedly made famous in the U.S. by Cafe du Monde, steps from the cathedral of St. Louis in the heart of the French Quarter in New Orleans…though certainly not perfected by them.  I actually grumble and groan anytime I take someone…

  • Today is not only my birthday…

    I was born on this day in 1977.  July 14 is not only my birthday, it has actual historical significance. In France, this is their biggest national holiday…Bastille Day, or French National Day.  It is the day that, in 1789, the French people stormed the fortress Bastille in protest against their monarchy, starting the French…

  • MasterChef 4 recap: Glee and Meringue (S4E10)

    (PLEASE NOTE: This blog is not affiliated with Fox or MasterChef.  Contained below are the maniacal ravings of a season 2 survivor who has no inside knowledge of how this season was produced.  Well…not much, anyway.) When I posted my blog about the first of this week’s episodes (which happened to be a bit depressing…

  • MasterChef recap: The Final Four

    (Please note: This blog is not endorsed or approved by MasterChef, and they would prefer you not read it.  This blog reflects my own uneducated and uninformed opinions about Season 3 of MasterChef, and I have no inside knowledge about how the show is judged.) We’ve got 4 contestants left: Christine (age 33), Becky (27),…

  • French Onion Soup

    This seems to be everyone’s favorite soup.  From the instant that I posted on Facebook and Twitter tonight that I was making French Onion Soup for dinner, I had over 20 requests for the recipe. In France, one of the first things a chef learns to master is onion soup.  It’s such a simple soup…