Hi. I’m Isabel, I cook and scribble. I make a lot of food and do a lot of writing, and Bread & Courage is what I have to show for it. It started as a simple food blog called TASTE but evolved into something more—a place where I express my love of food, community and the environment. Thanks for spending some time here—and be in touch!
If I were asked to name some of my favorite things, great tomato sauce would quickly come to mind. So would traveling and staying someplace just for the sake of staying: as my friends Caleb and Deidre did on their honeymoon. Caleb and Deidre also happen to be cooks—mostly of the Italian variety, though they [...]
You know those people who resolve piety in the New Year, embracing soups and fruit juice and brown rice baths? Well I’m not one of them. But I do love soup. It makes me feel warm and clean and hale. This year I was especially in need of some elixing.
It started, as with all great [...]
Where I come from, the weather is pretty cool and the seasons are rarely vague. The transition from spring to summer to autumn to winter and back again is tidy, without a lot of fuzziness in between—except for those May days still plagued by freezing rain or the all-too fleeting Indian summer afternoons that sometimes [...]
If you love the idea of savory summer vegetables steaming in a deep bowl, the scent of herbs and spices rising to your nostrils, you’ve likely tried your hand at ratatouille. But, for as many delicious summer stews you’ve enjoyed, you’ve probably also faced many a limp blob of hot, mushy mass inappropriately called ratatouille.
Perhaps [...]
I woke up yesterday morning with a sharp stick in my throat…at least it felt that way. Every time I swallowed, my glands cried out and begged me to stop the searing pain. Oh how I hoped the feeling would pass, but it persisted—all day long. To add insult to injury, I also had an [...]
My friend Molly has a talent for great food in a flash: Rachel Ray would benefit from a lesson over this gal' s stove. Even though I' ve never had any of Ray-Ray' s reportedly YUMO stoup, I would be totally un-inclined to visit her home for thirty minutes of meal preparation. All that chatter [...]
Mussels are one of my favorite things to order at a restaurant. No meal is ever as fun to eat as a big pot of mollusks: the interactive element is what I like best, pulling at the shells, slurping the mussels and scooping the broth. It' s not especially glamorous, but it really is so [...]
I' m always looking for a new twist on the tomato, especially as my favorite summer fruit begins to wane. I had a request for panzanella this weekend and was delighted to find a recipe in Edible Nutmeg, the Connecticut farmer' s magazine that specializes on local food and produce. I quadrupled the recipe for [...]
Bitter as I was about a few failed Bittman recipes, I had to give his tomato-melon gazpacho a try. The combination did strike me as a bit odd at first, but as a lover of both tomatoes and melon, I came around pretty quickly. Also, I was won over by Bittman' s lament about the [...]
Swordfish is my favorite fish. It can' t be eaten too often I' m told, due to the threat of infertility, blindness or death by mercury. Despite the noxious metals that settle in its flesh, swordfish is one of the most delicious dishes ever drawn from the sea. The best swordfish I' ve ever had [...]
