Blog de Puree

Late September and into October is when the harvest really peaks here in Northern MA and this week’s farm-share had the most variety yet. I celebrated our veggie bounty by making “Le Grand Aioli,” something I have been dying to try since I read about it in Domino Magazine last year.
Some flounder poached in wine and lemon, [...]

We picked up our first share of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) produce from Arrowhead Family Farm in Newburyport, Mass today and consequently cooked our first, delicious meal from locally grown food.

A bird’s eye view of the Arrowhead Family Farm along the
Merrimack River in Newburyport, Mass.
Take that big chain markets and national (and international) food distribution [...]

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Nestled behind the brick building at 36 Main Street in Amesbury is an artisan chocolate shop called Ovedia that is sure to soon be known as Amesbury’s sweet spot.
I discovered the place a week before Valentine’s day in 2007 in a frantic search for sea salt caramels (One of my wife’s favorites) and I didn’t [...]

Randye and I spent the Friday after Valentine’s Day at our new favorite local restaurant, Ten Center Street–now that Theory has closed its doors.
What it lacks in Theory’s ultra-coziness (I think it sat no more than 30 people), Ten Center Street makes up for in sumptuous culinary delights by Head Chef Harley Smith and wicked [...]

Rather than going to a market, health food store or local coffee shops for fruit smoothies that cost upwards of $4 to $5 dollars, we’ve started making them at home.
Even better, for the price of a smoothie out in the world, we can buy enough ingredients to make at least eight to ten smoothies at [...]

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It’s worn, slightly yellowed and a bit long in the tooth, but the Hungry Traveler in Salisbury, Mass. is one of the better traditional New England style restaurants that I’ve eaten at in the greater Newburyport area.
After living in Amesbury and snobbishly driving by the restaurant’s unassuming gray clapboard exterior on the way to and [...]

This past Friday evening, Randye and I had a belated Valentine’s Day meal that blew away anything we’ve had in the area for a long, long time. And we’d love to recommend the restaurant, but we’re not going to. Why? Because it’s our secret and we don’t want to share! (It’s small and it’s in [...]

We decided we’d treat ourselves this past Saturday to a nice dinner out at the Mission Oak Grill (Web site still under construction), one of Newburyport’s new restaurants and our waitress told us that it identifies itself as a steak house. Unfortunately, it wasn’t as good as we had hoped.
The restaurant is in an old [...]