At the market last week, I just about stopped dead in my tracks. There each one was, assembled in such close proximity that I almost couldn’t bear it. Check out the loveliness of the following: Fuyu persimmons, Satsuma mandarins, and Belgian endive.
If I were Martha Stewart, hostess extraordinaire, queen of all good things, CEO of a multi-billion dollar empire, and owner of several palatial estates along the East Coast, I know what I would have done. I would have bought a basket full of these stunning edibles, arranged them beautifully on one of my 12 foot long, maple dining tables, careful to hide all of their bruises and imperfections, and had a stunning centerpiece to enjoy for the few days that the produce remained rosy.
But let’s get real. Martha may be great, but she can also be a tad, well… unrealistic. I live in New [...]

I remember my grandma’s waldorf salad– an interesting mix of both fruit and vegetables, all mixed up with a paste-like dressing. I have never been a huge mayonnaise fan, but yet I was enthralled with the waldorf dressing. A little mayonnaise, a touch of whipped cream, could it be? Sweet yet tangy, light and lustrous, this dressing seemed to have it all. I would sit at the table, a dish of the mellifluous concoction before me, both repulsed and intoxicated.
Now it’s been years since I have partaken in this salad of yore. And just the thought of it, I must say, repulses rather more than intoxicates me. But the basics of the waldorf salad are good ones. It has good bones. It’s just the dressing that must be updated, made more palatable for my 21st century tastebuds. And so I resorted [...]