Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Dancing Fun Fact:

In 1958, at the age of 18, Bruce Lee was the Cha-Cha champion of Hong Kong.

Source: Bruce Lee Foundation 

Seems like ol' Bruce had plenty to strut about. Why don't you check out the Strut Playlist after the jump and join him!

Since this is a lifestyle blog with “entertain” in its name, I guess I’d better invite you to a party every so often, right? Truth in advertising, and all that.

Well, the Supper Club dinners are definitely a party and you’ve had a front row seat for those – fondue, French cooking techniques, and most recently Puerto Rican cuisine – so now let’s expand our party horizons in a new direction. The big national holiday kind of direction.

The 4th of July is right around the corner so Ilise and I are planning to host an old-fashioned BBQ with a low-key vibe and an haute-cuisine twist. Not all that haute, really, just trying to say that all of our guests are good cooks so we are taking a potluck approach (quite wisely if I do say so) which makes the prep easier while offering a great mix of flavors and a few surprises for everyone.

There will be about a dozen of us celebrating independence -- and the recent Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage, cheers-clink-clink! -- on the patio next Saturday, weather willing. The theme is more ‘easy summertime hangout’ than ‘stars and stripes’ although who’s going to say No to a couple of flags and sparklers?

There’s an illegal fireworks show in the schoolyard down the block which has become an annual neighborhood tradition – very well done, always safely executed under the watchful yet unofficial eye of the many firefighters and other first responders who live in the area. In addition to the delightful company of our guests, this will provide the evening’s entertainment. 

June is the month for many cities' Puerto Rican Heritage celebrations, including the big parade in NYC held June 14th, and the Chicago festival and parade just last weekend in and around the Humboldt Park neighborhood. Flags were waved, car horns honked, and salsa music and reggaeton blared from the radio while families partied in the park. It was a fiesta no matter what your nationality.

A few weeks ago the Supper Club celebrated Puerto Rican cuisine thanks to our host, Ellyn, who recently took a business trip to Old San Juan and was inspired for our theme. Although I have never been there, it was fun to learn a little about the culture as we prepared for our contributions to the meal. (And the destination has now moved up a notch or two on my vacation bucket list!)

Puerto Rico Fun Fact #1:

Here's what we made for our banquete ('feast' en Español):

Drinks: Ilise & Ann – Bamango Coladas; Beers (Red Stripe and Negra Modelo); Wines

Appetizers: Karen & Kathleen – Empanadillos stuffed with Pork Picadillo; Tostones with Smoked Salmon; Cheddar and manchego cheese topped with guava paste  

Dinner:  Ellyn & her guest, JoAnn – Pollo Guisado; Relleno de Camarones; Mofongo

Dessert:  Dan and Greg – Banana Flan; Pineapple-Coconut Macaroons

Photos and recipes after the jump.

This video clip is ancient history in Internet years but it still makes me smile. Maybe you too? Give it a look-see. And then check out the Pony Playlist after the jump.

Not long ago I wrote a post in which I bashed bacon, but now I’d like to kiss and make up.

This dish provides the perfect combo of flavors for a summer supper. Fresh corn cut from the cob, nice large chunks of green onions, smoky bacon (crumbles and drippings for a double whammy of flavor), and a beautifully seared piece of mild white fish riding on top.  

It’s fresh and fast and it’s what you want for dinner. 

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind.

Dancing Fun Fact:

Busby Berkeley became the first filmmaker to realize that screen choreography involved the placement and movement of the camera as well as the dancers. Instead of filming numbers from fixed angles, he set his cameras into motion on custom built booms and monorails. Berkeley's trademark was to put dancers in kaleidoscopic formations and film them from overhead – if necessary, cutting right through the roof of a soundstage to get the right shot.

Source: Musicals101.com

This is your big break, kid! The Jazz Hands Playlist is your ticket to stardom, after the jump. 

Got a favorite kitchen tip that doesn’t even count as a tip because it’s so obvious and everybody probably knows about it already? Share yours in the comments. Here’s one of mine.

I used to have lots of excuses for not cooking fresh fish at home more often. No great recipes; no desire to stink up the house; no knowledge of how to keep the fish fresh for more than a day. Since becoming a Hooked on Fish subscriber, I now feel prepared to handle all of those things with style and grace. The final item – keeping fresh fish fresh – is the subject of today’s kitchen tip.

I learned this technique from my friend Karen. Check out this easy process + photos after the jump.

Sometimes the simple things are the best things, you know? 

Sunshine and blue skies. The gentle sway of a porch swing. A cold drink on a hot day. Cocktails with a minimal list of ingredients and zero pretensions. 

This is one of those.



Recipe and summertime drinkin’/porch swingin’ music after the jump.

Afternoon Dance Break is a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Dancing Fun Fact:

The most dance spins in a minute by a couple is 195. 

This feat was achieved by Marina Femia (Italy) and Alexander Caicedo Sastoque (Colombia) on the set of Lo Show dei Record in Rome, Italy, on March 27, 2010. Marina was spun, Alexander was the spinner.

Source: Guinness World Records



Please enjoy the Spin Playlist after the jump.

I’ve mentioned before that I am a latecomer to the fish-loving community of eaters. Growing up we were served fish sticks and mayo-licious tuna salad, so hardly any fish at all, and the few try-a-bites that I dared to do even with restaurant fish turned me off pretty thoroughly.

As an adult diner I made a point to expand my horizons and have long since come around to ordering all manner of fish in a restaurant setting. Okay, not all manner, I still make pretty tame selections and I know I will never enjoy certain things such as squid, octopus or even scallops.

But cooking fish at home is still a fairly new thing for me, which is why I’m enjoying the Hooked on Fish sustainable fish delivery subscription so much. (Full disclosure: the owner is a friend.) Pushing the piscine envelope and moving outside my mild-fish comfort zone has been fun and easier than I thought. Now I’m confident enough to seek out recipes that are a little bit out of the box as well. Which brings me to this week’s fish dinner – Sicilian-style Swordfish. 

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

James Brown was many things, not all of them admirable. But the fact that the Hardest Working Man in Show Business was a mighty fine dancer cannot be denied. Dig this home video (looks like it anyway) where he demonstrates a few of his signature moves. 

And then turn up the volume for the Get On the Good Foot Playlist after the jump.

In culinary terms piccata refers to thin slices of meat, dredged and then quickly sautéed, served with a pan sauce frequently involving lemon, butter, capers and wine. The protein can be anything -- fish, pork, turkey, or the old favorites – veal is commonly served in Italy and chicken is more popular in the U.S.

All I know is that my taste buds start watering when I read Chicken Piccata on the menu at my favorite restaurants. I grew up in New Jersey, home to many excellent Italian-American family-owned neighborhood red sauce joints, so I love a simple dish of noodles and gravy (or sauce or ragu depending on who you ask) but every so often the lure of that lemony-briny goodness is too much to resist. So give in already and pucker up!

I love this show and its seriously flawed, funny as hell, twisted, down-but-not-out characters who often get kicked in the teeth for their troubles but every once in a great while emerge triumphant.

Apparently in Season 3 we will be treated to themes of motherhood and faith, the comings and goings of some featured characters (Alex/Laura Prepon is back and Larry/Jason Biggs is not), and the tastiest treat of all -- big butch Boo (Lea DeLaria) in ruby red lipstick!

Can. Not. Wait. Good news – we don’t have to! Season 3 returns Friday June 12 on Netflix for your viewing pleasure. If you’re going to binge-watch, you might need a little nourishment along the way, keep up your strength to command the remote. I don’t know that you’ll get much nutrition from these suggested snacks, but they’re delicious and thematically correct, so there you go.  Pictures and recipe after the jump.

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Dancing Fun Fact: 

When Fred Astaire had his first screen test, a Hollywood executive commented this on paper that he (Astaire) "Can't act, can't sing, slightly bald. Can dance a little."

Source: Encyclopedia Britannica

Please feel free to cut a rug to the Foxtrot Playlist after the jump.

Oh, bacon, what are we going to do with you. (Besides the obvious. Get in mah belly, you tasty morsel of porky goodness!)

Though its deliciousness has never been in question, bacon has ridden the popularity roller coaster and shrieked through the loop-de-loop of trendy foodstuffs more than once over the past 15+ years. For a while, bacon was found everywhere you’d least expect it: in chocolate bars, ice cream, bacon-infused vodka. Bacon-wrapped turkey, bacon-wrapped hot dogs, deep-fried bacon. Bacon hats, bacon underpants, bacon tattoos. Everywhere all the time. Bacon Festivals sprang up in many places (with EMTs on standby no doubt – good event management protocol in any case, but maybe especially so here?) 

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Dancing Fun Facts:

Tap dance originated in the United States through the fusion of several ethnic percussive dances, primarily African tribal dances and Scottish, Irish, and English clog dances, hornpipes, and jigs.

Tap dance as it is known today did not emerge until roughly the 1920s, when “taps,” nailed or screwed onto shoe soles at the toes and heels, became popular.

Source: Encyclopedia Britannica 

Give a listen to the Tap Dance Playlist after the jump.

Do recipes ever jump off the page or the screen and grab you? They lie in wait to ambush me, waiting for a hungry or otherwise vulnerable moment to leap out yammering for my attention, “Make me! I’m soo delicious. Make me right now!”

Sometimes these “love at first sight” recipes are keepers, becoming tried and true stalwarts in your kitchen repertoire. Other times they provide a nice taste but nothing more. And at times they turn out fine but lead you to the conclusion that what you really wanted all along is something different entirely.

Today’s recipe, my children, falls in the latter category. Don’t worry, there’s a happy ending.

Questions, I get questions. People often ask where I find the music that’s featured on the blog. 

You know -- the fishin' ditties in the Fish for Dinner posts; and the singer-songwriter-y tunes in the Sweet Bites and Savory Bites posts; the crank-it-up playlists for the Cookbook Road Tests; and who can forget the Afternoon Dance Breaks. 

Short answer: All over.

Better answer: I’ve got a pretty extensive music collection of my own, although it probably leans towards oldies, er ... classics. 

Labels don’t bother me much though, not when it comes to music. It’s all about what resonates -- whether old or new, fast or slow, major or minor -- how you feel, what moves you and grooves you. 

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Wikipedia sez:

The term jig was probably derived from the French giguer, meaning 'to jump' or the Italian giga. It was known as a dance in 16th-century England, often in 12/8 time. During the seventeenth century the dance was adopted in Ireland and Scotland, where it was widely adapted, and the jig is now most often associated with these countries.

Huh. Now you know. Perhaps you’d like to get jiggy with it? In that case I recommend the Jig Playlist after the jump.

After a wonderful week in Paris Ilise and I parted ways with mom-in-law Ina, each headed onward for more travel. Ina joined a tour group in Amsterdam while Ilise and I went to the Bourgogne (Burgundy) wine region, specifically the town of Beaune which became our home base for three delightful days.

Ilise and I are wine people (we know a little, collect a bit, love to sip and serve it to friends) and this is definitely wine country, a mecca for Pinot Noir and Chardonnay lovers. Everything revolves around the wine and the industries that support it. Perfectly fine with us, although we did try a few non-wine related activities just to prove we could and met with mixed success. More on that during the detailed travelogue after the jump.