Balsamic Vinegar

When planning a menu for a company dinner, I usually select the main course first then think about the side dishes. But sometimes it works the other way around, and an accompaniment becomes inspiration for a meal. In a quandary over what to serve at a casual supper for friends, I was exploring my files in search of ideas when I came across a recipe for honey-glazed carrots seasoned with cumin and orange. I created the recipe last winter after tasting a similar version in Paris, but I had tucked my notes away and forgotten them.

As temperatures drop and autumn's enter- taining moves indoors, get ready to juggle that glass of merlot in one hand while you reach with the other for a bore d'oeuvre. Zzzzzzzzzzz. You know the kind. Cubes of bland cheddar and pallid Swiss, all tossed into a jumbled pile like loose Legos or - even worse - lined up in neat rows, each chunk stabbed with a toothpick that waves a sad little fringe of colored cellophane. "It's your classic, cheap catering tray" is how Mick Kipp, owner of the Whiskey Island Pirate Shop on 36th Street, derides this cheesy old standby.

The mere mention of the phrase fast food is enough to send most serious chefs running for their slow cookers. But for celebrity chef Jacques Pepin, fast food is nothing to sneer at - if, that is, it's done Pepin-style. With the publication of Fast Food My Way (Houghton Mifflin, 2004, $32) - a companion to Pepin's new television series of the same title - the prolific French cook shares the best of his easy, quick recipes. Fast food, as Pepin defines it in the introduction to this lively, brightly illustrated cookbook, is not processed.

A handful of chopped shallots is spooned into the blender, followed by a splash of vinegar, a bit of Dijon mustard, some seasonings, then bruuuuum, the motor roars, a steady stream of olive oil is gradually poured in and voila - vinaigrette. The procedure takes Barry Rumsey, chef-owner of Bicycle restaurant in South Baltimore, less time than boiling an egg, but the results are a marvel. On this particular morning, he's created a pomegranate vinaigrette, a sweet-and-sour accompaniment to an appetizer of arugula and smoked duck breast with caramelized onions and pumpkin seeds.

Once upon a time, vinegar mostly came in two types, cider and distilled. If you looked around, you might find red wine vinegar, maybe even white wine or rice wine vinegar. Then the foodie explosion of the 1970s led to all sorts of doctored vinegars. Vinegar appeals to the kitchen tinkerer because it can't spoil, so you can add flavorings to it without risk. Why not throw in mint or basil or sage? Garlic, hot chilies, tangerine peel? Great fun. And then came the fruit vinegars. A couple of years back, the words "raspberry vinegar" were splattered all over every self-respecting restaurant menu.

This project started off as a way to say "thanks for showing up" to the eggplant. In these, the waning days of garden productivity, I am grateful for any plant that continues to bear fruit. As often happens with my cooking projects, this one soon took a turn in a different direction. I found a recipe that mixed eggplant, basil and four cheeses. The challenge came with handling the calzone, the trouser-leg-shaped dough that wrapped around the eggplant and cheeses. The trick was transferring the dough, stuffed with eggplant and cheese, onto the pizza stone in a piping hot, 500-degree oven.

Last fall, in the Perigord, a region in southwestern France, I picked up a little jar of balsamic onion marmalade with a handwritten label. In an attempt to duplicate the recipe, I sauteed chopped onions in a small amount of butter and sugar until soft and brown, then added balsamic vinegar, red wine and dark raisins to the pan. The onions were cooked several minutes more until the vinegar and wine had almost evaporated and the mixture was glistening and...

NOW THAT THERE are ripe peaches in the kitchen, mornings should smell sweeter. The other morning I was sitting at the kitchen table, savoring the flavors and aromas of a bowl of peaches and cream. Then I sniffed something foul but familiar. I smelled smoke. The air streaming through the kitchen door carried the same off odor that had filled the neighborhood a week or so earlier, when the smoke from a burning CSX freight train rolled out of the Howard Street tunnel. "Not another train fire," I thought.

If you're a meat lover, you know that a dinner at a steak restaurant is a rare treat. You'll be seduced by steak cuts with a quality that you probably won't see in your supermarket. Prime meat is usually reserved for food service. But what are you to do when you crave a hunk of meat in the comfort of your kitchen? My solution is opt for beef tenderloin. It doesn't have to be prime to be tender. I ask the butcher for 1-inch-thick slices. A balsamic-vinegar marinade and blast of heat are the secrets for getting the best flavor from this meat.

When my cooking students ask me how I determine whether a restaurant is good or not, I often reply, "It's all in the vegetables." I explain that if a chef pays attention to these side dishes, you can be certain the rest of the menu will also be carefully prepared. The same adage applies to home chefs. Show me the cook who presents beautifully cooked vegetables, and I know the other dishes will be just as tempting. In the fall, a new crop of vegetables appears: squashes in all colors and shapes, huge cabbages, tightly coiled Brussels sprouts, and fresh rutabagas and sweet potatoes.