A person's first taste of the Chinese soup dumplings called xiao long bao is a magical one. I've seen it again and again on the faces of friends and family eating the dumplings for the first time at Din Tai Fung in Arcadia, a nearby outpost of the Taiwan-based soup dumpling chain: there is wonder, followed by bliss, and finally greed, as they mentally calculate the remaining dumplings divided by the number of people at the table. So how did this regional specialty from the outskirts of Shanghai come to be a beloved food in Southern California and beyond? More

Do you sometimes notice that certain foods make you feel sluggish while others energize and revive you? Well, Oprah does and in the latest issue of her magazine, she reporting on which foods she grabs at the grocery store to boost her brain power. More

Back when our grandmothers started baking cookies, they probably weren't reading articles about the gluten content of cake flour versus all-purpose, or the melting points of butter and shortening. Baking is chemistry, it's true — but it's also more than that, as writer Deborah Blum realized when she set out to recreate her grandmother's chocolate chip cookies. More

With our recent focus on American farmers and growers it seems like this land we love has more than enough food to go around. If we took all the food harvested from American soil and distributed it evenly to all our citizens, would it be enough to go around? More

Perhaps you have a healthy kitchen garden and chicken coop, and you are ready to move onto something a little more challenging. How about pigs? In The Washington Post, food writer and backyard pig farmer Tamar Haspel writes in fascinating detail about what it takes to set up your own backyard habitat for pigs. More

There have been a number of independent food + lifestyle journals to hit stands in recent years—Kinfolk, Wilder, Lucky Peach, to name just a few. The newest journal to enter the fray is Gather, a "recipe-driven food publication devoted not just to cooking and eating, but to what those acts inspire: the bringing of people together." Each issue will focus on a theme ("Float" is the inaugural theme) and be divided into chapters—"much like a meal," they say, with "amuse bouches, starters, mains, and desserts."

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One of the things we love about Food.Farmer.Earth, the YouTube video channel, is how succinctly but beautifully it connects viewers with the wisdom of people who grow, raise, and prepare food. "Sustainable agriculture" can be a rather daunting subject, but Food.Farmer.Earth brings food issues home with cooking tips, first-hand stories, and well-curated content. More

What better accompaniment to summer's fresh tomatoes, zucchini, and peas than pesto! And not just the classic basil and pine nut variety, either. How about sun dried tomato and Aleppo pepper or pistachio and lemon? Read on for more great pesto inspiration! More

On a scorching summer day, you're probably more likely to grab an iced coffee than a steaming cup of joe. But a study has shown that drinking a hot beverage on a hot day actually can cool you down. How? More

Once upon a time, it was unusual to even ask dinner guests about food allergies, let alone their preferences. Today, it can seem strange to have a dinner party without some sort of food restriction. Paleo, vegan, no carb, no gluten: sometimes planning a menu can require research into what these diets mean exactly. Fortunately, specialty food like gluten-free flours and vegan meat substitutions are much easier to find. But where to draw the line before you're practically making individual meals for each guest? The New York Times asked this question this past week — see what they had to say. More