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There's abalone. And then there's the geoduck.

On Good Food this past week, Evan Kleiman had a captivating (and a bit giggle-filled) interview with filmmaker Justin Bookey on his documentary, 3 Feet Under: Digging Deep for the Geoduck Clam. Bookey explains that there's more to the geoduck than...er...meets the eye.

Preferment, noun: A combination of flour, water, and sometimes yeast that is prepared in advance (as in pre-fermentation) and then mixed into the main body of the dough as an additional ingredient.

When we first started baking, this was a new technique and a new vocab word all in one. Wrapping your head around the idea of a preferment can be a little tricky at first, but well worth it for the boost in flavor and structure one provides!

Q: What do roasted meat, crusty bread, and dark beers all have in common?

A: Aside from a mighty fine dinner, all three are made tastier are thanks to a chemical process known as the Maillard reaction!

Curious?! Click through for more...

In Kathryn's post last week on corked wine, she advised returning it to the store or refusing it at a restaurant.

The wine savvy among us might have no problem with this. But for those of us who feel timid at the prospect of returning an opened bottle of wine, here are a few notes on etiquette.

Blanching vegetables--cooking them in a large amount of boiling water--might seem fussy or bring to mind childhood dinners of overcooked mushy carrots.

But blanching is a good technique to keep in your back pocket, particularly when planning a dinner party.

If you're serving veggies with dip or a cold salad, blanching the vegetables will bring out their vibrant colors and take the edge off the raw flavor and texture. If you're serving them as a hot side dish, vegetables can be blanched hours ahead of time and then reheat before serving.

Here's how!

If issues of your local Edible Community publication are too far and few between for your liking, check out Edible Nation!

Bruce Cole and Kurt Michael Friese are the official bloggers for the Edible Communities organization. With candor and a good dose of wit, they keep us posted on issues affecting the national food scene and give us updates on local news.

Do you taste your food while cooking? Or do you wait until the end and hope for the best?

Tasting food during cooking might be second nature to some of us, but maybe not for all. Getting to know your dish in all its stages and what flavors taste good to you is a big part of learning to cook beyond the recipe.

A friend of ours who purchases supplies for a culinary school slipped us a few of these fresh, green beauties the other day. We felt like we were "in" on some clandestine culinary transaction!

Breaking open the pod revealed two perfect garbanzo beans nestled snugly against each other. We ate them right there, popping one and then the other into our mouth with glee.

For years, we've been trying to duplicate the kind of tofu we're served at Chinese restaurants. Finally, we think we're on the right track.

The secret is dredging the chunks of cut tofu in cornstarch and then sauteing them separately from the veggies. This method yields springy tofu with a pleasantly chewy interior, a nice contrast to the crunchy snow peas and the tangy flavors in the sauce.

Steam is an essential component for getting a classic artisan loaf with good oven spring and a crackling crust, like the sourdough loaves we've been baking lately.

Short of investing in an oven with steam-injection, home bakers have developed a few tricks over the years to generate a steamy baking environment. Here's how!

Recipes for preparing mussels, including our own recipe for Linguine with Mussels and Dandelion Greens, includes an instruction to "clean and debeard the mussels." For the uninitiated, this can be a confusing and discouraging step.

Never fear! In the spirit of learning new things, here's a tutorial to help walk you through!

Since reading about food pantries and shelters struggling with the rising food costs, we've been struggling with how we might be able to help out.

There's one man out in California who already knows what he's going to be doing, and it's the same thing he and his friends have been doing for the past 10 years: handing out home-made burritos to homeless people, hungry people, and pretty much anyone who wants one!

On this past week's episode of Good Food, Even Kleiman interviews the LA Burrito Guy to get the scoop.

Remoulade (Ruh-moo-LAHD); noun: A classic sauce of mayonnaise with capers, chopped cornichons, dijon mustard, anchovy paste, and fine herbs.

If you're a fan of crunchy, salty, and sweet combinations, it's a safe bet that you'll like this sauce! Just chop up and measure out a few tablespoons of each ingredient, stir into some mayonnaise, and you've got yourself a quick and easy sauce!

Salt to taste. Such a simple and innocent instruction! We've read those words a million times over the years without thinking anything of it.

But lately we started wondering what this really means. What exactly are we tasting for?

Chris's post last week on cooking mistakes was a catalog of every kitchen snafu we've ever had the joy of experiencing. Ouch!

There's nothing worse than realizing that you forgot to chop the spinach just as your onions turn translucent. Or even worse: that tell-tale aroma of singed vegetables wafting from the stove.

Next time you find yourself facing a dinner disaster of the burned variety, here are two quick tips to help save the day.

Reading this article from the Boston Globe, "Squeezed by Prices, Pantries Ask for Help," should have felt like more of a shock. But really, it just made grim sense.

Of course food pantries and homeless shelters, dependent on donations of food and money, would be hard hit by the rising food costs we've all been anxiously discussing.

But it's more complicated than you might expect.

In our humble (as always) opinion, crunching down on a sweet airy meringue is one of life's great pleasures. Since just a few egg whites yields dozens of meringue bites, we can eat a belly-full and still have plenty left for the days ahead.

The only trick is keeping the meringue crispy beyond that first day...

We've talked a lot recently about how much we love cooking and serving with wooden utensils. Silicone and stainless steel have their uses and particular beauty, too. But there's a tactile pleasure in using a wooden spoon that's all it's own.

Wooden utensils do have one downside: they quickly lose their attractive glossy finish, are prone to cracking, and are generally a little fussy to take care of. Here are a few simple steps to help you avoid replacing them every few months.

When held up against the fresh, mouth-watering produce at farmer's markets, canned foods can definitely pale in comparison (to say the least). But they have their time and place too!

This soup recipe makes use of a few of our canned pantry staples: black beans, diced tomatoes, and chicken broth. A single piece of bacon adds a subtle smoky flavor and silky texture. And sure, feel free to throw in a few seasonal ingredients to round things out!

Ok, folks, put on your thinking caps. Professor George Hart has issued a challenge to all us smarty-pants foodies.

He asks, "Can you find three foods such that all three do not go together (by any reasonable definition of foods "going together") but every pair of them does go together?" In other words, a triad of food ingredients where A+B is lovely, B+C is scrumptious, and even A+C is conceivable, but A+B+C is just unthinkably disgusting?

Anyone doing any baking this weekend? We're still playing around with sourdough in our kitchen, which boils down to throwing a cup of sourdough starter in just about everything. (Pizza dough? YES! Muffins? Mmm...we'll get back to you on that one...)

If you're looking for some inspiration, here's a round-up of some of our favorite cookbooks. What are yours?

For some reason we often find ourselves shying away from the seafood section at the grocery store. Particularly with shellfish, there's an intimidation factor that just isn't there with chicken or steak.

If this sounds like you, mussels are a good place to start overcoming your fear! Cooking them is a snap--all you need to do is scrub off any residual grit, throw them in a pot with a little liquid, and cover with a lid. Wait five minutes and PRESTO! Mussels for dinner!

Attention, bargain hunters! With all this talk of high food costs and budget crunching, have you ever thought of grocery shopping at $.99 stores?

Like Evan Kleiman in her interview with Julie Makinen, we were skeptical. Thinking of 99-Cent stores, and we can't help but envision rows of dented canned meat, the occasional cake mix, and rolls upon rolls of scratchy toilet paper.

But Makinen tells us not to judge so quickly...

With all the wine talk this past week, we thought we'd introduce you to a bit of wine trivia you may not have heard before!

Botrytis cinerea, a.k.a. Noble Rot (noun): a kind of mold that grows on grapes late in the growing season.

But don't let the idea of moldy grapes fool you! This noblest of rots is a crucial component to many fine wines.

When noble rot sets in, the grapes shrivel up like raisins, concentrating the sugar inside. Much of this sugar remains after the grapes are fermented, eventually producing an intensely sweet white wine.