Kitchen & Home

As we make our way through all of the tomatoes and peaches in our kitchen, we’re noticing fruit flies hovering around the garbage can full of pits and skins. The bad news: These suckers can create hundreds of offspring within a week or two. The good news: AT: Re-Nest posted an incredibly simple way to get rid of them. See a close-up picture of a fruit fly and get the instructions for its demise, below… Those red eyes are a trademark of the fruit fly — yuck.

Marché Atwater is a glorious sight right now: the outdoor parking lot is transformed into rows of greenhouses filled with flowers and plants. And the indoor shops are bustling with activity. Fresh seasonal produce galore makes the trip a feast for the stomach and the eyes. On our first trip there, we acquainted ourselves with a few favorites…Just a small selection of the seasonal produce available at Atwater right now.

Cleaning the inside bottom of a wine glass isn’t easy. And unless you have tiny hands that can wiggle inside, you may want one of these brushes…There are a lot of wine glass brushes on the market, but we like this one for its soft, flexible foam bristles that don’t scratch or make us nervous that we’ll break the glass. The one above is a goblet brush, and it’s pretty big and bulbous.

This is one of those things we do because our mom did, and we have no idea if it’s actually doing anything. Our guess is no, but we still do it — and we found funny little product devoted to the practice. See it below…This is from The Container Store, and it is supposed to let air reach your open baking soda while keeping the baking soda “fresh.

Not since a roommate in college had a rice maker have I played around with one. If I remember correctly, that one singed the bottom layer of rice and then broke before Thanksgiving break.Not much of a gadget-cook myself, I usually avoid appliances like these. But I’ve been playing around with Zojirushi’s latest model, the Rizo, and recently took their suggestion in the instruction manual to make risotto using the machine’s intriguing risotto setting.

We saw these jars over at AT:Chicago and zoomed right in. They’re from the new Ikea catalog…Ikea’s kitchen department is right in line with the rest of the store — modern, simple, lots of stainless steel — but these caught our eye because they look like they’d fit with traditional decor, too.We love the natural, acacia wood tops, and even the plain white porcelain looks warm and creamy.

The last time we moved, we packed our used pieces of shelf liner. Every bit, from every cabinet. Then we re-cut and re-used it in our new kitchen. That’s how durable this stuff is — and how much we love it.As the company says, “The difference is the ribs!” See details, below…We love shelf liner and won’t stock a new kitchen without it.

We saw this photo in the August issue of Domino. It’s from designer Thom Filicia’s lake house, and it’s (obviously) a picture of his well-stocked bar. In his entry way.It got us thinking…There is something very suave about beautiful decanters of brandy or scotch sitting on a handsome bar cart in the corner of the living room.

It seems that a lot of people are enamored with bento these days, and for good reason. It’s practical, convenient, aesthetic, and it sure is a big help with portion control! However, we’ve been kicking it old school recently with our old-fashioned wooden bento box.Before plastic bento were the rage, bento boxes were made of wood, often lacquered wood. The boxes often had only four sections, and a lid.

In the latest email about barbecuing, you mention the Lodge grill pan. i was so thrilled when i bought one about 2 years ago. The first few times i used were pretty fabulous. Unfortunately, i live in a tiny apartment and had no place to store it except jammed between my stove and small prep table. The pan developed this unbearably sticky, crusty, dusty film on it that i just couldn’t get off.

Our tour yesterday of Biggie’s well-organized and bento-optimized kitchen made us think back over some of our favorite creative storage solutions from past kitchen tours. Read on to see our top five… In no particular order, here are five creative storage solutions we’ve enjoyed from past kitchen tours and kitchen spotlights. David Lebovitz’s vintage Champagne bucket.Great for utensils and spatulas.

A few weeks ago, we were having trouble getting our chili pepper plants to pollinate and bear fruit. The flowers would bloom and seem to flourish. Then a few days later they’d curl up again and fall off, stem and all.After a bit of research, we thought we’d try hand-pollinating. Here’s how!Container gardens and balcony gardens are particularly prone to pollination problems because they don’t get as much insect-traffic or crosswinds as ground gardens do.

Has this ever happen to you? We’d just finished enjoying a home-cooked meal and went back to the kitchen for cleanup to find this. Scorched food burnt to the bottom of the pan. Sigh. Whoops. We were searing something and took it a little too far, or we were making soup and didn’t realize the bottom burned until it was too late. It happens. And when it does, here are a few things we try. 1. Deglaze the pan.

Take a look at this chalkboard recipe wall in Leah’s new kitchen! We’re loving the bright and practical idea, as well as the rest of her stunning remodel.Leah took her old kitchen, with unpleasant wood cabinets, and turned it into a white space that is timeless and modern at the same time. We love it!

Marianne’s Paris apartment didn’t come with cabinets. “I didn’t want to get an IKEA like everyone else,” Marianne says. A DIY kind of gal, she started collecting empty wooden wine crates from supermarkets and wine stores, and drilled them into the wall as open storage in her kitchen.For the full house tour, go here.– Kristin Hohenadel blogging from rue Vieille du Temple, Paris, France. She can be reached at kristinh @ apartmenttherapy .

Whose cuisine reigns supreme?!We may not be quite up to battling Bobby Flay over cuttlefish, but we think we’re game for challenging our next door neighbor over flank steak!Lately, we’ve heard about a lot of these kinds of Iron Chef dinner parties, inspired by the Food Network and FujiTV series. Culinary-inclined friends create a dish using the same ingredient and your party guests become judges. What a fun idea!Want to throw one of your own? Here’s how!

We noticed these little wispy cobwebs on our oregano the other morning. We didn’t see any arachnid or insect activity, so we assumed it was a little gift left by a night visitor to our container garden.But then it seemed to be getting worse. We saw it on a few other herbs in the same pot, and some leaves looked entirely cocooned in threads.We still didn’t see any actual insects, so we wiped the cobwebs away with our fingers and carried on.

We made a heavenly mushroom risotto with ramps this past weekend.Creamy, oozy, and rich–we proclaimed it the Best Risotto Ever and promptly ate the entire pot.One problem, though. It’s now Monday morning, and what was originally the mouth-watering aroma of imminent deliciousness has become an unwanted house guest. The aroma, oh, how it lingers.Help!The most logical solution is to open the windows and let nature do the work, which is what we’re doing right now!

My office is looking into replacing our disposable plates, bowls, and cutlery with reusable items. I checked IKEA because their prices are appealing, but I’d like to know if anyone out there has used the MOTTO line of plates and bowls in the microwave. In my experience, the SYNTES line gets very hot when microwaved even though it is deemed microwave-safe. Do the MOTTO pieces also heat up to unsafe or uncomfortable temperatures?

We love looking at beautiful, envy-inducing kitchens, and we know you do, too (hence the popularity of our kitchen tours). Which is why we’ve already spent much more than our allotted procrastination time today looking at some doozies over at House Beautiful’s website.See more photos below…These are not our kitchens. These are not our friends’ kitchens — even our friends who have more money and space that we do.

Summer is high season for weddings – do you have invitations coming by mail already? We have blogged extensively in the past about DIY wedding food – elegant finger food, for instance, and a whole menu of desserts that you can make yourself.We’re going to have a weekly column this summer on wedding and party food and some of the challenges of making a wedding or a party more delicious – whether you’re working with a caterer or all by yourself.

Earlier this week I toured the Park Slope, Brooklyn kitchen of Elizabeth Crowell and Robert Wilson, the owners of the Sterling Place fine home décor and specialty gift stores. Robert and Elizabeth live in a beautiful four-story 1897 brownstone that they bought four years ago and live in with their two small children and two cats.

As the days get warmer and we start running air conditioners and paying higher electric bills, it’s good to remember ways to keep your kitchen energy efficient. Step one: Setting your refrigerator and freezer on the right temperature.You want your fridge cold enough to prevent bacteria from forming but not so cold it freezes things. We’ve pulled out many a bunch of herbs and vegetables, only to find hardened, brittle leaves that got too cold.

When I asked Eric Gower how often he cooks in his kitchen his answer was “Three times a day! At least!” Eric also teaches cooking, works as a private chef, is the author of two beautiful and innovative cook books, The Breakaway Japanese Kitchen and The Breakaway Cook, and maintains a wonderful food-centric blog on his website. In short, he is a man obsessed with food, which is good news for us.

We were reading the comments on our post about storing leftovers and noticed ksmile’s enthusiastic endorsement of Keepeez lids.When we went looking for more information, we found a promo video on You Tube that has some really catchy sound effects, and now we want some lids for ourselves (mission accomplished, promo video). Click below for the link…The cool thing about Keepeez is that while you can buy containers that match up with the lids, you don’t have to.

Seeing those first seedlings peek up out of the soil is a proud moment for novice and veteran gardeners alike.Which makes it all the more dispiriting when a late-spring cold snap blows through or a squirrel decides your container garden is a good place to look for dinner.An easy and inexpensive way to protect your wee plantlings is with a plastic pop-bottle cloche!Any plastic bottle will do.

Here’s a fun and interesting question from Lou. This is a different sort of question for us – any creative ideas from you kitchen decorators? Lou asks…I’m looking for a cool way/decorative way to store cookie cutters. Nothing in a box. Any ideas?(To All Good Questions) Lou, a couple ideas came to mind. First of all, it sounds like you already own cookie cutters.

Kristin’s lovely pictures of herb-filled window boxes in London brought up some comments about strangers stealing herbs or, worse, um, “watering” them. And yet we love the idea of planting a small herb garden and hanging it out the window — especially since we live in a high-rise building with no fire escape.

With a well-stocked pantry, you’ll not only be prepared to cook a wide range of dishes, you’ll save time and money in the long run, because by getting accustomed to your personal set of supplies, you’ll develop your own style, and you will not have to go out to the store and buy every single ingredient in a dish when it’s time for dinner. In the Kitchn Cure, I’m starting to try to impart some techniques for cooking more by instinct than by recipe.

We’re on a dessert kick today. We already showed you a heavy-hitting Rhubarb Fool, and now we’re pushing little glasses full of chocolate mousse…But our intentions are good! We think individual desserts that can be made ahead are a great way to give dinner guests something special without making more work for you.Any pudding, mousse, or parfait lends itself well to being served in small glasses.

That’s a 2004 issue of Gourmet on the far right. Isn’t the cover nice? We’ve had it sitting in a stack of magazines on our coffee table for years, through multiple moves, and still haven’t thrown it away. And yet, we’ve never cooked anything from its pages.

Yesterday we gave you a quick video snapshot of the rainbow of beautiful colors from Fiesta. We love Fiesta’s classic durability and made-in-America history. So we couldn’t resist showing you a few more photos. Here’s their newest product: a return to the classic set of three-sized mixing bowls. More below, including an up-close look at our favorite color and other new products.

I have a full set of the Dansk (DANSK IHC KOBENWARE on bottoms) Kobenstyle cookware in navy blue and white that has served me well, but the bottoms of all of the pots and pans have rusted and leave rust rings in my sink if I don’t clean them immediately. How do I safely remove the rust and somehow seal the bottoms so that they do not continue to rust in the future?(To All Good Questions) We love Dansk Kobenstyle pots and pans; you can’t beat that classic look and punchy color.

It’s lovely when dinner guests ask what they can bring. At the same time, it’s tricky figuring out what to tell them. Deep down, we always want fresh flowers to brighten up our house (if any of our friends are reading) but feel that’s like asking for a gift rather than something to help with the meal. We have a few guidelines we follow that take into account who’s asking (i.e.

What’s the most unsanitary item in your house? The toilet? Nope, think again. It’s your trusty, well-used kitchen sponge. Sponges are germ vectors. Think about it; all those holes, the dampness, the bits of food … perfect real estate for microorganisms to move into and throw a party. You could bleach the sponges, but we generally feel that less bleach in the environment is a better thing.What kinds of microorganisms can be found in sponges?

Emily, like many of us, is making her own collection of recipes, and she needs a binder to store them in. Do you have any suggestions?I am compiling a recipe “folder” and would like to find a very cute/chic three ring binder to store them in. Do you have any suggestions? There have to be cute binders out there somewhere!Thanks!

Last Thursday I gave a controversial assignment as part of Week Two of The Kitchn Cure: I asked you to pitch your processed foods.And the questions started rolling in about what, exactly, processed foods are?Processed food is basically food that has been changed from its natural state for the sake of shelf life and safety, or for the sake of convenience.

I know there are plenty of tea drinkers at AT and I really need their help. My husband and I are avid tea drinkers and are looking for a storage solution for our loose leaf tea. I know I want something that is air-tight and preferably rectangular (easier to store in cupboard). My husband wants something that is opaque so he can leave it on his desk at work. We haven’t been able to find something that meets both of our requests.

This product seems like the less glamorous stepsister of the Trio Herb Pot we blogged last week. On one hand, it’s an easy, space-saving option for growing herbs indoors. On the other, you insert a “Chia growing sponge” into each pot instead of soil.The sponges look like dirt… feel like dirt… But they aren’t dirt.We do get six seed packets to choose from: Basil, Chives, Cilantro, Dill, Marjoram, and Parsley (curly, not flat).

I was wondering what you recommend as a good kitchen trash bag. Right now I use grocery store bags. I like to bring my own earth friendly bag shopping with me, but then I am out of trash bags! What is an earth friendly option for dealing with my kitchen trash? Are plastic bin liners that bad? Thanks!– Britt (To All Good Questions) Great question, Britt.

This tour comes to us from Sabra Krock, a new tour contributor and photographer based in New York City. She also has a beautiful food blog of her own at Cookbook Catchall. Welcome Sabra! Read on for the story of a New York renovation done right, in one of the smallest kitchen spaces we’ve ever seen.Most people would see a dysfunctional, ill-equipped miniature kitchen in poor repair as the depressing reality of apartment hunting in New York.

Open kitchens are often the norm in new houses or apartments, the assumption being that most people like to cook without feeling isolated from the action in the living room. But one of us here at the Kitchn is about to build a wall specifically to close off a kitchen…The wall will give us a better layout in our living room, providing a spot for a bookcase. But we are actually happy it will hide the kitchen from view.We like being secluded while we cook.

March is Bathroom Month at our sister sites, and while cooking and bathrooms don’t instinctively mix (although, oh, how we loved Kramer’s shower drain garbage disposal on “Seinfeld”), there are some common kitchen ingredients you can use to whip up all-natural bath products.First up: We’re test-driving a trio of homemade body scrubs.

We are always interested in seeing how city-dwellers work with tiny kitchen spaces. Perhaps the reigning champion of tiny kitchen spaces belongs to Jack, an artist and musician who lives in a 10×16 Manhattan apartment. See more of Jack’s kitchen and some of the things we noticed about it, below…• Jack’s whole apartment is only 10×16 – our dorm room was bigger than that! The kitchen is immediately to your right as you walk in the door.

We’ve been trawling the house tour archives at our sister home sites, looking for kitchen inspiration to liven up these last grey winter days. This kitchen didn’t just pop out at us – it practically exploded with color! See more details from Kevin and Greg’s Melrose kitchen below, plus a link to their whole tour… The tulips really pop against the baby blue of their kitchen.

Here’s a doozy of a Valentine’s party question from Jessica. Well, she never actually says that there will be 10 for Valentine’s, but we are imagining a sit-down dinner for 10 in romantic candlelight. Quite the dramatic picture! Check out her request and see if you can help.I just moved in with my boyfriend and we are having a dinner party for his parents and siblings and my parent and siblings. In total there will be 10 people.

Maxwell’s Apartment Therapy Daily Email was all about coffee grinders yesterday – specifically, the best coffee grinder you don’t know about. There’s one of these rare coffee grinders available on eBay here: Spong Cast Iron Coffee Grinder. The auction ends in 5 hours and it’s already up to $56 so hurry on over. We also really like this antique wall-mounted Arcade Coffee Grinder, pictured above. $36.50, ending January 31.

Do you know of any sources for good looking recipe boxes that aren’t stodgy? Something more modern…perhaps Marimekko-esque?– DonnaThis was a fun question – we went on the hunt for a good-looking recipe box. There are many, many cutesy and frilly boxes, which we really don’t enjoy either. Stodgy is a good word too.

Compostable kitchen sponges? This question comes from Sara, who also came up with a great answer! I go through my sponges so frequently and it seems a really terrible waste to throw them in my landfill trash when sponges can be made naturally. I appeal to you, please, I can’t find any sponges that are made of natural ingredients so I can compost them! Help! I can’t bear to throw away another!Or, any other green alternatives? Sponges that are at least made sustainably?

I just won a great vintage Michael Lax tea kettle (yellow kettle in photo). It was super cheap on eBay and unfortunately is nasty beyond use. There were no promises so I can’t really fault the seller, but it smells like a mixture of Chanel #5 and cigarettes.It smells so strongly that I can taste it just by taking the lid off. I haven’t even tried to use it yet, but I have tried to clean it. I’ve boiled a mixture of vinegar and water, let it soak.

Can my white dinnerware be saved? After only a few years of use, most of my dinner plates are full of gray utensil marks. What is to blame here? Low grade utensils, low grade porcelain or guests that insist on using a fork instead of a knife to cut food into bite size morsels?I’ve tried a few different cleaners but nothing seems to be able to remove the scuff marks.– Marc(To All Good Questions)Marc, we sympathize. We have tried to find out what causes these marks, but with no luck.

Chocolate in the making. We visited the Scharffen Berger chocolate factory in Berkeley, California, and took a few pictures. This is a highly recommended trip; the tour is free, and you get to sample cacao beans from around the world, then walk through the factory – past the beautiful red roaster and the assembly line.The factory is an old brick building in downtown Berkeley – it used to be a Heinz ketchup factory. You can smell the sweet chocolate from a block away.

End your search for affordable everyday dinnerware at Fishs Eddy. Visit the store in Manhattan’s Union Square or stop by their excellent website to send a gift. Fishs Eddy sells American-made sturdy plates and mugs for every price point: from overstock items made for hotels and diners to special dishes that celebrate the New York City skyline, Brooklyn Bridge and brownstones, or even the Brooklyn accent (Cawffee, anyone?).

Cooking.com is one of the oldest and hardiest online cooking shops – they got started before the dot com boom and they held on throughout the crash and are now still thriving with a wide selection of cookware, kitchen appliances, tableware and other accessories.They have some great website features missing from other online retailer sites, including an active forum area and a very appealing selection of recipes and reviews.

Stacks and Stacks is another popular giant in online shopping for storage and organization products. Like The Container Store they boast a vast amount of products to help make your kitchen organization chores easier.From under-sink organizers to a wide array of food containers they have all sorts of storage products to browse and buy. They also sell a good range of generic cookware that seems reasonably priced, like this 5-quart Dutch oven for $59.99.

When piping out lots of whipped topping for cupcakes or mini-tarts, or just covering a cake, we often like to pump up our whipped cream with some cream cheese. Adding in this tangy workhorse of the dairy world gives whipped cream some extra body and flavor. It’s another way of stabilizing whipped cream for a big party where it might be sitting out for a while in a warm room. You get the body of a heavier, sweeter icing, but the lightness of whipped cream.

Desserts for a Crowd is our February series looking at tips, hints, and recommended recipes for beautifully and economically throwing a big party or even a wedding reception! You’re planning for a big party of 40 or more, and you want to know if you can feed them something sweet without breaking the bank or your sanity. Yes, definitely. There are two principal considerations when planning the variety and quantity of food for a large-scale dessert party: guests, and presentation.

I use my blade grinder a lot for grinding coffee and spices, and I used to find it almost impossible to keep it clean. The oils from coffee build up into a residue that can go funky and rancid, and if you switch it up and grind some spices, well, then things can get really messy. Then I learned a quick trick for blotting up those oils and spice fragments. Use rice to clean your coffee or spice grinder; grind the rice until it is pulverized, then wipe the inside clean with a paper towel.

Like a well-stocked bakery entices the passing sweets addict, the doublewide storefront of Kamei Restaurant Supply beckons kitchen junkies inside.With its unparalleled selection, this is one of the best kitchen supply stores in the city. It’s really two stores in one. There are rows of commercial goods like hotel pans, industrial stockpots and plain white, deep soup bowls.

There’s nothing like an old standby. At the center of Upper West Side Levantine food culture is Zabar’s. Started in 1934 by Louis and Lillian Zabar this is a family operation and there is always “a Zabar in the store.”We all know and love it for their gourmet groceries and prepared foods that are perfect for Central Park picnics. But have you seen the second floor? It is one of the best stocked kitchen supply stores in the city.