COOK FOOD EVERY DAY

Boston musicians and artists collaborate on a charity cookbook

By RACHAEL KATZ

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Cook Food Every Day is the peoples' cookbook. Edited by Kristina Nies, it was born from a locally based online food forum where pilgrim could share cherished recipe with fellow pilgrim. Now, with over 130 recipes to choose from, weary gastronomical travelers can set down their takeout and eat from the bounteous table of Boston's foodies and food-loving musicians, for the benefit of the Greater Boston Food Bank.

And ye, haggard, high-strung hamburger helper, will eat richly from this lot. A choice cut of Boston's creative types have come together to lead you to the promise land (your own pantry). Artists, writers, wily cooks and, yes, dreamers, have lovingly tucked their favorite recipes, drawings and doughy bits of humor into this volume. Many of these recipes also come with back stories or suggestions.

Cook Food Every Day is filled with such an entertaining collection of idiosyncrasies (one recipe ends with a quip about working on the dish until you're adequately late for your friend's party), it begs to be read closely in an entirely new way. Some of the recipes have each step drawn out like a comic strip, like tiny French toast adventure stories.

Not just words, there are also contributions from 38 local artists, including full-page caricatures, such as the wacky lobster of "Twin Slaws." The pages explode in every direction with personality, and in the little blurbies in the margins, contributors even leave their email addresses, welcoming feedback.

When I met up with editor Kristina Nies, she told me that from the start, these were all recipes that came directly from someone's home kitchen, bizarre family tradition and/or weekend experiment. She said it was important to everyone involved that people (that means you) continue to participate in these recipes, in these foods, so that they belong to all of us.

This is where the Greater Boston Food Bank comes in. When the project started, Nies and the others were trying to figure out a way to get over to the Food Bank with their food-smarts and do their good works right on site. These charitable grassroots were then placed in a pot and mulled over for six months, and voila! One big fat cookbook.

Everything inside is homegrown, and it's a resource we Bostonians can really take pride in. The book also includes many recipes that are vegetarian, vegan (with so many substitution options your head will spin), gluten-free and nut-free—for the free in all of us.

Nies taught me a lot during our time together, including but not limited to:

Steps to telling if fish is thoroughly cooked:

1) Poke fish

2) Make a fist

3) Poke fist

4) Compare

That thing people sometimes do, where there's nothing in the fridge so they take the two cans of whatever is left on the shelf and throw it in with a condiment (you know what I'm talking about)—that's called cooking!

Steve Gisselbrecht's vanilla cups = awesome sauce.

Compiling and publishing a community cookbook = slaying dragons.

Liquid smoke is crazy shit! But it's really just hickory chips, charcoal and a funnel.

Cook food every day.

No really, do it.

COOK FOOD EVERY DAY
COOKBOOK RELEASE SHOW
WITH THEORY ENGINE,
QUOINS AND MIND YETI
WEDNESDAY 12.16.09
P.A.'S LOUNGE
345 SOMERVILLE AVE.,
UNION SQ.
SOMERVILLE
617.776.1557

8:30PM/18+/$1
PASLOUNGE.COM

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