I have been making a lot of sausages lately, and as each batch will typically give me some new insight into this craft, I have much to tell from my recent adventures. You can learn all kinds of things from books on the subject; I recently went through a quick review of my sausage-making library. But [...]

I have become a big fan of goat. Don’t get me wrong, I never shied away from eating it — hell, I ate stewed goat necks several times a month back in graduate school because it was one of the few meat items I could afford. But last week’s goat extravaganza taught me quite a [...]

This is a story about a strange gift, an unusual challenge, and three very old, very ornery roosters. And as you may well guess, it ends badly for the roosters. To a point. I have become something of our Italian neighbors’ personal rooster assassin. I killed my first two years ago, and have returned at [...]

This dish is my little way of protesting an opinion piece that appeared in the New York Times recently suggesting that eating free-range pork poses a significant health risk compared to swine raised in factory farms — and as an aside mentioned how foolish it is to eat pork that is cooked below the incineration [...]

While much of what I have learned about making salami, sausages, and other charcuterie projects has been by making it, most of those efforts have been backed by reading up on the subject. I get a lot of emails from readers wanting to know where to start, and many want to know which of the [...]

It is a good thing that growing cardoons is a low-maintenance endeavor. For months I have watched them sprouting like fountains in my garden, and with only fleeting thoughts I’ve pondered how to eat them. You see, cardoons require some work to prepare: You need to trim the spines, peel the fibers and boil them [...]

So the Sacramento Bee’s Blair Anthony Robertson wrote  a profile of me that appeared today. Overall I think he did right by me, and I appreciate the Bee for doing a story on a way of living that is — as I well know — controversial in many circles (Just look at the comments section). [...]

I am not perfect. This fact has grown easier to live with the older I get. A decade ago, I might not have admitted it publicly, but even then I knew. Now I am happy to proclaim it in public spaces like this one. I have many failures, but in this case I am talking [...]

“I think I’m going to do a post about vegetarian food.” “But Hank, April’s Fool’s Day is over!” That was my friend Elise, who understands me well enough to know that vegetarianism is not in my immediate future. That does not, however, mean that I don’t love eating veggies — especially in springtime. When duck [...]