Anissa Helou is a cookbook author, cooking teacher, and all around expert on the foods of her native Lebanon. She also leads once-in-a-lifetime culinary tours of the Middle East. This spring, you can join her on a tour of Damascus and Aleppo, Syria, which she leads roughly twice a year. There is no one better to explore the ancient souks and delicious traditions of the region…Save your pennies and seize the opportunity!

When: May 9-19, 2011

Where: Damascus and Aleppo, Syria

The nine-night tour is $4000 per person double occupancy, which includes lodging, meals and wine, transport, entrance fees and tips (airfare not included). Go to her web site for more information or to sign up.

Join me in lovely Atwater Village for a pre-Valentines Day craft and vintage sale! I will have an assortment of my vintage kitchenwares available to buy for your food-loving Valentine (especially if he or she likes the color pink…). Or perhaps you are buying a Valentine for yourself (yes!), and you’ve always wanted a martini set…Well, stop by the Bitchcraft Trading Post and I’ll hook you up.

Also available will be Bitter Tears, handmade bitters for  your cocktailing pleasure. Don’t miss out!

When: Saturday, February 5
12:00pm – 4:00pm

Where: The Complex
3015 Glendale Blvd.
Atwater Village, CA

The cast iron skillet is, hands down, my favorite piece of cookware. I use a skillet pretty much everyday—for eggs, stir-frys, reheating leftovers, pancakes…Thanks to the January ’11 issue of Sunset magazine, I have yet another skillet dish to add to the rotation (see also 2010 discoveries, skillet chicken pot pie and skillet almond cake).

Pizza!

It’s a one-pot dinner that comes together incredibly quickly if you have defrosted pizza dough on hand. I buy the dough for $1 from Trader Joe’s, but basically every supermarket carries some form of it in the refrigerated section. (Or you could make the dough and freeze it. But for $1, I’m probably not botherin’.)

The Sunset recipe had a topping of broccoli rabe, yellow bell peppers and mozzarella; my pizza had Italian sausage, parsley and goat cheese. Your pizza can have whatever you want. Here’s how it’s done: Read on… »

It’s time for PIE! Put your pie-baking chops to the test at what is sure to be a heated battle at the 4th annual Brooklyn Pie Contest, put on by the Brooklyn Homesteader. This year’s bake-off benefits Growing Chefs, a Brooklyn-based group that teaches people “where their food comes from, and how to grow it.”

Brooklyn foodie’s are hardcore, people, so bring your A game.

Judges are to include Blake Joyal, Head chef of The Bedford, pastry chefs from Momofuku Milk Bar, Four & Twenty Blackbirds, and Baked. Sweet and savory pies will be judged, but no pizza allowed!

When: Sunday, January 23, 2011
5:30 pm – 9:00 pm

To be entered in the contest, bakers must arrive at 5:30. The first 50 pies will be accepted.

Where: The Bedford restaurant
110 Bedford Ave. (at N. 11th), Brooklyn, NY

Tickets are $10