use real butter

My head hurts this morning and I all I had last night was a sip of Jeremy’s Sauv Blanc. The hell? [I'm pretty sure it was my 2-hour cardio workout because my ass hurts when I walk right now.] A very good friend of mine is in Colorado all the way from Sydney. She and her husband came to Boulder last night to meet up with us for Community Night at The Kitchen. Oooooh Comm Night…

herbed gioia ricotta and fennel confit wood roasted flatbread

This was our fifth time at Comm Night. Come hungry and wear elastic waistband pants: fixed menu, family-style dining with a bazillion courses! Well, to be honest, over the past 4 years, Comm Night has gone from serving *insane* amounts of food to just *quite a bit* of food. I don’t feel like I’m going to pop and die at the end of the meal anymore. Or perhaps I’ve just learned to pace myself. Either way, it’s still a big treat partly because we don’t typically eat like that and partly because we aren’t made of money. Because our friends know their food (the hubby is a chef in Sydney), we thought Comm Night would be a perfect meal to share with them… and the dozen other diners at our table!

marinated shell bean salad with prosciutto, country terrine, grilled bread

**Jump for more butter**

Well, we have come to it at last… the final segment of our kitchen tour. I hope that these past several weeks have inspired some of you, be it from the beautiful, dreamy kitchens some bloggers have created to the bloggers who are “making due” and in fact, doing it incredibly well. You’ve gotta love the photography setups and nifty kitchen or entertaining tips - these bloggers know their way around a kitchen, know their way around food. It’s all about sharing and learning (and laughing, oh the laughing…)! Our last two blogger kitchens are half a world apart and yet these two people could not be dearer friends to me. Enjoy.

blog: No Special Effects
blogger: Mark, or Manggy, which is a shortened version of my surname.
location: Quezon City, Philippines
house: I live in my parents’ house, which I feel particularly defensive about since I’m already much older than many of you probably were by the time you’ve moved out! Think of the Philippines as the Italy of Asia, I guess (being a perpetual student didn’t help matters). Anyway, the house is 9 years old, and I love it as my dad designed it and oversaw the construction.
kitchen footprint: 10 sq. meters
photos: all photos of the No Special Effects kitchen are courtesy of Mark

Oh boy. It’s hot… and humid! Here we are in the Philippines visiting with Mark of No Special Effects. Er, that’s Dr. Mark to you :) Not only is he Dr. Mark (of the MD persuasion), but if you have ever visited his blog, you know that he is a talented cook and baker. Mark kids around with everyone, but at the core he is incredibly thoughtful and kind… and dorky - all qualities I cherish about him. After spending a few months in the States interviewing, he returned home just in the nick of time to partake in this tour despite battling jetlag. I’m certainly glad to have him here. Let’s have a look at the kitchen, shall we?

I think the most important change that happened to the kitchen when I decided to pick up the whisk is that it actually got used! Curiously in some Filipino homes– and that includes most of the Filipino homes I’ve seen– there is what we call the “dirty kitchen.” And it doesn’t mean half the time we don’t care about food safety; it only refers to a separate kitchen where you can really mess up (oil splatters, spills) on a daily basis while the other kitchen, the “clean” one, is for show. Obviously I don’t like this system as the clean kitchen becomes a waste– soulless. While I’m not the one who cooks meals on a daily basis, when I do cook, I make it a point to use the kitchen for what it was built. As a result, my pans and little knick-knacks invade most every crevice.

the main kitchen

[This is] where all the non-magic happens. All the utensils are on display. My lone saucepan and dutch oven are stashed in the cabinets underneath, as is an ass-ton of sugar. My mom is on a juicing kick right now and uses the machine every day no matter what a chore it is to clean.

clean kitchen : “dirty” kitchen

**Jump for more butter**

We’ve been at this food blogger kitchen tour for a month now and honestly, I’m amazed at how many people are as excited about snooping around other kitchens as I am. I love seeing brilliant ideas implemented by my peeps. More than anything, I like how this series emphasizes that a food blog is great because of the effort, the creativity, and the personal style of each blogger. It’s not the kitchen that makes the blog, it’s the heart of the blogger(s). [Does this sound like my standard rant that a good camera does not a good photographer make? Just replace camera with kitchen and photographer with cook or food blogger.]

Last week, we ventured about sunny Southern California. This week, I’m taking you north near the heart of San Francisco. Have you ever been? I love it there, but I’ve always been a mere visitor. Today, we’re a guest of my favorite resident of the city!

blog: Dessert First
blogger: Anita
location: San Francisco, California
house: 1920s-ish apartment
kitchen footprint: 80 sq. ft.
photos: all photos of the Dessert First kitchen are courtesy of Anita

When I first became aware of the food blogosphere, one of my regular sources of inspiration was Dessert First. Anita is talented. She creates gorgeous food, teaches baking courses, and is working on her second cookbook right now. All of this from an engineer! Let’s hear it for gear heads! I had the pleasure of being the first stop on her virtual book tour when Field Guide to Cookies came out last year. The woman is not only a class act, but has a heart of gold. You are going to be amazed at what Anita accomplishes in this kitchen.

the entire kitchen of dessert first

I have a new found respect for you, my dear. It’s one thing to create those lovely pastries at all, but it is a whole new level of OMG now that I see the space you work in.

The kitchen in the apartment is about 80 to 90 square feet in an approximately 650 square foot place. Yes, it’s getting quite cramped and my boyfriend and I are looking for a new bigger place! But we’ve managed to make things work pretty well here. In the photo you can see the kitchen from the living room. It’s basically a rectangle, one side lined with cabinets/sink/counters, one side with the stove and refrigerator, one side with windows and a storage rack for my baking equipment, and the fourth side has a table/workspace that divides the kitchen from the living room. There’s not a lot of counter space, and much of it is taken up by appliances. You can see the microwave, my Kitchenaid, food processor, toaster oven, rice cooker. It means I do most of my prep work on the kitchen table.

the stove is nestled between the refrigerator and counter

**Jump for more butter**