I can always count on Mark Bittman. In How to Cook Everything, Bittman recommends poaching pears with sugar and vanilla bean for a simple, light dessert. And that’s exactly what we needed after pizza and ravioli. We were really not very hungry, but I had to finish out the Challenge with my third and final [...]

Next up for Challenge Pears: the main course. We had pizza as our appetizer, so I decided to stick with the Italian theme. And I know cheese pairs well with pears, so how about nestling the fruit inside a soft egg ravioli with Pecorino Romano and mascarpone? Perfect! But first: the dough. We followed a [...]

When Nick revealed the seasonal ingredient of our first Challenge, I immediately thought of pizza. Not pepperoni or mushroom or Margherita, but … pear pizza! Over the Christmas holiday, we dined at a wine bar in Escondido, California. We ordered glasses of local red wine and no less than five pizzas for the group, including [...]

Way back in 2007, Nick and I initiated our first Iron Chef Battle. During that fall, we challenged ourselves to concoct meals using the following ingredients: limes, peanuts, and apples. Highlights included: skirt steak in lime marinade, peanut butter pork stir-fry, and sweet potato and apple soup. Unfortunately, we abandoned the battles somewhere between getting [...]