Photos: Putting the L.A. Times' king cake recipe to the test

From the looks of it, our Mardi Gras king cake recipe was a hit.

Times Test Kitchen Manager Noelle Carter crafted a king cake recipe rich with butter, cream cheese, toasted pecans and apples. She said it was the perfect way to mark Mardi Gras -- the end of Carnival season -- before Lent begins. (Like we needed any convincing!)

The recipe was a hit with readers. Several shared images of the delicious results, including Adri Barr Crocetti of Sherman Oaks, who writes the food blog the Front Burner -- that's her festive photo above -- as well as Linda Geiler of Davie, Fla., who writes the food blog Savoring Every Bite. You'll find the photo gallery here.

Thanks for sharing your photos, Adri and Linda!

If you try any of the recipes from the L.A. Times Test Kitchen, we'd like to see the photographic evidence so we can showcase some of them on the blog and, occasionally, in print. You can upload your images here.

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Twitter / renelynch

Photo: Adri Barr Crocetti of Sherman Oaks.

Food culture: History's making us hungry at the Norton Simon

"Paintings of food shine out at me with their voluptuous colors and shapes whether I am hungry or not," says Eleanor Congdon. As educator for the Norton Simon Museum in Pasadena, Congdon creates tours of interest for museum guests including a food paintings tour titled “Dinner at the Norton Simon: Food in Paintings” that was featured in June.

Throughout the museum’s galleries are a range of still life and genre paintings depicting food from the 17th to the 19th centuries. The Chardins, Courbets and Manets, among others highlighted in the tour, reveal a subject eternally relatable for its viewers. Whether depicted as necessity or extravagance, with symbolism or none at all, food is visually stimulating enough to provoke its viewer to go beyond the surface and imagine the possibilities of its textures, aromas and tastes.

“Symbolism [in the food paintings] disappears over the centuries and the painting techniques evolve over the course of time just as with other subjects in art," says Congdon. "What does not ever disappear is their lusciousness and the invitation to eat.”

Congdon has kindly re-created the food paintings tour for Los Angeles Times readers, which can be viewed here. Bon Appetit!

411 W. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (626) 449-6840, nortonsimon.org.

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Image: Still Life with Cherries, Strawberries and Gooseberries, 1630, by Louise Moillon
Credit: The Norton Simon Foundation

Photo of the Day: Crunchy Nutella brownies from La Casa de Sweets

We love it when you share your food photos with us so we can showcase them online and in print: These Nutella Crunch Brownies are from Jackie Gonzalez-Feezer of the food blog La Casa de Sweets. We'll let her describe it: "A rich, fudgy brownie, topped with chocolate, Nutella, and rice cereal to give it a delicious crunch!" Follow Jackie on Twitter @LaCasaDeSweets.

Here's how you can share your food photos with us:

How to throw a royal wedding party: 22 canapes from the L.A. Times Test Kitchen

A common buffet for the royal wedding of Prince William and Kate Middleton? Perish the thought. The 600 guests invited to attend the nuptials at Westminster Abbey in London on April 23 will retire to Buckingham Palace to dine on canapes. Ten thousand canapes are being prepared for the gathering.

Which raises the question: What, exactly, is a canape?

It would be too easy to describe a canape as simply another word for an appetizer, for a canape must have style and panache to spare. We turned to the L.A. Times Test Kitchen archives and found this delicious definition: "Canapes are bite-sized hors d'oeuvres made by assembling different ingredients on bread or a bread-like base ('canape' is the French word for 'couch'), though these days the definition can be stretched. The interplay of colors, textures and flavors is what makes a canape attractive and intriguing ... "

As the royal wedding draws nearer, the media have gone into overdrive tracking down every little tidbit about the preparations. Apparently, it was reported at one point that guests would be treated to a -- gasp!-- buffet at Buckingham Palace.

Oh, the horror.

Instead, CNN reports, a team of 21 chefs will prepare nearly 10,000 canapes for the affair: "There will be 10 or 12 savory varieties and five or six sweet ones. Some will be hot, some will be cold -- and all have been approved by the prince and his bride-to-be." People magazine has some more detail: The canapes will includes plenty of variety, such as smoked salmon on a beet root blini, confit duck-leg terrine with smoked duck and pear chutney, and quail eggs with celery salt.

After these festivities, a smaller group of close friends and family will move on to a formal dinner.

Did you get an invite to the Royal Wedding? Neither did I. I guess we'll just have to throw our own Royal Wedding party. Here are 22 recipes for canapes from the L.A. Times Test Kitchen.

And here's to a long and happy marriage for William and Kate. I only wish that Princess Diana could be here to see it.

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-- Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch

Photo: More than hors d'oeurves. Credit: Kirk McKoy / Los Angeles Times

Happy Mardi Gras 2011! Eat, drink and be merry this Fat Tuesday

 
Mardi Gras 2011 has been a celebration of excess, but it's not over yet. You have one more day -- Fat Tuesday -- to party hard before the clock strikes midnight.

So show us your beads!

Fat Tuesday is also known by another nickname, Pancake Day. That's a reference to clearning out the cupboards of goodies like sugar and eggs before the fasting begins. And what do you make with sugar and eggs? Pancakes and cakes. Above, we've got a king cake decked out with Mardi Gras beads courtesy of Times Test Kitchen Manager Noelle Carter. Here, she shares a recipe from her personal files.

We've also collected some of our favorite L.A. Times Test Kitchen recipes to usher in Fat Tuesday. Laissez les bons temps rouler!

 

Why does all this merriment come to a crashing halt at midnight Tuesday? 'Cause that's when Lent, and the traditional fasting, begins.

Nola.com has plenty of New Orleans coverage, including lots of Mardi Gras parade pictures. Enjoy!

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Photo credit: Noelle Carter

10 Mardi Gras recipes from the L.A. Times Test Kitchen

 

It's time for Mardi Gras -- or Fat Tuesday -- a.k.a. an all-day pass to eating, drinking and all-around celebrating before Lent.

It's also known as Pancake Day, a nod to the tradition of making use of ingredients such as sugar and eggs before the fasting begins. We've collected some of our favorite L.A. Times Test Kitchen recipes celebrating this raucous holiday.

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

How about we celebrate with some beignets, gumbo and more? Here are 10 Mardi Gras recipes from the L.A. Times Test Kitchen.

--Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch

Photo: Damon Winter / Los Angeles Times

What's hitting its peak in February? Baby bok choy

It looks something like regular bok choy, but has thinner stems, darker leaves and tell-tale yellow flowers. Milder Shanghai, or baby bok choy, looks like bok choy's prettier sister (it's not really a baby, of course, it's just smaller, even at full maturity).

Click here for tips from Times Food editor Russ Parsons on how to choose, store and prepare baby bok choy and other Chinese cabbages.

And check out our Market Fresh photo gallery: It's your guide to cooking through the seasons, using the freshest produce available:

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Photo: Los Angeles TImes

What did you eat this weekend?

Each Monday morning, we put off the beginning of the workweek just a little bit longer by talking about -- what else? -- what we ate this weekend. Scroll down to take a look at some of the highlights. Want more? Check out this photo gallery of more than 300 photos, including this crostino di burrata at "Top Chef"-er Fabio Viviani's Firenze Osteria in Toluca Lake. 

So, how can you play along? Join us on Twitter @latimesfood bright and early Monday mornings. We use #weekendeats as our hashtag. You can also chime in on Facebook. All the better if you have a photo and upload it here. And it's never too late to add a comment in the comments section below.

And now, without further delay, here's a sampling of what you ate this weekend:

-- Rene Lynch
Twitter / renelynch

Video: The curried slaw served at Napa's Mustards Grill

 

Culinary SOS is one of our most popular features. You ask us for a recipe, and L.A. Times Test Kitchen manager Noelle Carter does her best to get it.

Our most recent Culinary SOS request was for the curried slaw served at Napa's Mustards Grill restaurant. Watch the video above to see Noelle making the recipe in the L.A. Times Test Kitchen.

Want more? Check out this photo gallery of Culinary SOS recipes that we've been able to answer of late: 114 recipes for your favorite restaurant dishes.

Do you have a Culinary SOS request? E-mail noelle.carter@latimes.com.  Please include your name, phone number and city of residence.

-- Rene Lynch
twitter / renelynch

Don't forget to take your #weekendeats pictures

Something tells me there will be a Super Bowl theme running through #weekendeats.

For the uninitiated, #weekendeats occurs bright and early Monday mornings when we waste company time talking about what we ate over the weekend, and swapping pictures of it. You can join us on Twitter (we use #weekendeats) or on Facebook. (Check out this photo gallery so you can see what the heck I am talking about.) 

Gaby Dalkin of What's Gaby Cooking -- one of our favorite bloggers and a #weekendeats veteran -- has been getting an early early start on #weekendeats with trial runs for her Super Bowl munchies, including these football-themed brownies.

Please be sure to upload your #weekendeats pictures here so that everyone can see them, and we can showcase them on the Daily Dish.

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Photo: What's Gaby Cooking