What can you do to make a hot dog more than a hot dog? Serve it on a bed of roasted new potatoes, with a side of avocado, and garnish it all with salsa (made from scratch, of course!) That's what I had for dinner tonight, and it's a far cry from the ballpark frank!

This turkey is so-called because it is cooked in an oven who's temperature falls during the cooking. Raw meat can handle high temperatures, and will not burn. But at the end of cooking we become concerned about possibly drying out the bird, especially the delicate white meat.

Preheat the oven to 500 F.

Spread olive oil, lemon juice, and soy sauce on the turkey, and shake on salt, pepper, garlic and sage.

Insert the turkey into the oven, and lower the temperature to 400F. In an hour, lower to 300F. In an hour, lower to 200F. Cook until the turkey reaches an internal temperature of 170F and remove. Cool slightly before carving and serving!

We all love a hot cup of apple cider in the winter. As the mercury falls, we go into our spice cabinet and start hunting around for some good mulling spices.

What is the best spice mix? It's kind of like asking who's the best presidential candidate - your bound to get strong opinions, and if you're not careful you could make some enemies.

But I'll take my chances. And I'll give you a technique trick that will give the flavor a real boost.

1 Cinnamon Stick
5 Cloves
1 Star Anise
1 chunk fresh ginger, peeled

Put all the ingredients in a gallon of apple cider, then heat until it just barely boils. Lower the flame to the lowest it goes. Keep it on, covered, for about 1/2 hour. Leave it out of the fridge until it cools fully. Then, leave it in the fridge for 3 or more days and reheat. The flavor intensifies a whole lot in those days.

Some grown-ups also like to add a splash of dark rum (responsibly :)

Enjoy!

This guy is a gourmet chef who of course also loves to eat, and he just decided one day to train for a marathon. That doesn't mean he had to give up expensive champagne and fine meats, though.

Sounds like a fun lifestyle to me!

OK, so it might be a little ambitious to make The Perfect wings. To really accomplish this we will have to look at the whole field of wing-cooking from a broad perspective and then zero in on the perfect combination of a variety of factors.

Let me say right up front that I believe the wing is a vastly underrated part of the chicken. It's finger food, it's almost bite-sized, it's cheap, it's small enough for total smoke penetration, and it has enough fat to make it flavorful, along with a skin to protect it.

The main drawback to the wing, as you experienced bbq-ers know, is it's tendency to be impregnable to seasonings and sauces. Usually, marinated wings have almost none of the taste of the marinade. I've gotten many a bland wing, even in an expensive restaurant.

So if we leave the bbq-pits of the southwest behind for a moment, and head up to the northeast, we find the solution to this problem - the Buffalo Wing. In case you didn't know, those are deep fried first, and then doused in a hot pepper sauce. This way the flavor stays on (and on, and on, in some cases).

In the Southwest, they BBQ, which is the best way to cook, but in the Northeast they post-Sauce, which is the better way to sauce. We should do both. We will BBQ the wings and then post-sauce them.

In terms of the sauce composition, you really don't need to put in a whole lot of stuff. I am a minimalist and oppose extraneous or unnecessary ingredients. I also don't like precise ratios. Here's my recipe; Mix in as much of each as you like.

Tabasco, Soy Sauce, Honey - that's all.

Get your bbq going on a steady, low heat with some mesquite in it, keep the wings far off the coals, either vertically or horizontally removed, and smoke them covered for about 45 minutes or until done (once again, they're done when they're how YOU like them).

Then put them in a big pot or bowl with room to mix, and pour on the premixed sauce. Mix the wings in the sauce an serve.

If you are not satisfied, send me your wings and I will eat them for you! Please also send along adequate beer to sip between wings.

By the way, the real pitmasters out there can get away with pre-saucing - if you are really careful not to overcook, the flavor will be retained, and if it cooks off you can post-sauce too.

At a certain point you tire of paying exorbitant prices for a few precious slices of lox, and wonder if there isn't a better way. Here's the super-simple way to make yourself some homemade gravlax, a delicate, flavorful Scandanavian cured salmon.

Get a boneless salmon fillet, and place in a large, non-reactive tray. Mix 1/2 cup kosher salt and 1/2 cup sugar. Spread evenly all over the fish, even on the skin side. Cover and allow to sit on the counter for 6 hours.

Refrigerate, covered, for 24 hours.

Rinse thoroughly in cold water, and slice across the grain into thin strips with a long, sharp knife.

I've tried a lot of different homemade BBQ recipes. The spices and flavorings are the easy part, but what to use for the base? Plain ketchup always falls a little short, for me.

I think the best option is to mix some wine and ketchup, then reduce over a low flame for a few minutes, this yields a complex flavor that is both familiar and exotic at once. Add some brown sugar for sweetness, and some garlic, onion, and hot peppers for kick, and you're all set!

Here's a whole blog advocating what to many of us is a cultural affront: Wine in a Box!
Before you scoff, read this article about the popularity of boxed wine down under, due to its longer shelf-life after opening, its good value, and its reduction of pollution that results from shipping heavy glass bottles. With high-end outfits like Black Box Wines lending the cardboard bottle an air of dignity, maybe more of us will reconsider our allegiance to glass and cork.

It's easy to find your favorite restaurant, just look in the yellow pages and find the address. But what if your favorite eatery is a little more mobile, like, say, a Taco Truck? This guy used google maps to create a reference for all the Taco Trucks in Oakland. Great idea! Now all we need is real-time info on the movements of ice cream trucks, so we can get dessert!

As summer drags on, we all get tired of sweltering in a hot kitchen. Wish you could prepare a gourmet meal using the freezer instead of the oven? You can cook with cold! Harold McGee explains how.