Joy of Cooking

Slush Funds

When Auden Schendler, environmental director for Aspen Ski Company, sermonized to a congregation of green-minded folk in Boulder last year, his message wasn’t really what the audience wanted to hear. Switching light bulbs, building “green” and buying low-flow toilets will not save the planet, he said. It will in fact do very little in the big picture. Even at the expansive Aspen Ski...

Joy of Cooking

They say the secret to a great plate of food is the heart and soul that are put into it. And we can’t disagree. Even for those who cook for a living, some meals simply mean more than just sustainence and tastiness. They are about family and friends, history and ritual, and the celebration of tradition. Here, four local chefs spread the love with YS readers, offering recipes for dishes they...

Geoffrey Kent

Geoffrey Kent only plays a bitter Christmas elf on stage. In reality, he’s a fulltime actor and fight choreographer, he’s the president of the Society of American Fight Directors and he’s a member of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. Also, he’s tall. And he’s funny; though, not as funny as Crumpet, the acerbic elf stuck in Macy’s during the idiocy of the holiday season in David...

Geoffrey Kent

Geoffrey Kent only plays a bitter Christmas elf on stage. In reality, he’s a fulltime actor and fight choreographer, he’s the president of the Society of American Fight Directors and he’s a member of the Colorado Shakespeare Festival. Also, he’s tall. And he’s funny; though, not as funny as Crumpet, the acerbic elf stuck in Macy’s during the idiocy of the holiday season in David...

Bunny Slopes and One-Piece Suits

Most skiers have their first experiences on snow not long after their first steps. My wife, for example, grew up in upstate New York and learned to ski at 3. It’s in her blood like oxygen. First, she gets excited in September when we hit Sniagrab. It builds with the first mountain snowfall, followed by opening day at A-Basin. I’d say it officially consumes her after watching the latest Warren...

3 Questions with Ventriloquist Jeff Dunham

Ventriloquists creep people out. We’re not sure why, but they rank just below clowns on our informal office pool of things that make people’s skin crawl (also on that list, strangely: The chubby guy on Outsourced. Go figure). It doesn’t seem fair—there’s nothing creepy about Geppetto, for instance (except for the weird talking cricket in his workshop). Comedian Jeff Dunham doesn’t...

Don’t Fear the Beer at Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is the best of all the holidays. Feasting all day on a table full of fresh, home-cooked food amongst family and friends is a true oasis amid the marketing tsunami of Christmas that gets its green light when the Halloween candy goes on sale. It’s a day we can all enjoy being consumers...

Walkman Walks on By

Progress. That’s what they call it when things you love become obsolete. Things like broadcast television. Your 1970 Oldsmobile Cutlass SS 440. Bowler hats. Jazz music. Al Pacino. We’re never allowed to ignore the ticking clock of life’s second-hand movements. We’re all on a death march, sure, but every 20 feet, we get another signpost pointing it out. We’re getting old, we’re...

Season’s Fleeing

‘Tis the season for the gathering of the tribes. From November through New Year’s Day, the dining table will be circled by family and friends. While that thought may fill you with joy, you’d be less than honest if you didn’t also confess to a tinge of impending doom...

DIY Merriment

When I was a child, every Christmas was marked by at least one full day of cookie-baking madness. Family friends would come to the house where my mother was busy mixing and rolling and cutting dozens upon dozens of sugar cookies and molasses cookies while we children were sat around the kitchen table, armed with colored sugar, egg-yolk paint, frosting and sprinkles, ready to decorate...

More Chef Recipes

For our Joy of Cooking issue, we asked restaurants across the county to submit their favorite holiday recipes, and many responded creating a truly international menu for a holiday feast!...

I Want it Now

This year, no one gave me a birthday present. Not a real one, anyway. There was cash from my mom, who also treated me to a stellar dinner out. My co-workers bought me flowers and cake, and my friends got me cards and a plenty of celebratory drinks. My step-dad paid off several old parking tickets, and my real dad showered me with praise during a long phone call. I received an apology from my...

Prehistoric Thanksgiving

My nostalgia for Thanksgiving dinner extends this year to the Cretaceous Period. Yes, I’ll be feasting on dinosaur, or at least a cousin about 75 million years removed. Not Tyrannosaurus Rex or Stegosaurus or a Velociraptor—although I’m frightened to learn that the Velociraptor is pretty close. No, I’ll be sticking a fork in a cousin that’s been crapping all over my yard since June and...