The Chopping Block Cooking & Wine Blog

4 Kitchen Tools You Need to Become a Better Cook

I’m so thrilled to be back with The Chopping Block’s fabulous blog team yet again! During my hiatus, I’ve been taking lots of pictures of food and cooking up a storm as per usual. Since the last time ...

My Top Five Mexican Cookbooks

Whenever students ask me what my favorite regional cuisine is I always say that its impossible to choose a favorite because blah blah blah… but the real answer is Mexican food. Mexican food is ...

Top Tools for any Kitchen

As a chef instructor at The Chopping Block, I work with hundreds of home cooks all with varying levels of comfort in the kitchen. My goal and hope is to identify where they can find an edge to help ...

Five Great Pastry/Baking Books for Beginners

I’ve been getting some good traction on these book roundups, and maybe if I can make the case that the book collection can be routed into a productive outlet, I’ll be allowed to continue to purchase ...

Top Ten Fancy Chef Books for the Fancy Cook in Your Life

If you’re one of those among us who celebrates one of the winter gift giving holidays that terminate near the end of December then by the time this post comes out you will technically still have some ...

Top Five Books for Aspiring Chefs

As a self-taught chef, I quite literally wouldn’t have a career if it weren’t for food and cooking books. There are few resources as important in developing an understanding of the different cooking ...

The Chefs Who Have Cooked in our Mart Kitchens

I've been working for The Chopping Block for 20 of our 25 years in business. I've worked in each of our three locations in Chicago: Lincoln Park, Lincoln Square and the Merchandise Mart and for the ...

Get Must-Have Kitchen Tools During our Sale at the Mart

It's almost spring in Chicago, and for me personally, that means spring cleaning, organizing closets and sorting through my kitchen. I'm sure you can relate. Right now, I am looking at my spice ...

Woman of Black Excellence Writes Cookbook During Pandemic

In honor of Black History Month, when it comes to the world of food, we take the time to recognize those who made a mark in history ranging from inventors to chefs to restauranteurs to grocers. When ...

Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat in Healthy Cooking

I recently watched the Netflix series “Salt, Fat, Acid, Heat.” In four episodes, chef and food writer Samin Nosrat travels the world to explore the basic elements of flavor and how they are used in ...