Pencil Cob Grits, Carolina Gold Rice, Toasted Stone-Cut Oats, Appalachian Heirloom Sweet Flint Popcorn, and Rustic Polenta Integrale, all from Anson Mills, are three of our very favorite things that we carry. Read all about them.

Here we’re featuring two perspectives on dry-aged meat—one from food writer Bill St. John, and one from Pete Marczyk. They will answer some of your questions—why does it cost more? what happens during the process? what is the history of dry-aging? how soon is now?—and you will realize why our dry-aged Niman Ranch beef is our signature item of every year.

Move over, avocado toast. This is a turn on what in Barcelona, Spain, they call “pa amb tomàquet,” tomato toast, a food eaten there at all times of day, for breakfast or as a light meal or snack or starter plate.

Maybe it’s an old question in the South — when’s the best time to slather on the BBQ sauce, early or late? — but here in the West, we’re unburdened by either answer because we get to do with the sauce what we want.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
Significant numbers of people enjoy red wine with fish, beyond the impending pairing of Rosh Hashanah’s gefilte fish with Manischewitz. Red wines carry more tannin than do whites, an element that scours fish oil from the palate. White wine’s more assertive acidity can do the same, although often less successfully. 

BY BILL ST. JOHN
Niman Ranch pork is different; it truly is something else. I’ve cooked with it now several times, from shoulder to belly to loin. It’s not only that Niman Ranch pork has true pork flavor, it’s that that flavor is so richly deep that it shocks. When you first experience Niman Ranch pork, your palate remembers that of all the pork that you’ve eaten before, none had this much flavor.

BY CHEF JAMEY FADER
This past weekend I was fortunate to be presented with an opportunity to visit a hog farm in Iowa that uses the Niman Ranch methods. I also got to attend the yearly Hog Farmer Awards dinner and ceremony. I was eager to see the practices being put into play and, quite honestly, to see if the hype was real or if it’s all just a great story.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
The key element in the recommended wines (see below) is moderate or low alcohol. Alcohol in wine-and-food combos is like push technology: it slams whatever is in a food right smack in your face. Food has a lot of salt? High-alcohol wines cause it to taste even saltier. A bit of chili heat (as here)? Alcohol takes the hot off the chart. Wines with lower alcohol don’t mishandle those elements in food, letting the ingredients’ true flavors show through. Here we’ve got a white, a sparkling white, and a low-intensity red that all marry terrifically with this multi-layered dish.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
Simplify pairing wine with food by attending less to the texture, flavor or weight of each and more to elements such as salt, sweet, acid, and fat. For instance, foods with salt (as the tamari soy sauce here) really appreciate wine that is high in acidity. Acidity enlivens, cleanses and balances.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
A spoonful of sugar makes more than the medicine go down; it makes everything taste better. But sweetness can be a bugaboo to tasty wine pairings. When a dish is sweet — as here with the peach chutney or the milk of the cheese — but the wine is dry, in the way most wines are, then it's the wine that will taste like medicine.

BBQ pulled pork over salad greens? Read on.

A simple and ridiculously full-flavored topping for ice cream.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
What we have here is a preparation of protein and vegetable that is high in its own native acidity (mustard, white wine, the ferment of sauerkraut) and that, consequently, poses a problem for wine. Acidity in food is one of the most difficult elements to match with wine; it "flattens" most wines, making them taste dull and uninspired. However, some wines do work well: those that are high in acidity themselves.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
Eating asparagus is about as close as we get to dine as do the ruminants, most hoofed animals and that great natural lawn mower, the sheep. Asparagus is a grass, after all; just take a good look at it. Unlike the cow, however, we get to enjoy wine with our asparagus — but there’s the rub.

BY BILL ST. JOHN
My mother poached fish in an unholy amount of dry white wine. I've adapted her recipe to this one, both to save on the amount of wine, and also, because it is a simple recipe, as an inspiration for family peeps to cook for Mom on her annual day. You won't believe how tender these salmon filets turn out; they become fish pudding.