a nugget of pure delight For the current edition of Cook the Books, we are reading Victoria Abbott Riccardi’s book Untangling my Chopsticks: A Culinary Sojourn in Kyoto. Ms. Riccardi spent a year in Kyoto studying kaiseki, the cerimonial tea cuisine. Kaiseki uses seasonal ingredients to create small plates intended to accompany the heart of the ceremony, tea made with matcha, finely milled Japanese green tea. The production of matcha follows a specific process (you can read the details here) and the preparation of the tea during the ceremony follows a traditional ritual. For part of the time, Ms. Riccardi lived... Read more →