Nearly every day my wife and I ask each other, “got any ideas for dinner?” As all grown-ups know, you gotta’ eat, and you’re probably gonna fix it yourself. So here’s a suggestion. Open the fridge and pull out all the veggies you can find, and voila: you have the makings for a healthy vegetarian soup. And Chef Jerry Pellegrino, that collection of vegetables will vary from season to season.

There was a time when everybody seemed to be afraid of cooking eggplant. Rumors were rampant about bitterness and annoying seeds and the difficulty of cooking it well. As it turns out, that’s all a lot of nonsense. Our colleague Chef Jerry Pellegrino is eager to set us straight on eggplants.

Here in the bleak mid-winter, we Baltimoreans are lucky to have so many traditional dishes to keep us warm and happy. One dish is so closely associated with our hometown as to be known nation-wide as Baltimore-Style Sour Beef and Dumplings. As Chef Jerry Pellegrino will confirm, this is one of the tastiest and most comforting regional comfort foods that we know of.

Of all the most popular cuts of beef, one stands above the others as the most desirable, and that would be the loin. The cut is expensive and is revered by many. But it is a much more complicated piece of beef than you might think. Chef Jerry Pellegrino explains all you need to know about this intriguing bit of meat.

Occasionally the time of year, one’s list of favorite foods and the traditions of one’s city all coincide to conjure up the perfect meal. In this case, in mid-winter, here in sauerkraut loving Baltimore, lovers of Alsatian cuisine can cook their way to heaven. And to Chef Jerry Pellegrino, we could only be talking about one thing: choucroute garnie.

I’ve been lucky enough to travel in Europe quite a bit in recent years and I’ve enjoyed many wonderful meals and impressive glass of wine. At lunch time I may be tucking into a fresh tuna-salad and it occurs to me that the canned tuna I’m eating is really good. I asked Chef Jerry Pellegrino, is it true that European canned fish is something super?

So, the holidays are behind us and I’m willing to wager that one near universal resolution is to lose a little weight. In addition to hitting the gym with regularity, I would suggest adding more vegetarian dishes to your diet. And as Chef Jerry Pellegrino will tell you, if you do it right, you’ll never begin to think you’re depriving yourself of anything.

Not all holiday feasts have to center on platters of roasted meats or poultry. There is a simpler, and in many respects, more intimate way of dining, and it involves little more than cheese and bread. And Chef Jerry Pellegrino will tell you, fondue is one of the more sensual ways to dine, in my opinion.

Holiday season is upon us and that means we can expect lots of dinner invitations. If you’re wondering what to bring to help things along, may I suggest a home-made pumpkin pie. And Chef Jerry Pellegrino agrees that a well-made dessert, made from scratch, is always welcome?

All of us want to sit down to a dinner of tender, flavorsome food, and there are many ways to pull that off. One of the most reliable is braising, which is the long, slow cooking of meat in a savory bath. It sounds simple, and if you know the tricks, it really is. So, Al is hoping that Chef Jerry Pellegrino will share with us some of the essentials of preparing a good braise.