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Review: Le Gamin Country, A Parisian Post In Hudson

By David McDonald In his groundbreaking book Kitchen Confidential, Anthony Bourdain talked about the hardest challenge for a restaurant: maintaining consistency. Sure, many restaurants can come up with a transcendent meal every now and then. But doing it consistently? That’s an entirely different challenge. It’s a challenge more

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Community

10 Things To Love About Chatham

By Tresca Weinstein Mix Williamsburg hip with Williamstown charm, add a generous seasoning of down-to-earth heart, and you get Chatham, New York — living proof that good things come in small villages. 1. Breakfast: It’s the most important meal of the day, and in Chatham, you can get it any

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Food

A Farm Of Your Own: Membership Has Its Privileges At A CSA

Eating locally grown food is valuable on so many levels -- ecologically, economically, nutritionally, sociologically, spiritually -- that it's no wonder many CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) farms in our region report that new and returning members are signing up earlier every year and that waiting lists to join

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Food

Dining: The Bocuse Restaurant at the CIA

By Don Rosendale Ask of my most memorable meal, and I’ll tell you of a cream of sorrel soup at Restaurant Paul Bocuse, a 10-Euro taxi fare from the Lyon, France train station. Remembering that soup, every year I optimistically sow sorrel in the garden, but give up because

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Community

A Place To Write In The Berkshires: Coffee, And Contagious Motivation

The Writers Room in Washington, D.C. By Lisa Green A few years ago, Charles Karelis and his son Alex were sitting in a Starbucks in Washington, D.C., observing the klatch of writers consuming more tables than coffee. What if, they thought, we turned the Starbucks model on its

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Food

A Free Range of Egg Sandwiches

Recently, a friend was singing the praises about the latest neighborhood du jour (not in the Rural Intelligence region, but you can probably guess) who said the restaurants are fabulous…except you can’t get an egg sandwich. And what’s a town without a good egg sandwich? Fortunately, our

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Community

10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival Returns For Charming Third Year

By Lisa GreenThe 10x10 Upstreet Arts Festival returns to Pittsfield for its third year, Feb. 13-24, and while in some cases the third time’s the charm, 10x10 seems to have been charmed from the get go. It began with a premise nobody could argue with: People need get out

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Food

Dining: At Pizzeria Posto, The Pie's The Thing

By Alice McGowan It takes a certain amount of guts for a restaurant to offer a limited menu, even if it's a pizzeria. Especially when it’s a pizzeria located in a region that’s nothing if not rich with New York pizza experts hungry for a pie

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Food

Cheddar Making 101: Sharpen Your Artisanal Skills

By Betsy Miller Peter Kindel demonstrates cheese-making techniques in a class on Burratta cheese held earlier this year. Why, when every market, every artisanal shop and nearly every farm stand offers a variety of cheeses, would anyone want to make cheese from scratch? Nobody could argue with the fine cheeses

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Community

From Pittsfield to Sochi: Terry Holland Heads For the Olympics

By Lisa Green Terry Holland goes for a run. "There are a lot of religious conversions at the top of a skeleton run," says Terry Holland, who’s on his way to the Olympics in Sochi, Russia, where he’ll be coaching New Zealand’s Olympic skeleton team.

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Community

Nice Ice: Where and When To Skate

There is nothing more romantic than skating on a pond or a lake. But this winter's eccentric weather is making it hard to tell when it's actually safe to go skating outdoors. Fortunately, there are public skating sessions at indoor rinks across our region (some at

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Food

Shunpike Dairy: Milk So Fresh, You Pour It Yourself

By Don Rosendale Every day or so, Kelly Fierrevante drives to the Shunpike Dairy in Millbrook to fill a container of raw milk for her three sons. She says she makes the trip, and pays more than what she might for a quart of milk in the supermarket, not only

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