Living calendar
February
Winter
February is the month of contradictions. Valentine's Day pushes you toward dessert, the Super Bowl demands a vat of chili and a tray of wings, Pancake Day (Shrove Tuesday, UK) means a stack of crêpes — and yet the markets are at their lowest. Citrus, the last squash, brassicas, chicory. You improvise, and you season hard. It's the month for unexpected moves: fleur de sel on the caramel, tonka in the Valentine's chocolate, sumac waking up a winter slaw. Tasmanian pepperberry lands fresh from Australia at its peak. On the condiment side, this is the month of soft-versus-intense contrast — you lean on opposites to lift the flat produce. Get ahead of Valentine's by a week, not on the 13th at 9pm. And leave the Spanish strawberries for nobody — they taste of water.
Bring out of the pantry
Signature dishes
- Chocolate fondant (Valentine's) · with Tonka Beans · see the pairing →
- Salted caramel (Pancake Day) · with Fleur de Sel de Guérande · see the pairing →
- Dark chocolate with fleur de sel · with Fleur de Sel de Guérande · see the pairing →
- Chili con carne (Super Bowl) · with Ancho Chile · see the pairing →
- Buffalo wings (Super Bowl) · with Cornish Sea Salt · see the pairing →
- Panna cotta (Valentine's dessert) · with Tahitian Vanilla · see the pairing →
Culinary celebrations
- Early February (Sunday) · Super Bowl Sunday (chili, wings, dips)
- February 14 · Valentine's Day
- Variable (Shrove Tuesday) · Pancake Day (UK — crêpes, lemon and sugar)
- Variable (late January or February) · Lunar New Year
Chef's note
For Valentine's, skip the sugar roses. Melt a bar of 70% dark chocolate, grate in half a tonka bean, fold in a pinch of fleur de sel, pour into little pots and chill. You've just made a $15 restaurant dessert in fifteen minutes for the price of the chocolate. Same logic on Pancake Day: a few crystals of fleur de sel across the caramel turns a flat recipe into a signature. The rule of February: one good ingredient, placed right, beats ten mediocre ones thrown at the plate. And if you're feeding a Super Bowl crowd, build the chili a day ahead — ancho and chipotle deepen overnight.