In a stew

NBC talk show host Conan O'Brien doesn't make it a secret that he doesn't cook.

All the more reason he was very confused to find his photo and name featured with a recipe for "Conan O'Brien's St. Patrick's Day Stew" in the March issue of Good Housekeeping magazine.

"I'm in the make-up chair today and I'm given this magazine," said O'Brien, holding up a copy of the issue during his St. Patrick's Day show broadcast Monday.

"This is apparently my recipe. There's only one problem, ladies and gentlemen. I've never cooked anything in my life. I didn't send it to them. They just made it up. It's got all this stuff in it, I've never even heard of."

O'Brien held up the page from the magazine depicting a published photo of the finished lamb stew recipe which features the headline: "Conan O'Brien shares his favorite St. Patrick's Day dish."

"I'm lost in a kitchen," said O'Brien, who explained to the audience and viewers he wasn't mad, just confused with the recipe's references to things like "use a Dutch oven," since he's never heard of most of what was published attached to his name.

"This shakes my confidence. And for the people at Good Housekeeping, if apparently I'm the one who cooks this all the time for my sainted mother, I want you to send me some of this stew."

Martha's Easter

On the subject of cooking, Conan O'Brien's guest for his St. Patrick's Day broadcast was kitchen queen Martha Stewart, who politely ignored O'Brien during her segment when he attempted to once again make reference to the Good Housekeeping recipe that used his name. Instead, Stewart talked about a recent guest on her own daytime talk show who spins and makes yarns from the brushed fur of pets, like cats and dogs. Stewart said she knitted scarves for her two French bulldogs, with yarn made from the fur of her beloved Chow Chow Paw Paw. Later in the show, Stewart did an elaborate cooking demonstration with O'Brien, which included making Irish cocktails and beer libations, shamrock sugar cookies and an Irish mashed potatoes dish. The main event of the feast was ham glazed with Irish whiskey and brown sugar and the ham just happened to be from Stewart's new line of Martha Stewart Cured Hams sold at Costco stores. Stewart said the idea for the ham line came to her last year

after a small family-owned meat market in New York, where her father would always buy holiday family dinner hams, closed last year. Stewart and her company purchased 2 million hogs to start her own brand, which recreates the same flavor and curing process used at the former meat market. She also informed O'Brien and his audience that each hog produces only two hams for market.

The opinions expressed are solely those of the writer. He can be reached at ppotempa@nwitimes.com or 219.852.4327.

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