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Baking Recipes

Chipotle-Scented Sweet Potato Corn Muffins…in a Jiffy

  I just can't seem to get on the pumpkin bandwagon this year.  Everywhere you look, things have been pumpkin-ized. It's not new, Starbucks has done a pumpkin spice latte for years, I can remember 31 Flavors doing a pumpkin pie ice cream when I was a kid,  but I must be spending too much time in the aisles at Trader Joe's, because I already have pumpkin fatigue.   Pumpkin spice chai, pumpkin bread, pumpkin pancake and waffle mix, pumpkin macarons, pumpkin yogurt, pumpkin cream cheese. Pumpkin, pumpkin, pumpkin (Marsha, Marsha, Marsha)! And I know when you saw these muffins, you thought pumpkin, right? Nope.  Sweet potato.  Chipotle and cinnamon-scented sweet potato corn muffins.
October 29, 20120Comments

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Main Course Recipes Salads Side Dishes

Fall Salad/Side Dish: Butternut Quinoa with Cranberries & Pepitas

  If you need any proof that it's possible to eat fabulously as a vegan, you only need to visit Denver. We just spent the weekend with our friends Jed and Lara there and ate at Justin Cucci's restaurants, Linger and Root Down. Not only is Linger's menu focused on global street food, which would be a potential disaster in less capable hands, these restaurants serve both carnivores and vegans, satisfying all parties.  And Root Down makes a mean blood orange mimosa at brunch.  I came back from Denver thinking about vegetarian dishes, and while I made a beefy, warms-your-soul pot of chili earlier in the week, I also roasted up a butternut squash and made a little butternut and quinoa salad with the flavors of fall.
October 25, 20122Comments

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Baking Dessert Recipes

Cookie Time: German Chocolate Cookies aka Chocowalnos

german chocolate cookies Every Christmas, I find myself making the same cookies. For every other holiday, it's ok to add new dishes, but at Christmas, there’s something comforting about tradition, about knowing that there will be snickerdoodles and chocolate crinkles and that my mom will probably send me a batch of candy cane cookies. But if tradition is just something you’ve done more than once, these chocolaty, coconutty, walnut-studded "brownie meets German chocolate cake" cookies are going to be a new holiday tradition.
October 23, 20122Comments

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Baking Dessert Entertaining

Rosemary Cornmeal Pine Nut Biscotti

It’s Tuesday night.  The gorgeous Asian pears are gone, except for a half, the blueberry muffin from Craftsman and Wolves but a memory, the husband is sick and watching Corner Gas somewhere he can’t infect the rest of the household, and I had my dad’s Sloppy Joes for dinner.  It involves Campbell’s Chicken Gumbo soup. Don’t judge.  It’s back to real life.  It’s a relief.  Being on the road, dining out for every meal, sounds glam, but it is tiresome. I’m not 25 anymore. But believe me, it’s not a complaint.  I had a fantastic time in San Francisco, catching up with folks I see once a year. Italian and Cal-Italian dominated our restaurant choices over the course of the week and Tim, the friend we hung out with at the market, and I chatted about lavender biscotti, so naturally I’m diving back into posting with these little Italian cookies on the brain. So, Rosemary, Cornmeal and Pine Nut biscotti.
October 11, 20120Comments

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Travel

California, Here I Come: San Francisco Ferry Building

Two days after being back from SF, I’m finally hungry again. When you’re trying to pack food experiences into a compressed amount of time,  you’re never hungry for 3 meals, let alone afternoon snacks.  But I persevered.  California delivered a gorgeous week of sunshine, practically a heatwave for early October. Ahhh, vitamin D.   And not only that, this past weekend happened to coincide with Fleet Week, the America’s Cup,  a post-season Giants game, and a Niners game.  But let's start with an appetizer, shall we? The Ferry Building ended up being a home away from home of sorts, since it was so close to the hotel.
October 10, 20120Comments

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Appetizers Recipes

Vegetarian Summer Rolls w/ Quinoa

You know that thing I said about tiptoeing into fall? It’s on hold. Well, temporarily. Ma Nature has gifted us with an extended summer and around these parts, you don’t look a sunny and 75 gift horse in the mouth. You bypass the pumpkin lattes and keep on making cold brew and enjoy every last bit of summer you can, because there’ll be beets and parsnips from the moment it ends until July comes around again next year. I’m sure I’ve committed some kind of culinary crime with these vegetarian summer rolls. Violated a sacrosanct law by bringing quinoa into the picture. A grain that’s as hipster as skinny jeans and typewriters. But if you’re trying to get more whole grains, more fiber, well, then you work it in where you can.  These summer rolls are a perfect little snack, a perfect little starter and they’re chock full of vegetables.
September 19, 20123Comments

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blackberry froyo
Dessert Recipes

Killer Blackberry Froyo

At the tail-end of blackberry season, every week is a guessing game. Whose berries will best?  Last week, the Skagit Sun blackberries and golden raspberries were terrific. This week those blackberries were phenomenal -- sweet and full of berry flavor. It's not hyperbole. I bought a mixed flat of blackberries, golden raspberries and regular raspberries and ate half a basket of the blackberries as I walked back to the car.  Then I high-tailed it back to their booth to get another flat of just blackberries.  I thought I might make pork chops with a blackberry-cabernet sauce, but then I remembered this froyo.
September 16, 20121Comment

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