Sometimes, in reflecting on my childhood, I realize just what a weird kid I was. I’ll forever be thankful that I had supportive parents who had a “go with the flow” attitude about my idiosyncracies. One of those strange traits flashed in my mind recently, when I decided I wanted to make a Mexican-style rice …
Continue reading “Prepare to paint the town red with a from-scratch Mexican rice”
Several years ago, my parents gifted me with a gorgeous, red braising pot. It’s a ceramic-coated cast iron pot, and I always feel like whatever I put in it should be really extraordinary. This week’s recipe really fit the bill for using my special pot, since I was getting ready to embark on a dinner …
Continue reading “Don’t skip this week’s a‘braising’ recipe”
I am not my dog’s favorite person at the moment. K.C., despite being 15 years old, still has a great set of teeth, and her all-time favorite food to snack on is carrots. I know, it’s a little strange. We joke that she would walk right past a steak if she eyed a plate of …
Continue reading “Once you try it, you won’t ‘carrot’ all that this pie is a little weird”
An article from “Eat This, Not That” by Cheyenne Buckingham breaks down all the differences between Italian and Asian noodles. I started wondering a bit this week, after I bought a package of lo mein noodles and the finished product really didn’t look a whole lot different from spaghetti, so of course, I had to …
Continue reading “You have to try this delicious ‘mein’ dish tonight”
For a recent meal with friends, I made a cherry pie to share, and since I knew I sometimes get carried away with lattice pie crusts and run out before I’m done weaving, I made one extra crust, just in case. Of course, once I was done making pie, I wrapped the crust up, determined …
Continue reading “A hearty pot pie is a ‘crust’-try recipe this time of year”
We have a friend we lovingly refer to as “the human jukebox.” He has a ton of songs floating around in his head, and all it takes to get him to launch into one is to subtly mention a lyric. Joey and I sometimes make a game of seeing if we can make a comment …
Continue reading “Combination of chicken, veggies, herbs more than just fair”
This past weekend, Joey found whole chickens on sale and proceeded to put three on his smoker. I told him I wanted to try a different way to make stock from the bones, once he was done pulling the meat, and he graciously put the pieces into my large crockpot for me. Normally, we make …
Continue reading “This creamy chicken soup was fabulous, ‘gnocchi’dding”
They’ve just been staring at me. Four potatoes have been sitting on my kitchen counter since Thanksgiving, and as the days passed, they literally were growing some eyes to look at me with. So I knew I needed to make something to use them up, and with the weather finally hitting a dreaded cold snap, …
Continue reading “Soup recipe lets me tell counter leftovers ‘see you tater’”
Despite some of the balmier days lately, I’m certain autumn is upon us after seeing multiple “It’s fall, ya’ll” signs around town. Fall is always my favorite time of year, mostly because I’m excited to have slightly cooler temperatures that let me pull out my favorite sweatshirts, and I can start cooking up soup as …
Continue reading “Make a great week even ‘Moroccan’ with veggie stew”
Over the years, I have to confess that I have tended to order off of the side dishes part of the menu for a lot of my meals. Particularly at Chinese restaurants, I’ve been known to just buy an order of fried rice for lunch and skip over the entrees completely. It’s one of my …
Continue reading “For dinner tonight, choose to go with the grain”
