Until my adulthood, I always just thought of rum as something fictional pirates sang about in cartoons. Looking into it now, I know how nuanced the flavor profiles can be for the spirit, which is distilled from sugar cane syrup or juice or from molasses, which is what is leftover when you process sugar cane. …
Continue reading “Prepare for a fine ‘rum’ance with this banana cake”
If you didn’t know, we recently celebrated the first-ever “Local News Day” on April 9. The effort to observe local journalists around the country came from a push in Montana. In Newton, we had a small, but mighty, group of community members who stood outside our office with signs, touting the importance of having a …
Continue reading “There’s no doubt you should cobble together dessert this week”
Something I love about Joey is that he is often quite willing to jump into a grand kitchen experiment with me. Recently, that was when I pulled out my pasta roller, and instead of merely making noodles, as I have so far since I bought it, I proposed creating ravioli from scratch. He was totally …
Continue reading “This week’s dish is ravi‘whole’i made for someone with spare time”
I love finding recipes that claim to be “national dishes” or “traditional” ones. But I will also confess that, more often than not, when I declare that something is “traditional,” there is someone who will email me (very nicely, mind you) to let me know that, actually, the recipe I found wasn’t quite right. Inevitably, …
Continue reading “I’ll give this recipe my ‘stamppot’ of approval”
I am always amazed at how many different kinds of pumpkins and gourds you can find this time of year. In my mind, a lot of the stranger ones are merely for decoration, but after some recent research, I discovered that many of them are actually supposed to be pretty tasty. It was that research …
Continue reading “This pasta will give ’em ‘pumpkin’ to talk about”
“Those apples were kind of pricey, weren’t they?” Joey asked me as we exited the grocery store recently. “They’re honeycrisps,” I told him. “So, they’re high-end apples?” “I mean, kind of.” It’s amazing that after 15 years of marriage, I can still discover new things about my husband. Case in point: he has no knowledge …
Continue reading “Can’t tell the varieties apart? You just have to ‘apple’y yourself.”
I’ve struggled over the years with the definition of coffeecake. Generally speaking, it’s cake that is meant to be enjoyed with coffee and doesn’t actually contain any. But then I run into a recipe like I made for this week, which is a coffee cake—a cake that includes coffee. We hosted an event at the …
Continue reading “Every night is date night with this great coffee cake”
Even though it seems to be billed as a fall fruit, I love a good apple all year round. In a lively discussion about favorite fruits this past week, I decided apples hold the number one spot for me right now, and if I’m eating one on its own, I like a sweet, red one. …
Continue reading “I have a good ‘peeling’ you’ll love these apple bars”
Before I married into the Young family, I was pretty coffee agnostic. I would basically drink whatever was in front of me and be happy with it. The Youngs, though, are coffee people, by which I mean they know how to make a fantastic cup of the stuff. If you want proof, just pop by …
Continue reading “‘Chai’ can’t believe I managed to make these lattes at home”
So much sour cream. Seriously, you should see the nearly literal vat of sour cream in my refrigerator right now. We hosted a catered meal about a week ago, and I ended up with the leftovers in my fridge. I’m not complaining, mind you, because the meal was absolutely delicious, and I’m never going to …
Continue reading “Lots of leftovers results in some recipe (sour) scheming”
