Some people think Paula Deen is crazy. After all the lady happily drinks melted butter and some of her favorite recipes, Butter Popsicles, Gooey Butter Cake and Deep Fried Butter Balls are made almost entirely out of…yup, BUTTER! But I get her. Butter is her thang. See butter is to Paula Deen what garlic is to me. There are very few things that I don’t add garlic to. When a recipe calls for a clove or two of garlic, I add 6...
This will be the first Thanksgiving where I don’t have my traditional after Thanksgiving Toasted Turkey Sandwich. Of course, after whipping up this fantastic cranberry vinaigrette that sandwich is a distant memory. I’m loving the sweet and sour of this dressing and could pretty much drink it up with a straw. This might be my favorite use of Thanksgiving leftovers yet! ~Sarah Ingredients for Thanksgiving Salad: 1 package (5 ounces)...
Even before we switched to a plant based diet, Turkey was not the item I looked forward to most for Thanksgiving dinner. It was ‘Mashed Potato Volcanoes’. What? You’ve never heard of them? I don’t remember who in my family invented this little tradition but my cousin and I always had a little competition to see who could make the biggest volcano. You start with a big ole’ spoonful of mashed potatoes and you...
Every year at Thanksgiving my family and I go around the dinner table and list the things we are thankful for. What’s at the top of my husband’s list this year? His loving wife, adorable kids, wonderful mother-in-law? Nope, whipped cream. See, every year at Thanksgiving we have apple pie (although this year we are doubling up and having Chocolate Pecan Pie too!) and my husband can not eat pie without whipped cream. Since we...
There are weeks when I seriously can’t come up with a new recipe to save my life. My creative juices have run dry. Those are the weeks when dinner is a bowl of cereal or toast with peanut butter. You think I’m joking, but I’m not! This last week I was banging out the recipes. It was a Mom of the year moment! My family LOVED this cheesy taco bake. Even my EXTREMELY picky daughter ate this right up. And if a round of...
Can there be too many pumpkin recipes? I don’t think so. This pumpkin cream sauce is one of my favorites. Oh, who am I kidding? Pumpkin recipes are like children. How can I have a favorite? I love them all. Anyway, this one is really good, creamy and delicious with savory herbs to make you sniff in appreciation before you even taste a bite. Don’t stop at putting in on pasta. It’s great on roasted vegetables or mixed in with quinoa...
What is confit you might ask? Well, I asked the same thing and being the queen of Googling I learned this; “Confit (French, pronounced [kɔ̃fi] or in English “con-fee”) is a generic term for various kinds of food that have been immersed in a substance for both flavor and preservation. Sealed and stored in a cool place, confit can last for several months. Confit is one of the oldest ways to preserve food, and is a speciality...
There is a lot to be learned from watching a 4 and 5 year old play together. For instance, did you know that if you want a toy that another person has that the best way to get the toy is not by asking for it or attempting to share?! Nope! Seems the preferred method is finding a toy of your own and pretending that it is the coolest thing ever and acting like the original toy doesn’t exist. Amazingly this method has like a 99% rate of...
Living in Southern California is awesome EXCEPT when your Facebook feed is filled with stories of apple orchard trips, pumpkins, cool crisp weather and hot apple cider. We don’t have fall here. No leaves changing colors, no fall air. I decided a trip to an apple orchard would help put a little fall into my California days. My Mom (Kristy) and I took the kids to an organic apple and pear orchard in Julian, CA. Kristy and the kids picking...
I was missing my dad today, thinking about his garden and all the good things that he grew. One thing he grew a lot of were cucumbers. Not only did he like to make all kinds of pickles but we always seemed to have a cucumber salad on the table at dinner time. Sometimes it was a sour cream sauce and others a tangy vinaigrette. I was reminded of this salad when talking with Sarah the other day about sesame seeds being a good source of calcium. ‘Got...