My favorites from 2015...

It's that time again, hard believe we have completed another revolution around the sun.
In looking back, I found ten recipes worth singling out as my favorites from this year.

Here they are in no particular order.

1) Very Orange Cake: This surprisingly simple cake is vegan and came from Joy of Cooking.

2) The Best Pork Chops: Our local farmer's market worker told us about this sure fire way to achieve moist chops. After avoiding them for decades, due to growing up with tough, dry meat, pork chops are back on the menu at our house.

3) Coconut Curried Rice: I adapted this recipe from one I got at a yoga retreat from an Ayurvedic chef. Don't dismiss this recipe if you don't like coconut, it's more about the flavors of the spices. My husband couldn't even tell it had coconut in it ;-)

4) Easy Brownies: I saw this recipe attributed to Kathryn Hepburn and had to give it a try. Sure enough they are easy and very tasty brownies.

5) Not Your Mother's Potato Salad: This dish will make any summer meal a real picnic, while similar to a classic potato salad it goes beyond the mundane.

6) Chimichurri: That silly word is fun to say and the sauce is amazing on so many dishes. How can you go wrong with a sauce that stars garlic, parsley and cilantro ??

7) Almond Milk & Almond Spread: Another gift from that same yoga retreat: fresh nut milks !! When faced with what to do with the almond pulp I came up with a yummy sandwich spread/ dip.

8) Quinoa Potato Pancakes: This recipe came from Mount Madonna, again the simplicity is key.
These cakes make a great addition to breakfast or dinner.

9) Crazy Pecan Toffee: My dear friend and fellow food blogger made this confection for me last Christmas, it sounds so crazy but tastes so good !!

10) Tomato Chutney: This is by far the best thing to come out of my kitchen in a long time. It was the hit of my yearly craft sale and a family favorite as well. I only wish I had made twice as much when those beautiful organic dry farm tomatoes were in season.

So there you have it, hope something in this list inspires you to get into your kitchen and cook !!
Best wishes to all for a delicious 2016 !!

10 holiday gift ideas you can make in your kitchen.

Who really wants to spend all that time out at the mall or even online shopping.
Step away from the Star Wars movie promo-junk aisle, that's NOT what everyone wants for the holidays. Instead step into your kitchen and give a few of these ideas a try.

Here are some holiday gifts you can make in your kitchen.
Most folks are delighted to get a homemade gift, especially one that doesn't need dusting ;-)
1) Cilantro garlic butter is the star of my kitchen gift giving this season.

2) Infused oils and vinegars are always on one of my niece's wish list.

3) There are some spice blends I love to use in my cooking: chili, pie spice, curry powder, Moroccan spice blend, jerk spice and ranch dressing mix.

4) Fruit syrups and citrus syrups, great for parties and mixed drinks.

5) Ice cream toppings for easy desserts over the holidays.

6) Homemade granola, an easy breakfast when the house is full of guests.

7) Smoked pecans and other nutty treats, the perfect host gift.

8) Snack mixes, another great simple hostess gift.

9) This chocolate bark is stuffed with dried fruit and nuts !!

10) Just in case you want a non-food item, here a simple and satisfying body scrub.

Thanksgiving meal, all the good stuff.

This year for the first time in seven years, I won't be hosting Thanksgiving dinner.
I will still be sharing all my great recipes and tips, but since I am only making the stuffing, I have not been looking up new and creative recipes for one of my favorite holidays.

The best way to make Thanksgiving an enjoyable meal is to plan ahead and share the cooking.
There are things you can do in the next few days that will make life easier on Thursday.

Check your table linens, serving dishes, etc... to make sure you have ready and at hand everything you will need to serve the meal.

Make some of the dishes ahead of time.
Cranberry sauce can be made right now.
Bread or cornbread can be cubed and allowed to get stale for the stuffing.
Some people like to make their gravy drippings ahead of time using turkey wings.
Desserts can be made a day or two before depending on the what you are making.
You get the idea.

Here are some of my favorite recipes or tips by category.

Appetizers: Don't bother, let everyone get very hungry or if you must offer a plate of raw veggies.
It's a task you can assign to someone else anyway.

Side dishes; That's what it's all about !
Candied yams, made with maple syrup and rosemary.
Bacon roasted Brussel sprouts, bacon makes everything better, it's true.
Cranberry sauce, please make your own.
Cornbread stuffing, my sister's recipe.
Genna's and Laurie's hybrid stuffing, the best of both kinds.
Winter squash biscuits  these are great for breakfast too.
Roasted winter squash , tis' the season.
Stuffed baked squash, this dish would be great for your vegetarian and vegan dinner guests.
 Pumpkin cornbread

And if you need still more ideas here is a post : 101 Thanksgiving side dishes.

Check out this post for Alton Brown's explanation of why it's better NOT to stuff your turkey.

Desserts, you can never have too many, that could be our family motto.
Pumpkin pie
Pumpkin cheesecake
Pecan pie
Pumpkin cake
Ginger cake with caramel topping
Baked apples
Pecan pie bars
Old fashion gingerbread 


Do have fun, love your friends and family as much as you can, be grateful for the bounty in your life.

In the words of the immortal Miss Piggy: Never eat more than you can lift !

In the Garden Art Show and the last week of our trip...

I have been so busy making things for my show this weekend: jams, jellies, soaps, toffee, body butters and lippies. It's been hard to get this last part of our trip documented.

Do come to the garden and see the fabulous new Celtic soaps I have been making and sample the amazing new tomato chutney.  This show is always such a fun social event, bring a friend !!

Week three of our road trip...

Day 15: Our first night after Boulder, we camped at Elk Ridge Campground. Not only did it have full amenities like a laundromat and showers, it also had this sweet free library. I enjoyed the book I traded for one I had just finished.

Day 16: Driving through the snow dusted Colorado Rockies the next day was spectacular.

Day 17: Camping on this mesa with amazing views was one of the highlights of our whole trip.

Day 18: We love the crazy sculptures on the road up to Wheeler Peak.

Day 19: Wheeler Peak with a sprinkling of snow, the contrast in just a few weeks was astonishing.

Day 20: I learned to dress up the Trader Joe's noodle boxes into a simple tasty, hot dinner.

Day 21: Great fungus on the hike we took on the Chapman Creek trail in the Sierra Nevada.

What a great three week adventure we had, seems like a long time ago at this point.

After my show I will begin to delve into that greatest of all food holidays: Thanksgiving !!

Cilantro garlic butter, my busy kitchen and week two of my trip.

As promised I am posting the recipe for this cilantro garlic butter. It makes just about everything taste better, so far I have had it on toasted French bread, beet greens, steak, pasta...yum !
It's very simple, the only trick is to be sure your butter is soft. To make this vegan use Earth Balance instead of butter.

 Cilantro Garlic Butter

Ingredients

1/2 cup soft butter
4 cloves garlic
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, coarsely chopped

1) Start by whizzing the peeled garlic cloves in your mini-food processor.
2) Add the fresh chopped cilantro. Whiz that a bit.

3) Add the soft butter and whiz some more until it's fairly smooth. It's doesn't have to be pureed.

4) Scrap into a small bowl and store in the fridge, try not to eat it on EVERYTHING :-)

I have been busy in my kitchen lately, I do spend a lot of time there. Cooking food from scratch is my default mode, I have come to realize.
Continuing with the winter squash theme, I made a pumpkin pie out of the rest of my frozen squash. Just remember to turn the oven down from 425 F to 350 F after the first 15 minutes...I forgot and while the pie is long gone, it was a bit brown on top.

One night I was feeling lazy so I took some pesto from the freezer for pasta. It was some I made this summer with almond pulp instead of other nuts or seeds and froze without the cheese. I do like it this way better.

With some locally grown and processed chorizo, I made chili the other day. What a great fall meal, served with my cornbread muffins. I threw the almond pulp from my almond milk into the muffins and it added a nice texture.

I got really ambitious and made my vegetable Wellington tonight. I was a bit lazy about draining all the liquid from the vegetable so it was a bit sloppy. It still tasted great and was a good paring with the flat iron steak we grilled, much like we do our flank steak.

To warm up the kitchen in the morning I baked apples, great smells and yummy to eat with hot cereal in the morning.


Here is week 2 of our latest road trip:

Day 8: Crazy found art sculptures in someone's yard in Hanksville, UT.

Day 9: Striped Mountain near the Henry Mountains, great place to find 200,000,000 year old petrified wood.

Day 10: Our campfire by Oowah Lake in the LaSal Mountians outside on Moab UT.

Day 11: We hiked to Warner Lake in the La Sal Mountains, UT.

Day 12: Red sandstone canyons in Colorado.

Day 13: T-shirt seen in a visitor's center on I-70 in Colorado.

Day 13: Genevieve on a hike outside the Mount grandparents cabin in Eldora, CO.

Day 14: Princess KitKat, roommate of the senior Mounts in Boulder, CO.

What's been happening in my kitchen lately and a week of photos from my trip.

I have been thinking of a way to share my most recent trip and still post about food. This latest adventure was not really about food so instead I'll combine it with what I cooked once I got home.

With all the winter squash we grew this year, I knew I had to use up the frozen squash from my freezer, sooner than later. I decided on my spicy squash soup, wow, it was great. The first night I served it with crusty French bread and some excellent garlic cilantro butter, I concocted at the last minute. That butter with fresh cilantro is so good, I will make it again, take photos and post about it soon.

Since I usually make about a half gallon of soup for the whole week, we had it again last night with fresh spring rolls. I usually make these myself ahead of time. I was inspired by my sister-in-law Marty, who served them as a "roll you own" meal while we were in Lakewood. I like not having to do all the work !!

My always-moist-pork chops were an easy dinner after a day doing piles of laundry.

With the cooler nights finally here, I revisited my gourmet mac and cheese, adding sauteed mushrooms and chard, topping it with the almond pulp from my homemade almond milk. It was so good, Bob couldn't stop eating it, luckily I made a large pan, so there will be another dinner there served with a large green salad.

Blogging about a three week road trip after the fact can be long, painful and tedious. I decided instead to break it into week segments with a photo for each day, photos I haven't already posted on Facebook. Here is week 1, enjoy !!

Day 1:An artsy shot of the shoe tree on highway 50 in Nevada.

Day 2: Fall colors on the road up to Wheeler Peak at Great Basin National Park.

Day 3: Taking a moment to commune with an ancient Bristlecone pine, it smells like honey.

Day 4:We saw lots of wild turkeys on this trip, too bad Ben Franklin couldn't convince anyone they should be our national bird.

Day 5: Driving through the San Rafael Reef, is always a dramatic experience.

Day 6: Our camping spot in the Henry Mountains.

Day 7: The Henry Mountains are known for the very large mule deer.

Quinoa Potato Cakes

I  was served these simple potato pancakes at Mount Madonna, a retreat center where I attend a biannual yoga retreat. The food is always simple and usually tasty (sorry, I can be a bit of a snob). These pancakes were so delicious and satisfying, I could hardly believe they had only two main ingredients.

I just made a large batch and froze them just the other day, some we had for dinner, some will come with us on our big road trip this week and the rest will await our return as a simple addition to a future dinner.

You can get as fancy or a simple as you like with these cakes. 

Quinoa Potato Cakes

Ingredients

2 cups cooked mashed potatoes

2 cups cooked quinoa

olive oil

salt & pepper to taste

 optional:  1 teaspoon cumin powder or some sauteed leaks or ...whatever strikes your fancy.

1) Preheat the oven to 350 F. Make your favorite mashed potatoes and allow to cool enough to handle or use leftovers from the night before.

2) Same with the quinoa, we often use it in place of rice with a stir fry, in fact I cook it in the rice cookers.

3) Mix equal part in a bowl, add salt, pepper, cumin etc... to taste.

4) Form into patties.

5) Place on a well oiled baking sheet or into a cast iron skillet. I use the spray olive oil, you can brush them with olive oil or melted butter.

6) Bake for 15 minutes then carefully flip them and brush or spray with more olive oil. Bake for another 15 minutes.

7) They should be nicely browned. If you use a skillet, they will take less time, cook on medium heat, flipping them after 5 minutes. Cook for another 5-10 minutes.

8) Serve with as a side dish with  steamed greens, or a big salad, with a pork chop or sausages. They are great by themselves or try any of your favorite condiments, we like them with my tomato chutney.

They are great the next day heated up for breakfast or lunch !!

Coconut Bliss Balls

Coconut bliss balls is not the best name for these simple sweet treats, but it is the name they came with so that's what I will call them until I come up with a better name.
My friend Laurie made them for me once upon a time, then made me promise not to blog about them until she did. She has a wonderful food blog herself, check it out. I just looked and she posted about these treat back in December 2014...I guess it's OK if I post about them now ;-)

I was so impressed when I first ate them, then made them, with how simple they are...few ingredients and simple prep, almost too easy. They do need to chill several hours before serving, so take that into consideration if you plan to use them for dessert. They are vegan and gluten free, in case that matters...

Coconut Bliss Balls

Ingredients

    •    2 cup finely shredded coconut
    •    3 Tbsp. coconut oil
    •    2 Tbsp. maple syrup
    •    ½ tsp. vanilla extract
    •    1  cup dark chocolate chips
    •    sea salt

 Makes about 25-27 balls

1) Combine coconut, coconut oil, maple syrup, and vanilla extract in a blender or food processor. Blend until well combined into a thick ‘crumb’.

2) Use your hands to mold the coconut crumb into bite-size balls. They should stick together nicely. Place the balls on a piece of wax paper. If you are having trouble getting them to stick together try chilling the mixture for an hour.

3) You can chill them once you formed them into balls or try to coat them now. It depends on the temperature of your kitchen. If you are in Baton Rouge like one of my favorite people, then chilling them will make them easier to dip.



4) When you are ready to dip the balls, melt chocolate chips, I like using the microwave for this, start with 1 minute, then stir, heat for 30 more seconds, stir, until you have a nice soft texture. You can use a double boiler if you prefer. I had trouble getting my soupy enough one time and found that a teaspoon of coconut oil added to the chocolate worked wonders.

5) Use a spoon to dip each ball into the chocolate. This is the messy and sometimes tricky part. Persevere ;-)

6) Sprinkle each ball with a bit of sea salt while the chocolate is still moist. I used this wonderful lavender rosemary sea salt my friend Joni made for me.

7) Refrigerate the balls for two hours (to harden) and enjoy!