Mushroom Chicken, Rice and Pasta for Comfort Food

Pardon the radio silence on Bake This Day, but we lost a key member of our team, my beloved bulldog Izzy. She passed away on Wednesday, and with her, she took my appetite for a brief while to the grave. We have been overwhelmed, just overwhelmed, with kindness and an outpouring of love and sympathy […]

Spiced Kuri Squash Soup and Gingerbread Bundt Cake

Our sweet bulldog is now half-blind. In a Shakespearean twist, her eyeball had to come out last Tuesday. She is adjusting like a champ. We are resorting to pirate costumes to adjust ourselves, but she is in much less pain now without the tumor that had invaded the eye, and so we are grateful. She […]

Free Range Eggs and S’More Whoopie Pies

My hens bring me joy. Sometimes I lounge in the yard with a plan to read a book, and then spend the hour watching chickens dodder by, top-heavy, clueless, burbling like a slow stream. They bring me laughter and peace, and every day, warm and smooth round gifts. We love to give our ladies oats […]

Pod and Bean Dinners: Fajitas, Pumpkin Chili and Quinoa

The paint palette of spring sometimes requires a boost. And in my particular case, the colors need to be vertically boosted away from the hungry beaks of my backyard chickens. KP and I re-purposed these pallets into flower beds. Really enlivens what was otherwise a chain link fence with all the usual vines. Spring usually […]

Easter Brioche for Bostock and Grilled Salmon Burgers

Easter will heretofore be marked by the ritual making of brioche. Tartine brioche. There was a recipe in Char Broil the Great Book of Grilling for salmon burgers and the suggested bun was a brioche roll. I walked to our local grocery on the lookout for some fresh made brioche buns and found only processed, […]

Vampiro Sauce for an LA Halloween – Be Our Guest

We attempt to bring a touch of Hollywood to LA (Louisiana) every Halloween. A neighbor recently said that living near us brought the excitement of living near a playhouse–always a production in the works. This year we brought Beauty and the Beast to Midcity Porch Crawl and took home Best Costume for a Group! For […]

Fourth of July BBQ and Italian Ice

If you can’t beat the heat, join it! Been trying to get some grilling on for the holiday, like everyone else. In New Orleans, it is actually an important chore during hurricane season to clear through all the major meat products taking up residence in the freezer, just in case we need to evacuate and […]

Anniversary Champagne Cake

My parents celebrated 41 years of marriage on Monday, and on that bright day in 1976, they served champagne cake to their guests in Portland, OR, my mother’s favorite. Mom recently came to New Orleans for a visit, and in addition to entertaining the chickens, restructuring my patio and filling raised beds made chicken-proof by […]