I doubt flying home will ever get old. Stepping off the plane into the cool, breezy mountain air, encountering several people I know (or at least know of) on a quick grocery stop before we head out of town, watching the peaks I’ve grown up with becoming larger and larger as we drive home.
Since I left for college, my parents have sent me pictures of first snows, sunrises, and pretty clouds nestled around those peaks, and I never tire from seeing them. This morning is no different, after a night of fresh snow.
Comfort. Major.
But you know what else is comfort major? Hint: starts with cheddar, ends with biscuits.
Last August, I canned 118 pounds of tomatoes. Broke ’em down one-by-one and divvied up them up into whole tomatoes, diced tomatoes, plain tomato sauce, pizza sauce, and marinara sauce. And while I certainly do use those the other products, the biggest motivator is the marinara sauce. Which I ration carefully across the year for one dish and one dish only.
Magic Pasta.
Having stumbled across this delightful combination of ingredients by pure accident, I accidentally discovered a meal that Brad and I both find so perfect, so delicious, that I have to work really really hard to make anything else for dinner. Originally hatched as a way to use up the previous year’s supply of home-canned marinara sauce, this dish now holds permanent quarters at the top of our favorites list. I know that “Magic Pasta” doesn’t really indicate the components of the meal particularly well, but it’s all we call it. If you prefer, you can call it Pasta with Amazing Tomato Cream Sauce and Italian Sausage.
Oh, happy day. Happy glorious day, I’ve arrived in Colorado! And I’m about to go off the grid.
Four days waaaay up in the Rocky Mountains with no phone service, no interwebs, not even electricity except for three hours every evening.
I cannot wait. There’s nothing quite as refreshing as few days without a single moment looking at a screen.
But! I did want to leave you with a summery dessert to savor during this heat wave. Using two fruits that simply scream “SUMMER!!” (can you hear them?), it comes together quickly and easily and most importantly, it doesn’t require too much oven time. I know, I know, hot dessert during a heat wave?? Just wait, the heaping scoop of vanilla ice cream melting on top of it makes it worth the 20 minutes your oven will be on.
Brad and I sometimes grapple a bit when it comes to ordering pizza. Brad likes lots of toppings: meats, mushrooms, onions, veggies, goat cheese, herbs… and I actually like those, too. But if I ever have a choice, if I’m ever ordering pizza just for me, I get cheese. Beautiful, glorious, unadulterated cheese pizza.
But the shocking truth is that until last week, I’ve never made a cheese pizza at home. I know. I know. I can’t explain myself. I’ve been making pizza regularly now for a couple of years, but I’ve always dressed it up. It was high time I build my own perfect cheese pizza from scratch.
This pizza started with my go-to pizza crust recipe. I have another crust that I really love, but I only make it when I have excess whey from a batch of homemade mozzarella. This recipe, on the other hand, is super-easy to whip up when you need dinner in less than an hour. It’s a no-fuss crust that requires little resting time and rolls out easily.
Comfort food, thy name is Biscuits and Gravy. This is usually my first stop on the menu at a new breakfast or brunch joint, and there’s no way I want it to be anything other than a soft, fluffy biscuit nestled in a wave of rich gravy and crumbled breakfast sausage. Woe to the trendy places that try to gussy it up.
But this hearty meal is also incredibly easy to make at home. So maybe it’s really woe to me for not doing so every damn weekend.
First up, the biscuits. These ones are super easy and super fast. The ingredients are pretty basic, and I keep most of them on hand on a regular basis. No raising, very little kneading, and just a few passes with a rolling pin and we’re on our way to biscuit magic.
Next, the gravy. Which honestly, is even easier than the biscuits. All it takes is a pound of sausage, some flour and milk, and a little seasoning. I love my gravy a little herb-y, so I like adding rosemary or sage, too.
Despite the seasonally cold and rainy weather that has swept across the majority of the US over the last few days, the beginning of summer is approaching in all its three-day-weekend glory. I love the bookends that Memorial Day and Labor Day offer to summer: for many, they mark the first and last travel weekends, family weekends and most significantly, cookout and potluck weekends of this productive season.
I always look forward to summer potlucks. As someone who hates to eat just one thing for dinner, the wide array of casserole dishes, salad bowls, and serving platters squashed together on an eight-foot table is a favorite sight of mine. I also relish the chance to pull out a few of my favorite recipes that are either too large or too high-calorie to cook for our two-person household. I imagine you have a few of these recipes of your own.
But if you don’t, or if you’re looking for something new to bring to any festivities you may have planned for the weekend, I dug through the archives for my favorite summer dishes that make for good sharing.
While I first learned to make this salad as a light, fresh foil to rich and heavy holiday menus, I find it really shines at summer cookouts and potlucks. It does take some time to prep as all the ingredients must be chopped and layered, but this can be done a day in advance. By adding the dressing immediately before serving, the result is a textured, satisfyingly crunchy salad that you cohorts will love. It’s almost a sure bet that your salad bowl will come home with you completely empty.
This dip is easily one of my favorite culinary discoveries. Piles of onions are caramelized down to the soft, sugary, sultry versions of themselves. Then, mixed into Greek yogurt and mayonnaise, a delectable ambrosia emerges. I make this exclusively parties and potlucks: it’s not particularly high-calorie on its own, the thick-cut potato chips are a different story. Spread the calorie love!
‘Tis the season for strawberries and rhubarb! And it’s ALWAYS the season for goat cheese and toasty bread. Give your party-goers a little DIY fun with these easy toasts.
There is rarely a time when, if one is put in front of me, I will turn down a savory bite of something served on a cracker. Whether it’s cheese and fruit or creamy dips or thinly sliced cold cuts, if I lived alone and chose to appease only my deepest food-desires, I might never lift a fork to a plate of un-crackered food again.
These little bites grew out of a fortuitous collection of ingredients I happened to have on hand after returning home in January. A last hoorah of apples from the fall, a couple packs of crackers I didn’t use at my food-filled Christmas party, and a precious gift of maple cheddar from some dear friends who live in Wisconsin.
Apple & cheddar cheese are a match made in heaven. The pairing of a sharp, creamy bit of cheese against a sweet, juicy apple would be delicious enough, all on their own, on these crisp little crackers. And I won’t lie, I’ve eaten my fair share of little bites just like that. But these little bites are more than that. The apple and cheddar are chopped into tiny little wedges and cubes with a tangy, punchy dressing.
Three weeks ago, I finally gained access to a few square feet of earth to grow some of my own food.
Buuuuuuut then I spent the next 15 days traveling, working extra shifts, and spending time with my parents on their visit to the Tar Heel State.
Last weekend, though, I finally knew I’d have an afternoon to plant!
I just had to decide what to plant.
The first step, before any little green things could start growing my my 10’x4′ plot, was to make a plan. Brad chuckled that my obsession with organization was to blame for this, but it’s actually both important and common to plan out the garden well before any seeds or plants are obtained. Traditionally, gardens are planted in long rows with furrows in between for watering, which works very well for large plots but doesn’t really benefit a gardener with just a few square feet. So I borrowed a book from my dad called Square Food Gardening, by Mel Bartholomew. Square Foot Gardening is a guide for organizing these smaller spaces to maximize the available soil without packing plants in too closely and limiting their growth.
Next, I found a very useful page on the North Carolina Cooperative Extension website with a year-round calendar of the best timing for seeding, transplanting, and harvesting all manner of vegetables. I wonder if I’ll ever get used to living in a place where there is more than one option for planting: in Colorado, gardens are planted as late in the spring as possible, and then fingers are crossed in hopes against a surprise freeze. I made a list of the recommended varieties for a June planting and made my rounds at the farmers market nursery vendors.
Do you need some comfort food? Something that invites your soul to snuggle up against some memories of simpler times, of peaceful days when the world made sense? Something that fills your belly with a perfect medley of carbs, fat, protein, and flavor?
Me too.
This fall has been crazy. In mid-August I dove headfirst into some projects at work that required every ounce of creativity, planning, and time that I possessed. I took on a leadership role in my choir. I volunteered for an election that, well, let’s just say it didn’t go the way I’d hoped, and since then have still had trouble finding my bearings in this strange, post-election world. Sharing new recipes with you just hasn’t been at the top of the list.
But now it is! As the flood recedes, I’m finally finding myself looking through cookbooks again, browsing the wild and wonderful internet for tasty new things to cook. Which is how I found this one.
Sierra has been my best friend since we were eleven. Not just friends that catch up when we return to our home town at the holidays. She’s the kind of friend that still edits my resumes (and I hers). The kind of friend that calls me at seven in the morning just to tell me about how crappy the Phoenix traffic is, still references events from middle school, and who holds the other membership in our two-person book club. The kind of friend who helps me strategize and plan elaborate parties despite the fact that we live 2000 miles apart.
