BUSTLE and VIM

I have this problem, or actually, maybe it’s a process.  When I want to make a certain thing – a type of cookie, cake, or anything really, I research all recipes for that particular thing, comparing and contrasting, and then I keep making that thing with different iterations on the recipe until it is, as I deem it, perfect.  For instance, you may congratulate on me on recently perfecting the coconut macaroon.  Of c...

My new manicure has been compromised.

My fingertips are burned and sore.

And I'm tired.

What have I been doing?  I'll give you three guesses.  Have I been...

a) teaching my preschoolers Fun With Bonfires and then rescuing the tiny tots from fiery skirmishes?

b) polishing my silver tea set for Meghan and Harry's wedding with an essential oil that the hippie mama from Arkansas assured me was all natural, but turned o...

Not everything in life is hard right now.  A lot of things are, but this cake isn’t one of them.  

So … this is a post about my Easy Italian Cream Cake.  And I feel a little weird posting it right now. The recent hubbub over Tina Fey’s sheet-cake sketch in the wake of Charlottesville has my social media feeds full of folks smarting at the suggestion that we should just ignore these racists and neo-nazis and, we...

I think the words "Easy, Breezy" feature somewhere in every article in every magazine in Spring - easy, breezy hair, easy, breezy wardrobe, easy, breezy entertaining.  So, I'm just following suit.

What to call these?  Easy Breezy Italian Kabobs?  Maybe.  

Anyway, I ordered these cute cocktail sticks from Amazon, very affordable.  And then it's just some cut basil, cherry tomatoes, fresh mozzarella pear...

I feel bad giving these cookies a somewhat downtrodden title.  The truth is, these are EXCELLENT cookies, cookies of your dreams, cookies of obsession, cookies that could dominate the self-control of an ascetic monk, and here I am calling  them “Better Late than Never”.  Sigh….  Let’s talk about exceptionality and my troubled relationship with time and then I’ll give you an awesome recipe.
 

So, the r...

Y'all Gentle Readers, it is freezing today.  So, I thought I would take inspiration from Vim and make a pot of wholesome, nutritious soup.  Soup...mmm, so warming.

I could picture it so easily: the 4 of us sitting around the kitchen table set with Christmas placemats, newly added Christmas lights twinkling around the window, somehow both inhaling the soup and making meaningful conversation infused with lau...

Fall is here!  Many herald this as the season of pumpkin-spiced beverages, but for me, tis the season of soups, stews and chilis!!   As soon as the weather gets brisk and the sky goes a little gray, all I want to do is snuggle up on the couch with a cozy blanket and a good movie, and chow down on that most comforting of cuisines, soup.  Soup: the only cure for seasonal affective disorder.  Or just yummy.  Whatever....

Who came up with that phrase?  There's nothing easy about pie.  Except maybe eating it.  Maybe that was the original phrase: "Why, it's as easy as eating pie someone else baked."  It's the pie crust, of course, that gives me fits.  Years ago a nice lady at my mom's church had a bunch of us over to show us how to make pie crust.  It didn't really take with me.

So, I compensated with homemade...

Not one, y'all, but two, TWO hits in the kitchen this week!  I hosted my book club this past weekend, which is always a fun sort of challenge: coming up with a menu that pleases everyone and tidying up my home at the end of a weekend.  Stubbs BBQ now has crockpot starter kits for chicken, beef, and pork.  These are excellent.  I made the pulled pork.  You can find Stubbs  Cookin' Sauce in t...

I normally don't put dressing or sauce or anything on fruit.  Summer fruit is pretty tasty as it is.  Unlike salad, which needs a lot to make me forget that I'm eating a salad.  Salad is, like, the ultimate in punitive meals.  And kale - I might as well start flogging myself!

But back to fruit.  Last summer my mom made this yummy fruit salad for me and added this amazing, AMAZING dressing to it.  It w...