• Cheese crisps – two ways

    We’ve been trying out some Super Bowl recipes, but not all of them have worked out that well. Sorry. That’s why we tried them early! But I figured cheese crisps are always a winner. Yes, most people call them quesadillas. But in Arizona, we called them cheese crisps. Not sure why… other than they are […]

  • Guacamole salad

    This salad is great for Super Bowl or, really, for any party. It is colorful, delicious and even kind of healthy! (You don’t have to tell anyone that, though) You can make most of it beforehand, but you should wait until just before people arrive to add the avocados. Otherwise they may get brown and […]

  • Super Bowl food

    Toby loves football, I love food and we both love having people over. So the Super Bowl really works for us. Last year we were semi-foiled by a major blizzard, but even that worked out OK because if everyone who RSVP’d had shown up, I don’t think we would have had enough room for everyone […]

  • Pinto bean mole chili

    Before I get into the story of this chili, you need to know two things: 1. It is really good. 2. It is not that hard to make. Now that I’ve gotten that out of the way, I’ll tell you that Toby and I were both pretty skeptical about it. It has a ton of […]

  • I heart plies and legwarmers

    As you may recall, I started taking an adult ballet class in the fall. Now we’ve just started the new semester. But it seems I’m not the only one hitting the barre. Apparently undeterred by the ripping of flesh and cracking of toenails in Black Swan, fashionistas are signing up for online workouts with the […]

  • Banana crunch muffins

    Well, I fell off the cleanse/diet wagon. Luckily, I fell onto the sugar wagon, which is padded with toasted coconut marshmallows (thank you, Timmi!). So it didn’t hurt a bit. I am going back on the diet, but in the interim I needed to do something about these super-ripe bananas. (I randomly started calling them […]

  • Pear crisp

    Everyone needs a little dessert — even if they are on a diet. I wanted something sweet that would also be relatively healthy, so I ended up with pears. There is really no reason to use two different kinds of pears, except that it looks prettier to have two colors. And I thought it might […]

  • New swim cap!

    I’ve had the same swim cap since 1999. I got it at a random store in Belgium after I determined (through a series of gestures) that I needed to wear one to swim at the pool down the street from our house. My dad did buy me a bright orange “Who’s your Tiger?” cap a […]

  • Coconut pancakes

    I have had a subscription to Bon Appetit for a year (after they shuttered Gourmet) and read it every month… but none of the recipes ever looked very good to me. So imagine my surprise when I was leafing through the January issue and I saw a COUPLE of recipes that looked good. This is […]

  • Sweet potato “fries”

    I’m not really that big on french fries. I will eat them, of course, I just don’t really love them. But sweet potato fries? Those I find hard to resist. So I was excited to try the homemade kind — and even more excited when I realized how fast and easy it is. Plus, they […]