These last few days of warm weather have been absolutely blissful. We’ve eaten nearly every meal outside, playing before and after on the swings. The kids love every second of it. Heck, so do I. But it is a little hard to believe that it’s only April. I keep waiting for the weather to turn on a dime and become cold and unfriendly again … so far, that isn’t the case.

With all of this delicious summer-like weather, I haven’t spent much time in the kitchen. Instead, we’ve been grilling nightly and keeping inside cooking to a minimum. However, I did make this delicious, fruit-packed recipe over the weekend. It’s something that my young kids absolutely love.

On weekends, I love to surprise Will and Paige with something special. This blueberry cake does just that. It’s best served chilled, so make it the evening before, cover it and refrigerate it overnight.

The taste is light on the sweetness, which is perfectly okay with my two little ones who go gaga for the blueberry wonderfulness. But, if you want to sweeten it up just a bit, drizzle the slices with a bit of maple syrup before serving … anyway you do it, this makes for a fabulous weekend morning breakfast.

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Growing up, we ate a lot of baked potatoes. A lot. I would load mine up with butter and salt, at first. But that got boring. Then I turned to mixing in salsa and occasionally adding cheese. That’s tasty, but I like it to be a tasty treat — not an all the time thing. These days, I just slice baked potatoes and salt them. Unless I am making a meal out of them, which happens most often in the fall when the leaves are turning and air begins to take on that familiar chill, a preview of the long months of winter that will come. When I am making a meal of them, I like to add broccoli, bacon and cheese. Good combination.

In the spring and summer though, we eat a lot of potatoes — in fry form. Sometimes I grill them, other times I make delicious sweet potato fries (or my fave: Parmesan Rosemary Sweet Potato Fries) … and of course there are oven fries. Mmm. Fries are the perfect accompaniment for barbecued foods like burgers, hot dogs, chicken … you name it.

These steak fries are fabulous with chicken like the Salt and Pepper Chicken Breasts recipe I wrote about last week. The chicken is delicious served plain with these fries and a side of a colorful veggie. It’s even better if you put the chicken on a roll with some barbecue, cheddar and bacon. Mmmm.

(P.S.: I just ordered the Progressive International Vegetable/French Fry Cutter. If it works well, you will be hearing a lot more about it … and more fry recipes. Who doesn’t enjoy low-fat, crispy fries with fun flavors?)

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Will talked all last week about eating outside. We have our table and chairs set up by our newly appointed flower garden and he just couldn’t wait to use it. So, when Sunday evening rolled around, Shawn started up the grill and I got everything we needed onto a tray to carry outside. It was a little chilly at dusk, but totally worth it. I can’t wait until we can eat all of our meals outside.

The word for this week is progress and boy, did we manage to make a lot of progress in a short time.

In terms of planting, the kids and I filled three of our vegetable garden boxes. We have one box with broccoli that is growing quite quickly. I cannot wait to see the familiar vegetable appear.

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If banana trees could talk, they would express fear at the mere mention of Will and Paige. My kids can put down those distinctive yellow fruits like nobody’s business. Nearly every morning, once Paige is changed and revving to go, she runs to the kitchen with an outstretched hand. Is the cute gesture a sign of happiness that she’s up and about? Is it to pet her beloved dogs? Is it to say good morning?

No. It’s to retrieve a perfectly ripe banana.

And as soon as she has one, Will is quick to grab one too. At this point, if I could grow my own bananas, I would just to save myself a twice weekly trip to the grocery store for more. Seriously. Forget the Cookie Monster, I am mom to the Banana Monsters.

So these delicious, syrup-y bananas? They are a favorite all around. The kids devour these lightly caramelized bananas on their French toast (and I bet they would be amazing on ice cream too!). Considering that this is ridiculously easy to make and totally delicious (you don’t need any maple syrup when you’ve got these!), there is no excuse not to healthy-up your breakfast with this serving of fruit.

But who cares about health when something tastes this good? Read the rest of this entry…

Some days, I write and write and write. I think Sunday was one of those days. But today, I just want to share a delicious recipe with you.

On Easter, I wanted a special frittata to grace the table and this was the result. I used the Joy of Cooking method, adapted slightly, to craft this recipe. Cate of Sweetnicks had suggested a similar frittata from Ina Garten, which sounded divine but had a few too many steps for me. So this is the simplified version with similar — but not the same — flavors.

I made it with egg substitute to keep it a little heart healthier. And the goat cheese and dill are just perfect with the salty smoked salmon. This is a perfect brunch dish.

Coincidentally, when I recently wrote about eating quiche for breakfast, I felt like the only one who considers it a breakfast dish after getting several comments about brunch, lunch and dinner. I guess I think eggs and that leads right to breakfast for me. Doesn’t anyone else make quiche for breakfast? What about frittata?

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A homemade hot fudge sundae. Sounds totally yum, right? Well, some times, things are not as good as they appear. Homemade hot fudge, delicious vanilla ice cream, some cookie crumbles. Except one thing … the hot fudge instantly hardened. And I am not talking in a good way. It became a supersized Tootsie Roll-like … and I hate Tootsie Rolls. Total culinary disaster.

It was also disastrous removing the leftovers from the bowl I store it in. Ouch. I am still cringing at the thought.

(Disclaimer: I didn’t make this. It’s totally not my doing.) Now, this cake? It’s a carrot cake. No, I am serious.  It’s a carrot cake with cream cheese icing. You know, the kind of icing that goes onto homemade cinnamon rolls? Yea. That. It’s a shame, because the carrot cake buried beneath the too rich, too sweet icing was actually really good. See, some times, things are better than they look.

The icing? We won’t go there.

It just goes to show that anyone can have a kitchen disaster: me, the person who made this cake, even you …

Spill: What’s your latest kitchen disaster?

Yesterday afternoon, Paige woke up long before Will from their afternoon nap, a very rare occurrence. Apparently all that fresh air really did him in. Finally, as it neared evening, I had to wake him up. Paige was munching on tasty low-fat chocolate chip cookies and scampered into their bedroom with me. Did she boast about her bounty? No, she proceeded to try to feed a barely awake (he didn’t even have his eyes open!) Will half-eaten cookies. She even climbed onto the bed to get a better angle for shoving the cookies in his mouth.

It was really cute. I daresay she missed her big brother. But then, it got even better. After finishing the cookies, she scooted down in the bed and laid her head on the pillow, pulling the blankets up and over her. Will was just starting to open his eyes when she grabbed a book and started leafing through. Adorable.

They laid there, side by side, looking at books for at least 20 minutes.

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When the warm weather started to roll around last year, gas prices were rising so fast that they kept me up at night. I worried that the high fuel costs would translate to crisis for food costs and other expenses. That got me thinking about growing our own food in our backyard as a way to control costs. So, after learning about gardening in raised beds, I decided to do that — I mean, build some — in my backyard.

Oh, I had some seriously huge plans for the raised garden beds in our backyard. I envisioned tall tomato plants, leaning on posts to support the massive weight of their fruits and lush basil plants to season pretty much everything I cooked. Oh, it was going to be grand.

Unfortunately, after building the four raised beds and burying three of them, time got away from us. The boxes were never lined or filled with soil. The project sat there in the rear of our yard … abandoned.

Yes, it was quite pretty. Really.

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The first time I hosted a holiday meal was about four and a half years ago. It was Thanksgiving and we had it at my house. When I think of that holiday, I think about how frantic I was all day and how it felt like I would never get everything done. I ran and rushed and was short with people … so not fun.

Man, have I come a long way. Holidays are no longer frantic here. I know how to plan and organize and it pays off in spades for my relaxation level. Making a meal isn’t just about choosing good dishes. It’s about choosing dishes that go well together and complement each other. Furthermore, it’s about planning the best method for cooking things and in what order.  These days, I not only make a menu for a holiday meal, but I also time out everything and make whatever I can in advance.

When I was planning the menu for Easter brunch, I wanted to keep the hands-on cooking on Easter to a minimum. The ham was a given and an easy frittata fit the bill as well. I enlisted my husband to make eggs over easy and two potato hash browns. … But I wanted something sweet and breakfast-y too. I considered making and reheating pancakes, but reheated pancakes are never that good.

Then I remembered: Cate had posted about a make-ahead French toast recipe last summer that had me drooling. I inquired about the recipe and she forked it over (and might have cursed me a bit for making her mouth water at the thought too).

The name: Creme Brulee French Toast (though admittedly, that is a bit of a mis-nomer since you never actually brulee the French toast). It’s a delicious, sweet, crave-worthy dish that comes together really quickly and sits overnight before baking to an ooey-gooey, sweet and tender French toast. Absolutely divine. Above, you see only the browned side, but at the bottom of the pan is the caramel-y goodness that is the piece de resistance of this dish (sorry no pics of that — it was devoured too quickly).

This is a fantastic celebration, special occasion, happy day breakfast … I can’t thank Cate enough for this delightful, delectable, delicious recipe. It’s a family fav. Read the rest of this entry…

When we were driving to my cousin’s house this afternoon, Will pointed out the brilliant blue sky (“I really like the color of that blue sky.”), and he was right, it was spectacular. It was one of those skies that takes on a breathtaking sapphire hue that makes you want to drink it in while sipping something cold and refreshing on the front porch.

That’s the kind of day it was too – relaxed, brilliant, spectacular. We had brunch at my house (you will be hearing lots about that meal this week. Mmmm!) before heading to my cousin’s for an Easter egg hunt and dessert. Between cooking (and that last-minute batch of cookies I whipped up … wait to you hear why later this week), and visiting, it was a jam-packed day, but in the best way. I love seeing all of our kids together – there is something magical about a group of cousins who enjoy each other’s company like that.

Brunch yielded a serious amount of leftovers at my house … including a great stash of ham. I’ve been clicking around trying to decide what to do with it all … Here are five of my favorite ham recipe finds.

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