For Bastille Day, I did a little jig on my front porch in gratitude to France for the Louisiana Purchase, and then I made macarons. There just is no better dessert, I’m convinced. The last time I made these with my lovely neighbor Denae, I ate my half of the batch with embarrassing haste. Oh, […]
Category: Dessert Miscellaneous
Fruit and Bouillabaisse L’American
Summertime in the South means fruit-based desserts. A recent convert to eating fruit, I was a bit shy in receiving Fruit by Nancie McDermott. This cookbook features fruits I’d never heard of—mayhaws, pawpaws, quince and others I’d heard of but have never cooked with—scuppernong grapes and persimmons, and damson plums. There are no pictures in the […]
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 […]
Peach Tart and other Farm to Table Desserts
Saturday. The day when all our front lawns get crew cuts, all the food threatening to rot in the fridge gets whipped into salads and quiches and pico de gallo and fruit tarts. Like am’uricans we went to a baseball game last night and enjoyed beer and nachos and watched the planetary orbits of brilliant […]
Sesame-Matcha Bark- Green Chocolate
I meant to get this one online before St. Patrick’s Day this year — Green Chocolate — but my mother came to town and I went on vacation and things fell into a new prioritization scheme as they should. Extremely strong green tea flavor, and, many friends who sampled this remarked, “very interesting.” Not sure […]
Pumpkin Cupcakes for my Pumpkin
We celebrate Izzy’s 8th birthday this year with cupcakes, a kibble cupcake for the bully, and pumpkin marshmallow cupcakes for us. She has settled into our lives like an heirloom, a treasure, a thing that we have been lucky to get, ancient and precious, decorating the living room with various stations of repose. She loves […]
Chocolate Caramel Swiss Roll
Well, I’ve had my obligatory one month-ish break from sugar after the holidays and now here we are on the verge of Valentine’s Day, and I’m snuffle-hunting for chocolate recipes to stir up rohmahnce. May it take you to sunny heart-filled scapes deep within your nostalgia. Today, that place for me is the purple house […]
Blueberry Gingerbread for a Very Special Christmas
One of my favorite Christmas memories was in a New Orleans church service in 2007. The pastor proclaimed himself to be a “reformed musician” –having left the wild partying life, he still brought his saxophone into the pulpit to accompany the choir. That night it was an advent service and to kick off the hymn […]
Pecan Maple Glazed Kringle for Christmas Morning
Well I just watched a monarch butterfly land on a lush red blossom that exploded overnight on the Mexican Flame Vine crawling up the lattice outside my kitchen window. December, folks, December in New Orleans. A chilly winter’s day, such that my petunias mistake it for spring. To get in the holiday spirit, I’ve been […]
Candy Factory Halloween with a Loaded Sweet Potato with Pomegranate and Chorizo to Fill a Sumo Suit
Still enjoying the memories from this year’s Halloween—themed in honor of the late Gene Wilder, it was a Willy Wonka Chocolate Factory party! KP was Willy Wonka himself, and I chose to costume as Violet, better known as The Blueberry. We turned each of our rooms into a scene from the original movie, the Invention […]