Totally Easy Slow-Cooker Kalua Pork

Happy New Year, Friends! I hope you enjoyed a bit of holiday R&R! What did you do? Did you travel? Did you stay home? Was there any Christmas caroling? How about scandalous NYE romance? Did your crazy aunt get drunk and take off her wig? I want stories. Spill it. You should write me. I enjoy a good tale.
I had a quiet holiday this year. The husband and I enjoyed cozy fires and copious amounts of carbs mixed with cheese. There was bourbon-sipping and movie marathons. There was friendship, wine, merriment and board games. There were cookies, a bag of butterscotch caramels, and a complicated relationship with a bag of chocolate-drizzled kettle corn. I’m just now slowly and reluctantly coming out of my Netflix coma and assimilating back into the real world. I suppose I should start drinking more water and wearing less yoga pants (oh, and possibly doing MORE yoga) — but, let’s just ease into things. I’m needing a little more time to regroup and reboot before I come in here guns blazing a fired up trail of resolutions and green juice. We’ll get there. There will be a notebook scrawled with 2014 intention setting and polar bears doodled haphazardly in its margins. But, for now… let’s just enjoy that sleepy moment right after waking up from a long nap. The late morning sun is shining in through my window and I just want to lay here a little longer with my eyes closed and take it all in. It’s comfortable here. […]

Spaghetti Squash Pesto Pasta With Chard & Sun Dried Tomatoes {Gluten-Free, Paleo & Vegan Option}

Have you ever tried to recreate a food memory? We all have them, right? Things that were simmering or baking during significant moments in our lives. Certain dishes that remind us of someone or something special. They can also go the other way on you… for example, I will most likely never again put a Sun Chip in my mouth — Thank you windy road to the beach for all the memories #nope.
When I was making this dish, I wanted to recreate what I ordered on my first date with my husband. The smell of pesto always brings me back to that evening. I wore a denim skirt that in hindsight was gloriously too short. He wore a button down that looked just like the checkered table cloths at the Italian restaurant. He was nervous. He wiped his mouth incessantly with his napkin. We joked. We laughed. Our waitress was totally drunk and boisterously exclaimed “You’re such a beautiful couple! When’s the wedding?!” Perfect for a first date. After the date, I asked him if he wanted to come over and meet my cat, Gunther. Smooth, right?  I made out with his face. The rest is history. Some might consider Gunther our Yenta (Fiddler On The Roof reference, anyone? )  Classic love story, right? Totally.  […]