Thanksgiving Meatballs with Easy Pan Gravy

Here we are again. It’s that time of year where I say predictable things like “What? How is the year almost over?” or “The holidays are chasing me down and I feel like I can’t breathe–can you pass me that paper bag to breathe into? Thank you.” Oh, was that second thing not as predictable? I dunno, it feels about right. The holidays are filled with a lot of joy, but they can also fuel a lot of stress and panic. For me, I’m pretty much always traveling on a holiday to get to family. So, a lot of the stress is logistical. I also get stressed out because my birthday is very near Thanksgiving and I’m getting old and I don’t want to feel my feelings–but that’s an entirely different post that isn’t centered around meatballs or topped with anything like gravy. […]

Grain-Free Dark Chocolate Chunk and Blackberry Blondies

I’m not a baker. It’s not my thing. I don’t like to measure or follow instructions. When I’m not developing recipes, you won’t find me with a measuring cup in hand or a baking scale under foot (is that not how baking scales work? Weird). It’s cumbersome to have to be so meticulous. I come from a long line of people who write recipes with the precise measurements of “just put some soy sauce” or “use a few glugs of oil”. I was raised inside of a wild and free kitchen culture. So, as you can imagine,  I don’t like to feel the weight of science on my shoulders as we anticipate, with bated breath, to see if gluten-free brownies are going to rise. Baking is one thing, and gluten-free baking is a whole different more complicated (and sometimes frustrating) animal. You know what I’m talking about, right? Maybe you recently went gluten-free and you decided to google a recipe for bread. You are met with approximately five hundred different types of special order flours–there are many things on this list you didn’t know could even be made into a flour: Chestnuts. Sorghum. Teff. Eye of Newt. Xanthan Gum. Crickets. Unicorn Shoulder. In short, it ain’t always easy. I see you. I hear you. We are one.  […]

Creamy Mushroom, Bacon & Leek Soup

This morning I was startled awake by the heinous loud beeping of the carbon monoxide detector. My heart began pumping quicker, signaling to me that we probably needed to evacuate the house before submitting to a gas induced death. I jumped out of bed. I tried to think about where the cat carrier was. I found the dog sleeping on the couch, unimpressed by my antics. I put on shoes. I did not put on a bra. I grabbed my cell phone. These are the actions that I took in a very sleepy and very confusing emergency. I texted my husband, in a calm fashion. I was instructed to climb an it’s-too-early-for-this-$hiz-step-ladder and press a button that said “SILENCE”. As it turns out, the carbon monoxide detector was simply malfunctioning. Phew. In celebration that I would not be evacuating my home, and would in fact live to see the afternoon, I passed out into a deep sleep still wearing a questionable pair of crocks. I only know that I wore my crocks to bed because I woke up with them off and under the covers. It’s confusing to wake up with a rubber clog negotiating its way into your backside. […]

Grain-Free Spring Harvest Quiche with Sausage, Sun Dried Tomatoes & Goat Cheese

There are defining moments in life where you’re forced to examine what makes you different. For me, one of these moments centered around a hot dog. It was a sunny afternoon in ’94, and a friend of mine had come over for a play date. We were hungry, so my mom suggested some snacks. One of the things on the list was “a cold hot dog”. This didn’t strike me as particularly alarming, as I had been eating hot dogs in various states of cooked-ness for as long as I could remember. It wasn’t uncommon to grab a cold one right from the package and eat it with my hands like it was a hydrated Slim Jim. I grew up in a Hawaiian family, and this was normal. Other ways to eat hot dogs included: in a sandwich, fried in a pan, with Pork n’ Beans, and of course, with eggs. […]