Plantain Skillet Brownies With Salted Caramel Sauce { Gluten-Free & Paleo }

You know how I can’t seem to NOT let a banana turn all brown and mushy and gross? It’s like one of my hobbies. Should we count the times I’ve actually reached into my purse and accidentally squished an over-ripe banana all over my wallet? It’s a lot of times. I never learn that lesson. Curse the banana for being so portable and so quick to ripen! It’s a trick of nature. This is my way of shifting the blame onto an entire species of fruit that I can’t seem to get it together and clean out my purse like a grown up. I think it’s working.
Lucky for you, my reckless regard for the shelf life of a banana is working in your benefit. Remember this Tipsy Blueberry Banana Bread? That recipe rose from the ashes of a bunch of black bananas like a gosh darn Phoenix. After that post, my lovely friend Lauren commented that I really should be freezing all of these bananas and that they don’t need to hang out on my counters dying and attracting fruit flies. Okay, she didn’t put it like that… but, I got the hint and I totally started loading up the freezer. There are a comical amount of frozen bananas in there. I am seriously waiting for my husband to open up the freezer and have an avalanche of frozen bananas rain down on him. Not only would that be comically genius, but the look on his face would be priceless and probably pretty angry. Is it wrong that I find it super endearing when he gets angry? Oh, marriage.  […]

Grilled Eggplant Parmesan

Back up, Dudes. This girl totally learned how to grill this summer!  That’s right, I made fire. I made the charcoal glow. I totally put stuff over it and let it get all warm and crispy. I flexed my inner stud-muffin and grilled the heck out of  meats and veggies alike!  Did I almost light my hair on fire? Maybe. But you know… there’s always a learning curve. Me + Fire + General Clumsiness = Could have been worse. I think I might make my husband nervous. Even though I told him to back off, and in his attempt to not tell me what to do (because, really…who likes that?)  I can see him peeking at me from the other side of our sliding glass doors. Probably best. It’s always good to have a teammate when you set your hair on fire. One person to scream (me) one person to extinguish (him).

So… we all have vegetarian friends, right? I know I do. For some reason most of my really close friends are of the non-meat eating varietal. This used to stress me out. Am I allowed to say that? I know, I know, weird right? This coming from the girl who doesn’t eat gluten. Look at that big fat double standard, eh? I’m sure my gluten eating friends totally talk about how frustrating it is to feed me. It’s cool. We make due. I respect you. Let’s all just have a glass of wine. That’s vegetarian. I think it’s even vegan. If we found a bottle of wine in a back alley, that would technically be freegan. Beautiful. I like where this is going. It’s most likely going to end with a lot of exuberant dancing and a headache.  […]

Fig & Dark Chocolate Scones {Gluten Free & Paleo}

For most of my life, I thought Figs were a mythical kind of fruit. You know, like the fruit equivalent to a Pegasus or a Griffin.
To be fair, I never actually saw a whole fig in the flesh until my adult life. I had two fig references in my wheelhouse:
1) Fig Newtons: A delightful snacking cookie. I thought the person who made these cookies was named Mr. Fig Newton. I once asked my Grandfather what the filling was inside these cookies, to which he replied “something prunes.” As you can imagine, this threw me off the scent. As far as I was concerned Mr. Fig Newton was sitting in his house baking cookies filled with “something prunes.” I asked no questions.
2) Christmas Caroling: You know those lyrics in We Wish You A Merry Christmas? There is a whole verse where we demand something called “figgy pudding.” In my mind this sounded totally gross, and I didn’t ask questions. I assumed this so-called pudding was probably mushy, stinky, and something from tales of yore. I had visions of people clad in bonnets and bodices scooping chunks of wobbly pudding out into the hands of Christmas carolers. Whatever this stuff was, it was for sure old timey, as I’d never heard of it in my modern world. What ancient sorcery was this?  I don’t know. Maybe it was “something prunes.” Probably “something prunes.” […]

Easy Refrigerator Dill Pickles

Eleven years ago you could find me at a college theater party sharing a peach-flavored Arbor Mist with one of my best friends. Yes, directly out of the bottle. You might ask, what is the difference between a normal college party and a “college theater party”? Good question. I would have to say that since the people in attendance are theater students, can most likely cry on command, and have a flare for the dramatic, things can get intense. Also, there are usually two to five dudes that have ponytails (or if you’re lucky, a rat-tail)  un-ironically. Someone is drunkenly doing a monologue on the patio. Almost always someone is either wearing suspenders or a raccoon tail that is pinned onto the back of their pants. It’s a scene. I was there. It was confusing.

Ten years ago you could find me sobbing uncontrollably on the couch of my single-lady apartment. I was watching the last episode of Sex in the City and unashamedly splitting a whole rotisserie chicken with my cat. I wish I could say this is the only time that happened, but I would be lying to you. When you’re nineteen years old and live alone and have a lot of feelings, sometimes you just need someone to help you binge eat a whole chicken. You don’t discriminate if that someone has a lot of grey fur and two sets of paws. […]