Giuseppepaolo

Before we talk about the Giveaway, let me just Do you ever have one of those days...where you wonder if you shouldn't have even stepped foot in the kitchen that morning? Saturday ended up being a day of discoveries. I discovered that my dishwasher door is being weird...it's sticking shut while the handle that you squeeze to unlock it just sorta disappears into itself. I also discovered that my oven takes foreeeeeeeeeever to heat up to the proper temperature. As in, after the preheat phase.... and the required 45 minute baking time, the temp was 100' below the needed 350'F mark. That happened as I was baking this delicious coffee cake. I opened the oven door as the timer went off...toothpick in hand, ready for the plunge (do you know that this is probably the only reason I own toothpicks?) and I stopped breathing...in total disbelief as I tugged on the rack and witnessed the soppy center sloshing around. My mind raced....did I set the timer right? Forget to put in an ing

Navajo Tacos. Say what? Say....mmmmmm. This is one amazing dish! What we have here is a great infusion. Navajo Fry Bread topped with New Mexico Green Chile Stew. Now don't go thinking you can pick this baby up with your hands and eat it like a traditional taco. Unless you're into totally messy food! Not that there isn't great totally messy foods to do that with (burgers, burritos, traditional tacos) but I think you'd probably end up with most of that stew back on the plate. At best. Just get out your fork and knife and go to town on this baby. And use that last bite of fry bread to sop up any juices that might be left over cuz seriously, you won't want to leave anything behind. This is another great recipe from Megan Micozzi's (of  ScarlettaBakes.com ) cookbook,  The New Southwest . If you missed it, I posted a recipe last week of hers, Mushroom and Leek Migas . At the time, my copy of the cookbook hadn't arrived yet. When I got home from work on Friday, I w

I have a new found respect for pumpkin. And that's saying a lot for someone who doesn't really like pumpkin pie. I recently discovered a group of bloggers in my area who meet once a month. I have never met another food blogger, face to face. That I know of. (or that I can remember) Do you know how excited I was to attend my first meeting...and meet real live people who are just as obsessed with food and pictures and writing about it all, as I am? Oh man...I felt like I was going to my first ever party. Then I found out that everyone needed to bring a dish. Ok, that's cool. A pumpkin dish. Oh...that's....errrrr....challenging..... Then the nerves set it. What can I bring that will live up to whatever expectations other bloggers have? I certainly don't want to bring the same dish as someone else. I considered my Pumpkin Cheesecake but pushed it to the back of my mind for a bit. Then decided to experiment and see what my other options were. One of the many dishes that

It's that time again....time to Spotlight a new amazing cookbook. I'm sure most of you are acquainted with the author in some form or another. She's a fellow blogger (I love when this happens!) by the name of Meagan Micozzi. She has an amazing blog (of course) called Scarletta Bakes She's been giving away some amazing stuff lately so I highly, highly recommend that you give her visit and see if you can win something. So...she has this new cookbook, The New Southwest and I'm here to tall you about it...during the next 3 weeks. Aaaaaaand (this is a BIG and) during the 3rd week, I'll be giving this cookbook away to one of you lucky people. But let's explore a little. See what's inside. I mean, you never buy a cookbook without browsing through the pages first, right? So for this week, Mushroom and Leek Migas is on the menu. It's typically a breakfast dish but how many of you love to eat breakfast for dinner? I'm a huge fan, that's for sure. Whic

Many, many moons ago I raised and bred birds (at one point I had about 80) and millet was no stranger to me. I'd buy it by the bags full. And feed it to my birds. During my last trip to the farmers market, I asked a gal that had a nice spread of dried beans and grains if she had any quinoa. Her response was "I only sell stuff that's grown in the USA and quinoa isn't". I had never thought of that. Her next statement went something like this..."but I have millet. It's very similar to quinoa and is cooked the same way with just a bit more water. It has the same nutrients and a lot of people like it better because it doesn't have that 'soapy' taste that quinoa has." (well...if you rinse quinoa before cooking it, it will not have that undesirable hint of soap when cooked)....but I remained quiet and let her sell me a small amount of millet). After some research on my part, I found out that millet doesn't have the same nutritional value as

Leave it to Julia Child to make ground beef sound special! Or maybe it's just the French language. But since my introduction to this dish was from Mastering the Art of French Cooking, I'll give Julia the credit. My trip to the Hollywood Farmers Market over the weekend was different than most. I was not zoned in on vegetables. My mission was to check out raw milk and grass fed beef. With all the scares and concerns out there, I really wanted to do some research and see what my doable options were. The opinions and concerns out there are all very real on various levels. I personally think its a crime shame that eating healthy (ie: organic, grass fed, free range, etc etc) is so expensive. I still don't understand how pesticides, antibiotics, hormones and such can be less expensive than growing the product the way it's meant to be....as is. And that's just the tip of the iceberg. I'll leave it at that. I found some wonderful pasture-grazed ground beef for about $5.