Giuseppepaolo

Chocolate hazelnut spread. A great flavor combination. And, that very famous brand.....which I really did like.....except for one thing. It left a strange waxy coating in my mouth. And honestly.... it's not the healthy snack spread that's boasted about on those commercials. I mean...really....2 tablespoons at 200 calories? Over half of the calories come from fat.  Not to mention 21 grams of sugar, 12 grams of fat, plus....artificial flavors.  As if we should expect anything else. After all, it is the sad fact of processed food.  But that's beside the point....my focus here is on an amazing alternative. Because no matter how much I question the "famous" one....I still crave that combination.  Because really...I do love it. And now I have a great, healthy, easy alternative. That not only leaves my mouth feeling 'wax-free', but makes me feel so much better about eating it.  My daughter found the recipe on Instagram and unfortunately there wasn't a website...

Only one other time in my whooooole life have I liked something with beets. It was about a year about when I made a Quinoa and Roasted Beet Salad . I don't enjoy the earthiness of them. I love the color though. My girls love beets and it's because of them that I found this recipe. I won't proclaim to be a beet lover. But I love this particular recipe. I recently signed up to have fresh, organic produce delivered to my home...straight from local farms. It's pretty cool. I'm just giving it a test run to see how it goes. Anyway...my first delivery was the other day I got beets. I knew they were coming. I could've put them on the 'no-no' list but since my girls love them, I went ahead and let them come. In my Google search for beet recipes, I came across a Huffpost link that claimed to turn any beet hater into a lover. (They weren't kidding!) A little tweaking from the original recipe and we have here a vegan, gluten-free and dairy-free recipe. So delici...

When my Food & Wine magazine arrived, boasting 25 vegetable dishes, my daughter was on it like bees on honey. "Mom, we should go through this magazine and make all of the recipes!" Thank God she didn't mean, all of them on the same day. I mean, I like my vegetables and all, but for some reason they're kinda high maintenance. Lots of prep work. All that washing, drying, cutting. I know...I am  can be very lazy sometimes. I try not to be. But I can't help it . This recipe does have quite a bit of prep work. Of course I did increase that a little by grilling the corn before using it. I figured since there was so much corn in these cakes, that the flavor would be a plus. Which it was. And I can say that the added step was worth it. I didn't fire up the grill or anything. I just took a gas grill grate that I bought from the hardware store and plopped it on the stove top, over the flame...and grilled away. (works great for grilling peppers and such indoors as we...

This is the second time in my adult life that beets have found their way into my kitchen. The last time these purple-ish red veggies crossed my threshold was back a few years ago when I was baking my way through Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day and I decided to give beets a break (from my childhood memory of having to gag them down) and made some beautify Red Beet Buns . Loved how they looked but hated how they tasted. Well, I was faced with them again a couple of nights ago that all started with a phone call that went something like this: me: "Hello?" caller: "Hi, this is Nicole from Whole Foods Market and I'm calling to remind you about the cooking class that you signed up for." me: "Cooking class?" (First of all I had no idea they HAD cooking classes. Second of all, I couldn't remember the last time I'd been to Whole Foods) caller: "Yes, you've signed up for our Transition to a Gluten Free Diet cooking class" me: "Ooooh...

Did you know that April is National Soy Foods Month ?  Neither did I. Until recently.  My friends over at FoodieBlogRoll hooked me up with some soy foods products to help spread the word and share some ideas on what you can do with soy foods.  I'm not a soy person, personally but one of my daughters is lactose intolerant and soy foods products is one of the ways she gets around her tummy aches caused by dairy. I also use soy flour in a lot of the breads that I make for her. Therefore, I'm not a stranger to soy. Plus...I really enjoy soy nuts and I absolutely love eating edamame...those ones you get at Costco. Omgohs.....They're so addicting.  Anyways....this is what I received in the mail the other day.... These things are always a surprise. You never know what you're gonna get until it arrives. Hmmm...what to do...what do. I didn't want to do anything typical here so I started thinking about cheese. I've made cheese... soft cheese from milk, in the past so I f...

I decided to try another recipe from Thai Kitchen and Simply Asian. I posted one recipe for Spicy Kung Pao Chicken Wings with Sweet Chili Dip  which I loved. I then decided to try the Zing Rolls. Which happen to be Vegan. Not that I'm into vegan but one of my daughters is. The ingredients were simple and easily acquired. Except for the Rice Paper Wraps. I looked at various local markets. No luck. Then I remembered an excellent Asian market a few miles away and decided to head out one Saturday morning. After searching several isles, including the refrigerated isle and freezer (I was thinking they'd be with the won ton wraps and such)...I finally tracked down a store employee and was directed to a dry goods isle. All this to find a simple, tortilla like package of white disks. For 98 cents. For 100 wraps. I think I spent more in gas getting there. You see...I am not, in the least, familiar with rice paper wraps. They're pretty cool little things. No cooking required. Just a l...