First things first! I must thank you for your kind, loving, and encouraging words here and on Facebook. It truly gives me the strength and determination to keep moving forward and onward. I’m sending you virtual hugs and kisses! xoxo

I’m going to start the house tour on the outside and share with you what I did the first week I moved in; the front courtyard.

I live very close to busy Tatum Blvd., close enough that I could see the traffic whiz by outside my front door and front two windows. Thankfully, the way the house is situated prevents the noise from being noticeable in the backyard, but the front needed a barrier, so a courtyard was the answer. I checked with the city on the possibility of building the courtyard before putting in an offer on the house. If it would not be doable, I would not have purchased the house.

Moving day was November 10, 2017.

Demo of the front patio began on November 13th. I’m not one to waste time. I have to live up to my life motto, “Get Shit Done!”

As if that was not enough, I was having a propane tank installed in the back so that I could have my all-important gas range AND the demo on the inside double-sided fireplace began on November 15th. Because, honestly, if you don’t have at least four major things being done at the same time, what’s the point?

More on the awe-inspiring fireplace next week.

My dear friends, Tram and Steve, recommended the people I used for the courtyard and who I am using for the current backyard and pool remodel.

The wonderful Garden Plus Landscape and Pools do the most amazing work. They are quick, clean, efficient, trustworthy, competitively priced, and above all, kind. Honestly, I can’t recommend them highly enough!

They had the courtyard (and a new mailbox) done in 8 days! I talking completely done; demo, a wall built, pavers in place, irrigation, planted, painted, gate installed, mailbox post constructed, cleaned up, and done in basically a week.

[Read more →]

I had such a great day shopping with Blogiversary winners, Shirley, Laura and Maggie!

From left to right –

Shirley: Shirley is a longtime student of mine. She attends all my series classes at Les Gourmettes Cooking School and is the most lovely woman! I adore her in classes and I adored spending the day with her too!

Laura: I have known Laura for more than 20 years. We met as members of the Phoenix Junior League – way back when. Laura joined my committee when I chaired the Phoenix Children’s Hospital Beach Ball in 1997. The Beach Ball is celebrating its 25 anniversary with the 2018 event on March 3rd. Although Laura and I have not seen each other in years, hers is the first Christmas card I receive each and every year, on the day after Thanksgiving!

Maggie: I met Maggie for the first time on Monday morning at the Trader Joe’s at Tatum and Shea where we met up to begin our day of shopping. Maggie found the blog while looking for a “knockoff recipe” for True Food Kitchen’s Mediterranean Chopped Salad and has come back ever since. Although Maggie is substantially younger than the rest of us (she has three young kids, including a 3-year-old!) she fit right in and was an absolute doll!

[Read more →]

Tram & Steve invited me over for Taco Night, they are the sweetest! I asked Tram if I could contribute an exotic margarita for the night. She, of course, said yes.

I found a recipe on Epicurious.com. I made one cocktail as written and found it to be much too strong and not as special or exotic as I had hoped. It needed some lime juice and some sweetness to bring it up to the place I knew it could be.

This photo does not include the additions I made to the cocktail, lime juice, and a berry simple syrup, but those ingredients are there in the final version of the cocktail that I brought to dinner.

[Read more →]

While Anne, Peggy and I  were vacationing in Carlsbad last month, Peggy made her famous salsa. Lucky us! I took notes and happily share it with you.

Peggy insists that one thing is an absolute must for her salsa.

You must use only chiltepin chile peppers! They can be hard to find and are more expensive than that other little pepper easily found in grocery stores, the chile pequin. The pequin is nothing like the chiltepin, so don’t bother using it as a substitute.

The chiltepins are what make this an authentic Sonoran salsa. You can find them at Food City or on Amazon. To read more about the chiltepin and the salsa, check out this article from Edible Baja Arizona.

Peggy also prefers to use a mortar and pestle to crush the peppers and the garlic. Mine is packed away, so I opted for a cocktail muddler and measuring cup.

Alternately, you could start an empty food processor or blender, and while it is running, drop the garlic cloves and chiltepins through the feed tube into the empty machine and let it do the work for you.

[Read more →]

There is so much to talk about today!

First of all, do you want $100 in cash? For free? If so, you still have time to enter and a shot at winning it. Just leave a comment here and you’re in the Wednesday drawing. That’s all you have to do!

You can just say, “Hang in there baby, Monday’s almost over.” Or, “Hey Linda, I understand your life is in a state of change and flux but you really need to get back to posting recipes more often!” Or just, “Hi.”  Anyhow, learn more about the Happy 8th Blogiversary Contest at this Link and leave a comment today.

Secondly, feast your eyes on this hilarious vintage-style oven mitt that my adorable friend, Lisa, gave me! She told me she had a prize for me (what I did to deserve a prize, I don’t know, but I need to figure it out so I can do it again and again!)  I love it! Thank you, Lisa! xoxo.  The oven mitt says so and it is true, below there is a new recipe that I’m droppin’ on y’all.

Lastly, have you heard that in just about 2 hours there is going to be a total eclipse of the sun? No one is talking about it, but it’s true! It’s all going down at 10:34 AM, Arizona Time. If you’re like me and don’t have eclipse glasses and have been too lazy to make a viewing box, set your timer and look out the window and see how dark it looks and say, “Well, that was cool.” and go about your day.

The boys all came over for dinner last night and I made yummy smashed new potatoes. When I was taking photos of the process, I inadvertently made my own little potato eclipse. Cool! No special glasses are needed to view this baby!

Wrecking Ball Baby Potatoes with Garlic and Rosemary

• 20 new (baby) potatoes
• 2 tablespoons kosher salt
• 5 tablespoons olive oil, divided
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely minced
• Sea salt (preferably Maldon Sea Salt Flakes)
• Freshly ground black pepper
• 1/4 cup fresh minced rosemary leaves

[Read more →]

We spent the day at the Del Mar Racetrack on Wednesday. The most that was bet by any one of us on any one race was $3. Big spenders or gamblers, we are not. But we had fun! Our seats were right in front of the finish line. If not for that pole in front of us, they would have been perfect. Darn structural engineering.

We arrived back too late to cook, so we had leftovers and watched a movie. The next morning, I woke up early and took a 5-mile walk up the beach, to the Oceanside Pier, while Peggy and Anne slept in.

I don’t generally find many shells along the beach in Carlsbad, but the tide was low and I filled my pockets. I wanted to go out again this morning, but with the internet getting busy in the late morning and constantly kicking me off, I decided to get this post up instead. I’ll go out again on Saturday and take a bag with me to collect more.

Since we hung around the resort all day yesterday, Anne had time to cook us a delicious dinner! The recipe is one she found on allrecipes.com. But she switched it up and made it her own, in true Annie-style.

One great twist she made was switching out the regular pasta for a chickpea variety. It was fantastic!

She found the Banza brand pasta at Sprouts (in the Phoenix area you can also find it at Whole Foods and Target) and although we didn’t have wheat pasta available to do a side-by-side tasting, I’m certain I would not be able to taste the difference if we had.

[Read more →]

This deliciousness was Tuesday night’s dinner. Peggy not only manned the grill but was master of the kitchen as well.

Since it was my night off, it didn’t even cross my mind to take any preparation photos. Sorry, but I’m on vacation! I will try to do better when Anne takes over the duties tonight.

We spent Tuesday afternoon having lunch at Stone Brewery and wine tasting at Orfila Vineyards & Winery, with a little T*J*Maxx on the side.

We were ultimate Maxxinistas. Peggy was looking for a swimsuit and I was looking for a barstool. The Carlsbad patio has only two stools. There are three of us. I had no choice but to find another stool!

I was successful, Peggy was not. I picked up this industrial-style barstool for $29.99. I’m keeping the tag on it in case I decide to return it after the week is over, although I’m leaning towards keeping it for future visits. Decisions, decisions.

[Read more →]

Peggy, Anne and I are at my timeshare in Carlsbad, CA for the week.

We arrived on Saturday afternoon.

Upon our arrival, I opened the hatch of my car … and this happened. We may have over-packed a tad.

My intention was to post daily. Turns out that the WiFi is easily overworked here at the resort. This is the first day I have not been kicked off before I could at least load the photos. I’ll post as often as the network will allow.

We had a planning session before we left town, each taking a night or two to cook dinner. I was up first with a ravioli dish that I was inspired to make from an Instagram photo my friend, Gwen, posted last week. Gwen has a gorgeous blog called Pen & Fork. You can always get to it over in the “Foodie Blogroll” on the right side of the page.

For the mushroom ravioli, I used the Trader Joe’s brand. It comes with truffle sauce, which you do not want to use in this recipe.

These are the truffle sauce frozen squares. They are easily picked out and removed from the ravioli squares. You can throw them back in the freezer and use them for another pasta night or you can throw them in the trash. That’s what I do because I’m not a huge truffle fan. I’ll eat it if it’s served to me but I don’t go out of my way to put it in my mouth.

The spinach is cut into thin strips. When cutting leafy greens, the technique to do so is called chiffonade. It is easy to do, just stack the leaves, roll them up tightly and slice. The word is French and translates to “little ribbons.”

“Brothy Situation” Mushroom Ravioli with Shredded Chicken

• 4 cups chicken broth
• 2 shallots, peeled and thinly sliced
• 3 garlic cloves, peeled and thinly sliced
• 8 to 10 sprigs fresh thyme
• 5 sprigs fresh oregano
• 5 sprigs fresh rosemary
• 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
• 3 cups shredded rotisserie chicken
• 4 ounces fresh shiitake mushrooms; cleaned, stems removed and thinly sliced
• 1 cup baby spinach leaves, chiffonade
• 1 cup cherry tomatoes, sliced
• 1 pound package frozen mushroom ravioli
• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Freshly grated Parmesan cheese, garnish
• Roughly chopped fresh herbs (thyme, rosemary and oregano)

[Read more →]

When I was in Chicago last month, I met up with two of my nieces, Megan and Amy, for dinner. Amy brought her son, my grand-nephew, Greyson. Grey, is seven years old and had just finished 1st grade.

(You may remember Greyson from THIS POST in October 2014)

The three of them were already seated when Lori and I arrived and Grey was sitting at the end of the table. I sat next to him and noticed that he had a paper and pen in hand and was working on something.

Lori was sweet enough to take a photo of the four of us. (Amy, Greyson, me, and Megan.)

Anyhow, I asked Greyson what he was doing and he said, “I’m writing a story.”

As we all chatted and caught up, Grey continued to put pen to paper and write his story. A while later he announced that he was done and asked if I would like to read it.

“Yes!”

He handed me the paper and I proceeded to read it out loud.

“Once upon a time there was a man.

One day the man went to a castle, he went in the castle something punched him. Aaaaa!

It was an invisible guy. The invisible guy cut the man’s hand off. The man found a hook, he put the hook on his hand. He ran out of the castle.

The invisible guy grabbed a bow and arrow and shot the man. AW! AW! AW! AW!

The man never went to the castle.”

By: Greyson Hopkins

Monday, June 26, 2017
7 years and 1 month old
Summer between 1^st and 2^nd grade

I have to say, I was impressed! He just turned seven a month before. Amy told us that he loved to write, so she had enrolled him in a summer creative writing class. What a fantastic and proactive mom she is!

I asked Greyson if I could keep it and he said that he wrote it for me. My heart melted. I asked if he would sign it for me. He said yes and asked if he could make all the letters in his name into pictures. I told him I’d love that, but asked if could he please sign his name on the front and sign it again on the back in pictures? He did and then he even wrote his name backward for me too.

[Read more →]

Independence Day has come and gone, but there are plenty more patriot holidays between now and July 4, 2018. Labor Day is only eight weeks from today. Columbus Day is a month after that and before you know it, Veterans Day is upon us! The point is, don’t wait a year to make these fun and easy dessert kabobs.

I whipped a few of these up for the grilling tips segment I did last week and then made them again the next day for a 4th of July party I was invited to. Technically, I may have invited myself. But I tried to make the hosts feel it was worth it by bringing these kabobs along with an awesome flag appetizer, the recipe for which I will post tomorrow.

When I made the kabobs for television, I used pound cake. I quickly discovered that pound cake is not the best choice. Angel food cake works better, so that is what I used on the 4th. The pound cake is too dense and has a tendency to break apart when skewered. The angel food cake is light and fluffy and stays in place. Large marshmallows would be a great choice too.

I’m not providing you with any quantities here. I made as many as I could until I ran out of one of the ingredients. The first thing I ran out of was strawberries, then I was done.

After making four or five, it was getting tedious, so I decided to make three at once. I held three skewers in my left hand and added the ingredients with my right. I was done in no time.

[Read more →]