Sponsored: Victoria Fine Foods Pasta Sauce

When it comes to comfort food, linguine with (red) clam sauce is way up there on my list. I have fond memories of my dad making it for us - it was his specialty - alongside his classic "secret recipe" garlic bread. Learning to make these dishes was important to me as a youngster, and it's something I've made over and over again as an adult.

Now, these are not fancy recipes. This pasta is quick and easy and one of those low effort high reward type dishes. But man, is the payoff worth it.

When Victoria Fine Foods reached out about expanding their pasta sauce line to California, and asked if I'd be willing to try their sauce and write about it, I started thinking about linguine with clam sauce, and my mouth started watering. Done deal. I'm glad I got to try their sauces -- I don't often buy jarred tomato sauce, but I do like to have go-to brands I can keep in the pantry for those nights when I don't want to make sauce from scratch. It's a great staple, marinara sauce. Versatile and delicious and just hits the spot on a cold night.

I'll share my recipe with you, because it's worth sharing. Make it, share it. I'm sure my dad will approve (but that garlic bread's still a secret).

Linguine with red clam sauce

feeds 4 people, plus leftovers, unless you're super hungry

1 box linguine (or fresh, if you have it)

1 jar marinara sauce (this time, I used Victoria Fine Foods' Fradiavolo) 

a few shakes red pepper flakes

a squeeze of lemon

some garlic, if your sauce doesn't have garlic in it 

1-2 cans chopped clams (up to you)

1-2 cans whole clams (up to you)

optional fresh clams, more for show than for the clam meat

How To:

1. Boil your linguine according to the package directions
2. Meanwhile, heat your marinara sauce (preferably in a wide pan with sides, like a sauté pan)
3. When the sauce is simmering, add your shakes of red pepper and squeeze of lemon (to taste, depending on how spicy and/or lemony you like things). If you're adding garlic, stir it in now (as much as you want).
4. Open your cans of clams, and drain them -- but before you drain them in the sink, drain a little bit of the clam juice (amount is up to your taste and how clammy you like things) into your marinara sauce. Gives it a little more clammy richness and depth.
5. Add the clams in the last minute or two and stir things around. You don't want to overcook them - they'll get chewy. Really, they only need a minute or two to heat up.
6. Toss the linguine in the pasta sauce. You want the noodles to be well-coated for deliciousness.
7. Gobble it up as quickly as possible.

A little plug for Victoria Fine Foods, because I really enjoyed the sauce: "The company uses a slow, kettle-cooked approach to making their sauces, and they use fresh, real food/non-GMO ingredients that provide an authentic homemade sauce in convenient, ready-to-eat form. They do have vegan options as well, and just expanded into California."

Full disclaimer: VFF sent me the sauce to review free of charge, but did not otherwise compensate me for this post. My thoughts and opinions are my own.

Family Pizza Night!

Back in August, Rustic Crust contacted me about hosting a "family pizza night". I've always loved this idea - pizza is such a fun and easy way for the whole family to work together to make dinner. It's fun for kids, fun for adults, fun for our bellies. All around wins. My husband has a pizza dough recipe that he made as a kid, and I've had "family pizza night" with my parents and with kids I've babysat, but since we don't have children of our own yet, we don't have regular occasion to do "special" dinners. Like, with a theme. Like, FAMILY PIZZA NIGHT!

Anyway, October is apparently National Pizza Month (?), so why not celebrate by sharing the photos from our family pizza night. Our family right now is our close friends Sonja and Jack. We make dinners together often, but it was really fun to have an extra excuse to try something :)

The ingredients. Wine is especially important!

Sonja prepping our crusts with a brush of oil.

Sonja and Jack pose with their creations.
We made flatbread with fresh tomatoes and
parmesan, garlic herb crust with meatless
 meatballs and padron peppers, and plain flatbread
with figs, balsamic, and parmesan. Gourmet!

I mean, they're frickin' beautiful, no?

And like any great family dinner, it ends with empty glasses,
empty plates, full bellies, and passing out in front of the TV.

Thanks to Rustic Crust for sponsoring this post by providing the dough and the sauce! While I do prefer a from-scratch homemade crust, we don't always have time to make one. These ready to go flatbreads and crusts tasted way better than your standard Boboli, and it's nice to know that they come free from chemicals or artificial ingredients. Super delicious.

Full disclosure: Rustic Crust provided me with free samples for review, but did not influence my review or provide additional compensation. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

Just Your Average Wednesday Night

While driving home from the mountains last weekend, we stopped at a fruit stand for some fresh strawberries. We bought an entire flat, because it was only $10, and I had a small desire to bake a pie (thinking about Waitress, lately, I guess). I had a bag of frozen rhubarb left over from last summer, when a neighbor mentioned she'd picked far more than she could eat, and had sliced and bagged it already. And it was exactly the right amount for Smitten Kitchen's Strawberry Rhubarb Pie recipe (that I'd made once before). And my dear friend Sonja is into baking pie. And Will is into eating pie. So pie time it was!

Sonja rolls out the top crust

It's missing something...

Ah yes, egg wash and a healthy dose of
cinnamon and sugar!

Perfection.

But because I'd picked so many beautiful tomatoes, I also wanted to make tomato sauce.

This is only a small sampling -- I had about 10 San Marzanos
all in all, I think? We added one very ripe Brandywine as well.

Our lovely upstairs neighbor offered to bring over dinner, so we didn't *need* it, but the tomatoes just looked so peak-sauce-readiness that I couldn't resist. Now it's in the freezer.

So I made tomato sauce and pie. And all was well in the world. Homesteading-ish is fun.


Are you growing anything at home? Have you been cooking lately? Do you ever surprise yourself with sudden industriousness and food-based inspiration? Is it just me, or is the End of Summer Ennui giving way to the Beginging of Fall Nesting Happiness?

It Is It

Who needs Rice a Roni? The only San Francisco Treat I care about is the It's It. Cookies and ice cream, all covered in chocolate, frozen to perfection. I've tried the It's It several times before (I mean, Google had freezers filled with them and I just about lost my mind my first week working there!) but I couldn't turn down the opportunity to try some new flavors when the kind folks at It's It asked if they could send me some.

Glorious It's It magic
(this is one of their promo shots; I did not take it)

My coworkers gobbled most of them up before I could snag one (I was out of town the day they were delivered), but they saved me a Pumpkin-flavored one, and holy cow! Deliciously creamy, it was pumpkiny without being overwhelming, and the oatmeal spice cookies really balanced the pumpkin nicely. Definitely going to add this one to the rotation, especially for Fall! Mint might still be my all-time favorite, but I need to try the chocolate one of these days...and perhaps the cappuccino too :)

Super tasty, even though it was a little squished.
Most delicious eaten with a spoon.

Do you get It's It where you live (PS they deliver)? Has anyone seen them outside of SF? What kinds of ice cream treats do you treat yourself to?

While I did receive free ice cream sandwiches for myself and my team, I received no other compensation for this post and was not asked to write anything specificc. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

Tablemakers at Kendall Jackson Winery

On Saturday night, I had the pleasure of enjoying an evening full of incredible food and wine, in the company of some truly lovely people, at Kendall Jackson Winery. The dinner was a part of something new they're calling Tablemakers, which is based on the concept that dining should be thoughtful. It doesn't have to be perfect; it should instead be about good food and good drink and good people all coming together to share in the joy of a meal. Now that's a sentiment I can get behind. I'm all about the simple, unfussy meal. Delicious ingredients presented thoughtfully, not pretentiously. Food that feels good to eat, and meals that spark conversation. And boy, did Saturday's event deliver!

Farmer Tucker with some gorgeous produce
(and our gorgeous dining area behind him)

We began with wine and a stroll through the gardens - including the lovely sensory gardens, where we plucked herbs to smell and taste as we tasted our wines. Farmer Tucker told us about the foods grown on the property, really kickstarting my summer garden drive (we'd spent the morning tilling our soil, but haven't decided what to plant yet this year). I'm especially inspired to plant peas, after snacking on fresh pea shoots that we harvested ourselves! Dining in the very garden in which our meal was grown, harvested and prepared? As our hosts said, "It doesn't get more farm-to-table than this."

I was so in awe of our beautiful surroundings and so delighted to be sipping my wine that I neglected to photograph the first half hour or so. So...unfortunately...you won't see the trout caviar on oyster lettuce (holy crap I could eat this all day - OYSTER LETTUCE AND TROUT CAVIAR YOU GUYS) or pea shoot arancini or fennel "creamy cold soup whose name I've forgotten". Trust me, they were tasty.

Others in attendance were photographing like mad (which reminded me to bust out my camera), so check out the #kjexperience and #tablemakers hashtags on Twitter and Instagram and see for yourself! Luckily, our dinner menu included the wine pairings, so I can let you know what we drank as we ate :)

The gorgeous place settings. Major kudos to the design team!

First course: Seared scallop, estate carrot, fava beans, pea tendrils, celtuce, savory granola
First wine: Vintner's Reserve Pino Gris
First reaction: The scallop was perfect. Just, like, imagine the most perfect scallop on Earth. That's what it was. And the sauce was so delicious I mopped it up with the grape skin flour bread that was studded with olives. The wine was crisp and fresh and cool, a perfect counterpoint to the seared scallop.

Second course: Estate lamb loin, morel mushrooms, turnips, kale spring onion soubise
Second wine: Grand Reserve Merlot
Second reaction: Jesus. This lamb. Thank you for your sacrifice, tiny one, who was humanely raised about 200 feet from where we ate you. The lamb was perfectly cooked - and the morels were a special treat. The sauce, again, perfectly balanced. And I'm not usually a Merlot girl, but this Merlot was really great. Just sweet enough, just dry enough, and it went with the lamb like they were made for each other.

Third course: Baserri (Barinaga Ranch), Midnight Moon (Cypress Grove), Dry Jack (Vella Cheese Co)
Third wine: Grand Reserve Cabernet Sauvignon
Third reaction: The cheese was a nice complement to the richness of the lamb. I'm not sure what the compotes were (I'm guessing fig) but they were lovely, as were the nuts. Of course the cab was nicely balanced, and went with the cheeses. I mean, obviously. And yes, I started to eat my cheese before I took the picture. Oops.

Dessert course: Peas n' carrots, yogurt sorbet
Dessert wine: Vintner's Reserve Late Harvest Chardonnay
Dessert reaction: The sorbet was refreshing, but the peas n' carrots was the star of dessert. That moussey situation was just right, and I probably could've gobbled up a whole lot more of it if they'd put it in front of me. Really hit the spot. I wasn't a huge fan of the Chardonnay - a little sweet for me, but that's a dessert wine for you!

Bonus course: Assorted chocolates
Bonus wine: Something magical and I don't even know what it was but it was delicious and thank you Chef for pouring it for us it was absolutely stupendous.
Bonus reaction: Always stick around to chat with your hosts, friends. Delightful conversation about gin and Chicago and wine and gardening and why Northern California is the best. I mean, it is.

We left with a goody bag that included two bottles of wine, a corkscrew and a copy of A Man and His Mountain...and thanks to the generosity of Farmer Tucker, Will and I also left with a giant box of gorgeous produce. Now we just have to think of some amazing ways to use it! Any ideas? Hit me up in the comments!

I know it's been a hot minute since I made an appearance over here at KKS, but I was so inspired by this meal that I had to show it off. Work has been nuts for the last few months, immediately following the craziness of that wedding I planned, so the blog has taken a backseat to the priority of self-care and making some space in my life for just breathing and living. But Spring is here, which means you'll start seeing some garden photos soon, and hopefully some more blogging in general as well. Here's to Spring, and a renewed joie de vivre.



While I was granted complimentary media access to this event, my opinions and thoughts are all my own, and I was not otherwise compensated or required to write this post. Thanks to the Kendall-Jackson Team for a great evening!

Buffalo. Tuna. Mac.

You guys. I don't have a photo because I ate it too fast, but holy cow. I've been on a buffalo sauce kick since around Super Bowl time, and tonight I was just sitting at home thinking of things I could do with the buffalo sauce in the pantry when I got it in my head to make buffalo mac. 

Sometimes a kitchen experiment just goes terribly, terribly well. No further ado needed. Here you go.

Buffalo Tuna Mac

These are the ingredients I used. Feel free to substitute at will.

• One box Annie's White Cheddar mac and cheese
• One package Sea Fare Pacific jalapeno tuna
• Two slices American cheese (I buy Trader Joe's organic)
• Approximately 2 tbs Litehouse OPA blue cheese dressing
• Approximately 2 tbs Frank's Red Hot buffalo wing sauce
• Approximately 2 tbs heavy cream

This is how I made it. Feel free to follow your own heart's mac cheese instructions.

1. Boil yo water.
2. Boil yo noodles.
3. While the noodles are noodling, clean up your house a little. You're a grown up.
4. Al dente noodles? Strain 'em. No need to rinse.
5. While they're straining, plop the whole package of tuna, with its olive oil, into the pot.
6. Mash the tuna around with your spoon, breaking it into little pieces as best you can. This is just a matter of taste. If you like bigger chunks, leave 'em bigger. I like 'em to be smaller so they integrate better.
7. Add the heavy cream, swooshing it all around together.
8. Add the cheese packet from the box, stirring until dissolved/integrated.
9. Add the pasta back into the pot, stir it all around until noodles are coated.
10. Tear American cheese into little pieces, because little pieces melt better.
11. Pour in the wing sauce. Add more if you want. This is just "to taste", whatevs you like.
12. Pour in the blue cheese dressing. Again, add more if you want. Live your life.
13. Stir it all together and marvel at how good it looks and smells.
14. Try not to eat the entire box, and then realize you're a grown up and you can eat however much you want so there. 
15. Kind of wish you had celery to crunch on alongside this amazing concoction, but don't stress about it.

You're welcome.

Lindt Chocolate Tastes Good and You Can Have Some!

Lucky me, I met the fine folks at Lindt Chocolate when I was at BlogHer this year.  So many chocolate samples, oh yum oh yum oh yum.  And then they mentioned me on their BlogHer recap post.  And then they offered to send me more chocolate.  Lindt, I love you.  If Will hadn't given me a giant diamond, and if I could marry a company (corporations are people too?), I would marry you.  For reals.

cue angels sighing 

My dear, amazing, wonderfully hilarious friend Lyz (who lives way too far away from me) also got courted by the Lindt (wemakeyourchocolatedreamscometrue) people, and she made some SEXY PIE out of her chocolate.  I just ate it.  But I made Will help me.  And I made him offer tasting comments.  We worked for this chocolate, yo! (not really)

What did we think?

• 70% cocoa almond brittle -- a pleasant nutty flavor, chocolate is dark but still creamy. I like the crisp/brittle bits amidst the creamy chocolate. Will says it has a "satisfying crunch"
• 70% cocoa nut crunch -- a little more plain, more focused on the chocolate, but still with a walnutty undertone. Not sure I can taste the hazelnuts at all, but I enjoy the still-creamy darkness.  A milder, more traditional-tasting nutted chocolate.
• 90% cocoa -- I was surprised at just how much darker it tasted than the 70%.  I mean, it's a 20% difference, sure, but I hadn't really expected it to be so...cocoa-more-than-chocolate. Not sweet at all, really, more bitter, but not in a bad way? It's not subtly creamy like the 70%, just raw-tasting cocoa.  I like it, a lot, but this is definitely a 1-square at a time richness (the 70% with various nuts are lighter in taste and I could probably eat half a bar at a time).  I wonder what the 99% is going to taste like, holycow.
• Extra Fine Dark with a Touch of Sea Salt -- We tried this almost immediately after the 90%, and it felt extremely smooth and creamy in comparison.  The sea salt is subtle at first, but it sticks with you, leaving a pleasing salty-sweet aftertaste. Will thought it had a slight raspberry taste, and I agree. A bit fruity and sweet, with that saltiness countering nicely.  I'm so glad Lindt sent this in my batch, because it was my favorite one at BlogHer :)  Delicious.
• 99% Dark -- whoa baby is this stuff dark.  Scary dark.  Almost too much to handle dark.  Seriously.  The instructions say to place it on your tongue and let it melt...so Reed and I did just that.  It turned into a sort of chalky, bitter mush in our mouths.  Not super pleasant.  I chewed and swallowed, and it was like, ok. I guess.  Sort of like taking a spoonful of cocoa powder.  Bitter, without the sweetness of the 90%.  This chocolate is probably best used in recipes.  Or maybe turned into chocolate milk.  Will have to experiment with the rest of the little squares (this one comes in much smaller squares than the others).

We didn't do an official taste test for the plain 70% chocolate, because it's the basis for the nutty ones, and because honestly I forgot it was on the counter until I started cleaning this weekend and realized it was still there.  And now I want to make sexy pie.

And I want to give you chocolate!  Read on...

Some words from Lindt:

The Lindt Excellence collection is the world’s most exceptionally-crafted premium chocolate, boasting a wide range of cocoa percentage bars and innovative flavor combinations.  Made with the finest cocoa beans and highest quality ingredients, these innovations from the Master Chocolatiers at Lindt have a thin, refined profile to offer chocolate lovers a unique and sophisticated sensory experience.  The 3.5 oz. Lindt Excellence bars are available at retail locations nationwide, Lindt Chocolate Shops, and www.Lindt.com (SRP: $2.59 each).  For more information, visit www.LindtExcellence.com.  

The winner of the giveaway will receive three Excellence bars including: Excellence 70% Cocoa, Excellence Almond Brittle and Excellence Nut Crunch.
 Excellence 70% CocoaThe #1 premium chocolate bar in the U.S. – a full-bodied dark chocolate, masterfully balanced to be neither bitter nor overpowering Excellence 70% Almond BrittleA delicate crunch of almond brittle provides a sweet counterbalance to the deep flavor of the full-bodied, dark chocolate Excellence 70% Cocoa Nut CrunchThe subtle flavor and delicate crunch of caramelized walnut and hazelnut pieces enhances the refined, intense dark chocolate

To enter -

• Leave a comment about your favorite kind of chocolate.  Or why you love chocolate.  Or why chocolate is the cure for what ails us.
• Share this post on facebook, Twitter, etc. and come back and leave a comment for each thing you do.
• Go read Lyz's post about sexy pie and come back here to leave a comment telling me something you liked about her post.  Cross-bloggy-promotion for my friend Lyz!  Bonus treat: she also posts pictures of her nommably chubby baby, Ellis.  Enjoy.

Giveaway remains open until 11:11pm (Pacific) on 11/11/11.  Because, as Lyz said, I can.

CHOCOLATE!

Bonus! Muffins!

Bonus post! Me and a muffin! I had a few bananas that had seen better days, and what better to do with browning bananas than turn them into muffins? 

Ta da! Chocolate chip banana, with a touch of cinnamon - and whole wheat flour to boot (I do like saying "to boot")! They are so delicious, light and fluffy. These muffins make me happy, a very slight tweak on a recipe I found online with my dear friend Colette many, many years ago (look carefully, and you may see her pretty face in the background of the picture).

Please ignore the mess behind me (and on my head). Such is life, I suppose. But who cares about a mess when you have muffins?

It's World Pistachio Day! Party Favors For You!

Did you know that?  Did you even know there was such a thing?  Me neither.  That is, until I met the lovely folks behind Wonderful Pistachios (at FoodFete).  They sent me home with a ton of pistachios, which is a good thing, because man.  I love pistachios.  There's something so satisfying about prying the shell open and devouring the little green nut inside.


The funny thing is that I didn't even know I liked pistachios until I started going to Will's parents' house for Christmas.  I always thought pistachio ice cream was the weirdest idea ever (perhaps because I always expected it to be mint), and I just never took to the little ole pistachio.  But Will's family always has a bowl of pistachios in the living room, with a smaller bowl sitting on top of the pile of nuts to catch the shells, and I quickly became addicted to these delicious nuts.  Thank goodness they're one of the healthiest nuts out there - and thank goodness the shells remain as evidence of how many I've devoured!  :)


Anyway, today is World Pistachio Day!  Celebrate good times, come on!  And now, a word from the wonderful folks at Wonderful Pistachios (you may know them from their funny ads). 

February 26 is World Pistachio Day, encouraging us all to take a moment to reflect on the amazing history and modern day health benefits of this wonderful nut.

• Did you know that pistachios are one of the oldest flowering nut trees? Evidence suggests that humans were enjoying them as early as 7,000 B.C.!
• Dubbed “the skinny nut” by nutrition experts, pistachios are one of the lowest calorie, lowest fat nuts!
• U.S. President Barack Obama is a self proclaimed fan of snacking on pistachios!
• And in China, pistachios are given as a gift during the Chinese New Year and are known as the “happy nut” because they look like they are smiling.   :)
• For more fun facts, click here! 

Sweet map courtesy of the folks at Paramount Farms

Ok, ok, pistachios are really good and all, but am I really just posting a whole post about pistachios for no reason other than because it's their special day?  Well, as much as I love any reason to celebrate, the most awesome part of all this Pistachio Party Time is that one of you lucky readers is going to win a sweet stash of these salty snacks!  The kind folks at Wonderful Pistachios are offering a giant (24 oz!) bag, as well as several small (8 oz) "snack" size bags as a way to celebrate World Pistachio Day.  Which, again, is today.  In case you missed that.


So how do you win?  Leave a comment telling me how you deal with the shells.  Do you keep a little bowl inside the big bowl?  Do you scatter them all over the floor?  Use them in your compost bin?  Do you have a ridiculously awesome (but sort of mono-tasking) contraption like this?  Let me know and you could win a pistash (ha ha, get it) of your own!  For extra entries, tweet this contest, share it on facebook, and/or blog about it - and then come back here and leave a comment for each thing that you do.  There is no limit to number of entries, so get crackin'! 


I'll be choosing a comment at random, and the contest is officially closed on Tuesday 3/1/11 at 11:59pm PST.


Oh, and super awesome bonus?  My friend Suki is also giving away pistachios!  Her contest ends at 11:59pm TONIGHT though, so if you want to enter, head on over to her blog!

Review: Pamela's Products

I am pleased to present the first in my series of Food Fete related reviews: Pamela's Products.  I sampled a ton of cookies, and a cake and frosting mix, and even though I am not under any dietary restrictions that require me to eat gluten-free foods, I give Pamela and her Products two thumbs up!

zee cake, made by me. and friends. and a monkey.

Pamela's Products makes gluten free treats, from cookies to cheesecake, and boy are they good.  The white chocolate cheesecake is so good I have been bugging my local Whole Foods to stock it.  They don't.  Yet.  But you can get all kinds of other products by Pamela there...for a full list of where to get her treats, click here.  Seriously, good stuff.  And I can vouch for Pamela - she's very nice!

Now, I would have taken pictures of all the cookies we tried.  I am, however, impatient when it comes to cookies (and so are my friends), and somehow all the cookies were gone by the time I remembered my camera.  Oops.  I guess we liked them.

We tried: Chunky Chocolate Chip, Organic Dark Chocolate - Chocolate Chunk, Organic Spicy Ginger with Crystallized Ginger, Ginger Mini Snapz, and Extreme Chocolate Mini Cookies.  I have to say, while I am normally an All Chocolate All The Time kinda gal, I think I preferred the ginger!  The Mini Snapz were perfectly crunchy little bites, and the big ones were soft and chewy; they had a nice spicy kick to them, and lovely little bits of crystallized ginger mixed in.  I really dug those ginger cookies.  When it comes to the chocolate chip, I think I just always prefer homemade, but I also really liked the chocolate mini cookies. Perfect with a mini glass of milk or just for a smaller sugar appetite.  But yeah.  Loved those ginger cookies.  We brought the cookies along on a trip to Tahoe, and as I mentioned, they were quickly devoured.

I remembered my camera for the cake making extravaganza - thank goodness, because the little monkey who helped us bake it had a really great time.  Check out our little (10-photo, mostly of Monkey) slideshow for pics!


This cake was seriously good.  Somehow both dense and fluffy, and with a really delightful taste. I can see how the batter is versatile too; it would be great with various extracts and zests (lemon? orange? mmmm), and it would be great for cupcakes.  Honestly, if you hadn't told me it was gluten free, I wouldn't have known.  Delish. 

And the icing?  I definitely used a spatula to scrape remnants out of the Cuisinart (yes, we made it - super easily - in the food processor! Love this thing!) and licked as much as I could.  I was worried there wouldn't be enough, but there was plenty to cover the entire cake, and fill in between the layers, and allow for lots of spoon/spatula-licking as well.  Mmmm!

In case you're wondering, it was the Classic Vanilla Cake Mix and the Dark Chocolate Frosting Mix.   The frosting seemed more like regular than dark chocolate, but I think you can tell that we liked it.  I have always been a red-box-mix and frosting-in-a-can kinda girl, but I think from now on, I'm going to stick to Pamela's!  This was seriously easy to make, and void of scary chemicals.  I approve!

My only complaint is that it didn't hold up as well the second day (after a night in the fridge) as its chemical preservative-laden counterparts (I love you, Betty and Duncan).  But if you're going to eat it all on the first day?  Totally awesome.  Spongey and light and delicious.  Any tips on helping gluten-free cake stay good for another day or two?  I normally do the toothpick-in-the-top, aluminum-foil-over-it-all method, but like I said, that didn't work as well this time.  Note: we still ate it.  Topped it with a little raspberry ice cream and we were good to go.   :)

Thanks, Pamela (and all the lovely people who help with your Products)! I can't wait to try the Baking & Pancake Mix and the Chocolate Brownie Mix you sent!

Food Fete

Recently, I had the privilege of attending a little event called FoodFete (with my buddy Suki), where I had the opportunity to connect with truly great food vendors. We had a grand old time, sampling tasty treats and learning about some really cool products, and left the event with (literally) bags of goodies. 

The Loot.

Seriously though, we had a great time.  And it was cool to sample teas and salamis and chocolates and scones and all sorts of delightful things I might never have tried (and I definitely drooled over some cookware, oh yes I did).  Some of these vendors have been kind enough to send me packages to sample, and I'll be posting reviews as I try things out.  Don't worry, nobody made me promise to be nice - so if I don't like something, I'll honestly let you know.  Though in the interest of full disclosure, if I didn't like what I saw (and sampled) at FoodFete, I wouldn't have given them my business card!  :)

Are you a food vendor of some sort?  Do you want me to review your product?  Do you have an event coming up?  Let me know!

Chafing Dish

I love the Alameda Antiques Fair (aka Alameda Flea Market).  It’s massive, and I’ve never made it through the whole thing in one day, but it’s such great fun wandering around, up and down the aisles looking at treasures and oddities.  The last visit proved quite victorious…I ended up with some fantastic ornaments (I was told that estate sales are a great place to find these as well) and a gorgeous chafing dish.

This is no ordinary chafing dish.  This baby is practically in mint condition, with canisters for holding oil and wicks that twist upward to be lit and two pyrex dishes to hold a myriad of delightful dishes I just can’t wait to make.  Time to have a party, eh?

In this picture, you can see the little oil-holders below.
So pretty.

Spun Sugar

I have recently discovered a wonderful little cake haven in Berkeley called Spun Sugar. It is a tiny, hole-in-the-wall-looking place, but although it is small, it is mighty! The short aisles are lined with baking supplies, from cupcake wrappers to cookie cutters to pastry tips to Styrofoam cake tiers to a wall of chocolate. Seriously, a wall of chocolate. Floor to ceiling. Chocolate. Oh and LOTS of sprinkles. On one side of the shop is a little coffee shop, where you can get coffee and pastries and such. And they teach decorating classes too. Awesome.

I heard of this place a while ago, and it's one of those places that I've been meaning to go to for a long time. Finally, with a plan to bake cupcakes that evening, and no cupcake tin liners, I decided I had to check this place out. Pronto. I was also looking for Cal-appropriate decorations, since the cupcakes were being made for a Cal-football-watching get together, and I had a feeling that this place would have what I was looking for (it's right down the street from the University).

Anyway, I'm glad I finally got to patronize this place. It is super cute, and they pretty much have everything you could ever need. And did I mention the wall of chocolate? Honestly though, I was in baking supplies heaven, and I wanted to buy it all. I walked away with mini cupcake liners (actually labeled "Cal Blue" and "Cal Gold"), three pastry tips, and two little bags of blue and yellow nonpareil sprinkles. Oh, and a salted caramel and piece of blood orange chocolate fudge (handmade by one of the employees).

A short slideshow so you can see the store:

Let Me Eat Cake

Last week, every night, around 10pm, Will and I had a conversation that went something like this:

Me: I want cake.

Will: Ok...

Me: No seriously, why doesn't anyone deliver cake? To my house? At 10pm?

Will: Kim, you are crazy.

Me: But I just want cake! That's all! Is that so much to ask?

Will: Why don't you just make some cake?

Me: ...well...ummm...maybe I will! Ha!

I then proceeded to go to Safeway and purchase not one but THREE boxes of cake mix and THREE containers of frosting, because they were on sale, and altogether it cost me about $8. Muah ha ha, I shall have cake forever!!!

On Sunday night (after his hockey game, and while also preparing a dinner of linguini with canned clams in garlic marinara sauce - delicious and takes zero effort whatsoever), I made cake.

I was feeling bold, and experimenting with parchment paper - I had heard that if you line your baking pans with parchment, you don't have to worry about your cake sticking to the pan. Also, less mess. Which means less cleaning. Which means a happy Kim. Even though Will usually does the dishes. I think you're supposed to cut out a nice little circle with the parchment and just line the bottom...but um...I didn't do that. I was a little concerned, because, well, it looked like this:

Cakes, pre-bake - How will this fadge?

It worked...kind of...As you can see, the cakes turned out a little flat and the sides are a little crinkled. This made for interesting frosting techniques, but really it didn't matter too much. I wonder if the flat-ish cakes are a result of the parchment? Usually, my cakes are just a bit taller. The other thing I noticed was that the bottoms of the cakes weren't as spongy as they usually are. The slickness of the oily parchment seems to have made it retain too much moisture in the bottom or something. More on that later...I tell you what though, those cakes came right out of the pans, the parchment slid right off, and with a quick rinse, the pans were clean!

Cakes, post-bake - crinkle crinkle!

The photo on the left has wax paper strips under it to keep the plate clean while icing. Did your mom teach you that trick? Mine did - and I love it. Thanks, mom! I like these photos because they clearly show the awesome crinkly-ness that is the result of my lazy parchment papering. Hey, when you want cake, and it's 8pm, and you're also making dinner, you do not have time to be messin' with cutting perfect circles out of parchment paper! No siree, you want cake, and you want it now! (actually, I wanted it a week ago, so you can only imagine the impatience!)

I am Cake! Hear me roar! With sprinkles!

The frosting is chocolate chocolate chip - Betty Crocker, I believe. The cake itself (I think) was Duncan Hines Chocolate Devil's Food. I like the little chocolate chips in the frosting - I think they added a nice touch. I would call them a pleasant surprise, but I bought the frosting specifically because it said it had chocolate chips in it.

Cake best served with ice cream, methinks.

The only problem with this cake is that the layers don't really stick together...I'm not sure what that's all about (maybe something to do with the moist-bottomed parchment thing I mentioned earlier?), but when you serve a slice, and you start to eat it, the layers kinda come apart. Not really an issue, I mean, you can still totally eat the cake, but yeah. Not something I've ever experienced before.

This did not stop us from having cake for dinner last night. And it was delicious.

Happy Eating

My dear blog-friend Shannalee (of Food Loves Writing) just got back from a vacation in Maine, and she left a wonderful quote as a comment on Happy Jack Eats (another wonderful food blog I'm now in love with).

The restaurant is Paolina's Way in Camden, and at the end of the meal, they brought her party a laminated card with their bill, with this inscription on it:

"There are things you do
because they feel right
& they may make no sense
& they may make no money
& it may be the real reason
we are here: to love each
other & to eat each other's
cooking & say it was good."

I just thought that was so very nice. There is not much more wonderful than sharing a good meal with someone you love.

Farmers Market Lunch

I went solo to the Farmers Market today, and was able to pick up all my delicious goodies in just half an hour! Not my usual leisurely walk around the booths, but I had a nice time and ended up with lots of good food.

For example, the kalamata olive loaf, goat's milk feta, fresh basil, and awesome stripey tomato you see pictured to the left. Otherwise known as lunch! :-)

I also got baby eggplant, green beans (and some other kind of wide, flat green beans), nectarines, strawberries, sage cheddar cheese, beautiful summer squash (some with the blossoms still on! Oh I will be stuffing those tonight!), more stripey tomatoes, baby spinach, a cucumber, some lemon cucumbers, some "dry grown" (or something like that) tomatoes, and some nice little button mushrooms. All organic! Fresh! From Farmers! And for $35!

I love the Farmers Market.

Alameda Pie Truck

I couldn't have said it better myself...so here you go. Copy-pasted directly from The Painted Peach

Ummm...so, guys?

There's this Pie Truck.

It's based out of Alameda.

You order a pie off the website, and dude delivers them to you.

This dude is quite obviously a genius.

Why don't y'all go order some pies. http://pietruck.wordpress.com/

About Pie Truck
Pie Truck makes delicious pies and brings them to you! Place an order by emailing alamedapietruck@gmail.com .

Summer Squash and More!

I'm no Crazy Aunt Purl, but I sure as heck can buy summer squash at the Farmers Market! Ok, so that's not even close to impressive. But look how pretty it is!

I also bought the most adorable baby eggplants you've ever seen (perfect for making baked eggplant for one!), and a large bag of vine-ripened tomatoes for only $1! I'll be making some homemade tomato sauce this week for sure!

I bought some beautiful white corn, picked this morning only about 40 miles from where I live! And I purchased it directly from the family who farms it! Now if that's not supporting your local farmers, I don't know what is! Yay! I just finished reading Barbara Kingsolver's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, and I've been thinking a lot about supporting my local food economy. In California, this is fairly easy, especially in the Bay Area, where there are Farmers Markets nearly every day of the week, and much of the time, the farmers are the ones actually selling the goods. The cheese I buy is made less than an hour away.

Today's Purchases:

• Garlic Herb Quark (omg I am a Quark convert. It is amazing.) - $5
• Giant bag of vine-ripened tomatoes - $1
• 1 bag baby spinach, 5 carrots, a bunch of fresh rosemary, 4 medium zucchinis, and two lemon-cucumbers - $6.75
• 3 peaches and 1 nectarine - $0.90
• 4 baby eggplants - $1.50
• 1 medium-sized piece Indian Honey smoked salmon - $17.20 (SPLURGE!!! but it will last over a week)
• 6 assorted summer squash (one in the picture is from last week) - $1.50
• 4 ears of corn (I still can't get over the fact that it was picked this morning 40 miles from my apartment) - $3.00
• 3 honey sticks (I think they were wildberry honey?) - $1
  

Grand total: $37.65 - Not too shabby for all this delicious, fresh food! Mmmmmm I am going to eat well this week! Good food makes me happy, especially when I got to spend the morning wandering around in the sunshine talking to the people who also love (and create!) the food.

The Return of Mother's!

MOTHER'S COOKIES ARE BACK!!!!



That is all.

Chocolate Chip Granola Bars

And yet another blast from the past snack foods...Chewy Chocolate Chip Granola Bars. Remembered I had one of these at my desk, and it was pretty darn exciting.

The Boy is making fun of me right now for writing about this, but come on. They're delicious. I remember eating these as a kid, packing them in my lunch box.

Probably not great to eat every day as a "grown up" or whatever, but it's pretty great to eat once in a while.