Celebrate strawberry season with these buttery, moist strawberry muffins with an irresistible vanilla crumb topping. June is strawberry season and I am buying berries by the quart! Last Saturday, at the Oak Park Farmers' Market, I bought 4 (!) quarts of berries for jam, baking, and just eating out of hand. No one in my family can resist ...
Chicago-Style Hot Dog with New Mexico Green Chile (Air Fryer recipe)
Thanks to the New Mexico Department of Agriculture for sponsoring this recipe post through Kitchen PLAY. Try New Mexico green chile in a dish from your region, like this Chicago-style hot dog with roasted New Mexico green chile - cooked in the air fryer to keep the kitchen cool! There is no question that New Mexico has one of the great ...
Blended Turkey Burgers
Get the healthy secret to juicy, flavorful turkey burgers. Perfect for grilling and just in time for Father's Day! Do you remember that episode of "Parks and Rec" when Chris Traeger went to great lengths to craft the perfect turkey burger and everyone still preferred Ron Swanson's plain, Food N' Stuff hamburger? Yeah, that's a real thing. ...
Easy Peach Ice Cream (Egg-Free)
An easy-to-make peach ice cream with tons of fresh peach flavor and no egg yolks. Perfect for egg allergies or a quick DIY project! Having been without an oven for most of the summer, I have sorely missed baking. It's been killing me to go to the farmers market each week and see all the lovely summer fruit knowing that I can't turn any of it ...
Lime Ginger Peach Jam
A beautiful peach jam with the tropical flavors of lime and ginger. Last week, I returned home to find a box of softball-sized white and yellow peaches on my doorstep. Can you imagine how exciting that is? This year, once again, I am serving as a Canbassador for the Washington State Stone Fruit Growers. which means that every so often, I ...
Fig Honey Galette
Fresh figs are such a gift! Here I place black and green figs atop a honey-sweetened mascarpone filling and fold them into a flaky galette. Perfect for early fall parties or Rosh Hashanah dinner! Every year, I feel a little giddy when I spy fresh figs in the grocery store because they are such a short-lived, seasonal treat. Did you know that ...
Beets, Burrata & Blackberry Salad for Rosh Hashanah
A beautiful and balanced early fall salad with earthy beets, creamy burrata and tart blackberries over arugula in a honey vinaigrette. Perfect for your Rosh Hashanah table! Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish new year, begins at sundown on September 20. Like many new year celebrations, it is joyous and festive. All over the world, Jews will gather ...
Edamame Succotash
Sweet, crunchy succotash made with late-summer corn and a new twist: edamame instead of lima beans! It's "my supper dish/My succotash wish." Sing it, baby! Summer corn is a short-lived, seasonal treat. So while it lasts, I make the most of it. I never buy fewer than a dozen ears at the farmers market. At $5 a dozen, there is truly no reason ...
Stone Fruit Blueberry Pie
The perfect end-of-summer mashup pie: stone fruit mixed with berries. Don't let summer end without making this! I really love to make pie. My love for making pie probably exceeds my family's love for eating pie. My husband is all about a good fruit dessert, but given a choice between pie and cobbler, he will take the cobbler every time. He ...
Queen’s Jam (Raspberry and Blueberry)
Queen's Jam, a combination of raspberries and blueberries, is a classic Swedish preserve. It is also the perfect way to use the best summer berries. I write a lot about my Jewish heritage and how it influences my cooking. What I perhaps do not mention enough is that I am also part Swedish on my mother's side. My maternal grandmother was the ...
Great British Baking Show Victoria Sandwich
Make a classic British dessert from "The Great British Baking Show:" a Victoria Sandwich! Sponge cake sandwiched around layers of raspberry jam and vanilla buttercream. Do you love "The Great British Baking Show" as much as I do? Talented home bakers creating classic British desserts, expert assessment from the regal Mary Berry and the ...
Naked Peach Cake
Make the most of stone fruit season with a tender peach cake covered in peach buttercream. My daughter returned home from four weeks of overnight camp this weekend. Our little family of four has barely been all together all summer, so I wanted to celebrate. I prepared a meal of my daughter's favorite summer foods: gazpacho to start, grilled ...
Stone Fruit Ketchup
Ketchup isn't just for tomatoes anymore. Try this sweet-and-sour peach and nectarine ketchup on chicken, turkey burgers and, my favorite, sweet potato fries! Last week, I returned home to find a box of softball-sized peaches and nectarines on my doorstep courtesy of the Washington State Stone Fruit Growers. This year I am serving as a ...
Fattoush Salad with Yogurt-Tahini Dressing
Enjoy this crunchy chopped salad inspired by the Middle Eastern dish fattoush with a creamy yogurt-tahini dressing. This post is sponsored by Stonyfield Organic. As always, all opinions are my own. Everyone knows by now that Middle Eastern food is one of my favorite cuisines. Ever since 2012, when Yotam Ottolenghi's award-winning cookbook ...
Homemade S’mores Kits
Summer means s'mores! Elevate your s'more by making the marshmallows and graham crackers yourself. Packed together with some milk chocolate, you have a charming edible gift! One of the things we love about our not-so-new house is the outdoor fireplace. After eating dinner out on the patio, my husband and I love to argue about the best way to ...
Lavender Mojitos
A delicate, floral take on the classic Cuban cocktail: lavender mojitos made with Lavender DRY Sparkling Soda. What's better than a mojito? How about a mojito made with the delicate, floral taste of lavender? This is the refreshing cocktail I am going to be sipping all summer. And best of all, it's incredibly easy to make at home using DRY ...
Shortcake with Grilled Peaches & Rosemary
I have had such a busy summer that I have barely had time to do the things I love best: shop at the farmers market, pick my own fruits and vegetables at a pick-your-own farm, and cook for friends and family. This weekend, however, we found ourselves with a blissfully unscheduled Sunday. On the spur of the moment, I invited some friends to join ...
Food Swap in Philly and NYC
I'm back home from a wonderful week in California, which I spent promoting Food Swap, seeing friends, eating fabulous food (Tartine, Mourad, Wise Sons deli among others), checking out the new San Francisco MoMA, and attending my third International Food Bloggers Conference (IFBC). (Did you happen to catch my appearance on "Good Day Sacramento" on ...
Harissa Deviled Eggs (with no Mayo!)
A lightened up version of deviled eggs without any mayonnaise!. Have I ever mentioned that my husband hates mayonnaise? Like hates it. The number of times he has failed to eat lunch entirely because the caterer pre-mayonnaised -- yes, my husband thinks "to mayonnaise" is a verb -- all the sandwiches at some meeting is higher than it should ...
Apricot and Blueberry Galette
It pains me to say it, but my husband doesn't really care for pie. It's something about the fruit-to-pastry ratio. However, I love to make pie because it's fussy and fiddly and when you get it right, it demonstrates a lot of technique. The fact that I gravitate towards more difficult recipes probably makes me unusual among cooks. A galette, ...
Rick Bayless Summer Cooking Demonstration
Today’s post is sponsored by Everywhere Agency on behalf of Macy’s. As always, all opinions expressed herein are my own. Restauranteur, author, television star, Rick Bayless has been educating American audiences about authentic regional Mexican for decades. His restaurants are destinations for Chicagoans and tourists alike. And the city is ...
Strawberry Rhubarb Lattice Pie
It was pie as procrastination -- there is no doubt. Faced with a long list of overdue tasks and a full inbox, I chose instead to stop time and bake a strawberry rhubarb pie with a picture-perfect lattice top. The farmers market strawberries were on their last legs and the stalks of rhubarb were only getting stalkier. Email can wait. Produce ...
End of Summer Peach Pie
It's hard to deny that summer is over and fall is upon us. The kids have all gone back to school. The pool is closed for another year. In some places, the warm weather lingers, but it is no longer welcome. Sweaters and boots, that's what we want now as September settles in and August is dismissed. But here in Illinois, the farmers market ...
Bucatini with Corn Crema, Cherry Tomatoes and Green Chiles
I do not mean to alarm you, but you need to go out and buy the ingredients for this recipe right now. It's Labor Day weekend, folks. That means that summer is almost over. That means that corn and tomato season is almost over. Before we say goodbye to summer and fresh, sweet, corn and juicy, ripe, tomatoes, you are going to want to make this pasta ...
Chocolate Zucchini Cake
Chocolate zucchini cake may sound weird, but it is delicious and fun way to eat your vegetables! It is so zucchini season, is it not? Whether you are a gardener overrun with the stuff or a savvy farmers' market shopper buying 6 zucchini for $4, these green squash are everywhere. In fact, I'm going to be on WGN's Midday News Lunch Break ...