It's Easter Sunday! The time has finally arrived that I can finally make the adorable bird's nest cupcakes I've been seeing on foodgawker for weeks. First, make your favorite vanilla cupcake recipe. I used this recipe with yogurt as a base to reduce the amount of butter in the cupcakes to make them a little healthier.  I used vanilla yogurt...

Last year Dustin's mom made a delicious matzo brittle for Passover. We couldn't stop eating it and decided it should be a yearly tradition to make this quick and easy treat. Tonight we are hosting a Passover Seder with some friends out here, and we will most definitely be serving this matzo brittle for dessert. First, I spread matzo over a...

We love them, but Reuben sandwiches at a deli are expensive. Thankfully we have found a more economical way to get our Reuben fix— make them at home. We bought rye bread from Macrina Bakery, picked up some corned beef from a Stopsky's, aJewish deli (more expensive than from the grocery store, but much more tasty), used the sauerkraut we...

The theme for this meal was fresh and (mostly) local— a beautiful filet of wild Alaskan king salmon (hence the word mostly before local) from Pike's Place market, served alongside a crostini made from a Macrina baguette, local, first of the season asparagus, topped with a fresh, locally sourced poached egg and all covered with yellow sunburst...

My mind has been on the tropics lately. As our trip to Jamaica approaches, I have been thinking about the amazing trip Dustin and I took to Hawaii together in summer 2009 when he was working as in intern out there. With our housing paid for by Dustin's company and a free flight using frequent flyer miles for me, we were able to visit this...

Dustin and I thought it would be fun to take ridiculously unhealthy coconut shrimp and make a healthier version of it for a fun, tropical dinner alongside a fresh mango and edamame salad. I decided to go with a recipe from Bobby Deen, son of the queen of butter and fat, Paula Deen, that involved baking the shrimp rather than frying and using a...

After achieving success with dumping ingredients into my crockpot last November to create a delicious chili, I decided I'd give making chili one more shot before the weather gets too warm. Since it is closing in upon spring, I wanted to do a light chili with chicken and white beans. I grilled up one large chicken breast (seasoned with salt...

Well, making homemade gnocchi was an adventure to say the least. In the end, it didn't look too pretty, but it did taste good. We set out to make our gnocchi dough late one night with the intention of refrigerating it and making it the next night. We began by reading this article entitled "How to Make Gnocchi Like an Italian Grandmother," which...

The food blogging world was just beginning the cake batter craze when I discovered how much I love spending all of my free time looking at pictures of delicious food and finding new recipes to try. I made a mental note to try all of the cake batter recipes I saw, and now I have finally decided to bust open a box of cake mix and get this party...

It's not like we've been deprived of fancy meals lately, but we still like to make elevated cuisine at home from time to time. I was watching an episode of Kelsey's Essentials on the Cooking Channel all about how to work with chocolate. Kelsey did several cool things, including making chocolate pasta, something we have also done, but I was...