I wasn't a big bagel eater before I met Dustin. We ate doughnuts in my house. But bagels have really grown on me. We used to make trips to Einstein Bros. before classes as a special treat occasionally before class. I know Einstein doesn't make the greatest bagels in the world, but we were pretty limited in our choices in Houston. Dustin would...

About two days after I made my pumpkin snickerdoodles, I came across this recipe for Skinny Snickerdoodles by Chocolate Covered Katie. Considering all of the holiday baking I'm planning over the next couple of weeks, I'm doing anything I can to make great tasting, lower calorie desserts to maximize the number of cookies I can eat! So I made a...

One of the unfortunate things about being home all day while something is slow cooking in the crock-pot is that you are constantly bombarded by the smell of delicious food. This is the predicament I was in. This chicken tortilla soup smelled heavenly as it cooked all afternoon. I couldn't wait for Dustin to get home so we could finally eat...

I think I have found the perfect use for leftover cans of pumpkin. It's after Thanksgiving, and everybody is sick of pumpkin pie and other dessert containing the word pumpkin. Using pumpkin in a savory dish, spiced with paprika and garlic rather than cinnamon and nutmeg, was a really fun way to use up pumpkin puree, allowing me to focus on...

We finally made it into downtown Seattle on a Friday, so I was able to pick up a loaf of fresh challah from the bakery. I've been itching to make French toast with challah for awhile now. Even though Dustin is Jewish, he isn't a huge fan of challah (although he nibbled on this quite a bit and commented on how quickly it disappeared). I on the...

Walking by a fruit stand in Pike's Place, something caught my eye. It was half an orange with a deep red flesh. Blood oranges. We got so excited because blood oranges remind us of one of our favorite places back in Houston, Benjy's in Rice Village. Their lounge became our go-to restaurant for happy hour. During happy hour, they have great...

I think the best part of all of the experimenting we are doing in the kitchen is that we are learning so much about what works and what doesn't. This meal was a good example. We tried caramelizing these amazing fresh jumbo scallops to look like the scrumptious looking scallops in the pictures on Annie's Eats website where I found the recipe...

Top Pot makes a delicious old-fashioned pumpkin doughnut that sadly I only sampled once. I wish pumpkin flavored things were in season longer because now that Thanksgiving is over, so is most everything pumpkin. Everybody has moved on to peppermint, eggnog and gingerbread baked goods. Don't get me wrong, I absolutely love those flavors too—...

We’ve got another Tom Douglas restaurant down. If you are not from the Seattle area, then you probably are unaware of the city’s mini celeb chef with his numerous successful and much-loved restaurants. Our engagement took place at one of his seafood places, Etta’s, right in Pike’s Place. But our most recent adventure was to Palace Kitchen, a...

I think chocolate waffles are Dustin's favorite sweet breakfast. We bought the Williams Sonoma Chocolate-Chocolate Chip Waffle Mix before, but I was sure I could make delicious waffles from scratch. I used this recipe I found online except that part way through mixing the wet ingredients that I only had one cup of buttermilk, not the necessary...