Cooking

Pumpkin Spice Tim Tam Cookies makes 14 sandwich cookies total time: 1 hour including refrigeration Jump to recipe I’m slightly obsessed with Australia, but it tends to go in waves. When I was a kid, I was fascinated by koala bears, Savage Garden (heehee), and Australian accents. For some reason or other though, Australia fell off the map, until a couple of years ago, when Mike and I decided to visit. We hit up Sydney and Melbourne and basically ate our way around – it was awesome, minus me being freaked out by us driving on the “wrong” side of the road. I always felt like Mike was drifting, drifting into opposing traffic. Freak outs aside, we did what we normally do on any vacation, ate ALL the things, checked out the  penguins on the beach , and hit up the grocery store for snacks. There were entire aisles dedicated to packages and packages of Tim Tams. I bought myself a tiny package of  dark chocolate mint ones , popped in my luggage and promptly forgot about it. Wh

The Ultimate Veggie Sandwich and a Shun Knife and Boos Block Giveaway! It’s my birthday today! Are you guys big on celebrating your birthday? For as long as I remember, my birthday has been an obsession of mine. It’s probably just a bit (okay, a lot) egotistical, but I just love the idea of a day celebrating me. I like planning elaborate themed parties with tons of friends ( DIY grilled cheese party anyone ?), but I also love the flip side of that – spending a day celebrating, just me and my boo. No matter what I end up doing, there is one absolute must: eat ALL the things. It’s the one day you shouldn’t hold back. I know, I know, veggie sandwiches aren’t what one usually thinks of when they’re thinking about birthday eats, but when I saw  this glorious picture of the ultimate veggie sandwich  on Instagram, it had to be mine. I’m all about veggie sandwiches (and pizzas too, to be honest). I love the the different textures, the crunch, and the freshness. This sandwich

Avocado Bread: like banana bread, but with avocados makes 1 small loaf total time: 1 hour Jump to recipe Oh so long ago, back when I was still in high school, my mom came home from work one day clutching a photocopied hand-written banana bread recipe. I wasn’t impressed, but she claimed it was the recipe for the best banana bread she had ever tasted in her life. It was a pretty bold statement, especially for my mom, who isn’t really prone to superlatives – she’s more the stoic type. Still, she stood by it. She even had a bunch of bananas, purchased with the sole purpose of ripening for the bread. I had my doubts. I was wary of the illegible hand writing, the oil content, and, well, everything. But, I stand corrected: it really was the best banana bread ever. It was the banana bread dreams are made of. Moist, not too sweet, not overly oily, and loaded with banana flavor. The crowning glory was its crunchy, crisp, domed top. We must’ve made that banana bread hundreds of t

LA’s Eggslut: Mashed Potatoes, Soft Coddled Egg and Toast serves 1 total time: 20 minutes Jump to recipe I have a thing for breakfast foods. It’s kind of ironic though, because I don’t really eat breakfast on a regular basis. I’m more of a start my day with coffee kind of person. I hardly ever take the time to make myself a meal before diving into whatever it is that needs to get get done that day. My lack of eating breakfast on the regular may be the exact reason why I’m so obsessed. When I do take the time to breakfast – yes, I use breakfast as a verb – I want to do it completely right. When breakfasting or brunching, there are certain types of things that I’ll always order. I’m partial to the classic two eggs (any style) plus bacon/sausage, potatoes and toast. I’m also drawn to pancakes and waffles. And if I see a coddled egg on the menu, that’s pretty much a must order. Eggs are the perfect food no matter how you cook them, but coddling is the ultimate way to transf

Sunday Brunch: Buttermilk Totoro Pancakes and Bacon serves 2-4 total time: 30 minutes Jump to recipe Accidental ombre totoros. Otherwise known as a little too much time spent in the pan :) It’s the last week of October and you know what that means! Totoro Week! If you know me (even just a little bit) you know that I’m obsessed with all things cute. And of course cute includes  Hayao Miyazaki’s   Totoro!  He’s furry, he’s friendly, he’s absolutely adorable. It’s been my lifelong wish to  meet a totoro in real life . Since I don’t think that’s ever really going to happen, every October, I’ve been dressing up my food in a celebration of Halloween and Totoro. When I first started dressing up my food for Halloween in 2013, I made a  Totoro Spam musubi . Last year, I asked Lyndsay from  Coco Cake Land  to join in and she did two awesome cake tutorials:  Totoro   and   Catbus . (You can see my creations  here .) This year, Kaitlin of  Whisk Kid  is joining the party with