Mel-o-Yum!

[image from mel-o.com]
I discovered Mel-O-Creme the other day in the organic section of the grocery store. It is a fruit and honey spread that comes in peach or raspberry and it is also available as a regular honey spread. I bought the peach flavor and it's delicious! Their website also suggests trying it with cream cheese.

Hot Chocolate+Heart Marshmallows=Fun

Good Eatin'

I'm sharing a couple tasty things I've made recently. These are not exactly good-looking photos, but they are the best I've got. Above is a salad with mixed greens, gorgonzola, raspberries, pears, pecans, and raspberry vinaigrette (huh, didn't know that spelling). Below is Orange Chicken with Potatoes from the January issue of Real Simple. I've been trying to use my slow cooker more often because it's easy, smells good all day, and yields lots of leftovers. I know I'll be ready for less-cooked food by spring, but we've got a few months of cold to go. Do you have any good recipes?

Soup for Me

[image from uncommongoods.com]

Before Christmas, I was eyeing this clever Soup and Sandwich Tray from Uncommon Goods. Yesterday, I was in the thrift store and they had just put out a a similar set of 2 yellow ones, but these were $3, not $30! And they are fun and yellow! I wasn't feeling well tonight, so I tested them out with chicken noodle soup and saltines and it almost made being sick sort of fun. The bowl has a little handle, so I am envisioning their future to include tea+scones or milk+cookies.

Cookie Sandwich

Yesterday I saw gingersnap & lemon icing sandwiches at the bakery. I'd never seen that combination before and it sounded great, so I made my own cheater version! I used store-bought cookies and added lemon extract and yellow food coloring to plain frosting, and they were as good as I'd imagined.

Dutch Baby

Before you get too excited, Mom—I'm just describing our breakfast. For those of you who have never had a Dutch Baby, it's a puffy pancake (that quickly deflates) that is super tasty with lemon and powdered sugar. If you'd like the recipe, leave a comment and I'll post it.

Here's the recipe, as requested!

1/2 stick unsalted butter
1/2 cup milk
1/2 flour
1/4 cup sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature, beaten slightly
Pinch ground nutmeg (optional)

For top: fresh fruit, lemon and powdered sugar, whipped cream, sautéed fruit, etc.

Preheat oven to 425˚F. Melt butter in 10-in ovenproof skillet over medium heat, tilting pan to coat sides well. (If you don't have an over-proof skillet, you can melt butter in a pie pan in the oven. Don't let it cool, and add the rest of the ingredients. You may have to bake a couple extra minutes). Whisk milk, flour, sugar, eggs, and nutmeg. Pour into skillet. Cook one minute. Place skillet in oven and bake until pancake is puffed and golden, 12 to 15 minutes.

Since it flattens out and becomes quite thin, this amount is really only enough for 2 people!

Birthday in Boston

For my birthday on Sunday we went down to Boston for the day. Our first stop was the South End Open Market. I always loved the Talbot Street Art Fair in Indianapolis AND it fell right around my birthday (and my sister's!). In fact, the day I was born, my mom had been there earlier in the day and she likes to tell me how hot it was. I get the idea that it was HOT.

Anyway, this was a small show, but there were many wonderful booths. I think I'm going to save my purchases and lovely birthday gifts for another post. I immediately recognized the paintings at one booth because I've seen them around town. They were from local artist Lainey Hunter who also lives in Kittery!

We headed up to Harvard Square and browsed the shops and enjoyed an amazing brunch buffet at Henrietta's Table.



Finally, we stopped at my all-time favorite store, paper*source. By that time, my feet were sore and it was time to catch the bus!

Market Square Day

On Saturday we went to Market Square Day in Portsmouth. It's an annual street festival downtown. The weather was cloudy and I wasn't too impressed by the selection of vendors (not much art!) but the festival food, music and people watching were excellent.

I really enjoyed this group, whom I've been calling The Flintstone Drummers, but as it turns out, that isn't their name! They are actually called Foté and you can check them out here.

On to the food! Our first course was a sweet Italian sausage with peppers and onions and we washed that down with a Lime Rickey (basically Sprite with raspberry flavoring). We followed that artery-clogging sugar-fest with fried dough and Moxie. Yum! I was always a big fan of elephant ears in Indiana and I'm disappointed that everyone calls them "fried dough" here. How boring! According to Wikipedia, other names include whale tails and frying saucers. And Moxie is just gross. It seems like a cool vintage thing to drink and it's apparently the State Soda of Maine, but to me it tastes like bad root beer.



And lastly, Poncho Pink Socks wins the award for Best People Watching. He wasn't doing anything crazy, but I was reminded of The Dancing Festival Guy over on ljc's Rocha-chatter blog.

Good Grilling

Tonight we had dinner with friends and made these Turkey Burgers with Grated Zucchini and Carrot from a Real Simple recipe, and they were delicious! You can find the recipe here and I added provolone on top. If you do grill them, like we did (cause they're burgers!), be sure to put down some foil or you will lose your dinner to the coals. After a near fatal start, I came to understand why the recipe says to cook them in a skillet.

We are still enjoying the fiddleheads, so we grilled those in my new grill basket that looks very similar to this one. It was actually my friend's grill basket because we were at their house, but I have the same one. Cathryn and I came across them for $5 at Target last night after talking about them for 2 years. I think what we got may technically be a grill wok, but that's even better! The packaging showed it with shrimp and all kinds of vegetables, so I'm looking forward to trying that.

Happy Birthday, Dad! (Do you even read this?)

Tutti Frutti

I made up this cocktail the other night with ingredients we had around. That did not include ice, so I used frozen fruit. It was delicious!

Root Beer Floats

Today was a great afternoon for root beer floats. I like any excuse to use my spoon straws! How cool are these? The handle is actually a straw! Form+Function all the way. Nate's mom brought them back from Denmark, but I also found them available here.

It's fiddlehead season!

I've been keeping my eye out for these tasty veggies and last night I was successful! I sautéed them in olive oil and garlic and then added salt & pepper, lemon juice and a little butter. The man at the local shop says he'll have them for a solid three weeks. I wonder how many times I can eat them in three weeks? Just to prove they are appropriately named, I've done a side-by-side comparison.


[I'm still annoyed about the colors of my photos. Now I realized that there are even huge differences between Safari and Firefox. Safari is much better.]

1st Ice Cream of the Season

We first heard about Free Cone Day at Ben & Jerry's last year. It's coming up on Tueday, and I want to make sure everyone knows! I won't be able to go, so we headed over this afternoon. I not a huge ice cream fan, but I was eager to try the new "Willie Nelson's Country Peach Cobbler™ {Peach Ice Cream with Cinnamon-Sugar Shortbread Pieces}". Unfortunately, our shop didn't have it, so I settled for another new flavor called "Cinnamon Buns {Caramel Ice Cream with Cinnamon Bun Dough & a Caramel Streusel Swirl}" and Nate had Crème Brûlée {Sweet Custard Ice Cream with a Caramelized Sugar Swirl}". Their website is pretty fun and I especially enjoyed the flavor graveyard!

Side note to locals: Bob's Clam Hut is kicking Ben and Jerry's out on May 1 and they'll be serving their own ice cream. Boo.