design a life you love
As the big 3-0 approached, I found myself craving the taste of the rich chocolate birthday cakes I enjoyed in my youth. The only problem was that all of the chocolate cake recipes I had in my arsenal contained gluten. Not one to be deterred by my gluten-free lifestyle, I set out on a quest to find an easy and delicious alternative to the chocolate cake recipes I remember from my childhood.
For each of my childhood birthdays my mom would prepare a special meal and dessert for me; it could be anything I wanted. Without fail, I would request the same dinner every single year – a super rich chicken in cream sauce recipe. Having it for my birthday was our family tradition up until I moved to California six years ago.
With a monumental birthday coming up (the big 3-0) I found myself homesick and longing for my mom’s chicken and cream sauce. I had never previously attempted to make it but figured that I had enough cooking experience under my belt to give it a try. My mom still had the recipe handy and sent it to me but there was one problem…I have cut lactose and gluten out of my diet and the original recipe was heavy on cream and flour. Hmm.
Substituting almond flour for regular flour seemed straight forward enough, but what to do about the cream… Fortunately for me, Google exists and was able to provide a plethora of alternatives. I threw caution to the wind and went with the most basic option I could find – substituting 2/6 cup of soy milk and 1/6 cup of oil for 1/2 cup of heavy cream. The consistency seemed okay. Not perfect, but okay. And flour behaves like flour so the recipe should work, right? Wrong.
Now, this was in no way a complete disaster. It just didn’t taste exactly like my mom’s and that turned me into an emotional mess. Neither the meal or the pictures came out quite how I wanted them to and I considered not posting this entrée at all. It was my mom who encouraged me to go ahead with it as planned because it’s a recipe that means a lot to me, it still tasted amazing and, as she pointed out, maybe somebody out there has a suggestion for how to improve it next time. So without further explanation or ado, I give you…
We only have two days left until New Year’s Eve! Has this year FLOWN by for anyone else? I don’t know if that feeling comes from the fact that I’ve had such an eventful year or whether it just comes with the territory of getting older. Let’s just say it’s due to an eventful year.
I’m not really one for New Year’s resolutions, but I have always loved the concept that the clock striking midnight on January 1 symbolizes a fresh start. It means that there are 365 pristine, beautiful days ahead to make the most of. 365 days worth of unique adventures to come.
What better way to celebrate that than by clinking together a couple of glasses of champagne when you finally roll out of bed in the morning? These raspberry peach bellinis are the perfect New Year’s drink to keep the party going, all the while convincing yourself that you’re being healthy because you’re consuming fruit along with alcohol.
The name of these cookies is not an exaggeration. They are truly magical. Possibly even a little sinful, making them a perfect indulgence for this time of year. We can all wait until 2016 to worry about losing a few pounds in cookie weight, right? I promise you that these are worth a couple of extra sessions at the gym.
When I was growing up I could always count on my grandparents making two treats on Christmas Day. My grandfather would make what was in my humble opinion the most delicious homemade treat ever, peppermint ice cream, while my grandmother would make what was in my father’s humble opinion the most delicious homemade treat ever, peanut brittle. Over the years both grandparents made an effort to teach all of us how to create these delights but, in all honesty, I was always terrified to attempt either of them both because they are ridiculously labor intensive and because it would make me really sad to create an end product that didn’t properly do justice to their originals.
Despite my trepidation I decided that I wanted to give peanut brittle a go last Christmas. After discussing my grandmother’s recipe with my mother and being reminded of how absurdly challenging it was to get the peanut brittle to turn out well, I took to the internet. I came across several similar microwave recipes, melded them all together and gave it my best shot, all the while assuming it would be an absolute disaster. But wait…it wasn’t. It wasn’t at all. Somehow my crazy microwave witchery produced peanut brittle of the exact same taste, texture and consistency as my grandmother’s!
Easy peanut brittle in Grandma’s tin, every bit as good as her original recipe.