It amazes me how some recipes slip through the cracks. This is one of my all-time favorite cookie recipes, and somehow I never shared it here. This lead me to realize that there are still several more of my all-time favorites that have never made it onto the site. I plan to remedy that in the coming weeks. But these cookies! These cookies are really something. read more+++

I’d been coming across Julia Turshen‘s work for a while now and am always impressed by her voice and the projects she is involved with. She bills herself as a personal chef, writer and producer and seems to do all of those things well. She worked on Spain: On the Road Again, the beautiful PBS travel/food series that featured Mario Batali, Mark Bittman, Gwyneth Paltrow and Claudia Bassols. But what the show really featured was Spain, and it did so beautifully.

Julia also contributes to GOOP and worked with Gwyneth Paltrow on My Father’s Daughter, which has already been featured here. All of her projects manage to be both smart, beautiful and really engaging. (I think I might want to be Julia when I grow up)

Her next project, The Kimchi Chronicles, finds Julia working with Marja and Jean-Georges Vongerichten on a PBS series (and book!) “about rediscovering Korea and its cuisine and translating all of it into easy, approachable recipes for the American kitchen”— sounds amazing.

I asked Julia to share a favorite recipe with all of us and can say that she is as kind and charming as she is talented (if you want more evidence, check out this great interview with her over on Design*Sponge). And these turkey meatballs are fantastic. I don’t cook with meat at home very often, and so it is always an occasion when I do. These meatballs are perfect for a special occasion, or a weeknight meal. Julia brightens them up with some lemon zest which really makes them shine. We feasted on these and then enjoyed the leftovers (which are great on a sandwich!) for the next couple of days.

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Ever since I read Kim Boyce’s beautiful Good to the Grain, I have been taking whole grains a lot more seriously. I now find myself using them whenever I can, especially in baking. Because they are good for me, sure—but mostly because they taste good. So, I was pleasantly surprised when Maria Speck’s new cookbook Ancient Grains for Modern Meals arrived at my doorstep.

The book is beautifully written, and a real pleasure to spend time with. Speck manages to soft-sell cooking with grains in a way that has me wanting to completely transform my diet. She should consider starting a cult, maybe she already has—the Cult of Whole Grains. Sign me up. read more+++

I’ve always liked Gwyneth Paltrow, as much as I could like anyone I don’t know. I admire her work as an actor and I find it both charming and courageous that she also sings, dances, speaks Spanish, writes about food, raises kids, practices yoga, etc., etc. She seems like someone I’d want to be friends with. She demonstrates a good sense of humor, seems curious about the world and engaged in her life—honestly, she seems kind of awesome.

But maybe that is beside the point.

This week she published My Father’s Daughter, her first cookbook. read more+++

101 Cookbooks, the gorgeous blog started by Heidi Swanson in 2003, is one of the sites that inspired me to launch Lottie + Doof. That may surprise you if you were to compare the nutritional qualities of the two sites, but I really related to Heidi’s sense of design and to her relationship to food. It is one of the places on the web that continues to inspire me to cook. Heidi also writes some lovely cookbooks and I was pleased as punch that she sent me a copy of her newest, Super Natural Every Day: Well-Loved Recipes from My Natural Foods Kitchen. read more+++