This one is for Carollina, who asked what we brought back from the trip and wisely encouraged us to bring an extra bag.

Merci for Merci, one of my favorite places in Paris. These small enamel bowls are so rad.

Christine Ferber preserves for Pierre Hermé. The lady knows how to preserve fruit. I am always amazed when jars of jam survive air travel. read more+++

I want to spend a little more time talking techniques. Not formal recipes, but way of doing basic stuff that I find useful. And what better place to start than croutons? read more+++

Whenever I travel in Europe, I inevitably end up craving Mexican food. I need some heat. We have discussed traveling with a bottle of hot sauce, but that seems sort of weird and the chances of disaster are high. Admittedly, I could seek out Mexican restaurants, but I suspect they would be disappointing in one way or another. So, I return to the states wanting to put hot sauce on everything.

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I’m back!

October 2011 will go down as one of the greatest months of my life. It was all so good. I’ll share more soon, but for now let’s get right back into baking.

Traveling at the start of Autumn had me in constant awe of the bounty of food at the markets in Europe and happy(ish) to return to my kitchen and actually make something. I missed cooking! I returned to a pile of magazines, many with turkeys on the cover.

As soon as cool air flows into town, I start thinking about Thanksgiving. I use October and November as recipe testing time. Everything I try is an audition for a spot at the Thanksgiving table. Auditions have begun. read more+++

I somehow missed the 3-year anniversary of my blog.

I’m still distracted.

Here’s the thing, I’m planning a wedding—my wedding! Yes, dear reader, Bryan is finally making an honest man out of me (eww, that joke kind of creeped me out). Remember when we went to Massachusetts back in July? Well, we got married on a beautiful summer day under an old tree in Salem. Just the two of us.

But we weren’t content with it being just the two of us. We think these things need to be celebrated and so we’ve been planning a wedding celebration to bring together many of our closest friends and family for a fun weekend.

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This salad felt a bit like a dare. Melons, peanuts, fish sauce. It is an unusual mix of ingredients, for sure.

The recipe comes from Cooking in the Moment by Lantern’s Andrea Reusing. I’m not the first blogger to be charmed by this book. It has the sort of specificity that elicits trust, and so far it deserves the trust. The book is a collection of seasonal recipe that you simply want to make. read more+++

I know it sometimes seems like I don’t eat dinner. I do, it just usually isn’t that interesting.

I do what most of you probably do for dinner: throw together a sandwich, a salad, some pasta—pretty basic stuff. I save my energy for special occasion foods, the kind of foods I make to share with friends, or as special treats for myself, or that require a Sunday afternoon to prepare (let’s face it, nobody is making elderflower fritters after work).  But then sometimes a simple dinner recipe surfaces that I need to share, and it allows me to prove that I actually do eat dinner. I do!

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This was so obvious!

I was walking by a restaurant (Forno) in my old neighborhood (Wicker Park!) and the server was delivering something to the table that kind of blew my mind. It was a slice of a watermelon, cut into slices like a pizza, and topped with a delicious looking salad mix. What?

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