From the category archives:

Appetizers, Dips & Small Bites

Cucumber, Cream Cheese and Lox ~ a Foolproof Appetizer

If you’re one of those people who claims to not cook, or thinks they cannot cook, this recipe is for you. Don’t be “one of those” who stop at Whole Foods for something from the deli to bring to a potluck. Or a frozen Trader Joes fan. To a party?? Be a hero; bring homemade, [...]

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Guest Post by Jen at Domestic Divas – "White Trash" Bacon & Egg Salad Sandwiches

From Jen: This year, I had the pleasure of volunteering with Patti at the Stir It 28 Fundraiser for Haiti, where I provided two dishes, one of which was my “White Trash” Bacon & Egg Salad Sandwiches. I created this recipe specially for Stir It 28, and Patti loved it so much, she asked me [...]

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Hawaiian Coconut Shrimp Appetizer

Four couples who like to cook. And drink. And travel. Every few months, we gather at someone’s home for our Gourmet Club dinner cook-a-thon. The hosts select the theme and divvy up potluck assignments. We schlep bags of ingredients, piles of utensils, then make ourselves at home for platters, serving pieces. Every surface is used, [...]

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Darn Good Guacamole

The Perfect Guacamole recipe title prompted me to quietly tear it from the dentist office magazine. Yes, I do that sometimes, but only an emergency like this one.

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Claro’s Italian Meatballs

A TV show featuring Claro’s Italian Market resulted in Larry and me driving an hour to Arcadia just for the experience (not immediately, but we keep notes of stuff like this and Larry finally said, “can we pleeeeeze go to Claro’s???”) After consuming awesome subs and ogling at cheeses, meats, dry goods and hot foods, [...]

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Thyme and Goat Cheese Tart Topped with Mixed Tender Greens in Champagne Vinaigrette

This isn’t exactly how we eat around our home, putting salad on top of a cheese tart. Yet, as swank as this appeared, our “Thyme and Goat Cheese Tart Topped with Mixed Tender Greens in Champagne Vinaigrette” (whew, the name alone is a mouthful) was neither pretentious nor weird. This was the salad course during [...]

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Chile Lime Shrimp

You can practically smell this through your monitor, can’t you? A recent cooking class, “Date Night In Wine Country” with thirsty, hungry foodies was on a Friday evening. Give us sumpin’ to eat, fast! Chef Diane Brown was prepared, and put classmate Stefanie on the job of whisking up this appetizer. And we all agreed, [...]

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Fresh Basil Soft Pretzels

Jen, our way-cool yoga instructor at Camp GetAway for Mothers & Others had an explosion of gorgeous basil growing in her victory garden. She was asking me about making pesto — just as I was thinking of making pretzels. The ideas collided. The March 2004 issue of Gourmet had a Kitchen Notebook story on how [...]

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Larry’s Pesto Pizza

This is another installment in my series, “Hands Off, Ladies, He’s Mine.” Larry made dinner again recently and decided to create a spin-off of his most excellent pizza. If you are skilled at making homemade pizza, then you can become comfortable playing with it. Larry does this on occasion, deciding fun toppings and layouts. This [...]

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Best Shrimp Cocktail Sauce Ever

This post was first published during an LA summer heatwave: Using our oven or stove for any length of time is a mistake because our bedroom is upstairs and we get cranky about rising heat, debating the AC usage, window open, not open, ugh. The GOOD news is, dinner is Shrimp Cocktail – a giant pile [...]

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Mini Basil and Goat Cheese Turnovers

Dinner party for four here. Casual menu: Larry made his Excellent Pizza. I was excited for dessert, Butterscotch Pudding. But while shopping for ingredients, it struck me… I hadn’t planned an appetizer. Wracking my brain (well, not wracking, but thinking harder than normal while shopping), my sis-in-law’s recent pool party snacks struck me as do-able. [...]

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Larry’s Excellent Pizza

Have you seen the foodie blog, Hungry Hungry Hippie? Blogger Elise’s mom is my cousin, Melinda. I noticed this week that HHH was being written by middle sis, Laura – that’s how I discovered their ENTIRE family is vacationing in Hawaii, ‘cept Laura! What a good sister – and turns out, a good blogger. I [...]

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Killer Deviled Eggs

“This recipe dates back to my mom’s grandmother,” Laura emailed. In 2004, I wanted a “killer Deviled Egg” recipe because they are a favorite of mine and friend, Laura claimed her mother’s method was the best. She was right, and her signature dish morphed into mine. This simple recipe wasn’t easy to get, she had [...]

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