Dutch Baby Pancake

Dutch Baby Pancake

There are about a million and a half things that I love about having a day off. I love not having to wake up early or shower (yay, hygiene!) or put on makeup. I love drinking a cup of strong coffee curled up on the couch watching an episode of The Office. I love the feeling of productivity at home — laundry, dishes, vacuuming, dusting. And, my ultimate favorite thing about a day off? Cooking! 

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Last week, I took a day off of work to do all of those things, and I kicked off my spontaneous day of relaxation with a recipe from Chrissy Teigen’s Cravings.

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Mix and Match Quiche.

Mix and Match Quiche.

Skyler and I are not great at executing on a meal plan. I’ll use our Whole 30 experience as an example.

On Whole 30, it’s absolutely critical to plan your meals, because the ingredients that you’ll need to use are weird and expensive and hard to find, and because if you don’t have a plan, you’ll be overcome with the desire to call it quits and order a pizza or you’ll eat a steamed bag of broccoli for dinner, and literally no one in the world actually wants to have a steamed bag of broccoli for dinner. So, we planned! We made a weekly calendar and hung it in the kitchen. Monday: shepherd’s pie. Tuesday: sweet potatoes stuffed with buffalo chicken. Wednesday: salmon and brussel sprouts. Etc. Etc. Etc. And then Monday would roll around, and it would be the kind of Monday that really actually feels like a Monday, and my desire to spend an hour making shepherd’s pie and then clean a heaping pile of dishes would be 0. And then on Tuesday, Skyler wouldn’t be in the mood for buffalo chicken. At the end of the week, we would have existed on a random assortment of compliant foods that made zero complete meals, and we’d have a fridge full of fresh vegetables that were no longer very fresh.

And that fridge full of leave-me-in-here-one-more-day-and-you-won’t-be-able-to-eat-me vegetables is a thing that we just can’t seem to get ahead of. Until today, when I threw all those ingredients into a lip-smacking quiche!

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Blueberry Sour Cream Pie.

Blueberry Sour Cream Pie.

I woke up this morning in an embarrassingly messy hotel room. Think: A trail of clothes littered across the floor, open boxes of half-eaten chicken fingers and cold french fries, empty cups strewn haphazardly across the desk, a sticky uncorked bottle of wine, and the contents of my purse decorating the nightstand. Ahhh, St. Patrick’s Day. You were a fun one this year.

As I lay in our luxurious king-size bed mindlessly scrolling through social media, I came across a picture of a cherry pie. An advertisement for Country Living or some similar magazine. Mmm. Pie. And suddenly, that single photo was the beginning of my downfall and I couldn’t get pie off my brain. I mentioned my plan to Skyler – “I want to bake a pie today. Can we stop at the grocery store on the way home?” – and he grunted in my general direction. He clearly was not as excited as my grandiose pie plans as I was. It seems that hangovers hit us in very different ways.

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Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Brown Butter and Sage.

Sweet Potato Gnocchi with Brown Butter and Sage.

The past week and a half has been kind of a lot. It’s been emotional and trying and hectic, which in turn has just drained me (a serious introvert) of all my (very extroverted) energy. But then Sunday came around, and I had a bit of respite.

Skyler woke up early and headed out to hunting camp with a few of his buddies, leaving me at home with our three snuggly little pets and no plans of any kind. And although I gave him a hard time about leaving, if I’m being honest, it was just what I needed. An entire day to be at home, with myself, and just be. I needed to press pause on life, enjoy the quiet and recharge. That reset button looks different for everyone, but for me, it meant spending a whole lot of time in our kitchen.

After a quick trip to the grocery store (in my pajamas, because it was my day and who cares), I whipped up a batch of cappuccino biscotti, and then I set my sights on dinner: sweet potato gnocchi with brown butter and sage.

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Savory Sausage & Zucchini Galette

Savory Sausage & Zucchini Galette

Like most Fridays this summer, I woke up slowly. The sun slowly crept through the windows with the sounds of the world (and my little family) coming to life outside. It’s my favorite thing about mornings – the calm and quiet that permeates the early hours.

But I also woke up really excited. I planned to treat myself to a manicure and pedicure, knock out a few to-dos from our seemingly never-ending list and head to the rehearsal dinner of two of our favorite people at one of my favorite restaurants. And… I was going to make my very first galette.

I can’t say if it’s the crisp cool that has been slowly invading the foggy mornings around here, or if it’s just because fall has been on my mind a lot lately, but it’s definitely something. I can’t put my finger on why, but I have been completely consumed with the idea of baking a galette. (Truth be told, I’ve never even tasted a single bite of a galette, but still, I’ve been hellbent on making one of my own.)

The defining factor of a galette is that it’s a free-form pastry, baked without the stability of a pie pan or tart ring. The dough is rolled out flat, then folded around the filling. But the true appeal of a galette lies in its unsophistication. It can be anything you want, but as long as you’ve used good fruit or vegetables for the filling and real butter for the dough, it will bake up into something golden brown and utterly gorgeous, the kind of pastry you’re excited to whip up anytime.

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Sweet Christmas Treats: Ginger Cookies.

Sweet Christmas Treats: Ginger Cookies.

When I think about Christmas cookies, I think of the magnificent and decorative almond-flavored cookie-press cookies my great-grandmother used to make. Shaped like trees or candy canes, in one color or many, they were tradition. Every Christmas. Cookie-press cookies. It was like clockwork. Admittedly, I’ve tried a few times over the years to recreate her infamous treats, but to no avail. I just can’t seem to mimic her recipe.

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Baked Cheddar Eggs & Potatoes.

Baked Cheddar Eggs & Potatoes.

Every morning, I eat a salad for breakfast. A bean salad, to be specific. Coffee bean salad. Okay, every morning, I drink coffee. A ton of it. I don’t actually eat breakfast.

I know, I know. It’s the most important meal of the day. But during the week, breakfast just isn’t a priority. But on the weekends? Well, that’s a different story. I love breakfast (and especially brunch) on the weekends. So, when my sista from anotha mista Brittany came into town, we decided to spend our Saturday morning in the kitchen, whipping up some breakfast grub. (I mean, what else is there to do the morning after the Pirates take down the Braves 3-2? Besides binge watch How I Met Your Mother on Netflix, of course.)

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Armed with a short grocery list and hungry stomachs, we hit the grocery store for the supplies we needed to make Baked Cheddar Eggs & Potatoes.

Ingredients: 3 tablespoons of butter / 1.5 pounds of diced red potatoes / Minced parsley / Salt + pepper / 8 eggs / Extra sharp cheddar cheese, or your preferred flavor

Directions: Preheat oven to 400˚F. / In an ovenproof skillet, heat the butter over medium-high heat. / Add potatoes, and cook until golden and tender. / Stir in parsley, salt and pepper to taste. / With a spoon, create four wells in the potatoes. / Break two eggs into each well. / Bake for 9-11 minutes. / Remove from oven, and sprinkle with cheese. / Bake for an additional 1-2 minutes. / Serve immediately with a mimosa. Or a manmosa. Or a bloody Mary. Or just your favorite breakfast cocktail. / Enjoy with a good friend.

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