Category: Uncategorized
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Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake & How Recipes Work on This Site
Perhaps you’ve wondered about the timing of recipes, how I get the photographs, if I plan everything out. Perhaps not. But if you’re wondering why this photograph showcases 1/2 of a Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake I can tell you it is because we ate the other half. Last night. For dinner.* So that’s all… Read more
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Peach Scones (with or without Roasted Ginger) & BF Skinner & Books
I had two buns in the oven – no, no, NOT another human baby. Book babies. I have a novel for adults that I’ve just edited and a novel for teenagers (which I suspect will cross over to the grown up side, too). Finishing a book is always an odd sensation – relief, happiness, and… Read more
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Tomato-Onion Soup with Fresh Parmesan & Happy Days
Dear Scott Baio, Thanks for appearing in my dream last night! The party was really fun, even though the staircase had weird turquoise and brown carpet and there were chickens inside your house and there was no soup in my mug. I’m sorry to say that you are 30 years too late in your proposal.… Read more
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Italian White Bean Spread & Birds
The big news around our house is that Will turned 5 last week and, perhaps to celebrate, two chickadees have finally moved into the bird house will built and painted a couple of years ago. He painted it again last spring feeling as many house-sellers do that a fresh coat might clinch the sale. But… Read more
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Creamy Carrot Soup & Play These Games (Mother’s Day Gift)
If I were to make a list of life’s necessities for my kids, my friend, Heather, would be in the top five. Well, not Heather, exactly – I mean, she takes great care of herself but she won’t be around forever – but someone like her. Someone in their lives they can call just to… Read more
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Chicken and Vegetable Pot Pie with Buttermilk Biscuits & Random Bedtime Routines
This is a typical bedtime scene: Julia (age 7 3/4): Can I have a song? Me: Which one? J: Met my old lover in the grocery store. [my husband is apparently working his way through the entire 1970s singer-songwriter genre, a guilty pleasure of mine while driving, so I knew she meant Same Old Lang… Read more
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Deep Dish Salmon, Kale, and Potato Pie & Revisited Recipes
Spring in the UK comes early, and when I brought my daughter to see her godmother in London it was a flurry of blossoms, green stubbled grass, and muddy tromps in borrowed boots. We had a gaggle of kids, and the kind of laughs that are only shared with very old friends, wind-red faces from… Read more
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Passover Leek, Kale, and Bok Choy Gratin & Freedom ’12
As we prepare for family and discussions of religious, political, and intellectual freedom, my family celebrates the year marker of a different kind of freedom. Freedom from the Year That Was, moving past a dark time and into the spring. My son returns to school, the crocuses bloom in the yard, the weather goes from… Read more
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Vegetarian Boston Baked Beans & Bad Songs to Sing at Bedtime
If there’s a skill of mine that will never be rewarded financially, and in fact only serves as a road trip plus or game night choose me incentive, it is my ability for lyric recall. All that brain space that is supposed to be taken up by useful facts and figures is chock full of… Read more
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Red Chard with Citrus-Pomegranate Glaze & Marital Advice for My Kids
Kids, the day will come when you will ask me about marriage. You will want to know how I was sure about your father, and about certainty in love. And here is what I will say: it is easy to imagine and to live the carousel of love, to find the person you want to… Read more
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Banana-Bran Muffins & Sports Parenting
The score is 53-11, and my oldest son is playing on the Brown team, losing to Red. His team of twelve and thirteen-year-olds are still putting all efforts into the game, playing hard. But this isn’t what I’m admiring from the stands. What makes me grin? That they are having fun. Amidst their awkward,… Read more
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Mussels, Clams, & Shrimp Mariniere & Nightlights
“I have an idea,” says the 4-year-old. “I could go back inside you where I lived before I was born. But this time, I would like a nightlight.” PS Yes, the kids asked to have this for dinner. They ate it and loved it…until the very end when my daughter began examining each bite… Read more
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Kale Salad with Parmesan and Golden Raisins & Making Progress
You know how hearing a song can transport you to another time, a specific day, a season, or a person? It’s the same with food. A couple of years ago, my best friend and I had a book event in New York City. We read and signed and mingled and then escaped to a shoebox-sized… Read more
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Quick Skillet Cod with Tomatoes and Onions & The Writing Groove
When I’m deep into my writing grooves, which happens only on Wednesdays when my husband is home with the kids, I have to forage for a quick lunch that won’t break the spell. I’ll be posting some quick lunches that go beyond the sandwich – not that there’s anything wrong with a sandwich! Only, I… Read more
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Crispy Spelt-Poppyseed Crackers & Smoky Eggplant Dip & Crappy Dancing
At my cousin’s 100th birthday party (they are each 50, so had a combined party), I was called up to dance with my husband. “Give me Gershwin and I’d be fine,” he yelled over the music’s din. Hits from the 60s and 80s played and while there was a beat, my husband could not find… Read more