Food

Do you do meatless Mondays? This asparagus farro risotto with sweet peas is a great choice. Farro is my new favorite grain.

Asparagus was 88 cents a pound at the grocery store last weekend. Yay! Seriously, I was really excited. Sometimes, it’s the small things in life.

My husband, Jade, heard about using a cast iron skillet to make deep dish pizza while listening to the Splendid Table. We finally got a cast iron skillet last fall to make honey sage cornbread, but we haven’t used it all that much. Jade was interested to see how a pizza would turn out in a cast iron skillet, so he decided to give it a try.

My new office gives us unlimited hot drinks. Most days, I stick with my favorite earl gray, but the past couple afternoons, I’ve indulged by sipping a couple pre-packaged hot chocolates. Those little packets bring back memories of building snow forts and giant snowmen in my front yard.

For my daughter’s first birthday, I decided to make a homemade funfetti birthday cake for a couple reason. First, it’s cute and looks pretty. Second, I made a low-sugar healthy smash cake for my son’s first birthday, and he didn’t dig into it like I had hoped.

I’ve been on a soup kick lately. Maybe it’s because it’s winter (but it’s like 80 in Phoenix today, so cold weather isn’t the motivator). Really, I think it’s because soup is so comforting.

I love cooking in our crock pot, especially on the weekends. You throw everything in first thing in the morning, and by dinner time, you have a hot and hearty dish. Crock pots dishes are just so easy to make and not at all fussy.

Over the holidays, along with sugar cookies, I made some of my childhood favorites — puppy chow and special k bars. If you haven’t tried these no-oven-required recipes before, you should. They are ridiculously easy to make and really yummy. The perfect chocolate and peanut butter desserts recipes ring in the new year and a new year of life.

A lot has changed this year. Two biggies—my daughter Giada was born and we left California and moved back ‘home’.