CTB 2014 - Williams Sonoma - New York

I have two full containers of corn meal in my cupboard. I was making pizza and bought some. Then I was making another pizza and bought another one. What's a girl to do with all that corn meal? 

Make fried polenta!

This stuff is so freaking good. It's a side that takes a bit of preparation, but it's totally worth it. 

I made a similar recipe many many years ago, when I was still in grad school. When I happened on this recipe in the Williams-Sonoma - New York City cookbook, I knew that I had to make them again. Especially since this recipe was classed up with mushrooms and mascarpone cheese. 

You should definitely make this for dinner. It's ah-mazing!

Morel Risotto

I wanted to take a minute to thank you all for helping out with my bake sale benefiting Relay for Life.  With your help, we were able to raise over $350 for the cause!  Thank you so much!  I'm very excited to take part in the Relay this coming June.  Now, to celebrate our successful fundraiser, I've made you a fancy dinner.


They're so weird looking!

According to my mother, I have spent 26 of my 30 years on this earth going to school.  I started pre-school at the sweet age of 3.  Blonde with ringlet pigtails, I headed off into the world to learn my ABCs and 123s.  Apparently I wanted to go to school the year before because my brother was going and I was jealous. 

I always liked school.  I liked learning, taking tests, doing homework and bringing home good grades.  When I got a good report card we went to the toy store and I got more Barbies.  High marks = more Barbies.  That's some good math for a little girl.

As I continued through high school, the Barbie brides fell away and I simply realized my nerd potential and kept up my good grades.  I don't think it would surprise you if I said I took advanced placement chemistry and placed in the top of the New York State Chemistry challenge.

I spent a year in college, trying to pretend that I wasn't a big old nerd.  I was a photography major!  I spent hours learning about shutter and aperture, shooting roll after roll of film and wandering blindly through the color darkroom.  I wasn't a nerd, I was an artist!  Unfortunately, I was doing better in my calculus classes than I was in my art classes (I am not a painter).  Come sophomore year, I switched majors and the rest is history (or a story for another time!).

Indian Pizza

On our most recent trip to Europe, Boyfriend and I had some pretty amazing food. I would say it was some of the best food of my life. We started with authentic Indian food in London, a perfectly roasted chicken in Paris and amazing pizza in Italy. We ate schnitzel in the Alps, wieners at a castle and finished up our trip at a dimly lit restaurant, smiling over plates of curry. It was a crazy twelve days.

Yes, I said twelve days. We travelled through seven countries in seven days. We would have made it eight, but just couldn’t see how to get to Belgium and make our flight home. In honor of this crazy week and a half in Europe I decided to combine two great culinary palettes. Indian plus Italian equals delicious.