I have something to admit. :::hangs head::: I like cranberries but they are not totally off the charts for me. Nope..I can take ‘em  or leave ‘em. They are good in things like cookies and such..but I would rather have a big, fat blueberry any day. And, canned cranberry sauce is just…ick. We have it because some of the kids like it…but my daughter Erin makes a rockin’ from fresh cranberry sauce so I usually just concentrate on other things…Like dessert.

When I saw this recipe for chipotle cranberry sauce in Bon Appetit I was somewhat skeptical. But I …read more

Coffee chipotle meat rub? Just say WOW! and get it over with — you know you want to.

Seriously, what is not to like about summer…well besides the 107 degree heat? Cooking out is the best! I must admit that Marc likes the gas grill and I miss the taste of good old fashioned charcoal in my burgers but still, there is just something about eating a hamburger that has been cooked out of doors that is amazing.
My dad used to brush hamburgers with a little honey. I can’t seem to replicate that flavor and he never told me how he …read more

Last week we had summer. This week we are back to chilly winter. Who knows what next week will bring?
Did you see this month’s Bon Appetit? The entire thing is devoted to comfort foods. You have to admit, when you are cold and hungry, comfort foods seem to reach right in and fix you up.
And what is more comforting that soup? Nothing except maybe chocolate.

This soup is every bit as good as it looks.  Hubbard squash, granny smith apple, Texas sweet onions, and garlic cloves are roasted to bring out the flavors.  Once the soup is …read more

This is a moist, dense, chewy dark chocolate brownie with a smoky-spicy-sweet raspberry swirl.  I would say it is a great combination but it is more than that. It is just so good.
The chipotle makes these have a little “bite ya back” in the after taste and the smoke flavor adds an interesting layer of flavor.  It sort of deepens the chocolate and gives it an extra layer and depth of flavor.

I don’t cook pork nearly enough.  I just don’t think about it for some reason.  Dear God, I am in a foodie rut!
Anyway, I found a package of center cut loin chops on clearance (love those meat clearances!) for 50% off the lowest price…The lowest price was $10.00 and there was 10 of them in the pack. SO, in the cart they went, nestled against a couple of pounds of burger and a roast.

Anyone who has read my blog for any length of time generally knows that I have a passion for chipotle.
In fact, between Dharm and Valli I am teased about it quite a lot. Well, I just wanted to share my newest chipotle acquisition…
Meet Chipotle.

Chocolate. I like chocolate. I like dark chocolate. I like milk chocolate. I like white chocolate. Chocolate covered cherries…chocolate covered strawberries..chocolate covered raisins…no chocolate covered grasshoppers though.
We host a home group meeting every Wednesday night for our church…Some of you may know them as small groups, or cell groups.  The thing is that if you have people from church coming over, with the possibility of the pastor dropping by, you want to have your house sparkling like..well, sparkling. You want the kids to be perfect, preferably with one of their GOOD school papers laying out in an obvious place so …read more

I have always loved good molasses cookies. The key word is, of course, good. They are hard to find. These are from epicurious with a few of my own tweaks…you will know them when you see them..
There is something about one of these with a cup of coffee that has me sitting in my aunt’s kitchen watching her get a meal for her farming family. Just about the time these would come out of the oven the milk truck would pull up to get the milk and the driver always had to get a couple of these …read more

I feel so silly..after saying how it was an awesome cake and I never tweaked it guess what I did? Yeah. Big time.
Was it worth it?
Yeah. Big time.

First of all I added 1 cup of white chocolate chips to the batter…see, not a big deal at all..but the batter tasted so good..so sweet and I wanted to balance that out..with something…
but what? Hmmm…..What did I have in the fridge? Blueberries!

But they are so sweet…I needed some elusive flavor..but what? Aha!

yes. Chipotle!
So I came up with the most incrredible sauce…to serve with this incredible cake.
Blueberry Chipotle Sauce
(to …read more

Well, that is what we call them here. I have been working on the recipe for dark chocolate chipotle brownies  for a couple of months, ever since I fell in love with the smokey, complex flavor of chipotle and realized that it just is incredibly versatile. And I mean incredibly. We used to do a Monte Cristo sandwich and use a raspberry chipotle sauce as a dip…and the list goes on…
  These brownies are getting closer to what I am looking for, altho I would like them to be a bit more moist and chewy. The flavor is right though…What …read more