Random Recipe Meets Danish Apricot Pinwheels

What pretty little crumbly confections! They are sitting pretty on my countertop because I was instructed to pick a random recipe ...

Staffordshire Oatcakes, Baked Apples, The Hobbit, and More

"In a hole in the ground, there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort."
                                                                                                         - JRR Tolkien

Thanksgiving Breakfast - Coffee and Chocolate Kugelhopf

This month's We Should Cocoa almost brought a tear to my eye - a joyful tear, for what better combination could there be than bread and chocolate? Bread AND chocolate!

Bring on the Bird! Apple Cider Turkey Brine ...

Well, I feel like I've been away for a very long time ... so sorry if you have popped in to see what's what only to be faced with more peanut crusted chicken! I have been soooo busy working on the final preparations for my church's holiday fair that I had to set The Spice Garden aside for a couple weeks.  I had to concentrate on hand-sewing and press articles and ads, seeking contributions from local businesses and church members, setting up, decorating the church hall, taking down, counting money, saying thanks to as many folks as I can come across, etc etc etc ... it's exhausting for a hermit like me. And just when I finished that project, SB has begun the 'Bring on the Bird!' chant - I am out of the frying pan and into the ... brine!

Peanut Crusted Chicken with Pineapple Salsa

 

 

This month is National Peanut Butter Month, apparently! Oh, the lowly peanut ... such a humble little legume that sits squarely at the center of so many paperbag lunches, crinkles in many a bag at the ballgame, and gets munched on many a transcontinental flight. I've joined a small group of folks that intend to do more sophisticated things with the peanut, however. I scoured the Cooking Light website and found a tasty peanut-crusted chicken appetizer, as a starter for the Virtual Supper Club's peanut- themed feast.

 

Pumpernickel Bread and Dad's Sandwich ...

Pumpernickel Braid

When I was a little girl, sandwiches were one of the typical lunches that Mom would make us. During the week, a peanut butter, egg salad, tuna fish, or bologna and cheese sandwich always sat neatly wrapped in wax paper and nestled in my little tin lunch box. It would always have a small indentation from an apple or orange or a mis-shapen corner from being swung about in the lunch box on the way to school. Sandwiches were the staple of every school kid's midday meal and I was no exception. Unfortunately, mine were always made with a spongy white bread that came from a plastic bag. In my case, the store-brand or Nissen Bakery brand.