Sunday Prep: Meatballs

I officially discovered this amazing thing called Sunday Prep.  I don't do Sunday prep for lunches like you usually hear of people talk about, but I do it for dinner!  And it's awesome!  I usually try to pick a "base" that I can use in 2-3 meals and then dinner on Monday and Tuesday is completely effortless!

Heartwood Roastery

I'm a coffee fiend.  It's not just a "I-have-to-have-a-cup-in-the-morning-or-I-get-a-headache" kind of thing...it's a "I-need-to-have-3-to-4-huge-cups-a-day-in-order-to-feel-like-myself" straight up addiction!  But since I drink my coffee black, quality is extremely important to me.  And trust me when I say that it's pretty hard to find anything great at the grocery store, let alone from a dreaded Keurig machine!  So when I find a local coffee roaster that makes ahhhh-mazing stuff, it's a pretty big deal.  I'm officially professing my love for Heartwood Roastery.

Ham and Cheese Breakfast Bake

Great news!  The wedding planning is going great...which means a little time has cleared up in my schedule to return to blogging.  Phew!  I was missing it!  But planning the most epic wedding Cleveland's ever seen takes a lot of time!  Anyway, now I'm getting back into the groove of my normal food-obsessed self and doing things like making risotto on weeknights and hosting fancy brunches on weekends - my favorite things!  Last Sunday, Howie's parents were staying with us and I made them a Ham and Cheese Breakfast Bake that my family has been making for years!  This isn't just any old ho-hum egg bake.  It's my favorite egg bake!  It's just so tasty and different from the breakfast dishes you're probably used to making because you crush Corn flakes over the top and drizzle it with melted butter before you bake it in the oven.  It sounds strange, but it's an explosion of flavors and textures!  Try making it for your sweetie on Valentine's Day tomorrow!

Chicken Noodle Soup

Happy New Year, everybody!  I apologize for the lack of posts in the last couple of weeks, Howie and I have been diving head first into the wedding planning which is a lot more time-intensive than I could imagine!  Anyway, I hope you all had a happy and healthy holiday season filled with family, friends and traditions!  If you're like many of us (myself included), you succeeded in the happy but not the healthy part because of that lingering cold that seems to be going around!  Chicken Noodle Soup is always my go-to if I'm feeling under the weather, so I thought it would be a great recipe to kick off 2016!  But then again...it's also pretty perfect for the twenty and thirty-something degree days that have finally hit Cleveland!  Enjoy!  

We're Engaged!

Big news!  Howie and I got engaged on Friday night!  We are so unbelievably excited and have had a blast telling our closest family and friends/celebrating with these family and friends allll weekend long.  I think I've had more champagne in 2 days than I have in my entire life put together!

Sugar Cookies

If there's one holiday tradition that I couldn't live without, it would be decorating Christmas Sugar Cookies with my younger brother and my mom.  We've been doing it for as long as I can remember, and it's definitely evolved into my most cherished holiday memory, year after year.  We laugh, we make the biggest mess in our kitchen with sprinkles everywhere, we try to eat cookies when they're piping hot out of the oven and we play our Now That's What I Call Christmas CD from, ohhh probably 2001.  It's a total blast!

Holiday Shopping at the Cleveland Bazaar

Is your holiday shopping almost done?  If you haven't even made a dent in it (ahem, like me), be sure to check out the Cleveland Bazaar, an amazing indie craft show located in the 78th Street Studios that is happening this weekend only.  There's hundreds of super talented artists, food, drinks (a little liquid courage always helps you spend your money right?!), music and an eclectic, hipster crowd.  All of my favorite things!  I love how many Cleveland-based gifts some of the artists sell.  From funky jewelry to oil paintings of Terminal Tower to clocks made from reclaimed wood taken from demolished historic buildings around town, there's something for everybody.  I definitely got my history-loving, clock-collecting Grandpa that last gift from Rustbelt Reclamation for Christmas 2014 and he loved it.  So when is this happening?

Saturday: 10 am - 9 pm / Sunday: 10 am-6 pm @ The 78th Street Studios near Gordon Square
 (AND IT'S FREE, unlike The Flea which is apparently $5 admission now!)

See you there!  Probably tomorrow because I'm making my first turkey ever today for a Friendsmas dinner tonight.  A little intimidated but if it's super tasty like I'm hoping, expect a post for the recipe!

The Easiest Pie Crust

So you're the lucky one tasked with making the famous Pumpkin Pie for Thanksgiving dinner this year.  You could be lazy and pick one up at the grocery store.  Or you could be semi-ambitious and make the filling yourself and put it in a good old Pillsbury ready made crust.  Or you could just *gasp* make the pie and the crust yourself.  I swear on my life that this is the simplest pie crust ever - it's made with just 4 ingredients and is still super flaky.  The best part of all is that I consider it foolproof...in all the years I've made it, it's never once ripped on me while I was rolling it out.  Time to be the Turkey Day all-star in your family!

Bliss In A Bottle

Even though I love going out and exploring the Cleveland scene, there's just something beautiful about staying in when the temperature drops below fifty degrees.  Which is like every single day until May, right?  Ugh.  Instead of giving my Netflix and DVR some extra love last weekend, I decided to get together with a fabulous group of friends for a girls night in.  We laughed, we gossiped, we ate, we drank...it was a magical combination of things.  Especially when the eating and drinking part involved wine and chocolate.  And the flavor profiles of the wine and chocolate perfectly complemented one another.  Just wait.  The wine bottles were actually dipped in chocolate!

Do you hear church choirs singing and light shining down from above because you finally found heaven on Earth?  I sure do!  The handcrafted chocolate covered wine bottles made by Bliss in a Bottle are not only delicious, but stunning!  I couldn't think of a more perfect gift for the holidays, a birthday, a housewarming, a Saturday night in with the girls, any moment of time on any day of the week...

Apple Cinnamon Cranberry Bread

So I just came to the mind-shattering realization that Thanksgiving is 2 weeks away.  Where did the fall go??  Why haven't I started listening to Christmas music??  Just kidding about that last one.  I had you, didn't I?  The only thing I seem to be on top of this season is coming up with some ahhhh-mazing holiday recipes!  Like Apple Cinnamon Cranberry Bread.  Seriously though, the sweet apples, tangy cranberries and fresh orange zest combined with a heavenly brown sugar cinnamon mixture that caramelizes on top of the bread when you bake it in the oven...it's just perfect.  On top of how great it tastes, the bread is light enough that you can serve it for breakfast on Thanksgiving or Christmas Day and it will tie your guests over until the scrumptious dinner!

  Let the holiday season officially commence on the blog!

How to Perfectly Roast Chicken

Do you want to know something funny?  Well I think it's pretty funny at least.  It's that almost every single person I know assumes that since I have a food blog I make all sorts of elaborate recipes every single night of the week for dinner.  HAHA!  Newsflash - I'm only human and rely on chicken, hmmmmm, let me think about it...4 nights of the week.  Minimum.

Breadsmith

I'm not quite sure that there is much more I need in life besides bread.  I don't discriminate...white bread, wheat bread, cinnamon raisin bread, especially garlic bread...they're all fine by me.  I'm sure that you probably feel the same.  If you don't, then either your diet is extremely unfortunate, or you haven't been to Breadsmith in Lakewood yet.  This awesome locally-owned bakery makes some of the best loafs I've ever had!

Pancetta Quiche with Carmelized Peppers & Onions

Even though people will tell you that breakfast is the most important meal of the day, they're wrong.  At least on Saturdays and Sundays, when it's all about the art of the brunch. 

In my crazy mind, breakfast is about getting that perfect low-calorie balance of fruits, veggies, whole grains and protein.  Boring.  But brunch is a whole different animal!  It has to be slightly greasy, because it's a weekend, treat yo self!  It also has to be super flavorful because brunches at restaurants are always delicious and, let's face it, easier than making all of this at home.  And most importantly, the meal must be enticing to people who rolled out of bed at 7am for morning yoga and people who are going back to bed after this meal because they closed down the bars last night.  Tough crowd!

One of the most perfect brunch recipes that I can think of is my Pancetta Quiche with Caramelized Peppers and Onions.  This savory, cheesy, melt-in-your-mouth quiche is easy to prepare thanks to this awesome thing called refrigerated pie crust, but has a sophisticated flair from the sweet and crunchy Pancetta.  Brunch game strong! 

Sticky Asian Chicken Tenders

If you're cool like me a.k.a. a 90's baby, there's no doubt in my mind that chicken tenders were in your top 5 favorite foods growing up.  Probably alongside pizza, hamburgers, french fries and mac & cheese, am I right??  Okay Howie, I believe chicken fingers is the correct terminology in Buffalo.  I just got major girlfriend points for that.

Anyway, sometimes I still want my childhood classics, except with the flavor turned up.  And not out of a frozen bag.  And minus the whole deep frying part that adds loads of fat and calories.  That's where Sticky Asian Chicken Tenders come in.  I bread chicken tenderloins in panko bread crumbs, bake them with a drizzle of olive oil to add that unmistakable crunch, and then toss them in Ree Drummond's Orange Chicken Sauce and top them with chopped green onions and peanuts.  A little sweet, a little tangy, a little crunchy...a little perfect!

Cleveland Beer Week

In case you've been hiding under a rock for the past week, it's Cleveland Beer Week.  That's right, it's the magical 10 days of the year when Cleveland restaurants have "brewery takeover" nights, which basically equates to meet and greets with Brew Masters from your favorite breweries, free glasses almost anywhere you order a pint and super-delicious small batch beers, some of which are brewed exclusively for Cleveland Beer Week!  I've been to a few of the events, mostly because I love collecting different pint glasses..."collecting" meaning I'm 25 years old and really need to build my dishware collection...

But the food's great, the people are great and the beer's especially great.  So what are you waiting for?  Be sure to check out the Cleveland Beer Week Events page on their website to see what's happening tonight...and tomorrow...and Saturday and Sunday too, of course!  And if you have a chance to sample the Fathead's Jungle Juice Head Hunter IPA like we did last night at Forage Public House, I strongly encourage it!

Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Sugar Glaze

Howie left me alone in Cleveland this weekend to go to the Bills vs. Giants game...which means I finally have a Sunday that doesn't involve football!  Not that I don't enjoy football or anything, but it's about time I get caught up with my "life" things a.k.a. decorate my porch and fireplace mantel for fall, make Slow Cooker Garlic Rosemary Beef Stew and bake the all important Pumpkin Cookies with Brown Sugar Glaze.  Let me tell you, these suckers are addicting!  Like so addicting that I'm actually going on a run right now before dinner because I ate three in the last 2 hours.  And I'm probably going to have three more tonight.  And I actually don't even feel that bad about it because I'm just being seasonal.  Oh gosh you have to try these perfect fall cookies!

Beach Hopping in Bocas del Toro, Panama

Okay, enough with the city parts of Panama that you read here and here in my first posts about Panama City and on to the real reason you visit...the rainforest and the beach!  Since there are not many resorts in Bocas del Toro, every single beach in the islands is still lined by plush rainforest.  The scenery is stunning and truly unlike anything I've ever seen in my travels!  

What makes the beaches of Bocas del Toro even better is that they each give off their own vibe so that no two days of the trip are exactly the same...Cayo Zapatilla was the most remote and serene, Red Frog Beach had massive waves and some funky beachside restaurants and Playa de las Estrellas, clad with hundreds of starfish, was a pure daydream.  Can you just take me back already?

Chicken Paprikash Soup

You guys...today marks the official start of my favorite time of year!  Fall!  Although, let's be real - I bought a pumpkin cinnamon candle, pumpkin spice coffee and had pumpkin-flavored ice cream from Mitchell's last week.  I guess you could say that I've never been one to appreciate the present.  But now that the temperature is going down into the mid-50s every night and I've been waking up freezing every morning, I think I can justify some cozy cool weather food!   Like soup.  Like Chicken Paprikash Soup.  Oh my gosh, I think I love fall so much because soup season officially commences.  And trust me, this Chicken Paprikash Soup is the ultimate comfort food!  It's creamy - but not heavy -and full of roasted chicken, potatoes, onions and garlic in a light herb broth filled with a delicious paprika flavor.  It's the perfect one-pot-meal for a chilly fall day!

Panama, Part 2: Panama City & Bocas Del Toro

Good Morning.

After a delightful, much-needed slumber in the ultra-plush sheets of the Hard Rock Megapolis Hotel, we were ready to explore Panama City for a few hours before our flight to Bocas del Toro.  You know me, always up before sunrise...Howie thinks I'm a freak of nature.  Maybe I am.  But hey, rolling over in bed and seeing first light behind the skyscrapers and distant mountains is any architects fantasy.  And did I mention we got upgraded to a suite??  Thanks Hard Rock, you rock! Now on to Day 2 of our adventure!  Let's just say we were beyond thrilled to see the sun shining after being in a permanent splash zone the day before!

No Place Like Home...Panama, Part 1: Panama City

Howie and I officially scratched Central America off of our travel bucket list last week during a wild and adventurous trip to Panama.  After having the opportunity to visit a cosmopolitan finance capital, a quiet beach town, the Pacific Ocean, the Caribbean Sea, the rainforest and a gorgeous Spanish Colonial Old Town - all in a single trip - I can most certainly promise that this won't be my last time visiting Central America.  There's no doubt in my mind that the most spectacular part about traveling to Panama was that it still felt like a secret.  I was at some of the most astonishingly beautiful places I had ever been in my life, but knew that only a handful of other people had laid eyes on the landscape or stepped on the terrain.

Welcome to Panama, the "land of 1,000 fishes"...and perpetual bad hair days.