• Peach Ginger & Bourbon Slushie
    Blog,  Cocktails,  Food

    Happy Labor Day!

    I hope you are all enjoying a lazy holiday with friends and family, and just in case you need a delicious new cocktail to toast to the end of summer, I thought I’d share this Peach Ginger and Bourbon Slushie. It’s amazingly refreshing; the peaches and bourbon taste like they were made to go together, and the ginger and lemon give it a zesty kick. If it’s hot where you are, this is the perfect drink to cool you off. And if it’s chilly, close your eyes, take a sip of this through your straw and it will make you think you’re at the beach. You can’t miss. Happy Labor…

  • Honey & Lavender Glazed Fruit
    Blog,  Dessert,  Food,  Gluten Free

    Special Anniversary Dinners

    Eleven years ago on a gorgeous September evening, in our friends’ backyard in Everett, Greg and I got married. Four days after that we moved to a tiny town on the edge of the Blue Ridge Mountains called Jasper, Georgia where we lived for about fourteen months. We had a house on a couple of acres and my favorite parts of that house were the open kitchen-dining room and the back deck overlooking our huge sloping backyard, which was surrounded by tall white pine trees. Many of our best times there were wrapped around cooking and eating meals with each other and with the friends we made. Crab boils on…

  • Summer Peaches
    Blog,  Dessert,  Food,  Gluten Free,  Motherhood

    Peach Cobbler

    Peaches seem to surprise me every year. I never crave a peach. Maybe because I’m much more of a savory gal than a sweet tooth. I always, always look forward to tomatoes and onions and squash blossoms from the garden, dreaming up all the savory recipes I can make. When the season is over I miss them, especially summer fresh tomatoes.  But I never crave a peach.  Somehow, though, when late summer brings those juicy sweet, a tiny bit tart peaches to the market I am in love. Maybe it’s because they truly are amazing in their season; you can smell them before you even see them. And maybe it’s…

  • Blog,  Food,  Gardening,  Writing

    Showing Up

      What do you do when something you love that’s creative, that normally gives you energy, purpose, enjoyment, instead just drags you down?  Even though it’s late summer, a gorgeous one, and the garden and farmers’ markets are bursting with fresh deliciousness, I have to admit, I’m in a cooking funk. For someone who loves to cook and loves food with a passion, this does not feel good. I even went to the library with the kids this week and checked out a bunch of cookbooks hoping to get inspired and I felt blah about all of them, just like I’m feeling blah about my kitchen and cooking these days.…

  • Mint Syrup
    Blog,  Cocktails,  Food,  Gardening,  Preserving

    Making Homemade Syrups

    There’s so much I want to write about right now, so many things happening in the garden, some good, some weird. So many delicious things I’ve been eating and drinking, some gorgeous cookbooks I’ve been having fun with, writing deadlines from goals I set for myself that I’ve been trying to meet while my two mini-dictators still insist on me actually paying every single second of my attention to them, and weird, weird computer photo issues driving me insane. But since we are having another gorgeous weekend here (I’m pretty sure I’m bragging at this point), let’s combine the garden, food & drinks, and cookbooks together, and make some homemade syrups…