 Cheers to the new bride.🥂 We've spent the last weekend celebrating the engagement of our girl and creating memories that will last a lifetime. As a mom, it warms my heart to watch my child be surrounded by people who love and support her. I'm truly grateful for all of the friends and family who generously and wholeheartedly showed up for her during special season of her life.
On a blog post that celebrates the girl who sprinkles sunshine wherever she goes... this sugar cookie biscotti recipe couldn't be more appropriate. Did I just compare the future bride to a crunchy biscotti? Yes, I did.🤣 But the sweet, colorful, sprinkle filled treat really does seem fitting for this girl who referred to herself as "cookie" for the first 3 years of her life.😂  I also think I just unlocked the key to seasonal biscotti. I'm picturing green sprinkles for St. Patrick's Day, red, white and blue for the 4th of July and red and green sprinkled biscotti for Christmas. Why haven't I ever thought about this before? 🤣 Sugar cookie biscotti with customized sprinkles may be my new go-to for holiday breakfasts.  Sugar Cookie Biscotti 3 cups flour 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder 1/2 cup butter, room temperature 1 cup sugar 3 eggs, room temperature 2 1/2 teaspoons vanilla 1/2 cup rainbow sprinkles
 Bake 25-30 minutes at 350.
  Ciao!
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 Warm February days have me ready to put away my winter sweaters and pull out the shorts and sundresses. Last week I was basking in 80 degree weather and this week, I'm contemplating putting the flannel sheets back on the bed just to keep warm at night.🤷🏻♀️ Welcome to February in Georgia.🌞❄️🙃 I'm certainly not the only one who caught a little Spring fever during our warm spell last week though. I took a walk through this beautiful park in Savannah last week and there were lots of people soaking up the sun and laying in the grass trying to get a head start on their summer tan.👙 🌳🌷😎
Within in 2 days of coming home from Savannah, the daffodils in my garden started to bloom so I took that as a sign for me to officially launch into full blown Spring mode.🌷😅 (I'm in denial about the fact that it was only 20 degrees last night. 😰) For the next couple of weeks you can find me outside - tidying up my garden, pruning back the roses and getting ready to plant summer vegetables - even if I have to wear a wool scarf and gloves to do it.🧣🧤🤣 Over the years, I've slowly transitioned to planting more fruits than vegetables in my garden. Last year I gave up on the carrots, broccoli and beans and I grew tomatoes, pumpkins, raspberries, strawberries, blueberries and lemons.🍅🎃🫐🍓🍋 Clearly... I have a sweet tooth.😂 I love fresh fruit but unfortunately, so do the animals who live in my yard. The birds eat more than their fair share of the blueberries and the squirrels love to eat my strawberries but I can hardly blame them though - there's nothing like the taste of home grown fruit.🫐 🍓🐦⬛🐿️  Strawberry season has been known to start as early as the first week of April in Georgia so I'm already preparing. And by preparing, I mean, stocking up on my favorite dark chocolate bars so that I have plenty on hand when I'm ready to start dipping fresh berries.😅🍫🍓 I'm also dusting off some of my favorite strawberry recipes so I can have them handy when I get home from the berry farm with a bucket full of fresh strawberries. This is one of my new strawberry cupcake recipes and if you've ever wanted to know what Spring tastes like - just take a bite of one of these.🧁 Holding the refreshingly light lemon cupcake filled with bright and tangy lemon curd, topped with sweet strawberry cream cheese frosting and a fresh berry on top is like holding Spring in the palm of your hand. OK, that was a little much but seriously - these are amazing and you should try them. 🍓🍋
Strawberry Lemon Cupcakes 1 cup butter, softened 1 cup sugar 4 eggs, room temperature 4 teaspoons vanilla 1/2 cup fresh lemon juice 2 and 1/2 cups flour 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 cup whole milk 2 Tablespoons lemon zest Filling 1/3 cup lemon curd Cream Cheese Frosting 2 Tablespoons strawberry jam 1 Tablespoon lemon juice
 Divide cream cheese frosting in half. Add strawberry jam to one half and 1 T. lemon juice to the other half OR make it all strawberry.   Pipe swirls of cream cheese frosting over cooled cupcakes.   Ciao!
 Watch from the sidelines. This was my motto for last weekend - and not by choice.😂 I had the best of intentions, a detailed plan and a house full of out of town visitors coming to stay. But instead of following the plan, I ended up sitting on the couch all weekend with a nasty case of strep throat.😩🥴 I had no choice but to cancel all of my plans and rest while I waited for my tonsils to return to their normal size.😔 My poor family. Let's just say that I'm not so great at sitting still.😬 I did my best to slow down and consume massive amounts of antibiotics and hot tea in an attempt to speed my recovery but I wasn't happy about it. 😷  By the grace of God, my mom was here to take over the cooking for the weekend. Is there anything more comforting when you're feeling under the weather than your mom's home cooking? It doesn't matter how old you are.😁😅 She saved dinner on both nights that she was here. She made spaghetti and meatballs and homemade pizza - 2 of my favorites.🍝 🍕 Thanks mom and dad!!! My parents went back home on Sunday so it's soup from the freezer for this girl for the rest of the week. Someone please send me the scientific studies that proves that eating homemade vegetable soup cures sickness. And if I eat twice as much - will it heal me twice as fast? 😁 And to be clear - I'm not above swapping my Cheerios for minestrone soup for breakfast if it will heal my throat.🙃 This Minestrone Soup is exactly what the Dr. ordered this week. Not actually - but I feel like he should have. 🤣  Minestrone Soup 2 Tablespoons olive oil 1 yellow onion, chopped 2 carrots, peeled and chopped 2 ribs celery, chopped ¼ cup tomato paste 2 cups chopped vegetables (I used potatoes, corn and green beans) 4 cloves garlic, minced ½ teaspoon dried oregano ½ teaspoon dried thyme 2 (15 ounce) cans diced tomatoes 4 cups chicken broth 2 cups water 1 teaspoon fine sea salt 2 bay leaves Pinch of red pepper flakes Freshly ground black pepper 1 cup small pasta (I used lumanchine) 1 can (15 ounces) cannellini beans, rinsed and drained 2 cups baby spinach 3 teaspoons lemon juice Freshly grated Parmesan cheese
 Add pasta, beans and spinach. Cook, uncovered, 20 minutes.  Remove pot from heat. Stir in lemon juice and remove bay leaves.  Serve with a sprinkling of parmesan --- or not.🤣
Ciao!
If I can offer you one piece of party planning advice to you it would be this - do NOT host a party while jet lagged.🫥 Even though you may feel like your body is adjusted and your mind is clear - take if from me - it's not!🤣🤪 The kids used our house to host a birthday party for our sweet 1 year old granddaughter last weekend and I actually felt pretty good considering that I had returned from 24 hours of traveling just 2 days prior. Key word - felt.😂 I felt fine and I looked okay but my brain was definitely not engaged.🙃 The kids did all of the shopping, the cooking and decorating for the party. My only job was to provide a smash cake and a batch of cinnamon rolls. Easy enough - right?? They took care of all the leg work - I got to sit back and enjoy.  I often joke that I could bake a cake in my sleep and last weekend - I'm pretty sure I actually did some sleep-baking.😅 With no time to spare, I arrived home after my long flight on Thursday night and I immediately launched into baking autopilot.🧑🏻🍳 I started by baking the cinnamon rolls and the smash cake and then I went right into making a 2 tier birthday cake for the party guests.🎂 This 40 serving cake was NOT in the plan but somehow in my fatigued brain fog state - I was certain that I was baking a dessert that I had already committed to making. 🤷🏻♀️ It wasn't until after the cake was fully baked, assembled and decorated that I realized that we had decided not to make a cake for the guests.🤣 Oh well, a little extra cake at a party never hurt anyone.🍰 What does hurt is being so jet lagged that I forgot to serve the 5 dozen cookies that I had baked and stored in my freezer before I left for vacation.🤦🏻♀️ To make things worse - I didn't even realize that I had forgotten about the cookies until 4 days after the party! The jet lag is real people. My brain is definitely not firing all all cylinders yet.😜 Anyone need 60 Silly Goose cookies??🤣  Vanilla Cake 3 and 2/3 cups cake flour 1 teaspoon salt 2 teaspoons baking powder 3/4 teaspoon baking soda 1 and 1/2 cups butter, softened 2 cups sugar 3 large eggs + 2 additional egg whites, room temperature 1 Tablespoon vanilla 1 and 1/2 cups buttermilk, room temperature
 Bake 23-27 minutes at 350.  Fill with buttercream frosting.  There are lots of vanilla cake recipes out there so if you're looking for a new homemade vanilla cake that almost as easy as a box mix - this is the recipe for you. Save it for another day and subscribe to my blog to get the recipes delivered to your inbox.
Ciao!  Well, I didn't manage to get my life together enough to send out my regular my Valentine's Day blog post this year - I'm blaming jet lag.😅✈️ I had the best of intentions of arriving home after flying half way around the globe and jumping right back into blogging but unfortunately, it turns out - I'm only human.🤣 Did you know that you can't simply wish jet lag away?🤷🏻♀️ I'll share more about my most recent trip soon - turns out I also drastically underestimated the amount of time that it takes to get hundreds of vacation pictures sorted out too.😅 So today I'll take a much needed break from trying to organize my photos into some sort of sensible order and share one of my favorite chocolate torte recipes with. you.  I made this chocolate torte over and over again last Christmas. It's decadent and rich and the perfect treat to serve after almost any meal. It's also gluten and dairy free so it's a great option if you have guests with dietary restrictions. You also won't have to make a special trip to whole foods because all of the ingredients that you'll need for this recipe are most likely, already in your pantry - and your liquor cabinet. 😉  Flourless Chocolate Torte 6 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder 1 teaspoon espresso powder 2 teaspoons vanilla 1/4 cup + 2 Tablespoons water 2 Tablespoons rum 3 eggs 3/4 cup + 1 Tablespoon sugar 2/3 cup olive oil 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder 1/4 teaspoon salt 1 1/2 cups almond flour
 Bake 40-45 minutes at 325.   Ciao!
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