Food Diary

Brown sugar is a staple ingredient in my pantry, but there are times when I find myself running out of it and needing a replacement in a pinch. Usually, I would zip over to the store and buy some brown sugar, but you can also make brown sugar easily at home. This basic recipe will produce a brown sugar that is similar in color and flavor to the “golden brown” brown sugar that you can buy at most grocery stores, a great all purpose brown sugar that can be used in any recipe. For a lighter flavor, simply cut back the molasses to 2 teaspoons. If you want a stronger molasses flavor for a “dark brown” brown sugar, increase the molasses by 2-3 teaspoons. How to make homemade brown sugar: Combine 1 cup of white sugar with 1 tablespoon of molasses and mix until completely combined. You can mix the molasses in by using a fork or, believe it or not, by using your fingers to “rub” the molasses in the exact same way you might rub butter into a pie crust. That said, the process goes much more qu

There’s not much I won’t put in a tortilla.  This comes with plenty of early training.  I think I came home from fourth grade and everyday made a peanut butter and jelly ‘sandwich’ in a cold flour tortilla.  It took me a few months to navigate how to keep the precious filling from slipping out the end after biting through the tightly rolled peanut butter burrito.  It took me another few weeks to figure out that tortillas don’t work well in a toaster, but do fair well over the flame of the stove burner.   But, we’re here to talk about other tortilla things now that I’ve mastered what to put in a tortilla and how to get it in my face.  Sweet potato and bacon tacos.  They could be dinner, they could be lunch, maybe add some scrambled eggs and call them breakfast. Continue reading Sweet Potato and Lardon Tacos at Joy the Baker.

As the seasons change, a new one has begun for us. As of this week, both Alex and I are full-time A Couple Cooks. For years, we’ve both been working full-time at a technical writing business here in Indianapolis. I was at the company for 13 years and Alex for 10 years. (If you’re wondering, I was his boss!) We’re incredibly grateful for our time in the business world working with corporate clients, which gave us a huge amount of experience and knowledge. Our work in food started as a hobby seven years ago. As of this week, Alex and I are officially both creative entrepreneurs working in the food industry…and officially co-parenting little Mr. Larson. It’s a new chapter! The focus of this new season is creating margin, space for exploration, and focusing on family. Our 20’s and early 30’s were full of work, work, and more work. Once Larson entered our life, we knew it was time to press the Reset button. Our passion for cooking, food writing, and photography has also grown to a place w

The first time I heard of Nantucket Cranberry Pie, I was on the hut for recipes that used a lot of cranberries, but were a little bit different than what I usually made. The pie is actually a cake – though it could be considered to be a crustless pie – that is loaded with fresh cranberries and baked in a pie shell. I’ve seen a number of different variations, but all of them are easy to make and very delicious. In fact, this just might be one of the easiest desserts you can make with fresh cranberries. To put my own twist on this favorite, I baked up a Nantucket Cranberry Orange Pie. It not only contains plenty of cranberries, but it is studded with buttery walnuts and has a touch of orange zest in the batter for a bright citrus flavor. Cranberry and orange is a classic combination that I use a lot during the holidays. The pie is put together in two parts: a filling and a topping. The filling is nothing more than cranberries, sugar and chopped walnuts (you can also use pecans, if you

Gingerbread is a classic holiday dessert, whether you are enjoying it in the form of gingerbread men or as a layer cake. Gingerbread is a molasses cake that is flavored with ginger and other spices for a rich, sweet cake that will warm you up on a cold winter day. Trader Joe’s introduced a Gingerbread Cake Mix for this holiday baking season, which provides a simple way to whip up a gingerbread on a moment’s notice. The cake mix is made with powdered molasses – to get that rich molasses flavor without having to measure out any and add it yourself – and a blend of cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg. It also includes crystallized ginger bits, for extra ginger flavor. The mix is easy to put together, requiring the addition of an egg, oil and water. The crystallized ginger is already mixed in with the dry ingredients, so there is only one packet inside the box that you need to worry about. It bakes up quickly into thin, moist bars that smell wonderful as soon as they come out of the oven. I serv

There are some things I do with great ceremony in the kitchen.  Work butter into a pie crust, chop carrots for a soup, butter up a whole chicken for roasting.  It can all be pretty precious. A luxury, really. Truthfully, I do these same things in a total slap-dash if I’m in a hurry and need the comfort of pie, soup, or crisp chicken skin in a dang hurry.   Let’s talk about making risotto.  It’s all ceremony.  The simmering broth, the toasting of the rice, the spooning and stirring, spooning and stirring.  I do it well here:  Mushroom and Sausage Risotto .  It’s a dream. Continue reading Baked Lemon Spinach Risotto at Joy the Baker.

One of the most eye-catching pumpkin desserts you can bake is a Pumpkin Roll Cake. It is loaded with pumpkin and pumpkin pie spices, but it is a bit lighter than a pumpkin pie, making it a great choice for a holiday dessert after a big meal. The swirled design of the cake is actually easy to make, so you don’t have to be an expert baker to pull off this delicious dessert. The recipe starts with a sponge cake batter that includes pumpkin, pumpkin pie spices – cinnamon, ginger, cloves and nutmeg – and plenty of eggs. All of the rise in this cake comes from beating air into those eggs, not from leavening. Beating the eggs can be done with a hand mixer or a stand mixer and you’ll be able to see them triple in volume – and holding on to a lot of air – as you beat them. The pumpkin is whisked into the eggs, but the dry ingredients are folded in to keep as much air as possible in the batter. That said,  you need to completely incorporate both the pumpkin and the dry ingredients, so don’t wo

We've talked potatoes and pumpkin pie to death so let's move on to solving dinner problems for all other days of the year. I would take one of these lasagna squashes over a majorly brown thanksgiving plate any day. Sorry, bah humbug. Last year, I had dinner with some of my dearest college girlfriends at Malibu Farms (have you seen their cookbook ? It's beautiful and casual and colorful) and I still think of this spaghetti squash dish we shared. It was creamy, but not overly so, could be ordered vegetarian or not, tasted like comfort food but didn't sit in your gut as such. I know in the season of cooking and romantically long prep time with your glass of wine and holiday tunes, this recipe may come off as old news, but a simple dinner is what I am more interested in in the long term. I made four, and my kids mostly poked at it. They saves well and can handle a reheat the following day or perhaps you have another couple over to share. I made a few notes in the headnote

This post was created in partnership with  Roxbury Mountain Maple . All opinions are our own.  We’ve got a giveaway! See entry rules below. Have you ever wished that you could visit your past self? What would you tell that person as “Future Me”? Recently I stumbled across a blog post I wrote almost 2 years ago. It was for a recipe with maple syrup, but the words were about what was on my mind at that moment. Reading these lines today makes me feel a tingle, like looking into a window in the past (a quote from this post ): “Alex and I are in a long season of squirm-inducing uncertainty, waiting to be matched with a baby who will be our forever child. There’s no roadmap; we could get the call at literally any time. And it’s the weirdest thing, to be waiting for a baby to fall out of the sky… We wait with a boxed crib in an empty room, and try to distract ourselves from wondering, who this little one will be? Is it true, that a little human will someday inhabit that room, whose piercin

Cranberry sauce is a fall and winter staple in my house. Not only do I serve it alongside turkey at Thanksgiving, and with a variety of other roasts during the season, but I also bake with it. Sweet-tart cranberries are a common baking ingredient, but cranberry sauce isn’t necessarily the type of cranberry that gets used in recipes (fresh/frozen whole cranberries and dried cranberries are much more common). Though you might not have used it before, if you’re a fan of cranberry sauce, you’ll want to give this cranberry-swirled Leftover Cranberry Sauce Cake a try. The cake recipe starts with a buttermilk cake batter that is swirled with cranberry sauce. The cake has a dense, tender crumb that is flavored with both vanilla and almond. It is soft enough to almost melt in your mouth, but sturdy enough to support the weight of the flavorful cranberry sauce. I usually use homemade cranberry sauce in this bundt cake – this one is pictured with my Cinnamon Cherry Cranberry Sauce – but any w

Hello sweet friends!   Tell me you’re deep into this weekend feeling your finest!  I’ve indulgently got the heater running, and so far have the Christmas lights up on my tree.  It’s been one of those weekends with lots of joy and gathering, some chores and some sorrow, but here we are greeting another day with gratitude.   Here’s some of the links that struck me this week.  I hope you find a handful of food reads:  •   All the garbage comes and goes but be happy, be thankful – getting old helps. Continue reading Let It Be Sunday, 147! at Joy the Baker.

Happy Holidays! This year we’ve put together a little holiday gift guide. Of course, our favorite gift idea for the season is our soon to be released cookbook, Pretty Simple Cooking ! The book tells the story of our journey from eating fast and frozen food to cooking every day. It’s full of 100 vegetarian recipes, with a focus on simple and creative. It also features our 10 lessons for making cooking a part of your everyday, each beautifully illustrated by Ashley Rodriguez . It’s part real food eaters manual, part beautiful coffee table book. If you purchase as a gift, download the holiday version of the cover and wrap it up ! Books will arrive February 6. Here’s our gift guide—let us know if anything strikes your fancy! For book lovers… Pretty Simple Cooking is perfect for the home cook in your life or anyone who wants to cook more! Other cookbooks we love: Vegetarian Heartland, a Midwest-focused seasonal book with beautiful photography by Indiana author Shelly Westerhausen, or Lov

One of the traditions in my family is to open a bottle or two of Martinilli’s sparkling apple cider with Thanksgiving dinner. This tradition arose so that the kids could have a fun drink that could be served in a wine glass to fit in with the grown ups – and their glasses full of real wine – at Thanksgiving. We liked it then and we still like it now. The effervescent cider is a delicious beverage for people of every age. That being said, I do like to do things a little differently around the holidays and this year I’m doing that by making my cider even more festive by incorporating it into a cocktail: the Martinelli’s Apple Cider Mule. This drink is a riff on a Moscow Mule, an incredibly popular cocktail that is made with vodka, lime juice and ginger beer. To make that basic drink a little more fall-friendly, I substituted the vodka for bourbon and used a combination of ginger beer and sparkling cider. Grating a little bit of fresh cinnamon on top gives in a wonderful fall aroma bef

This is me, creepin up behind you while you’re whisking together your Thanksgiving gravy tomorrow.  This is me, whispering in your ear as you’re pouring gravy into the gravy boat.  This is me, asking to lick the gravy spoon.  This is me, encouraging you to set aside (hide, really) some Thanksgiving gravy to transform into salty-sweet caramels this coming weekend.   WHAT?   Yes.   Turkey gravy, in all of its savory saltiness, in a CANDY.  It’s possible, it’s delightful, it’s inspired by the Detroit ladies of BonBon Chocolate .   Think about it.  You love a salted caramel. Continue reading Turkey Gravy Salted Caramels at Joy the Baker.

The turkey might be the star of the show on Thanksgiving, but it wouldn’t be a real holiday without all the delicious side dishes that go with it. From green beans to mashed potatoes to wine, you’ll find plenty of inspiration in this post to make your Thanksgiving a memorable one. But keep in mind that you have to save some room for the turkey – which might be difficult when your table is loaded up with these goodies! Bundt Pan Stuffing – As much as I enjoy stuffing, I’ll admit that it’s not always the most attractive side on the table. Mix up your presentation by baking it in a bundt pan this year! My post includes a recipe for an easy stuffing, but you can use the technique with your favorite recipe. Roasted Garlic Mashed Potatoes – Wrap a head of garlic in aluminum foil and throw it in the oven while your turkey is roasting, then you’ll be ready to make these rich, delicious garlic mashed potatoes. Roasted garlic is surprisingly sweet, so it will give the potatoes a terrific ga

Hey! First of all, thanks for all your cheering words on the news of our marriage . That was fun! Secondly, I promised a lot of persons on instagram that we would share a chocolate recipe which currently goes by the working name Taco Brownies . But all the interest in them made me a little anxious so I’m heading back into the kitchen today to test another round before we’re ready to post them. Here is something to snack on while you wait. A peanut butter sandwich and a green smoothie. Technically, a sandwich hardly qualifies as a recipe. But what we want to say with this point is really just that you should try peanut butter on a savory sandwich. I love all kind of nut butter sandwiches and even if I usually top it with  sliced bananas ,  apples , strawberries or a sweet compote, this savory version is my most recent addiction. Crispy lettuce and cucumber add a nice textural contrast to the sandwich without competing with the peanut butter flavor. The cottage cheese makes it moist

Stuffing is an absolutely delicious side dish to serve along with turkey or chicken. While the bread-based mixture is traditionally stuffed inside of the bird you’re cooking, most food safety experts recommend cooking it outside the bird to ensure that it gets hot enough and doesn’t harbor any raw poultry juices inside. I’ve always made stuffing – or dressing, if you prefer – in a casserole dish because I enjoy the crispy top that it gets when it bakes that way, but the presentation for stuffing always leaves a bit to be desired. This year, I decided to explore some new ways to show off a stuffing so that it looks as good as it tastes when it gets to the table, like baking it in a bundt pan! This Bundt Pan Stuffing is made using my basic Vegetarian Stuffing recipe, one of my easiest and most-made recipes, but you can make it with any stuffing recipe that you like. If your recipe fills up a 9×13-inch pan to the top, it is enough to fill a bundt pan. If it is less than that, you’ll ne

I’ll tell you now that, as a former bakery counter girl at The Cheesecake Factory (heeeelllppp), I know my way around a tiramisu.  When I say I know my way around a tiramisu, please know that I mean, I would happily thaw out a tray of their frozen tiramisu and take the first, freshest slice all for myself.  No shame in the game. Listen… if you’re going to make me wear those awful white jeans and long white apron… expect that there are consequences by way of me eating all of your desserts at my whim.  This week I’m offering a no-bake take on pumpkin dessert at my Thanksgiving table inspired by my sneaky bites of tiramisu from years past.   Lady finger cookies are soaked to soft in very strong coffee that’s been spiked with bourbon. Continue reading Pumpkin Spice Tiramisu at Joy the Baker.

A basic cranberry sauce is nothing more than fresh berries, sugar and water, but sweet-tart cranberries pair well with a wide variety of other Cranberry sauce is a staple on my table when I’m serving Thanksgiving dinner or other roasts in the fall. The berries themselves are very tart, but with a generous addition of sugar, it turns into a sweet-tart sauce that compliments everything from turkey to roast beef. This Cinnamon Cherry Cranberry Sauce uses both cranberries and cherries for a fruity sauce that is both sweet and tart in every spoonful. The fruits are combined with white sugar, brown sugar and cinnamon sticks on the stovetop. The cinnamon sticks add a nice hint of spice without overwhelming the fruit and I steep them in the sauce from the time it starts cooking until it has completely cooled and is ready to serve. If you happen to make any fall centerpieces, the cinnamon sticks will be a beautiful red color after cooking, so feel free to rinse them off and add them to your c

For some, Thanksgiving is and will always be about turkey. Other eaters are more adventurous, and love the challenge of incorporating interesting new traditions at the Thanksgiving table. Alex and I are flexitarians, meaning that we eat meat once in a while. At Thanksgiving, we like to offer several options to make everyone at the table satisfied. This week, my sister and her husband have flow in from Thailand, and my parents from Minnesota. There are both voracious meat eaters and veggie lovers at our table, so along with a meat entree we’ll offer a vegetarian main dish as well. After seven years of posting vegetarian main dish Thanksgiving recipes, we’ve built up quite a collection. Here are our 10 favorite vegetarian main dish Thanksgiving recipes–each of which we can vouch for as a delicious and something the entire family will love. 1. Pumpkin Goat Cheese Baked Gnocchi This is a new main dish this year and our most popular recipe for the season. The gooey gnocchi are drenched in