Browned Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

{ tap tap tap }
Is this thing on?
Testing 1-2-3
{ clears throat }

Ahem!  So, uh, yeah.  It's been a minute since I last popped up here.  A year to be exact.  Oh, I've lurked around here occasionally, checking to see if anyone is doing any clicking in my absence.  But, posting?  With new recipes?  Obviously, no.  And now that I've finally (finally!) summoned up the bravery, I'm still trying to remember where all the buttons and links are in here.  AWOL blogger problems, no?

Let's see... Where did I leave off?  Oh yes, I had surgery (which turned out just fine, btw), and my parents were coming to visit a few weeks later.  They got all settled in, and then we sprang the news on them - we were eloping!  While they were here!  Yep, Bo and I decided to elope and threw the whole thing together within a month.  All my parents had to do was take me dress shopping and help make my wedding cake.

Chicken Lettuce Wraps

 

I just want to pause a minute to let you know how over-the-top amazing you are.

The other day, a few of you spotted one of my photos on someone else's site, without mention of where they found those tasty pictures.  And not only did you take the time to find my recipe here and then alert me to the use of my photo, but - and here's what warms my sugary heart - you noticed.  You recognized my photo.  You remembered.

Tangy Cucumber and Avocado Salad

Oh, I'd forgotten how yummy this recipe is!  I went digging through my cooking notebook (which is just shy of completely falling apart), and rediscovered this recipe I had saved four years ago.  Whoops!  And now, I'm wondering what other amazing recipes are in there that I'd forgotten about?

Friday Fun: Foodie Holiday Calendar

{ image source }

Huge thanks to The Kitchn for posting this link!  I was lamenting to Bo (well, he was lamenting, actually) that I'd missed National Cheesecake Day - July 30.  And I'd missed National Ice Cream Sandwich Day - August 2.  And apparently, my birthday is National Cherry Pie Day?!  Odd, considering that cherries don't come in season until the heat of summer!  Anyway, I've always wanted to know what food holidays were coming up, so that I could do something to celebrate.

Cookie Dough Bites

And then, there were cookies for her.

That's right.  My turn!  Which means, some funky recipe that's swapped out sugar for something crazy.  You know me by now, yes?

Once again, Pinterest has delivered something fantastic and fun.  It's absolutely my new favorite recipe, and I've made it no fewer than four times over the past ten days.  Oh, yes, I have.  It honest-to-goodness tastes like cookie dough, and the texture is a bit chewy like a granola bar.  It takes 10 minutes to whip up, and doesn't require any oven time.  You may eat the entire batch while you're standing there at the counter.  Or maybe that's just me.

Fancy Sandies

Guess who's got a working fridge again?!  Meeeeeeee!!  That's right.  Bo found the horribly expensive part, ordered it, and got it installed on Saturday.  I now have a fridge stocked with perishables.  Hurrah for almond milk and eggs!!  (It's the little things, no?)

Friday Fun: My Favorite Pins This Week

A Teaspoon and a Pinch on

Blueberry-Peach Crisp

If you follow me on Twitter, you'll know that at the end of last week, our fridge stopped working (and I was tweeting with excessive exclamation points).  It just wasn't getting cold; the freezer worked perfectly, the fridge not so much.  So while Bo researched ways to fix it, I researched ways to use up ingredients before they went bad.  Enter... Blueberry-Peach Crisp!  I had fresh blueberries and peaches sitting in my fridge drawer, just waiting to get used in something yummy.  I grabbed a stick of butter from the freezer and set to it.

Friday Fun: Peanut Butter Pup-Cakes

(Please bear with my cell phone photos.  My fancy camera's memory card went kaputz.)

You've all met Rory, haven't you?  With all this crazy heat we've got this summer, I decided that she deserved a frozen treat too.  And ohhhhh, how she loves them.  They're quick to make and cost about 1/4 the price of similar frozen dog treats in the grocery store.  Perfection on all fronts.

G'Day! And a Giveaway!

Now, you totally know where I went, right?

My company sent me to Brisbane, Australia to lead some software training, and I'm almost recovered from the 14-hour time difference and two stints of 24-hour travel to get there and back.  Whew!  But it was a fantastic experience, especially because I spent my one day off taking a river boat tour out to the Lone Pine Koala Preserve to see some furry natives.  It was such a fun - and beautiful day - that it made my whole trip worth it.

Strawberry Lime Granitas

Yum, yum, yum, yum, YUM!  This little recipe is just way too easy and delicious to skip!

It's a bit like an amazing strawberry-lime slushy popsicle you eat with a spoon.  And with only 3 ingredients, and no need for an ice cream maker, it's seriously your new favorite thing.  You can mix this up with other fruits (watermelon, anyone?!) and citrus; just follow the same basic steps.

Shrimp and Pasta Salad

'Morning!  I did some whirlwind cooking over the weekend, and came up with a couple of great summertime recipes.  Hurrah!

This one is a gussied-up version of a basic shrimp salad.  It was tasty straight from the recipe, but I amped it up by adding pasta and capers.  The pasta adds some carbs to balance things out, and is an inexpensive way to make the salad go further.  It would definitely be great with a whole wheat or gluten free pasta, so use whatever you like best!

A Coffee Blackout

Let’s talk about the color of that coffee up there.  What color would you call it – Taupe?  Beige?  A nice creamy caramel?  Certainly not the color of coffee straight out of the pot. 

Which brings me to the point of today’s post: I need your help.  I’m now resolutely on a mission to wean myself off coffee creamer, and I’d love all the help I can get.  

Lime & Salt Popcorn

Know what they say about the best laid plans?  Exactly.

I had planned to make granitas yesterday, but instead of 90+ degree sunshine, we got cool and glorious rain.  Couple that with a free HBO weekend, and my Sunday suddenly became all about movies on the couch.  And what better snack than some jazzed up popcorn?

Meal Planning

Happy Friday!!  What have you all got planned for the weekend?  Anything fun for me to be jealous of?  We're talking about going downtown to watch some crazy Redbull Soapbox races, but other than that, we don't have much going on in the way of fun.  Chores are a given :)

I just wanted to drop in and let you know that I've added a new Tab up top there.  Yeah, "Meal Planning."  Sounds tremendously exciting, I know.  But when a friend recently asked me for menu ideas, it got me to thinking.  See, every Saturday morning, I sit down with a trusty notepad, the grocery ads, some cookbooks, and a steaming cup of coffee.  Preferably, on our back patio, if the mosquitoes are off attacking someone else in the neighborhood.

Sugar Cookie Bars

Oh boy.

So this is what I threw in the trash on Sunday.

I know.  It doesn't look half bad.  So let me explain...

Let's first talk about pan sizes and baking times.  We all can pretty much bet that if you spread a bowl of cake batter into a 9x13" pan it's going to take longer to bake and bake up taller than if you spread that exact same bowl of cake batter in a 13x18" pan.  Right?  A wider pan means the batter will spread more thinly, turn out shorter, and take less time to bake.  Ok.  So now that we're on the same page -

Lemon Brownies

(aka Lemon Poundcake Bars)

Because sometimes, I really just want to bake.  With super-processed white flour and boatloads of sugar and a few sticks of butter thrown in for good measure.  I've missed my normal baking, so yesterday, I decided to just embrace it and have some fun in my kitchen.

I came across these bars on Pinterest and thought they sounded perfectly summery.  In all honesty, the recipe is pretty much my Vanilla Poundcake recipe, using lemon zest and juice instead of vanilla.  Which, of course, means it's soooo good.  A fantastically moist lemon poundcake bar that's both buttery and light, with a zesty glaze that ties it all up with a bow.

Sparkling Strawberry-Mint Limeade

A few things about this recipe:

1.  YUM!  I mean, I kinda knew I would love this recipe because, hello?  Champagne + strawberries + lime + mint!  That combo is just so yummy and perfect for sipping on a patio.

No Sugar Coconut Pecan Cookies

Hi!  My name is Sara!  I used to post fairly regularly on this little blog here and then a bunch of life happened, and I straight-up disappeared on you.  Whoops.

Every have one of those months?  Where everything extra you've been successfully juggling for forever suddenly seems like way too much, and you sit down and say "WHOA" and put the brakes on everything except for the most essential?  Yeah, I'm just now recovering from one of those.  My house is still a crazy mess, but my laundry is all caught up!  And I grocery shopped this weekend!  Baby steps, people, baby steps.

Friday Fun: Playing with Pic Monkey