All natural and unprocessed vegan scones with chocolate chips and cacao nibs make an excellent breakfast option with this easy recipe. “Mom, can we bake? Mom. Mom, I want to bake. Mom, bake. Bake.” After a long flight last Friday I headed straight towards the kids’ elementary school to volunteer. When I finally arrived home later that evening, I was tired. Exhausted. Wishing it was later so that the kids wanted to curl up in bed rather than demand dinner followed by popcorn for... more

A riced-up version of classic German potato salad with whole grain brown rice, crisp bacon pieces, and a honey vinaigrette just for your homemade autumn Oktoberfest (a week late). Yesterday we piled in the car, arms and legs of small bodies, and every ten minutes of our drive to see the in-laws my children asked what town we were in, eagerly looking for the landmarks that indicated we were making progress towards our destination. Cousins and grandparents and aunts and uncles waited, and clearly... more

How to make homemade pasta dough with basil from scratch using a Blendtec Twister Jar (plus, I’m giving one away). The basil here is used similar to how you would make spinach pasta dough rather than just mixing in minced herbs, which results in a green-colored pasta and a strong but not overwhelming basil flavor. This past Sunday we headed off to the farmers market to find the vendors are slowly starting to clear. It happens every year around this time when their particular items are done... more

A recipe for an easy creamy tomato sauce with a vegetable-loaded pasta from Amber of Bluebonnets and Brownies. If you’re reading this, it’s a sure bet you love Shaina. I think she’s pretty phenomenal, myself. When I think back to the first time I met her, at BlogHer Food in 2010, (I swear, I thought she was 18), I remember vividly her sweet smile and sparkling mischievous eyes. Our Shaina, she’s one of a kind. In case you haven’t heard, Shaina wrote a book, and has been... more

The classic seasonings and brown sugar flavors of Biscoff speculoos cookies are baked inside biscotti and begging to be dipped into your favorite seasonal latte. I’m sitting on the counter swinging my bare feet, the floor two feet away. It’s summer, and I’m in shorts, my legs sticking to the counter when I shift my weight so that I have to peel them off like a bandaid, only less painful. On the counter next to me is a goldenrod mixer. Just past the mixer are the plastic gallon... more

Make your own homemade Italian soda with fresh pear syrup and top it all off with cardamom cream. My house is full. There are four small bodies that fill it daily with their voices, loud and fun, quiet and contemplative. They fill it with their clothes, hastily thrown in the corner, discarded in the middle of the living room floor, mountains of cloth smelling of the grass and dirt where they spent their day. Their toys spring up from the rug as if their seeds were planted there and they are spontaneously... more

Looking for inspiration on what to pack in your kids’ lunchboxes as they head back to school? Here are a few fun lunchbox ideas to get you through the year (or at least the first half of it) in this month’s Eat Well, Spend Less series. I pull the white cotton sheet over my head and pretend the world does not exist. Being woken up to the sound of my husband’s alarm blaring at 5:45 a.m. after having just crawled into bed at 2:17 a.m. is a painful reality. If I can just keep my eyes... more