Every year around this time, usually during a long shopping day of trying to find just the right thing for…well, perhaps, you!, I get a green-eyed grinchy itch in my heart. I see baubles – shiny and beautiful and ON SALE and I just WANT. Gimme. That. Now. I start to stash things in closets...
Infamous after-parties don’t always have celebrity sightings. Some have plates of leftovers pulled from plastic containers and party-goers curled on the couch in fuzzy bedroom slippers. They eat off of paper plates because they’re sick of loading and unloading the dishwasher but they drink coffee from delicate bone china with silver-rimmed saucers because they can’t...
I am thankful for… A holiday dinner where laughter triumphed over dysfunction An injury-free, explosion-less turkey fry Leaves blowing in the air, leaves on the ground, leaves in a pile Leftover carrot cake A second refrigerator! Our birdy, froggy, piggy, and bunny puppet show with the single, repeated, repeated, repeated, repeated immortal line: “Hi, who...
Flat. Iron. and Steak. From an Argentinian rodeo, to a corner bistro in Paris, from your neighborhood Vietnamese grill, to your neighbor’s backyard BBQ, the Flat Iron Steak is being piled high and sliced thin upon porcelain and paper plates all over the planet. Not familiar with the cut? Don’t fret. It’s only been wrapped...
Down South, soaring July temperatures have us begging for cold-as-an-ice-box lunches: chilled bowls of cantaloupe cubes and watermelon chunks, tuna salad with crunchy cold celery hearts, refrigerated boiled p-nuts, and freezer-cold cups of red, garden ripe gazpacho. This is the first gazpacho I’ve committed to a recipe, and like most summers, it took me a...
I can be a star-struck-kinda gal. When I saw Tara Reid– the movie starlet-cum-calamity– at the bellman’s desk outside of the W, the miniature blond was a kludge of platforms, droopy jeans, and infamously altered parts. But, instead of my usual star-stunted stare, I blew her a wish for a life without an entourage of...
Yes, it’s CSA time. It’s time we toss our plastic eating habits in with the recyclables and open our waxed bushel boxes to a reveal a rainbow of roots and verdant greens. It’s time we eat real food; it’s time we appreciate dirt. In this Processed Age of heavily-marketed and seductive chemical concoctions, there’s something...
Yes, yes you do. I don’t quite know what to say. And actually, I suppose that says it all. Sometimes you just need to shut up and think. So, if you’ve been by the Paper Apron lately, you’ve noticed we’ve been sitting in a quiet space- a silent interlude–a rest, a nap, a lull, a...
I am particularly fond of recipes listing fresh ingredients as suggestions– an invitation to use my imagination. This spring roll recipe is exactly that. Let’s just say these are a Southern garden variety of the venerable Vietnamese version that we all love, but rarely attempt at home. I hope you follow the footpath to your...
A Great Cause A couple weeks ago, my friend Amy from Very Culinary asked me and some of her food blogging friends to participate in a video spot to promote the very worthy Cookies for Kids’ Cancer cause. And although I’m camera wary, who could turn down such a meaningful and special charity? Several of...
This is my totem chicken– an offering to the Goddesses of spring. My niece, Caley, dressed up my chicken with daffodil button eyes and budded headdress a few weeks ago and I have been doing it ever since. This Chicken Little’s plumage is spiked with Lily of the Valley, dogwood blooms, carrot tops, cilantro, wisteria,...
