John and I always plan our vacations around food. We (along with my sister) spend a good chunk of our beach vacation finding the best seafood, the best ice cream, the best restaurant, etc; we spent our honeymoon eating our way through Thailand; we added Spain and Morocco to John’s conference in Vienna for the…
Bobotie (South African Curried Beef Casserole)
Have you ever found a cookbook that nobody has ever heard of by an author no one has ever heard of and it turns out to be one of your most reliable, successful cookbooks? I’ve written about this book before, but I just have to reiterate it again: David Ricketts’ Home Cooking Around The World…
Eat Write Reatreat 2011: Fettuccine in Bianco with Asparagus, Mushrooms and Asiago Cream
As most of you know, I attended Eat Write Retreat this past weekend. I am (I think) one of the last attendees blogging about it–it amazes me how fast people got their review posts out. I needed time to sleep, to drive home, to sleep, to relax, to process the entire event, to sleep some…
Spicy Southwestern Rice & Bean Bake: A Review of Not Your Mother’s Casseroles
Christmas came to The Spiced Life this May! A friend of my dad’s, who graduated high school with him, passed my card onto his daughter, who works for The Harvard Common Press. She has my pre-mom dream job, she works in the cookbook division, where she also worked on their cooking blog (Harvard Common Press…
Cuban Mango Cake with Coconut and a review of A World Of Cakes
I mentioned a while back that some friends and I had started a supper club in my small town. We started with Italian and then most recently, with me hosting, we did Caribbean. I immediately volunteered for dessert because I saw a great opportunity to give Krystina Castella’s A World of Cake a test spin…
Pakastani Baked Pork with Lime & Black Cumin served with Pakastani Rice with Mint and Red Peppers: Silk Road Gourmet Reviewed
I love cookbooks. I love reading them, using them, and writing about them. So it only seems natural that cookbook reviews are starting to become a portion of what this blog does. In many cases I purchase the book out of my own interest, in some cases the publisher contacts me–but in a select few…
Whole Grain Chocolate Chocolate Cookies: A Rant and A Recipe
This is a vent and a recipe. I tried to think of a good way to connect them and all I came up with is life is short so have some cookies but have some whole grain cookies so your life is not too short.
“Bakery Classic” Chocolate Chip Cookies: A Review of Milk & Cookies
This is an ambivalent review of a cookbook. Which is kind of weird, but I just want to be clear from the start that I both like and am frustrated by Tina Casaceli’s Milk & Cookies: 89 Heirloom Recipes from New York’s Milk & Cookies Bakery (which, by the way, I chose and paid for–no…
Meyer Lemon Thins & A Cookbook Review
I am not sure I have given Alice Medrich’s Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cookies a proper review. I’ve now made 5 cookies from it: these, Extra Chocolatey Biscotti (they did not make it on to the blog because of traveling, but I hope to feature them soon), “Hawaiian” Wedding Cookies, Chocolate Mint Sandwiches, and…