Dinner Diva: Think Outside the Side Dish

How many of us live in households where the dinner plate consists of a serving of meat, starch, and a small portion of vegetables? Now that I eat a Paleo diet, my plate looks a lot different than it once did. No longer do we eat rice, couscous or pasta at my house. When you […]

Dinner Diva: Making the perfectly balanced salad

I serve a large green salad with almost every meal, and this is the time of year I love most, thanks to all of the gorgeous fresh spring greens and vegetables! Since I have this salad thing down to a science, I thought I’d share some tips with y’all as to how to make amazing, […]

Dinner Diva: Thinking outside the lunchbox

Today’s Dinner Diva article isn’t about our evening meal, but it’s an important topic to cover just the same – I hope you’ll agree! I’m talking lunch today, and specifically, lunch boxes. My kids are beyond the “but Mawwwmmmm, everyone else has [insert your child’s most desired petroleum-by-product-based poison of choice here] why can’t I?” […]

Food For Thought: Saving Time is the Key to Saving Dinner

I’m big on preparing fresh meals from scratch, but I also like to be realistic. Cooking should be an adventure, but hopefully a fun one and not a frustrating experience! If you’re trying to transition from feeding your family with packaged meals and takeout to good home cooking, you deserve a big pat on the […]

Food For Thought: Time to Get Organized!

As a cookbook writer and full-on foodie, you can imagine what my desk must look like. Yes, it is stacked with cookbooks, food magazines, and recipes torn from magazines, printed from the Internet, or scribbled furiously on my ever-present legal yellow pad. I have recipes; oh boy do have recipes. I had finally had enough […]

Dinner Diva: A Trip Down Memory Lane

I grew up in the ’70s where wide bell bottoms, Richard Nixon, and Charlie’s Angels reigned supreme. And even though Helen Reddy was singing, “I am Woman, Hear Me Roar”, most homemakers of that time weren’t exactly burning their bras…they were figuring out the art of juggling a home and a career and were more […]

Tip, Trick & a Recipe: Sweet Molasses

Molasses is a by-product of sugar making. Molasses is what is left when the sugar is separated from the juice from the sugar cane. There are three grades of molasses: light, dark, and blackstrap. Here’s today’s TRICK: When using molasses, lightly grease whatever you’re measuring it in so it doesn’t stick and drops out easily […]

Healthy Foods: 3 Ways to Start a New Habit

Dear Friends, One of the pitfalls in trying to get a new habit going (like making dinner, for example) is not being clear on the goal. It’s one thing to say you’re going to make dinner every night instead of eating via the drive-thru, but it’s another thing entirely to quantify your goal. Here are […]

Dinner Diva: What a Waste

I’m sure you’ve heard the old adage, “waste not, want not.” We’ve all grown up with that saying. In our parents’ and grandparents’ time, the very idea of wasting food was unthinkable. Today, it’s the norm with nearly 40% of food purchased wasted every day. When you consider that the most flexible thing in our […]