Where do banaberries come from, you may ask?  Well *pats seat* come here and sit down.  We should talk.

You see, when a banana and a blueberry love each other very much, they go out on a date.  Sometimes drinking is involved and they end up doing some things they don’t remember in the morning, which is probably for the best as it’s most likely somewhat uncomfortable and disgusting.  Banana sneaks out in the morning to avoid awkward conversation.  And shortly later the fruit of their love is born: the banaberry.

Or…

In coming up with a more succinct name for these muffins I baked yesterday, I shortened the original lengthy moniker of “Banana Blueberry Muffins with Walnut Streusel” by combining the terms “Banana” and “Blueberry” into “Banaberry.”  But that’s hardly romantic now, is it?

Anyway, so I was home all day yesterday.  It was a planned day off to wait for FedEx to drop off my new iPhone (yes, I’m one of those).  What was not planned was that FedEx dropped it off a day early on Tuesday.  But hey, I’d already taken the day off.  Might as well be productive and bake something delicious.

Three somethings, actually.  I made a couple batches of les petits pains au chocolat for Josh, some more cornbread (sans the prosciutto this time) for both of us (but mostly me, really) and a batch of these rather lovely little muffins, which I took to work. Continue reading →

This post is Not Safe For Vegetarians.

I had a delicious dinner last night.  “But, Lauren!” you say, “You have a delicious dinner most nights.”  And you’re right, you crazy kid, you.  But last night was especially delicious.  I dunno, maybe it was the Lauren-friendly sunny, hot weather.  Maybe it was the light, fresh romaine salad straight from my Needle Lane farm share box.  Maybe it was the company of my husband and the relaxed atmosphere of our very old house.

Or maybe it was the pork wrapped pork with the side of pork-filled cornbread.

Oh yeah.  You read that right.  Pork wrapped pork.  Pork filled cornbread.

This whole thing got started because a) Josh’s department was having a picnic-themed potluck and b) I found a recipe for Savory Prosciutto Muffins on EatingWell.  I thought, hmmm, what kind of picnicky item can I make for Josh?  Muffins.  Muffins can be picnicky.  Muffins are an anytime food.  And these proscuitto muffins sound great.  But you know what’s better than regular muffins?  Cornbread muffins.

Cornbread.  Ain’t nothing wrong with that. Continue reading →

That headline’s a reference to Spaceballs, by the way, if you didn’t recognize it.  And if you didn’t recognize it, shame on you.  Your penance shall be sitting down immediately and watching this national treasure of a film—while you’re waiting for this jam to cook down, that is.

So I’ll be up front here.  I am not a domestic goddess of any sort.  I’m barely a domestic imp.  I don’t sew–I can, but I don’t and I don’t have any desire to.  I clean but not nearly as much as I should.  I don’t really decorate.  My gardening skills and interests are minimal.  I don’t can.  (That sentence looks so wrong, by the way.)  I don’t bake my own bread.  And I know those things seem kind of odd, seeing as how I do cook a great deal and I’ll even make my own candy, chocolate, oreos and now I’m working on Snickers bars.  But I dunno.  Canning doesn’t really appeal to me and seems like quite a bit of work for an end result that’s not chocolate.  But I do like jam, and I like it minimally processed (as I prefer all foods to be, except Taco Bell, which gets an exception because it’s not really food anyway).  I don’t like jelly though.  I guess you could say that I’m not ready for this jelly. (No?  No good?  Well they can’t all be winners).  But I do love jam, especially stirred into some plain Greek yogurt with some chocolate chips and walnuts—that’s a winning breakfast right there, my friends.  Raspberry jam is awesome.  But strawberry jam is awesomer still.  Because I love strawberries so, so much.  It’s my second favorite flavor next to chocolate, and right before “barbecue.”  And it’s June!  Fresh strawberries abound cheaply.  Take advantage of it. Continue reading →

Oh yeah, you read that right.

Our farm share started up again–finallly!  One of the best days of my year is the day that I can start picking up our produce box from Needle Lane Farms. This year has the added bonus of us being able to pick up our box at the Depot Town Farmer’s Market in Ypsi on Saturdays, which I love, being that I love a 1 minute drive or 10 minute walk from Depot Town.  Love.  It.  Also, I appreciate local organizations giving local love to Ypsi.

So yeah, last Saturday was a banner day.  Not only had we just come back from our trip to Alaska, but I was all geared up to make my own food and the arrival of the farm share was the culinary equivalent of choirs of angels heralding the dawn.  Well, close anyway.  I was prepared for the usual late spring suspects: the garlic scapes, the radishes, the lettuces, the rainbow colored Swiss chard.  But once again, Needle Lane blew me away and introduced me to something I had never even considered being a possibility:

stinging nettles. Continue reading →

I have been to the mountaintop.

No, really.  I just got back this weekend from a cruise to Alaska and I really did stand on top of a mountain.  Not a very tall mountain, mind you, and it’s not like I was climbing up it, huffing and puffing with my faithful sherpa, Hodgkiss, a few patient yards ahead of me, doing all the real work.  No, I was very comfortably ferried up there by bus, 3300 feet up into one of the most beautiful landscapes anywhere.

So yes, Alaska was fantastic.  I was looking forward to it (I wanted to see whales—and did!) and it did not disappoint.  I mean, who knew that me, Little Miss Sunshine who is always either in front of a computer or iPhone screen, could enjoy being completely wifi-free in the frozen northwest?  Although I will be honest…it wasn’t exactly “frozen.”  Well, parts of it were.  We did see the Sawyer Glacier and that was pretty frozen, as you can imagine.

But the rest of the time, we were blessed with 70 degree, sunny weather.  And the highlight?  Part of me (the cheeky part) wants to say that it was seeing a street performer dressed as Darth Vader playing the violin.

Continue reading →