I do apologize for my quiet recently. It all stems from some exciting news, which is that after years of bubble sitting, Ken and I finally bit the bullet and bought a house. I say “bought” but we don’t own it yet. Please keep your fingers crossed. It’s not a fun process.
Of course, this probably more exciting for us than it is for you, other than an increased variety in backgrounds to food photography you see on Savour Fare, and a period of quiet while I’ve been stressing, packing, organizing, purging, drinking very large glasses of wine and lukewarm margaritas (it was an EMERGENCY), packing, stressing, packing some more, and not cooking. Seriously, we’ve been living on hamburgers (frozen, courtesy of the George Forman Grill) and toast. A lot of toast. Good thing I really like toast. I’ve also been a bit, um, distracted, with my new project. So not enough posting. I’m sorry. Maybe I’ll come back and teach you how to make a lukewarm margarita in an emergency (hint: it involves not measuring the tequila).
Of course, this means I found myself, a couple of Sundays ago, due for book club and having NOTHING to bring. (I said I’ve been busy, but book club is sacred. I need my girl time. And there needs to be carbs). So I whipped up this very basic coffee cake based on things I had in my house and one cookbook that had escaped the boxes (I keep finding cookbooks in the oddest places all over my house). Now you know my staples. (I know buttermilk seems like a weird staple, but buttermilk biscuits and dressing can save almost any meal). And this is delicious — gooey, decadent — not at all the plain coffee cake I envisioned. And it comes together in a flash, too. Don’t try to unmold it — you’ll just lose all that gooey, sticky icing. Just scoop it out with a spoon. If you’re under just a tiny bit of stress and you need a good hit of carbs and sugar, this has DEFINITELY got you covered.
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Tags: brunch·easy·weeknight
I don’t really understand the marketing of Mother’s Day. I see all these floral pastel cards and delicate lacy handkerchiefs and early morning breakfast in bed and advertisements for “brunch” and “afternoon tea” with fussy hats implied. Let me set the record straight. I am a mom, and I know a lot of moms. An informal survey of what our ideal Mother’s Day would look like involves 1) sleeping in; 2) a pedicure with some celebrity gossip magazines; 3) sushi; 4) chocolate and 5) lots of wine. Maybe this holiday doesn’t sell so well on a greeting card, but it sounds pretty awesome to me. Too awesome to be an also-ran Mother’s Day. Maybe I will name it something else, like “Saturday”. And it will fall once a week.
If your Mother’s Day veers towards the more traditional, or you’re trying to fill the time between pedicures, sushi and wine, try cooking brunch at home, and avoid the overpriced and overcrowded restaurant brunch options. (For more on this, see Brooke of FoodWoolf’s insider’s take on the restaurant Mother’s Day brunch. If you’re not feeling confident in your hollandaise sauce, or you’re a late sleeper yourself and don’t want a giant fuss in the morning, this is the brunch dish for you.
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Tags: brunch·cheese·eggs·holiday·Mother's Day
I’m not much of a muffin girl. Despite my rather extreme sweet tooth, I don’t tend to like sweets for breakfast, and most muffins are just cupcakes without frosting. And the times I actually want something sweet — elevenses or tea time — a muffin doesn’t quite cut it. I might as well have the frosting. Or a cookie. Or a bacon salted caramel brownie.
And it doesn’t much help that most muffins are not worth the paper they’re baked in. Take the blueberry muffin — what really should be the king of the genre. Most are cakelike, too sweet, with an indifferent texture that has neither the chew of bread nor the tenderness of a good cupcake. The exterior tends to dry at best, sticky at worse, and they always seem to insist on serving ice cold gluey blueberry muffins on airplanes. The thought makes me shudder.
But then I encountered these muffins.
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Tags: berries·brunch·fruit·muffins·teatime
