Desserts 
Chocolate Pudding, Not Kidding
Valentine’s Day next week, and few days ago we toasted our Mixed Greens’ two-year anniversary (thankyou dear readers). In celebration – okay, Super Bowl too – chocolate pudding. Like retro sleek-winged sofas and my mom’s Russell Wright dishes of the fifties, chocolate pudding deserves a comeback and some respect. Plus, it was among our first [...]
Fondues Warm the Longest Nights
Fondues are the perfect foil for winter blues, something gooey and melted wrapped around almost anything that we can dip or stick a fork into. For Pacific Northwesterners today is the year’s shortest day, longest night. Winter Solstice. Although we don’t dance around maypoles in chiffon, we do we have seasonal food rituals and celebrations [...]
Fruitcake Good Enough to Eat
I admit that I might have had a little problem with the traditional candied fruit and cake product. Winter’s culinary ritual perhaps, but show me one who loves fruitcake and I’ll give you ten who don’t. (Or am I way off about this?) Poetic justice happens and when I got married fruitcake was part of [...]
Bring Pears to the Party
Put a pear in a red dress and she’ll dance all night long. And she’s got moves.
We love her decisively pear-shaped bod and the way she fans the culinary flame at the swivel of her ample hip. Party animal. Local pears are in town for the holidays offering feastworthy fare from salads to chutney to [...]
A Beloved Brownie Lives On
Follow me and I’ll take you to Bert’s Brownies – it might be a circuitous route.
Roberta’s hugs were never obligatory or cavalier. She would take hold of you, look you in the eye with a smile and go in for the real deal, a long lasting embrace including whispered words of affection. For [...]
Savory and Sweet: Salted Caramel Ice Cream
It’s already August and if you haven’t used your ice cream freezer yet, the time has definitely come. There are very few multi-generational activities that evoke as many summer childhood memories as making and eating ice cream. Those of us who are lucky enough to live in the Seattle area not only have access to [...]
The Real Blue Angels . . .
Blueberries, able to leap tall buildings in a single bound, or give us the vigor to do so. Superfood? Though blueberry’s uber-healthy status is common knowledge, superfood designations in general are presently under scrutiny. Whatever their official status at the moment, it’s one of the sweet things in life that something so delicious is so [...]
Whip Up Blueberry Hotcakes (& Nix the Mix)
Indigenous to North America, blueberries are ripe and their compatibility with hotcakes is much appreciated. It’s time to flip a blueberry hotcake or two. Or twenty.
Pancakes, hotcakes, flapjacks, a short stack . . whichever terminology you prefer, from scratch with fresh local blueberries they require little more effort than a boxed mix and are [...]
Gotta Lova Pavlova
Sorry about the title. Once I discovered how these three words fit together I couldn’t resist even though they walk the fine line between amusing and just goofy. But once you’ve tasted Pavlova, loving it makes sense.
Fruity, frothy and fancy, I’d never heard of Pavlova until I hit the shores of Australia a few [...]
Strawberry Meals Forever
Local strawberries made their first appearance of the year at the University Farmers Market last weekend. It wasn’t a hesitant debut but an unabashed statement of presence that couldn’t be ignored. Not that I’d want to. In terms of sheer amount, I probably consume more strawberries per season than any other berry. Part of that [...]
