Easter Recipes: Dinner

If you're still planning your Easter dinner menu, here are a few tasty-sounding recipes. If I were making Easter dinner, I think I'd make this whole menu!



Mint & Pea Crostini with Parmesan - A simple appetizer that tastes bright, like spring.



Roasted Shoulder of Lamb - A bit simpler than a rack of lamb, if you've never made lamb before.



Scalloped Potatoes with Leeks - I really have a thing for leeks at this time of year, so these creamy scalloped potatoes sound amazing.



Asparagus with Mustard Vinaigrette - Take advantage of the greenmarket (if you're lucky enough to have asparagus at yours already) with this simple side dish.



Cream Cheese and Chive Biscuits - Um, yum.



Strawberries and Cream - A simple dessert, since everyone will be stuffed!

Top photo via Sunday Suppers, all other photos credited with the linked recipe post.

Easter Recipes: Brunch

Is it a little late to talk about Easter? It is in the blog world, but in my world I'll still be grocery shopping for ingredients for Sunday on Saturday (and probably Sunday, too) so if you're anything like me you could probably still use a recipe or two. First, brunch. I think growing up, Easter was about Easter dinner. But as I've started spending Easter with friends in the city, Easter is all about brunch. The lucky years (weather-wise) find us outside in a garden or a park, celebrating amidst sunshine and celebratory baked goods. When spring is slow to come, like this year, we're indoors, relying on springy dishes and cheery tulips to get the celebration going. Wherever you find yourself this Easter, I hope one of these recipes makes it onto your table :)



Spring Vegetable and Goat Cheese Tart - I always want goat cheese and herbs during this meal, who knows why, so this tart is a great way to get my fix.



Almond Berry Coffee Cake - Another thing I insist on (at least in the dishes I'm contributing) at Easter brunch is lemon-y baked goods. Lemon just tastes bright & spring-y. So this Almond Berry Coffee Cake with lemon zest certainly fits the bill.



Asparagus and Pancetta Hash - Potatoes + meat is always a necessary brunch component, right?



Deviled Eggs, Four Ways - As a kid, did anyone else eat egg salad that was a little pink, or a little blue in the weeks after Easter? The leftover dyed Easter eggs had to be eaten! Perhaps that's why I crave deviled eggs at this time of year.



Mustard Roasted Potatoes - I usually make these at Christmas, but have discovered they're equally good at room temperature as they are hot. So they're ideal if they have to travel a bit, or sit out on a picnic blanket for awhile.



Blueberry Beignets - If you're feeling adventurous. (Adventurous for me = frying something.)

Top image by Paul Ferney for Design Mom, all other images via the linked recipe post.

(A Manly Weekend Away) Weekend in Pictures

{bean boots for trudging through unexpected snow}

{snowy lake champion}

{watching snow fall on the half frozen lake}

{snow angels in an inch of snow}

{dusk or dawn...I don't remember}

{the dining hall, ready for the next meal}

{chocolate chip cookies, en masse}

{artistically arranged breakfast burritos}

{I do, even when it snows in march}

This weekend was a weekend away from the city, but of a different sort. Some friends and I volunteered to be the kitchen crew on our church's men's retreat, so while we got out of the city for a few days, we spent most of our time indoors prepping food, cooking, and cleaning. It was a lot of work, and our heads hit the pillows exhausted, but it snowed during our one hour break on Saturday, which was lovely. And even though it was definitely a working weekend, there was plenty of fun to be had. Hope your weekend was lovely, if a bit more restful than mine :)

Pretty Weather

You know how a pretty notepad makes writing the grocery list a little bit less of a chore? Or how a bunch of $3 grocery store daffodils can make a cold apartment seem warmer? This weather app is like that. It's called good weather, and it gives you your weather with a dose of pretty (plus a little game to play!) Pretty weather is a welcomed little something when the temperature dips from nearly-spring 50s to back-to-winter 30s. Plus, you can find out what the weather is like in Oz and Neverland :)

Happy Friday, folks! I hope your weather is pretty.

via Katie Evans

To Sparkle or Not to Sparkle?

One of my earliest memories is driving over the San Francisco Bay Bridge at sunrise, wrapped in a blanket in the backseat of the station wagon on the way to the airport. I crane my neck to look up, up, up at the cables stretching towards the pink and purple sky. The sight of that bridge, especially early in the morning or late at night, always spurs a feeling of anticipation. For most people, the Golden Gate is their iconic San Francisco bridge. For me, it's always been the Bay Bridge, the one that took me to the city and home again.



So when my friends in the Bay Area started talking about the new Bay Bridge light installation, I wasn't so sure about it. The Bay Bridge, sparkling? I don't know about that. The installation (by artist Leo Villareal) adds 25,000 LED lights to the bridge that will create a nightly light show on the bridge for the next two years. Similarly, I'm in the minority (at least among my friends) who doesn't think the Eiffel Tower needs to sparkle nightly, and I was dismayed when I heard that they were adding an LED light system to the Empire State Building. These structures are beautiful and iconic on their own, do we really need to guild the lily?





Though I do have to admit that the Empire State Building lights turned out to be cooler than I thought they'd be, and they didn't take away from the classic view of the building like I worried. What do you guys think of adding sparkle to architectural landmarks? Fun or frivolous?

Top photo by Ben_Cooper on Flickr, second photo by me (a very long time ago).

Luck O' The Irish Cupcakes

As with most of the smaller holidays, when I think about St. Patrick's Day I much prefer the childhood version to the adult version (similar to my views on Halloween and Valentine's Day). I'll take wearing green, jokingly pinch people, and sprinkling shamrock confetti over a drunken parade and green beer any day! So, in the spirit of a light-hearted St. Patty's celebration, I whipped up a batch of green cupcakes topped with Lucky Charms: Luck O' The Irish cupcakes!





To add the first dose of green to the the cupcakes, I sprinkled the batter (plain white cake mix from a box!) with two colors of green jimmies. When they bake into the cupcakes, they come out like leprechaun-inspired Funfetti.





See? I loved the unexpected pops of green on the inside. And the lighter green didn't show up as well, so you could certainly use one color of green if that's all you can find. I made up a batch of my new favorite frosting, swiss meringue buttercream, because it's not too sweet. But all these really need is a vanilla frosting base + green food coloring, and you're ready for the "lucky" part.





Lucky Charms! They're crunchy & sweet, so they add a fun texture to the cupcakes. Plus, have you ever met a person who doesn't like Lucky Charms? Initially, I just used the colorful marshmallows. But after a taste test, my taste tester agreed that a little bit of the cereal pieces added a nice flavor.



And there you have it! Luck O' The Irish cupcakes. I'm pretty sure if you're holding one (or a box) of these, you can't be pinched :)

(Snow and Sun) Weekend in Pictures

{a snowy start to the weekend}

{the lone bellow at city winery}

{pinterest-fueled resourcefulness: used up the leftover pieces of proscuitto from another recipe}

{spring-inspired present wrapping for two spring birthday girls}

{birthday candles on a fluffy white cake}

{a sneak peek at an upcoming baking post}

{my favorite dreamy brooklyn kitchen + sunshine}

Friends, guess what happened? The sun came out! It was glorious, especially following a snow storm. It was in the 50s and sunny on Saturday, and I saw people in shorts! A little overzealous, but I admire the sentiment. In addition to sun, there was baking, birthday partying, and amazing-music-listening. A stellar weekend. Hope yours was the same!

A Song for Your Friday

Sorry for the light posting this week, friends. It's been a dreary, uninspiring week here in NYC. But tonight I'm going to see The Lone Bellow perform, which should provide a much-needed dose of inspiration and fun. I love their video for "Two Sides of Lonely." The beginning is quiet and snowy, which is exactly how NYC feels and looks today.

Summer Dreamin'

I hope you'll forgive me, but I'm about to skip over a season. I'm excited about spring, I really am. I sort of like it more than summer, to be honest (no humidity!). But for some reason, today I'm dreaming about summer. It doesn't help that Urban Daddy wrote about the dreamiest-sounding summer getaway ever, The Graham & Co. It's in Phoenicia, NY in the Catskills, where I once spent an idyllic weekend in a slightly creepy cabin. The Graham & Co. sounds like it could improve upon that already wonderful weekend by removing the creepy cabin quotient.





Bonfires, movies on the lawn, floating down the river in an inner tube...sign me up. Although not for a few more months, it's supposed to snow tomorrow.