Blog Post List

This blog post list contains the most recent blog posts from The Messy Baker in reverse chronological order. You can also browse by recipe category or use the search function.

Andrew and I are mature, level-headed adults. We can easily discuss our budget, the laundry schedule, and who goes where at Easter. We listen to each other, see the other person's point of view and devise workable action plans. We use terms like "action plan,"...

To paraphrase from Nigella Lawson's latest book Nigellissima: Easy Italian-Inspired Recipes, this dish is "verdiglorious." Green basil, green beans, and green pistachios all come together in a "riot" of a pesto dish. What it lacks in authenticity, it more than makes up for in colour...

I'm not sure how many recipes Camilla V. Saulsbury has created over the years but it's more than I can count before losing track, and just slightly less than the number of stars in the night sky. She's prolific to say the least. When I interviewed...

Fool me once, shame of you. Fool me twice (a dozen times), shame, shame, double-shame on me. It took years, but I learned my lesson. No Newspaper Recipes. None. Do not clip them for me. I will throw them out. Do not make them for...

I seriously miscalculated the potato requirement for last night's dinner. Maybe I was distracted by the dishwasher that kept telling me the intake/drain needed my attention. Maybe I got a little pre-occupied trying to remember where I had hidden Andrew's birthday present. Either way, I...

Easter chocolate is like the The Phantom Menace. After plenty of hype and lots of waiting you're all set for something dark and intense, but the final product is just a disappointing merchandising opportunity. Take the classic chocolate rabbit. Tall ears, a basket on his back...

This roasted cauliflower salad serves as my reminder that good recipes are flexible. Good recipes invite experimentation. They serve as helpful guidelines, not rigid rules. With titles like "The Best This" or "The Ultimate That" it's easy to forget no one recipe has a monopoly...

The vanilla extract on the left is full of seeds and has a whole pod in the bottle. The vanilla beans on the right are fresh, fragrant and supple enough to knot. Both products are Really Horrible. Seriously. They're from Really Horrible Enterprises located in Ottawa, ON. I...

[caption id="attachment_11629" align="alignnone" width="620"] Clockwise from top: Black salt, French grey salt, Himalayan pink salt, Persian blue salt[/caption] When I was a kid there were three kinds of salt in my little world: Rock, kosher and table. That was it. The only specialty salt was Morton's....

I am capricious. One day I'll view a certain cookbook as General Cooking and file it away as such. Then after using it for a while, I realize I'm drawn only to its dessert section and stick it in with the baking books. Only it's...