Apricot and Honey Jam with Lemon Verbena

Apricot and Honey Jam with Lemon Verbena

I’d officially like to apologize to apricots. For years now, I’ve been the mean team captain who always calls dibs on her friends and chooses the popular kids first, leaving the smaller classmates kicking the grass with their yet-to-be-broken-in sneakers and pretending that being picked 

Hazelnut-Stuffed Baked Peaches with Mascarpone Cream

Hazelnut-Stuffed Baked Peaches with Mascarpone Cream

Gravity. It makes things fall. It’s why sauces drip and eggs crash to the floor when dropped. It’s why coffee pours out of the carafe and into the mug — not onto the ceiling. It’s why the milk bottle stays on the shelf after you 

Chocolate & Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream

Chocolate & Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream

Next time I go to the Farmers’ Market, stuff wax in my ears and lash me to the shopping cart. Cherries are the Sirens of the fruit world and I can’t resist them unaided. Last week, I ventured forth on a mission to buy easy-to-hull 

Maple-Blueberry Buttermilk Ice Cream

Maple-Blueberry Buttermilk Ice Cream

Whoever perfected commercial buttermilk is part genius, part half-wit. On one hand, they found a way to mass produce a low-fat, tasty dairy product that makes loaves tender, muffins moist and scones split into perfection. On the other, they sell it in cartons with two 

Browned Butter Mushroom Ravioli with Sage

Browned Butter Mushroom Ravioli with Sage

This ruffled plant is not a flower. It’s a King Oyster mushroom. I grew it from a kit I got at the Food Bloggers of Canada Conference back in February. The kits, courtesy of Mushrooms Canada, are intended for kids. It says so right on 

The Canadian Food Experience: English Cucumbers

The Canadian Food Experience: English Cucumbers

Living in Ontario has many advantages. Spring brings maple syrup, fiddleheads, ramps, rhubarb and garlic scapes. Summer provides back-to-back crops of fruits and vegetables starting with seed-studded strawberries and ending with juicy, sweet peaches. Good luck keeping up with all Autumn provides — apples, beets, 

Orange Sherbet – An easy homemade summertime treat

Orange Sherbet – An easy homemade summertime treat

Like most kids, when I discovered wordplay I was so thrilled with my new found skill I told jokes and made puns non-stop. On one occasion, I followed my grandmother around her apartment like a duckling, quacking knock-knock jokes at her in a continuous loop. 

Improv Recipe: Garden Greens Pasta Sauce with Tomatoes

Improv Recipe: Garden Greens Pasta Sauce with Tomatoes

Cooking with seasonal foods can be a bit like getting dragged on stage for an improv act. Even though you’ve been told the basic premise you don’t really know what’s coming, you’ve little time to think, and your success requires saying “Yes!” to what’s handed to 

Garlic Scape Soup

Garlic Scape Soup

Don’t believe everything you read. When researching how to grow garlic, every source I read said garlic from seed was next to impossible or took years to mature. Bulbs were the way to go. So a year ago, out of curiosity,  I left some scapes