Groth Winery

Last spring, I had the pleasure of taking a tour of several wineries in Napa Valley and the most visually seductive of the wineries we stopped at was a lovely place called Groth Winery. The people were friendly and not at all snobbish or intimidating (as some of the wineries in Napa can be) and [...]

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Cafeteria Food Fight

Today, the Chicago Tribune reported that one local school, Chicago’s Little Village Academy, is forcing children to eat at their cafeteria or go hungry. The school has mandated that unless a child has a medical excuse such as an allergy, they are not allowed to bring a packed lunch from home. According to school Principal [...]

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Adventures with Potatoes Au Gratin

No, I didn’t go trekking into a pile of potatoes and cheese; this week I tried my hand at Potatoes Au Gratin. I love cheese and you can’t go wrong with potatoes… so why not, right? Every recipe I read called for a 30 minute prep time and a baking time of 1 – 1.5 [...]

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A Little Courtin’ in the Kitchen…

When I was a kid, I spent hours by the sides of my mother, my aunts, my grandmothers and great-grandmothers garbed in a denim apron with a cross-stiched heart on the top. I learned to make pie crust by hand, how not to over knead dough, make jams and jellies, how NOT to slice my [...]

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Battle of the LA Live burgers

If you’re a fan of the bacon cheese burger, there are two places at LA Live! that you can get a delicious meal, Wolfgang Puck and the Yard House. There’s something about traveling and working that makes me hungry for a good ol’ burger. Nothing like a big dose of juicy protein to revitalize the [...]

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The Original Pantry Cafe is delicious

At the end of a long busy week in Los Angeles I was wondering town looking for a good place to grab some breakfast. Just a few blocks up from our hotel we found the Original Pantry Cafe. One of the women I was with remembered hearing it was good food, so we wondered in. [...]

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Friday Foodie Fun! Vintage Spoondelier

I found these incredible chandeliers while I was indulging in some old fashioned web surfing! Made from vintage silver plate flatware, these “spoondeliers” are hand crafted and made to order. It’s more expensive than my budget allows (and I certainly wouldn’t want the job of polishing more than 200 pieces of silver flatware regularly!) but [...]

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Best chocolate pudding recipe

The kids and I were craving sweets but at 9:30pm, we were out of ice cream and I wasn’t about to pile everyone in the car. So I set out to try my hand at making home made chocolate pudding. This recipe is quick and easy and full of chocolaty goodness! Total preparation time is [...]

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Funky Foodie Friday: Well hellooo there 2011!

Happy New Year! Ok, ok, it’s January 7th, but I have an excuse! Really! I’m headed to Vegas this weekend for a fun conference that I’m really looking forward to, plus it means we’ll get to sample the Las Vegas foodie scene again which is always stellar. Since it’s the New Year though, it’s prime [...]

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Foodie Rant: McDonald’s Happy Meal Kerfluffle

Now, I don’t consider the ‘food’ at fast food restaurant McDonald’s particularly tasty (or edible for that matter) however I am slightly amused and concerned about their presence in the news lately as San Francisco has tried to regulate their Happy Meals and today’s news that a Sacramento woman is actually -suing- them over it. [...]

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