My grandmother used to make a sauce from Birds Eye frozen winter squash. Bright orange, garlicky, cheesy in flavor, silken in texture - I can still picture the way the thick sauce coated broken pieces of pasta in the bottomless bowls she served on a weeknight. The summer I went to live on the farm in Connecticut, I spent half the time recreating her lentils and the other half perfecting this sauce.
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These banana almond cacao cookies came about from a few brown bananas, a quiet morning sipping tea and a need to go slow and recover from the week. They’re totally passable for breakfast, you know, being as they’re made with flax meal, bananas and almonds. A simple breakfast cookie that can be frozen and grabbed on the go
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Today I had my favorite kind of day; a day spent cooking with a kind hearted, hard working and beautifully spirited client I can call my friend. My clients aren’t people I work for, they’re people I consider friends and those I teach and learn from through shared experiences. Julie and I spent 4 hours in the kitchen making soup, sauce,
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There are few things I find as warming as a bowl of soup and as comforting as pasta. I love foods that make me feel satisfied, a lot of texture, hearty and that stick to my insides. I need to stay padded for winter, you see. Grains are up on my list of foods I try to fit in a few days a week into at least one meal. From buckwheat to quinoa, cous
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I’ve just now realized it’s Halloween weekend and I’m home on a Saturday night in a solo soup slurping contest with myself. I like to keep it really real.
3 reasons to stay in, stay safe and Saturday night soup when you’re 38:
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Today it was 65 degrees and gloomy all day in NYC. A slight chill was in the air, a slight chill only soup could solve. I’ve been on somewhat of a grind to find work, so I’m a little slow in body and mind these days, but still feel happy and pretty hopeful overall. It’s when I step into my kitchen to cook that the most hope fills me up.
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Because, sometimes, a spicy beef bowl is so necessary and so simple to put together on a Thursday night after long day of work. I’m still working, who are we kidding because having 3 jobs ain’t easy. Being single means you can work all night if you don’t give yourself a time to stop and working from home means you do this in
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Little Frankie’s in NYC makes a fantastic whole roasted eggplant, served with a giant douse of oil and warm bread - the charred skinned and soft flesh of the eggplant separate; allowing the oily eggplant goodness to be spread all over a thick slice…
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On Monday I gave you a recipe for one of my three ways with eggplant, and I’m doing this so the cook that I know lives inside of you can start to look at their food a little differently. The concept of Three Ways with Tina was born out of my long term singleness, weight loss maintenance and joy of cooking; creating and shedding new
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Here’s the thing, I’m an Italian woman who grew up in a predominantly Jewish and Italian neighborhood, so, suffice to say, I don’t just like my carbs - I love my carbs. Paint my world in pasta, pizza, bialys, bagels and babaka and color me happy. Now, here’s the other thing, if I ate these things in unlimited quantities as I did when I was
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Breakfast is one of my favorite meals of the day. I go to sleep thinking about eating breakfast because I look forward to quiet mornings and setting up my day. Breakfast time allows me to put myself first before my time becomes someone else’s - be it school or a client. And if you’re not into cooking or trying to take some steps toward healthier habits, breakfast is a good place to start.
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My freezer is stocked with frozen vegetables for many reasons, but the two main ones would be convenience and budget. Frozen vegetables are an economical way to stay stocked on healthy goods and they only take moments to prepare with some garlic, olive oil and - of course - love. Lately, between school, being tight on time and an income that is in constant flux, I find myself relying on the power of the freezer.
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Tomorrow I head back to New York after two weeks of being in the south. I love being with and around my family, close to the beach, the smell of salt water, rainy concrete, morning bike rides with swan sightings and cranes in the distance - I think you get it. My mom still isn’t feeling herself, which worries me because life is fragile and
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The recommendation from my friend Susana was to go out for breakfast this morning, and I was totally into it. A morning off from family cooking sounded glorious until I thought about all of the avocados sitting on the counter, the giant onions staring back at me and the dozen and a half eggs sitting in the refrigerator. I couldn’t justify spending money on breakfast
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My love for turkey meat has grown over the years. I’ve found ways to jazz it up, from adding vegetables and herbs to the mix, to topping it with onion jam or caramelized cabbage. Turkey meat on its own still reminds me of diet food and that time my parents bought me these pills called “Fit America” where one eats an Atkins style diet
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What I’m enjoying most about the summer is being around my family, close to the sun, with access to the beach. I love our shared meals, the fruit we always have in the house, my long post or pre-breakfast bike rides. Making breakfast for the family feels like less of a chore and more of a gift, dinner is more of a chore - if I’m being really real.
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One of my all time favorite spring/summer and early fall events is the picnic. There's an art to a picnic, you see. One does not want to pack food that is messy or cumbersome, as proper picnic food should be portable, light and easy to eat. The best picnic baskets, if you ask me, are filled with fresh fruit, nuts, spreads, bread, olives, a
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This week I spent $13.49 on vegetables to get me through the week until I fly south to see the family. That said, it's been hot and sticky here in NY which means that roasting and turning on the oven is a huge no no. Luckily, my life is pretty saucy (that's a pesto joke) and I've figured out a thing or two when it comes to cooking veggies on
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