Popsicle Experiments: Part One

My next post was going to be my New York City race recap… not anymore! I got productive on the plane and wrote a post originally intended for next week.

There was a huge bin of popsicle molds by the registers at the drug store. Stores place cheap, enticing items near registers to encourage impulse purchases, and boy howdy, did I fall for it. I’ve never made popsicles before, but now I could… for the low, low price of TWO DOLLARS! Sold.

My first popsicles, which I made that night, weren’t very pretty.

Brussels Sprouts with Carrots and Raisins

I recently had a wonderful meal at a restaurant, including a great side dish of Brussels sprouts with grapes. It was delicious. I wanted to recreate that dish at home the other day, but I was fresh out of grapes. I did have raisins, though, and those were grapes at one point, so… close enough. I came up with this recipe for Brussels Sprouts with Carrots and Raisins, and here’s how I made it. What do you think it began with? Brussels sprouts!

These little green beauts came from

It’s Loquat Season!

Earlier this week I had a great dinner with my friends Heidi and Tom at their house, which I hadn’t been to before. Guess what they have on their property? Loquat trees!

Which just begs the question: What’s a loquat?

Pan-Seared Balsamic Artichokes

Artichokes are one of those vegetables that just seem like a hassle. Artichoke hearts are delicious – I buy them in cans or jars a lot – but getting a heart out of an actual fresh artichoke takes roughly 23 steps, and it’s a mess. Similarly, cooking fresh artichokes takes forever, and the payoff, while delicious, is small. Most of an artichoke is inedible.

Despite all this, when a friend

A Roasted Vegetable BONANZA!

Remember all those veggies I brought home from the store last week? I used a lot of them over the weekend, and I’m going to show you what I did!

I got invited to a small little get-together to watch the Golden Globes on Sunday. I gladly agreed to contribute a vegetable, side or salad, and I came up with something that serves all those purposes. And it started with roasting a ton of vegetables.

Pictured above are

What’s in the Crockpot? Part Nine

All of you that are counting the days at home know that it’s been six long months since we’ve played a riveting, edge-of-your-seat game of What’s in the Crockpot? If you missed Part Eight, have no fear – just click right here. That’s right, I rhymed. And if you’d like to peruse my entire collection of crockpot recipes (and you know you do), then just hold your horses, because I’m in the process of creating a brand-spankin’-new Recipes page, and hopefully I should have that up this week.

In the meantime, turn off your Playstation, because this game is all you need for hours of fun game action. Are you ready? You’ll learn the rules quick enough, trust me.

WHAT’S IN THE CROCKPOT?

Keep It Up… DAD!

Happy belated Father’s Day to all the dads out there! I had a really nice Father’s Day celebration with my own dad on Saturday. Oh – I’m back in the states now! I flew from Sweden to Detroit on Wednesday, and after a couple quick days at my parents’ house outside Detroit, the three of us drove to the west side of Michigan for the weekend. My sister Laura joined us from Chicago, and went out to dinner in St. Joseph, Michigan (you can read about past adventures in St. Joe here). Here’s my dad and me from Saturday:

My dad has been on his own very significant weight loss journey – he’s lost 40 pounds since February! This is the first time I’ve seen him since he started losing weight, and he looks fantastic! Here’s how he did it: