Spring Chives

It's Spring and chives are in bloom. This Allium is solely grown for its leaves. Separate the tiny florets of the chives' pink flower and garnish your favorite soup, sprinkle minced chives into your breakfast scramble, add a handful of sprigs to any potato dish, toss with roasted vegetables and fold into biscuit dough or gougeres batter.

Banana Nib Brittle Muffins

Theo Chocolate's Fantasy Flavor Bars add a whimsical element to classic recipes. Today, I baked with Theo's dark and crunchy Nib Brittle Bar. This chocolate bar pairs beautifully with bananas; I chopped it into bits and folded it into my classic Banana Chocolate Chip Muffin batter in place of the ever traditional chocolate chips. If you like your muffins on the sweet side then make sure to add an additional 1/8 cup - 1/4cup sugar, as the nib brittle bar has 70% cacao content versus the typical 60-65% I use for this recipe.


Tasting Notes:
Day 1 & warm from the oven:
Moist, fluffy, oozing chocolate and not overly sweet.
May need to add 1/8-1/4 C more sugar.

Day 2:
Moist, chocolate brittle crunch, not overly sweet.
Although I prefer my banana bread less sweet than other muffins, I may add 1/8 C more sugar in the next testing.

Vanilla Almond Cupcakes with Bittersweet Fig, Fennel & Almond Frosting

These cupcakes are gluten & dairy free! Perfect for Travis' tummy and any vegans out there.

For the cupcake use Vanilla Almond Cupcake recipe.

This frosting was inspired by Theo Chocolate's Fig, Fennel & Almond Chocolate Bar; a delectable bittersweet chocolate perfumed with fennel and studded with figs & almonds.

Vegan Cupcakes

This afternoon I baked cupcakes without eggs and butter. Instead, I played around with Moskowitz & Romero's Vanilla Gluten Freedom Cupcakes from their Vegan cookbook Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World. Substituting oil & flax seeds for the traditional butter and eggs.

Vegetable Gardening

Sugar Snap Peas

We are planting a vegetable garden with our family this year. I have the delightful job of helping with the seasonal layout and planting (my days spent as a farm intern are coming in handy). Travis helped with the garden design and leveling out the raised beds with his dad. Travis' mom and I planted all sorts of veggie starters and seeds today. We hope the frost has passed!