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I'm a little early, but I just saw this video and thought it was a good of time as any to wish everyone a Happy and Healthy Thanksgiving! The video is more than a little cheesy, but the faces the little girl makes kills me!  I'm #allaboutthebaste Gobble gobble! Enjoy the day! XOXO -P

Last September while in Europe, we stayed at a good friends house just outside of London. It was a beautiful, old farm house. I fell in love as soon as we stepped in the door.  The house belonged to Andrew and his roommate Murray. Murray made us a wonderful roast Lamb dinner and a Pavlova for dessert.  We had never had Pavlova, nor had I ever even hard of it. But you know what? I fell in love with it even more than I loved the house!! What Murray had made was an amazing and prefect dessert for me. I rarely eat dessert because I am usually too full. I am way more a savory person, not a sweets kind of guy, so I tend to have seconds at dinner and leave no room for dessert. A Pavlova however is a light and airy meringue  that seems to usually be covered in whipped cream and fruit. Most people seem to think it was invented in New Zealand, so I think Kiwi is a popular choice for the fruit. Murray went with berries, and so did I. It took me a year to attempt this be...

In the late 90's I moved to LA for a short time. I just needed to get out of Connecticut, where I grew up, and learn to be my own person. I was 20, and a little lost. Luckily for me, I had a friend from home who also planned to be there for the summer to study art at UCLA. She planned to be there for 2 months, but to my happiness, she never left! So for the year that I lived there I had my friend Nicole with me for when I needed a friend. Once when I needed her, she came through with a crazy easy, crazy cheap, and crazy good recipe for a cocktail party I somehow found myself hosting. She showed me how to make these crunchy bite sized pieces of Asparagus wrapped in soft, saltily, and sweet pieces of Salmon. They were a total hit, and the few times after that, that I made them, they were a hit too. Now fast forward about 15 years later.. I missed them. I wanted them, and I had a great opportunity to make them. The thing was I needed to figure out how to jazz them up a bit. I...

OK, so this recipe is fun for me to share because I learned a few things by making it. 1. Brining chicken breasts should be mandatory. When I took my first bite of this dish I would have sworn that it was dark meat chicken and not breast. As brining promises, it made the chicken SO moist and tender. I think I may have even smiled with that first bite. And 2. If you boil rice like pasta it will come out perfect every time. This is coming from a guy who is really really bad at cooking rice. Even when I use my rice cooker it comes out too soft and starchy. Although this is clearly a recipe that can be swapped out in so many ways, I found that the Eggplant and the yogurt sauce went really well together. If you want to just make Eggplant Kebabs it could be equally satisfying as a dinner. First I'm going to talk to you about the rice. I really have no idea if this is a Persian method of making rice, but when I first saw this method on T.V. the other day Martha Stewart was making a ...

It's been a year since the last time I blogged. I don't understand it myself, so don't ask me to explain. Just know that I am hoping to get back in the swing of things, and this easy and healthy dinner I made last night seems like a great way to start things off again! So this combo of ingredients came to me while I was driving home from work yesterday and when I came home to look for a recipe it seems that I am not as clever as I thought I was. There were about 300 recipes out there and they were all different. I decided I would just make it the sway I wanted to. So here is my version of a Shrimp Avocado and Mango Salad. And how it's been since my first post all those years ago, this is a no recipe, recipe made with tons of love! These measurements will make about 4 small salads appetizer size, or 2 big dinner size salads. Here's what you need; 2 Mangos 2 Avocados Shrimp. I used about a pound of large shrimp. You need like 18-20. Or as many as you want. G...

This past weekend P2's cousin and his partner gave us a grill. Yup.. GAVE us a brand new grill!!! Since that day almost everything I have eaten has been grilled. I know that's probably not the healthiest choice in food preparation, but right now I can't help myself.  I'm a city boy, so I have never actually owned a grill.    Soon I hope to share the ridicules  joy I have found in brining meat before grilling it, but for now I am going to share the pleasure of the grilled flat bread. If you are unfamiliar with flat bread, it's Pizza. I am not sure what why it's cool to say flat bread, but in the past few years, that's just the way it is. So Clearly there not much to know about in term of how to make a grilled flat bread (store bought by the way). What I can tell you is more advise than anything else. I found success in having the grill very hot on one side and less hot on the other. Brush each side with a little olive oil...

February 21st, 2013 03:02 AM ET Nationwide study casts a wide net over seafood fraud Mislabeled fish is flooding the marketplace and Americans may be swallowing it hook, line and sinker, according to a new study by an environmental activist group. A look at seafood sales across the country by ocean conservation group  Oceana found that roughly one third of the time, seafood sold at U.S. grocery stores, seafood markets, restaurants and sushi venues had been swapped for species that are cheaper, overfished, or risky to eat. Beth Lowell, campaign director for Oceana, told CNN that the study was conducted over the course of two years and encompassed retail outlets in major metropolitan areas across 21 states. Staff and supporters of the organization purchased 1,247 pieces of fish and submitted samples to a lab for DNA testing to determine if the species matched the in-store menu or label in accordance with  Food and Drug Administration naming guidelines . ...