The cake is bananas! B-A-N-A-N-A-S!

Get yourself some bananas.
Forget to eat them for about a week.
Then make this cake.
You will not regret it.
Unless you don't like bananas.
If that is the case, I cannot help you.

She's alive! And she's eating tacos

OK. I have been a lazy blogger bum. Only not so much.
I have been blogging busily at work for the Mom Blog there.
You can read more by clicking here.

And if you are craving tacos, try this slow-cooker recipe for carnitas.
It's about as easy as they come.

Mint - it's not just for mojitos!

I love fresh mint. I think it is an unexpected flavor in a lot of dishes.
Not to mention how good it is in a mojito.

But in a pesto?
Sure! Why the heck not?

Paired with another favorite herb, mint-cilantro pesto is a nice addition to my sauce repertoire. It's easy, bright, versatile.
Try it on pasta, meat, veggies. Hmmm... maybe even swirled into a summer veggie soup.

Work, sleep, eat, work, sleep, eat

This is just the start of the dish. Looks good, huh?
Click through on the recipe to see the final product.

It has been an intense couple of weeks. Ben was supposed to have his surgery at the end of June, but then he got the croup and a sinus infection, so that was put off until early next week.
So there has been little energy for blogging.
The Man was also sick with a sinus/cold thing. It was not a fun couple of weeks.
Things seem to be improving though. Thank goodness.
Of course we had to eat through all of this, so at least I can glean a food post from the past couple of weeks!
The dish is called steak bun. But it does not involve any buns. In this case the bun in question refers to rice noodles.
I love the subscription my sister got me for Eating Well magazine. They also have a good website.
The dish for this post is from that. Of course I had to add my own touches.
It was a cool, fairly light dish. The steak made it very satisfying as a dinner and the base of the noodle salad was perfect at the end of a hot day.

OK. There is it. As for Ben and life and all the rest of it, I will work on being better about posting updates.
In the meantime, enjoy the food!

Stick-to-your-ribs ribs

I made some ribs.
They are really, REALLY tasty.
You should try them.

I bet this is my shortest blog post ever.

OK. Go eat.

Round Robin: Garden Portraits

It's been a while since I participated in the Round Robin Photo Challenge.
For you Robins who have not been here since my last challenge from April of 2009, I was a little busy being pregnant and having the most wonderful baby ever.

Now that the dust has settled and we are all finding our footing together (and now that he sleeps eight to 10 hours a night), I want to get back into doing some of my favorite things, including participating in the photo challenges.

It is nice to be back here.

That said, when it came time to pick a garden for the Garden Portraits challenge, I did not look far. I went to my own garden. Or lack thereof.


We are in the process of redoing the yards, front and back, so there isn't much there. But one thing that is left, and that I love, is the bear's breeches.

Maybe I just like it because of the name. Anyway, the plant is pretty cool these days. It used to just be a messy tangle of big leaves. Then suddenly, after years of not blooming, it flowered.
And they are pretty cool blooms.

Once I got my regular shots, I decided to play with the iPhone app, Hipstamatic.
All shots are taken with the John S. lens and the Dreampop flash. I used three different "films."

The next two are with the Ina's 1969 "film." This has been my favorite of the film options so far. But there are some others I have not tried yet since I have not bought all the paks.

These next two are take with the Alfred's Infrared "film." Pretty cool, old-school film look.

These last two were taken using the Blackey's "film." It is very contrasty, which I like. Though I don't think it really works with this subject.

Anyway, as I said, it is nice to be back in the land of the Robins. If you want to see who else played along on this challenge, go to the Round Robin site and check them out.

So it's not exactly soup season, but...

Soup is one of my favorite meals.

My mom always made great soups when I was a kid, and I love making soup now.

There are so many easy and flavorful combinations.

A favorite of mine involves tomato, red peppers and bacon. It's hard to go wrong with bacon, right?

The bacon-y tomato and red pepper soup also has a touch of richness from goat cheese and gets a little thickening from beans.

All in all, a very good soup no matter what the season.

With a salad or a sandwich on the side, this makes for a very satisfying dinner.

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By the way... I do plan on blogging about something other than food.

Hopefully soon.

It's just been busy with work and baby and, well, all this cooking!