Gluten-Free Sweet Potato Fries

Easy, tasty gluten-free sweet potato fries baked with spices.

Like my pal Kalyn I'm a big fan of sweet potatoes. And sweet potato fries. Kalyn's recipe has a different spice blend than mine but our recipes are quite similar. Check out hers if you don't happen to care for my particular spices. Or get down-and-dirty personal and make up your own signature concoction.

Cooking is all about making recipes your own. Developing your own tastes. Your likes and dislikes. Cooking is flexible. And highly personal. It's not precise like, say, brain surgery. Unless you're baking something fussy. Baking folks swear by precision. But I've never actually been that kind of cook. I'm intuitive. I fly by the seat of my jeans. I look at a glistening picture of pasta and vegetables and I feel inspired. I open my pantry and get juiced to play the What If? Game. 

What if I take this ingredient and add it to that ingredient? I wonder. What would that taste like? Then the fun begins.

How do you cook? 

Do you wing it like Chet Baker? Or do you prefer a road map, with precise direction?

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Gluten-Free Sweet Potato Fries

Easy, tasty gluten-free sweet potato fries baked with spices.

Like my pal Kalyn I'm a big fan of sweet potatoes. And sweet potato fries. Kalyn's recipe has a different spice blend than mine but our recipes are quite similar. Check out hers if you don't happen to care for my particular spices. Or get down-and-dirty personal and make up your own signature concoction.

Cooking is all about making recipes your own. Developing your own tastes. Your likes and dislikes. Cooking is flexible. And highly personal. It's not precise like, say, brain surgery. Unless you're baking something fussy. Baking folks swear by precision. But I've never actually been that kind of cook. I'm intuitive. I fly by the seat of my jeans. I look at a glistening picture of pasta and vegetables and I feel inspired. I open my pantry and get juiced to play the What If? Game. 

What if I take this ingredient and add it to that ingredient? I wonder. What would that taste like? Then the fun begins.

How do you cook? 

Do you wing it like Chet Baker? Or do you prefer a road map, with precise direction?

Read >>

Read more »

Potato Salad Recipe with Sweet Potatoes and Red Onion

Potato salad with no mayo- and sweet potatoes!

 A recipe winner from the archives you may have missed. Because I haven't been cooking. I've been packing. We're moving from our Santa Monica apartment to a sweet place in West Hollywood. Like, tomorrow. If it seems as if we live gypsy lives, it's true. We do (if packing up and moving six times in fourteen months counts). We're signing a lease today. Ostensibly for a year. I hope to settle in fast and start whipping up gluten-free recipes in the new kitchen- which is, I'm happy to report, new as in brand new. New everything. Hence, a gluten-free stove. Fridge. Dishwasher. The landlord remodeled, bless her generous heart. I'll post pics as soon as the dust settles. xox Karina PS: And yes, there's a window over the kitchen sink.

This is a colorful and lower carb potato salad recipe, a welcome change from the ordinary white spud con mayo and boiled egg offerings so ubiquitous at backyard get-togethers. Why? Beyond the no Hellman's and huevos part, it features sweet potatoes, Dude. Sweet potatoes.

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Potato Salad Recipe with Sweet Potatoes and Red Onion

Potato salad with no mayo- and sweet potatoes!

 A recipe winner from the archives you may have missed. Because I haven't been cooking. I've been packing. We're moving from our Santa Monica apartment to a sweet place in West Hollywood. Like, tomorrow. If it seems as if we live gypsy lives, it's true. We do (if packing up and moving six times in fourteen months counts). We're signing a lease today. Ostensibly for a year. I hope to settle in fast and start whipping up gluten-free recipes in the new kitchen- which is, I'm happy to report, new as in brand new. New everything. Hence, a gluten-free stove. Fridge. Dishwasher. The landlord remodeled, bless her generous heart. I'll post pics as soon as the dust settles. xox Karina PS: And yes, there's a window over the kitchen sink.

This is a colorful and lower carb potato salad recipe, a welcome change from the ordinary white spud con mayo and boiled egg offerings so ubiquitous at backyard get-togethers. Why? Beyond the no Hellman's and huevos part, it features sweet potatoes, Dude. Sweet potatoes.

Read >>

Read more »

Roasted Vegetable Chowder

Craving a bowl of comfort? Have I got a soup recipe for you.

Frost was not on the pumpkin this morning. Not my pumpkin, anyway. Mine's long gone. Turned into a pie. Well, that and it was 80 degrees yesterday. Skateboarders careening by my apartment (at impressive speeds for a Fat Tuesday) wore nothing but Aloha shorts. Welcome to Santa Monica in February.

But what was on my pumpkin- if I still had one?

Pollen, dude. The trees are blooming, doing their sexy spring thang. Bursting. Co-mingling. Giving the bees something to buzz about. And I'm all about having a good time. I believe in love. And bees. But tree pollen, I have to ask you. Why so hostile?

Can't we all just get along?

I am thick and stupid from your assault. Not to mention, dripping from frontal orifices (not the most attractive trait sported by a woman of a certain age, I assure you- though how would you even know? You're a microgametophyte, for goddess sake).

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Roasted Vegetable Chowder

Craving a bowl of comfort? Have I got a soup recipe for you.

Frost was not on the pumpkin this morning. Not my pumpkin, anyway. Mine's long gone. Turned into a pie. Well, that and it was 80 degrees yesterday. Skateboarders careening by my apartment (at impressive speeds for a Fat Tuesday) wore nothing but Aloha shorts. Welcome to Santa Monica in February.

But what was on my pumpkin- if I still had one?

Pollen, dude. The trees are blooming, doing their sexy spring thang. Bursting. Co-mingling. Giving the bees something to buzz about. And I'm all about having a good time. I believe in love. And bees. But tree pollen, I have to ask you. Why so hostile?

Can't we all just get along?

I am thick and stupid from your assault. Not to mention, dripping from frontal orifices (not the most attractive trait sported by a woman of a certain age, I assure you- though how would you even know? You're a microgametophyte, for goddess sake).

Read >>

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Mulligatawny Soup with Jasmine Rice

Warm up with a bowl of this delicious mulligatawny soup.

Soup weather has arrived in Southern California. The sky is flannel gray and thick with rain. The streets below are slick and shiny wet. Monday morning traffic sounds are hushed and distant. It is even a bit chilly- for L.A. standards. I am wrapped in a sweater. And I am craving mulligatawny- one of my favorite spicy soups. As luck or fate or Plan B foresight would have it, I had enough ingredients on hand to make my favorite soup for lunch today. A simpler, easier version of my well worn favorite recipe for Vegetarian Mulligatawny. I skipped the cabbage and cauliflower and canned tomatoes this time. And upped the carrots for a fresh tasting, healthy soup.

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Mulligatawny Soup with Jasmine Rice

Warm up with a bowl of this delicious mulligatawny soup.

Soup weather has arrived in Southern California. The sky is flannel gray and thick with rain. The streets below are slick and shiny wet. Monday morning traffic sounds are hushed and distant. It is even a bit chilly- for L.A. standards. I am wrapped in a sweater. And I am craving mulligatawny- one of my favorite spicy soups. As luck or fate or Plan B foresight would have it, I had enough ingredients on hand to make my favorite soup for lunch today. A simpler, easier version of my well worn favorite recipe for Vegetarian Mulligatawny. I skipped the cabbage and cauliflower and canned tomatoes this time. And upped the carrots for a fresh tasting, healthy soup.

Read >>

Read more »

Sweet Potato Pie

Gluten-free sweet potato pie- and vegan, too.

The afternoon sun is spinning the seaside air that particular autumn gold, burnished and warm and chilly all at once. Delicious. And gone too soon. The sun will officially set tonight at 4:50. I feel as if I am running out of time. There is so much I want to do- and never get done. I surrender my expectations day after day. The pile of choices snipped free by my dwindling energy is gathering a bulk and momentum akin to the dirty laundry (I’m still waiting for the post-menopausal zest promised by Margaret Mead).

But Santa Monica does not fade after dark. Her charms only deepen. So we walk after dinner to the Third Street Promenade and listen to the brave souls who risk their ego and their artistry (the unkind among us might quip, questionable talent) crooning songs or plucking violins or juggling. Palm readers and skateboarding bulldogs aside, it takes guts to stand in public and offer up a tune or a dance.

I come home inspired.

I am thinking a lot about my life these days. And what I want to do with the rest of it. Moving here is a new beginning (well, yeah, obviously). I am reinventing the woman I used to be. Spinning my own autumn magic from bits of bone and history.

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Sweet Potato Pie

Gluten-free sweet potato pie- and vegan, too.

The afternoon sun is spinning the seaside air that particular autumn gold, burnished and warm and chilly all at once. Delicious. And gone too soon. The sun will officially set tonight at 4:50. I feel as if I am running out of time. There is so much I want to do- and never get done. I surrender my expectations day after day. The pile of choices snipped free by my dwindling energy is gathering a bulk and momentum akin to the dirty laundry (I’m still waiting for the post-menopausal zest promised by Margaret Mead).

But Santa Monica does not fade after dark. Her charms only deepen. So we walk after dinner to the Third Street Promenade and listen to the brave souls who risk their ego and their artistry (the unkind among us might quip, questionable talent) crooning songs or plucking violins or juggling. Palm readers and skateboarding bulldogs aside, it takes guts to stand in public and offer up a tune or a dance.

I come home inspired.

I am thinking a lot about my life these days. And what I want to do with the rest of it. Moving here is a new beginning (well, yeah, obviously). I am reinventing the woman I used to be. Spinning my own autumn magic from bits of bone and history.

Read >>

Read more »

Roasted Hatch Chile Stew Recipe with Sweet Potato, Corn + Lime

Scrumptious slow cooker stew with roasted chiles, sweet potato and lime

Ho-la! It's that time of year again. The annual roasted Hatch chile madness is upon us here in chile blessed New Mexico. You can smell the intoxicating smoky-sweet scent of roasting green chiles everywhere you go. Even Walmart. Seriously. There's a roaster out front in the baking hot Espanola Walmart parking lot as we speak, firing it up, doing his New Mexican green chile roasting thing, turning his dented blackened barrel over a fire. Wiping his brow. Slugging down his cola. People are lined up waiting for their batch. Inside the store's entrance stacks of crated fresh chiles dominate the floor space like so many Stanley Kubrick obelisks (cue music).

If you live in Nuevo Mexico, you worship at the Sacred Temple of the Holy Chile Pepper.

The devotion to roasted chile runs deep in these parts and yes, it's with an e never with an i; if you call chile chili in these parts you may as well kiss your white bread tuchas good-bye, pendajo, because you'll be laughed out of the state. Shunned. Scorned. These folks get very serious about their autumn roasted chile. Don't mess with 'em.

It's harvest time.

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Roasted Hatch Chile Stew Recipe with Sweet Potato, Corn + Lime

Scrumptious slow cooker stew with roasted chiles, sweet potato and lime

Ho-la! It's that time of year again. The annual roasted Hatch chile madness is upon us here in chile blessed New Mexico. You can smell the intoxicating smoky-sweet scent of roasting green chiles everywhere you go. Even Walmart. Seriously. There's a roaster out front in the baking hot Espanola Walmart parking lot as we speak, firing it up, doing his New Mexican green chile roasting thing, turning his dented blackened barrel over a fire. Wiping his brow. Slugging down his cola. People are lined up waiting for their batch. Inside the store's entrance stacks of crated fresh chiles dominate the floor space like so many Stanley Kubrick obelisks (cue music).

If you live in Nuevo Mexico, you worship at the Sacred Temple of the Holy Chile Pepper.

The devotion to roasted chile runs deep in these parts and yes, it's with an e never with an i; if you call chile chili in these parts you may as well kiss your white bread tuchas good-bye, pendajo, because you'll be laughed out of the state. Shunned. Scorned. These folks get very serious about their autumn roasted chile. Don't mess with 'em.

It's harvest time.

Read >>

Read more »

Vegetarian Garden Loaf with Maple Apricot Glaze

Delicious vegan garden loaf with quinoa.

Go ahead and snicker. I'll wait. I'm fully aware that veggie loaves are the punch line for many a joke in Burger King sponsored sit-coms and pseudo-reality shows pitting sweaty cranky chefs against each other for the promise of fame and fortune. So do your thing. Snort. Sigh. Bare your teeth. I can handle it. 

Vegetarians and vegans endure more than their fair share of indiscreet eye-rolling.

I know this first hand. Because I've been a vegetarian and sometimes vegan for most of my life. Four decades. And after my medically recommended foray back into Omnivore Land (to jump start the healing of my broken hip) now that I am vertical and ambulatory without a cane I am once again whistling past the graveyard into familiar territory, leaving behind the protein I flirted with, listening to my body's need to get back to the garden, back to my first love, my culinary Eden. My natural preference, before The Fall.

I tell you this without judgment. 

I mention this without pressure of any kind. Seriously. I'm not proselytizing. Goddess knows, I understand better than most how hard it is to eat in this gluten infused world of ours without whittling down our choices even further. If you love your bacon and eggs, Babycakes, go rustle up some grub.

Gnaw on some haggis.

Read >>

Read more »

Vegetarian Garden Loaf with Maple Apricot Glaze

Delicious vegan garden loaf with quinoa.

Go ahead and snicker. I'll wait. I'm fully aware that veggie loaves are the punch line for many a joke in Burger King sponsored sit-coms and pseudo-reality shows pitting sweaty cranky chefs against each other for the promise of fame and fortune. So do your thing. Snort. Sigh. Bare your teeth. I can handle it. 

Vegetarians and vegans endure more than their fair share of indiscreet eye-rolling.

I know this first hand. Because I've been a vegetarian and sometimes vegan for most of my life. Four decades. And after my medically recommended foray back into Omnivore Land (to jump start the healing of my broken hip) now that I am vertical and ambulatory without a cane I am once again whistling past the graveyard into familiar territory, leaving behind the protein I flirted with, listening to my body's need to get back to the garden, back to my first love, my culinary Eden. My natural preference, before The Fall.

I tell you this without judgment. 

I mention this without pressure of any kind. Seriously. I'm not proselytizing. Goddess knows, I understand better than most how hard it is to eat in this gluten infused world of ours without whittling down our choices even further. If you love your bacon and eggs, Babycakes, go rustle up some grub.

Gnaw on some haggis.

Read >>

Read more »

Make Your Own Potato Chips

Make your own potato chips.

Before I get to how to cook your own potato chips and avoid the game we food allergic individuals refer to as Le Chip Roulette, I'd like to mention dreaming. Because I woke from some very strange dreams this morning. Dreams involving caveman chest hair and glistening inky fish and long distance songs on some radio left behind in an abandoned mining shack perfect for a David Lynch location shoot. Spandau Ballet, in fact- crooning, I know this much is tru-hoo.

It's day fifteen of the tenacious head cold I picked up in Los Angeles. And it's Friday the thirteenth. But I'm not so easily spooked. Old ghosts got nothing on this morning's weirdness. This is kindergarten stuff. Amateur hour. So I shook it off and brewed some tea.

I'm blaming high altitude and not enough fresh fruit.

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Make Your Own Potato Chips

Make your own potato chips.

Before I get to how to cook your own potato chips and avoid the game we food allergic individuals refer to as Le Chip Roulette, I'd like to mention dreaming. Because I woke from some very strange dreams this morning. Dreams involving caveman chest hair and glistening inky fish and long distance songs on some radio left behind in an abandoned mining shack perfect for a David Lynch location shoot. Spandau Ballet, in fact- crooning, I know this much is tru-hoo.

It's day fifteen of the tenacious head cold I picked up in Los Angeles. And it's Friday the thirteenth. But I'm not so easily spooked. Old ghosts got nothing on this morning's weirdness. This is kindergarten stuff. Amateur hour. So I shook it off and brewed some tea.

I'm blaming high altitude and not enough fresh fruit.

Read >>

Read more »

African Sweet Potato Soup with Peanut Butter, Black-Eyed Peas & Beans

A scrumptious peanut soup recipe - gluten and dairy-free.

Happy New Year, Gentle Reader. It's a new dawn. It's a new day. And it's time for a black-eyed pea recipe. One of my favorites, with African flavors. Serving black-eyed peas and beans at the start of a freshly birthed year is serious good mojo in some circles. At least that's what they tell me. Why eating a plate of legumes on New Year's Day brings luck I've no idea, but someone somewhere decided these humble little nuggets of vegan protein were a good and fortunate culinary choice. So why not?

Rather than rummage through cookbooks searching for Southern Hoppin' John recipes or Italian white bean escarole stews I turned instead to the sun drenched flavors of North Africa and reprised a stew that is spicy and hearty and peanutty. If you cannot use peanut butter try sunflower seed butter. It is no less fabulous.

Read >>

Read more »

African Sweet Potato Soup with Peanut Butter, Black-Eyed Peas & Beans

A scrumptious peanut soup recipe - gluten and dairy-free.

Happy New Year, Gentle Reader. It's a new dawn. It's a new day. And it's time for a black-eyed pea recipe. One of my favorites, with African flavors. Serving black-eyed peas and beans at the start of a freshly birthed year is serious good mojo in some circles. At least that's what they tell me. Why eating a plate of legumes on New Year's Day brings luck I've no idea, but someone somewhere decided these humble little nuggets of vegan protein were a good and fortunate culinary choice. So why not?

Rather than rummage through cookbooks searching for Southern Hoppin' John recipes or Italian white bean escarole stews I turned instead to the sun drenched flavors of North Africa and reprised a stew that is spicy and hearty and peanutty. If you cannot use peanut butter try sunflower seed butter. It is no less fabulous.

Read >>

Read more »

Sweet Potato Latkes

Sweet potato latkes and ruby applesauce.

Happy Winter Solstice! Happy Hanukkah! Let's celebrate. The shortest day of the year is finally upon us. The darkest point in the turning of the seasons will tomorrow tilt toward light. The balance in power has shifted. Daylight gains. The darkness recedes, inch by inch, minute by minute. Light is reborn. Pretty powerful stuff. No wonder so many cultures have celebrated this in a myriad of ways (see Nika's list of Mid-Winter celebrations and her beautiful photos).

For Hanukkah- no matter how you spell it- it's also about light. An eight day Festival of Lights, in fact, and food is intricately woven into the tradition. Because Hanukkah celebrates the fortuitous finding of a flask of olive oil (a small amount that would, maybe, last a day, but miraculously burned for eight dark nights) recipes for celebrating are cooked in oil.

And that brings to me to one of my all-time favorite foods on Earth.

Latkes.

Read >>

Read more »

Sweet Potato Latkes

Sweet potato latkes and ruby applesauce.

Happy Winter Solstice! Happy Hanukkah! Let's celebrate. The shortest day of the year is finally upon us. The darkest point in the turning of the seasons will tomorrow tilt toward light. The balance in power has shifted. Daylight gains. The darkness recedes, inch by inch, minute by minute. Light is reborn. Pretty powerful stuff. No wonder so many cultures have celebrated this in a myriad of ways (see Nika's list of Mid-Winter celebrations and her beautiful photos).

For Hanukkah- no matter how you spell it- it's also about light. An eight day Festival of Lights, in fact, and food is intricately woven into the tradition. Because Hanukkah celebrates the fortuitous finding of a flask of olive oil (a small amount that would, maybe, last a day, but miraculously burned for eight dark nights) recipes for celebrating are cooked in oil.

And that brings to me to one of my all-time favorite foods on Earth.

Latkes.

Read >>

Read more »