FROM SCRATCH CLUB

I have written a lot about breakfast on this blog.  I’ve realized recently that making breakfast is meaningful to me.  I like eating breakfast foods, but I now recognize that, more importantly, the process of cooking breakfast improves my mental health.  When I feel scattered and disorganized, making breakfast helps me to consolidate and settle […]

One of the reasons I think people read and write for this blog is because they want to challenge themselves to cook and eat thoughtfully.  I love the challenge of eating well but not the challenge of finding the ingredients to do so.  I moved to this area several years ago and was immediately aware […]

It’s hard to make decisions about what to eat these days.  There’s so much information and everyone has advice and opinions.  One thing I feel fairly certain about, when it comes to food, is that sugar is bad for me.  During periods of time when I’m eating sugar regularly, sometimes multiple times a day, I […]

Kale is important to me. I found it all by myself as a college student and it has stuck with me ever since.  There’s something about kale that represents my food ethics better than any other food.  It is diverse, hardy and adaptable.  Many an evening kale has been my starting point for dinner preparation, […]

I really love popcorn.  When I make a bowl of popcorn for my daughter to snack on, I find myself unable to stop eating it and usually consume an entire batch in one sitting.  Most often I eat it sprinkled with nutritional yeast, but when given the opportunity to consume sweetened popcorn, I get excited. […]

This post is about the powerful impact that allowing yourself to be present in the moment can have on your mental health, and on your family (and how your kitchen can help).  On Saturday morning I had caught myself, for the hundredth time in 24 hours, glancing at my iPhone looking for information about the […]

Chocolate almonds are an easy project that children can participate in.  My eleven year-old niece Isabelle and I spent a relaxing half hour making them.  Most of the time is spent dipping the almonds in the chocolate mixture.  We decided to experiment with a “Mexican” flavor by adding cinnamon and cayenne pepper and we loved […]

I cook primarily because I like to eat, but I also cook to keep myself entertained and feeling competent.  Long before I had a family to cook for I cooked dinner regularly so that I would have a sense of accomplishment at the end of the day.  Now that my house is a tornado of two […]

So, here it is, hot again.  Too hot to turn on the oven, or even to spend any real time in the kitchen.  Below are recipes for two pasta-based salads that can serve as an entree or a side dish.  The pasta or noodles can be cooked ahead of time (maybe in the morning when […]

Sunlit, muggy evenings late in June are the time to introduce chilled foods for dinner.  Some of my favorites are green beans, plain potatoes and soba noodles, all delicious when eaten straight out of the refrigerator.  Cold artichokes and roasted vegetables are good too.  On days when you can’t bare to turn on the stove […]

I realized recently that From Scratch Club had never had a post about making fresh pasta and wondered why.  I then realized that I had never made fresh pasta and wondered why. While making fresh pasta this weekend for the first time there were moments when I thought it was kind of a hassle and […]

We eat a lot of beans in my house. I love beans. I love them on salad or in stir fries, pasta or soup.  They are versatile and good for you, as well as tasty.  Just about any bean can be made in to a “burger”.  I typically use black beans to make burgers, but […]

Ramps entered my consciousness only a couple weeks ago, thanks to fellow blogger and farmers market master Jillian who suggested I pick some up as part of my first CSA share of the year. Since then I have learned to love them.  They are kind of a cross between garlic and scallions, although someone told me […]

Drama and simplicity:  two words that most aptly describe this fun-filled pancake.  I started research for this blogpost with the idea of expanding on my previous experiments with popovers.  I continue to find popovers easy and delicious, but wanted to learn to make something even easier to make, bigger and easier to clean up after. […]

I love the way Sarah Wu basically stumbled in to this project. While working as a school speech therapist, she forgot her lunch one day and decided to just eat whatever they were serving in the cafeteria. Shocked by the poor quality of food she was served she decided to eat school lunch for one […]