I’ve been thinking lately, with all of these meals we’re eating at home, how to mix up the staple recipes in our weekly dinner routine to feel new. With the warm weather (finally) here, I’ve been turning to the grill quite a bit for dinner-prep. I love that it gives me some time outside in the fresh air, and generally makes quick work of the cooking process. We love a good pasta dish in our house, and this recipe is a fun way to bring the grilled flavor into a quick, weeknight pasta recipe. I made this simple dish with just 10 ingredients: pasta, veggies, tons of fresh herbs from my garden, and flavorful al fresco chicken sausage. read more

Before we started social distancing, I used to go to the grocery store at least 3 times a week. Popping into the store every few days for last minute ingredients that I forgot or fulfilling a craving I had for a dinner idea. Now I am trying to stretch my grocery trips to last me 9 or 10 days and it’s totally flipped the way I think about my meal plan. I’m leaning on recipes that use up every last ingredient in the fridge and picking proteins that have a longer shelf life. The al fresco chicken sausage has been a lifesaver. I have different varieties stocked up in my fridge to toss into a pasta dish or serve on top of roasted spaghetti squash, to mix into omelets and frittatas, and I’ve even chopped up the buffalo chicken style sausage on top of a loaded baked potato. read more

We have been spacing out our grocery store visits quite a bit during social distancing, so getting creative with what’s in my pantry and making use of every-last-ingredient in my fridge has been a big part of mealtimes lately. We started the year off with a resolution to eat a bit less meat and swap in a few more vegetarian meals in an effort to have a lighter impact on the environment. It turns out our meat-free meal idea has translated pretty well to the current hunkered-down situation. This recipe is a winner for one of those meatless Monday lunches or dinners because it only takes about 15 minutes to make and uses a few simple pantry ingredients and my favorite Little Leaf Farms greens mix! read more

I have an endless number of variations of this pasta dish I make every spring – something simple yet buttery, a bit of white wine and pasta water for a silky sauce, and full of fresh veggies that speak to the season. My friends at Better Homes & Gardens magazine challenged me to create a recipe using delicious California Walnuts and I thought they would be a delightful and unexpected addition to a dish like this! This dish comes together quickly, so it’s perfect for weeknight dinners. read more

I think my ultimate goal when it comes to dinnertime is to create recipes that are fast, appeal to everyone, and require minimum clean-up. Getting a dish that can tackle all three of those requirements is easier said than done, but when I find one that works, I pretty much feel like Super Woman. I’m excited to report that the recipe I’m sharing today is one of those elusive speedy, one-pan, crowd-pleasing dinner ideas. I saw al fresco Mild Mexican Style Chicken Sausages in the grocery store and they inspired this dish, which is a marriage of two crowd pleasers – it’s one-part quesadilla, one-part pizza. read more

I made this dish for a quick weeknight dinner last week, it started as a “use what’s in the fridge” meal. We have been trying to get Jane to eat more veggies, and broccoli happens to be one green bite we can usually compromise on, so I’ve been keeping it on hand. I also had some tomatoes from a recent client photoshoot, and a few links of chicken sausage that I had leftover from another meal. The thing comes together in the amount of time it took to boil water and cook the pasta. While the pasta is doing it’s thing, I sautéed the tomatoes, broccoli, sausage and garlic together in butter, and the tomatoes burst to create a juicy caramelized base for the sauce. White wine deglazes and pulls up all of the flavor from the bottom of the pan, and some pasta water deepens the sauce and helps it stick to the cooked rigatoni. Fresh herbs and parmesan cheese finish the dish off, and let me tell you it was so simple and so tasty! Scroll down for the full recipe: read more

Trader Joe’s cauliflower gnocchi was the food craze of 2019, and my sheet-pan recipe for turning it into a tasty weeknight dinner was my top post of the entire year! When I saw the news that Trader Joe’s was releasing a brand new version this year — Kale Gnocchi — I couldn’t get to the frozen food aisle at my local TJ’s fast enough!  I used a similar method for cooking the Kale Gnocchi (ignoring the instructions on the bag, which give a soggy, unpleasant result) and baked them on a sheet pan until warm and crispy. Also on my sheet pan, Trader Joe’s frozen turkey meatballs, sweet butternut squash, shallot slices, and cherry tomatoes that burst and release their flavorful juices. To finish the dish off, I drizzled the roasted kale gnocchi, meatballs and veggies with a thyme-infused brown butter and lots of fresh parmesan cheese. The result was delightfully tasty, and dare I say even a bit more addictive than its cauliflower gnocchi predecessor! Get the full recipe below: read more