Easy Slow Cooker Pinto Beans for the Super Bowl

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment

You can eat a big bowl of pinto beans just as they are without one blessed thing on top. And you’ll love them. Add a heaping spoonful of jarred salsa or fresh pico de gallo if you feel the need for a little garnish. Or load up that same bowl with color, texture, and flavor (see photo above) for a totally different experience. Because you can or because you want good looking Super Bowl food! We do eat first with our eyes. You could add the beans to a pot of chili or a plate of perky salad or platter of pasta laced with thinly sliced jalapeño. Toss them in a food processor and whirr together a dip. Be like Chipotle and roll up a burrito. Poach your eggs in a cup of them and score about 30 grams of protein. Build up a 7-layer dip. (Remember those?) Refry the bejesus out of a cup or two. Is the sky the limit? It is. Mighty pinto beans, good and gorgeous food, are also ferociously versatile. And did you know my fine state, Colorado, produces a lot of the pinto bean crop, along with Mexico, New Mexico, North Dakota, Nebraska, and Idaho?

I make pinto beans once a month or so for dinner. We eat a big bowl with cornbread and then freeze the rest in small containers to serve with tacos or thaw for a quick weekday lunch. I have little against canned beans and keep them in my cabinet year round —LOVE CHILI!!–but homemade beans are such a major step up. They’re cheaper, too, (about half the price) and less full of the dreaded sodium. I do cook them on the stovetop or in the Instant Pot but the slow cooker might be my favorite method. There’s something about getting things done early and not worrying about them the rest of the day. Something about walking into the house during the day and the sweet fragrance hitting you in the face, letting you know, “Dinner’s coming.” Something about something bubbling away on the countertop while you do whatever it is you want to do. Slow cooker food sort of spells, “freedom” to this cook.

Continue reading →

Chippy Dippy Hummus Salad and Grandma Pizzas : A New Year’s Eve Spread

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment
When you still want chips and dips but feel you should lean a little more into the healthy lane…

I can’t imagine who would name a recipe something like, “Chippy Dippy Hummus Salad.” Surely not me but here I am. It’s the silly, but sticking name that came first to mind when I threw this little baby together as a combination appetizer-salad course to go with two big grandma pizzas Dave made for our Florida family on New Year’s Eve using my Pizza Class recipe. I began by whirring together my take on Jacques Pépin’s basic hummus recipe, meanwhile planning on chopping up a big green salad as well. But as I sliced up a few fresh veggies for dipping, I thought, “Why not dollop — or doll up– this dreamy hummus down the center of a big bunch of arugula seasoned within an inch of its life and stand up the perky veggies around the sides?” I grabbed a 3-quart, rectangular Pyrex casserole from my sister Helen’s pantry and began to put it together, only wondering a minute later about sticking the casserole in one of her large baskets for appearances’ sake. And, if I was going to do that, why wouldn’t I include a few tortilla, pita, and Kettle Salt and Pepper chips for good luck? And, if I’d gone THAT far, how about adding an on-the-rocks glass full of onion dip (I had to make that quick like a bunny), as well as one with pico de gallo, which I’d bought premade at the market? I mean, there was all that extra space needing filling. Sure, I could do that. And did it get eaten pronto? Yes, it did!

I’ll tell you a little about the pizzas and, in the meantime, you can think about the hummus salad for dinner now that you’ve just about decided to embark on healthy January. Haven’t you?!

25+ Scrumptious Dishes to Jumpstart Your Healthy January

20 Main Dish Salads to Continue Your Healthy January

Continue reading →

Peanut Butter Ginger Cookies, Christmas Cookie for 2025

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment
Could she take the happy but savory pairing of peanut butter + ginger and turn it into a cookie? She could.

Jump to Recipe

Most years, or at least those when I’m well and very lucky, I attempt to create a new-ish Christmas cookie. For years, my modus operandi was to bake all–or nearly all–our family favorites but to try something different, too. Maybe from a magazine or a new book or even the newspaper, though these days that might only mean the New York Times. Eventually, I began creating my own new cookies. Sometimes they’re innovative; other times I just manage a tweak on a standard like shortbread or Mexican Wedding Cookies. I’m equally proud of both styles. Really, it’s not easy to come up with a cookie totally unlike anything anyone’s baked before but it’s an interesting conundrum. Nothing new under the sun and all that. For the last couple of months, maybe less, I’ve had two cookies in mind. The one you’re reading about is a cookie I’m a bit proud of, a PEANUT BUTTER GINGER COOKIE. This small sweet has been in the works for a while now, but given I’ve had the flu, I hadn’t gotten the recipe written or tested. Until now, that is. The other is one I’ll ponder in my heart, like Mary, perhaps until next year. You’ll just have to wait.

Continue reading →

Cranberry-Blueberry Crisp

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment
Kid friendly baking! They may need help chopping those pesky cranberries.

Jump to Recipe

Cooking demands attention, patience, and, above all, a respect for the gifts of the earth. It is a form of worship, a way of giving thanks... ~Judith B. Jones~

I don’t think I’ve ever considered cranberries and blueberries together. (We’ll soon see I’ve lied.) There’s an excellent reason for that and it’s because the two don’t exactly show up or ripen during the same season. Blueberries are summer; cranberries are fall. Blueberries and strawberries? Of course. Blueberries and peaches? Sure. Cranberries with apples? Always. But blueberries and cranberries? It just doesn’t jive. I mean, we feel as if there’s a little wiggle room here because we’re still getting Fed Ex blueberries at the store in November when the royal red cranberries begin to show up. And we’ll continue to get some for a bit– but this doesn’t exactly happen in real time, does it? There are other ways to get such a combination, like freezing one kind berry until the other appears or drying a few cups or even canning a batch (as did my mom) and storing them until needed. Even so, I don’t remember mom, a fine baker, mixing and matching summer and fall fruits. Anyone? This November, though, perfectly gorgeous, firm and bloomed Peruvian blueberries seemed to be everywhere in Colorado Springs at a great price. I bought two big packs; best sous and husband Dave came home with another one. I meant to freeze some — my typical modus operandi when we’re flush with any berry–and somehow didn’t. Taking a little fridge inventory the other day, I realized it was bake something with blueberries or die. And…I wondered: Why not mix them up with cranberries? So I did. And a star was born. 😘 Sorry, Mother Nature. Politics (maybe global economy?) makes for odd bedfellows. Or is necessity truly the mother of invention?

Continue reading →

Butternut Squash-Mushroom Arugula Salad with Blue Cheese Dressing

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment
Recipe dedicated to my friend Lisa November, whose presence reminds me to pursue vegetarian dishes!

Looking for other Thanksgiving ideas? Start here..

Jump to Recipe

When I first made this pretty fall recipe, I posted a junky quick photo to facebook with the words, “Did they tell you to bring a salad to Thanksgiving dinner?” My longtime food blogging and fb friend, Mary, piped up that no one in HER family would ever ask someone to bring a salad!!!…and…she’s mostly right. On the other hand, fine Minnesota friend Lani quipped, “I’m saving this!” So, the jury’s out. For now. Salad, however, really is not the first thing we think of for Thanksgiving, is it? (Didn’t we used to have jello salads? Sure, we did. Long ago and far away. For years and years. Mine had cranberries, apples, and pecans in it. I’ll bet some people still make them.) Thanksgiving is all about turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, stuffing, vegetable casseroles, rolls and butter, pie, and all things crispy on the outside and tender on the inside–including mac and cheese, they say, though I wouldn’t know. (I do make a first course vegetarian soup lately in a feels-like almost useless, spineless effort to serve a curated meal.) It’s also about feeling thick as an ugly tick and wondering if you should just live on cold pumpkin pie, spiked hot tea, aspirin, and Tums the next day. Which is my way of saying that a little fresh something or other isn’t going to hurt anyone and could be the one thing you go back for when it’s time for seconds. And, playing the grandma card here, some fiber might be exactly what’s needed alongside all that mushy food and free-flowing wine. There. Well, now that that’s out of my system, you can serve this sweetish, peppery, briny, “meaty,” salad featuring butternut squash, mushrooms, and arugula anytime. But if you serve it at Thanksgiving, you’ll be happy!

Continue reading →

Sweet BBQ Bacon-Turkey Meatloaf with Cheddar Cheese

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment

If you could fix anything, why not start by fixing dinner?

Jump to Recipe

I am a Johnny Depp fan. And a favorite line of Roux’s — played by Johnny in the movie “Chocolat,” is, “Very good but it’s not my favorite,” when Vianne, played by Julienne Binoche, asked her new love to taste several different handmade chocolates. And that might be where meatloaf sits on the list of favorite American dinners. It’s not too awfully far from the top but it isn’t exactly the top-ranked favorite. Iconic home-cooked meals from the USA include pot roast, brisket, chicken noodle soup, steak, fried chicken, chicken pot pie, mac and cheese, spaghetti, chili, pancakes, eggs, and, of course, meatloaf. (The very high-end favorites are more fast foods like burgers, tacos, fries, pizza, etc., though we do make those at home, too.) Now, I think meatloaf sometimes has a bad rap because someone’s mom didn’t know how to make it or baked it dry (cue the ketchup bottle), and so these days just the word, “meatloaf, ” elicits a sneery eyeball roll or nose scrunch from more than a few. I’m here today to again take up meatloaf’s cause, because if you’ve eaten my meatloaf, you didn’t walk away sniggering and you for sure didn’t get out the ketchup bottle on my dime. (I hope.) And when you make my newest version, SWEET BBQ BACON-TURKEY MEATLOAF WITH CHEDDAR, you might very well dance away smiling and singing. Meatloaf, then, could rise to the head of the class on your list of homey dinners, too! As long as you don’t overcook it, that is. I’ve warned you.

Continue reading →

Pumpkin-Apple Streusel Cake — Two Ways

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment
A fast 9″x13″ cake for Halloween gatherings, holiday breakfasts, tailgates, or coffee any afternoon.

Jump to Recipe

How sweet it is to be home! I missed you!

Since I returned from a month-long trip last Sunday, I’d been thinking about a fall cake. Pumpkin or apple or maybe – probably – both. I wanted a chunky, dense sort of cake that a person could cut and grab a small (or large) hunk when sidling through the kitchen on the way to the mailbox. (I only had one bite!! Honest.) Something that, should we have need of it, would hold together in a lunch box or travel intact to a party without melting or crumbling or even shifting in the pan on the back seat. What about a goody to accompany a big cup of hot coffee out onto the deck some cool morning? Or one to sneak in bed with us sometime when that felt ok? (Are you a crumbs in the bed sort of person? While I’ll happily guzzle coffee in bed any day, I’m not a breakfast in bed woman, even when ill.) I had in mind what we currently call a snacking cake, which denotes an easy-to-make and easy to serve homey cake that’s for any time at all you need or want cake. Not an occasion dessert like birthday cake, wedding cake, or even an elegant dinner party cake but simply a hang around the kitchen, come as you are kinda cake. And while some snacking cakes boast a glaze, a frosting, or a fine dusting of powdered sugar, I was leaning, once again, toward a crowning cap of spicy streusel.

Continue reading →

Colorado Peach Muffins with Cardamom Streusel

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment

Jump to Recipe

Eggs/Toast hot at same time: In sm skillet: Grill cut in half buttered bread; flip; add eggs, s+p; flick with water. Cover til done.

I’m an egg lover and indulge in one or two in some fashion nearly every day. That said, there is simply nothing like fresh bread or pastries for breakfast. Am I right? Biscuits and honey with sour cream (try it), cinnamon rolls, banana bread, Danish, croissants, English muffins, scones, slices off a warm whole wheat loaf slathered with butter and jam, crumpets, and — of course — muffins. I rarely bake in summer but when a cool morning finally arrives, there’s little to stop me from mixing up some certain special something (Why not a muffin starring our famous Colorado peaches?!) and scarfing it down quite warm, right out of the pan. Well, truth told, it’s husband and best sous Dave who’s more the scarfer. The man can eat; thank you, thank you. I’ll have one muffin with my coffee and call it quits. While Dave…well, you get the picture.

Continue reading →

Salmon on Parmesan Polenta with Fresh Cherry Tomato Sauce

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment

Jump to Recipe

Kathy Beck

In June of 2024, my dear friend Kathy Beck crossed the river following a devastating fall, subsequent brain surgeries, and a stroke. To say my heart ached is somewhat of an understatement; the lack of her presence was palpable and remains so. She was smart, witty company and fitted with a wry sense of humor she–and everyone else– thoroughly enjoyed. In short, a fine role model and a comforting, intelligent presence. In the days following her death, I posted a recipe, “Salmon on Lemon Polenta with Vegetables,” and dedicated it to her memory as Kathy, who wasn’t a happy cook, often asked me for recipes or cooking advice. I do think Kathy would have thoroughly enjoyed the meal and I’m only sad I hadn’t the opportunity to make it for her. While not always attached to my blog’s statistics, sometime later I happened to check on them and was gobsmacked to see that post hugely at the top of the heap — where it still sits! I’ve made the salmon meal a few times since — just recently for a dinner party where we remembered Kathy warmly — and I kept promising myself I would come up with another salmon and polenta recipe as it has been such a happy match for my readers and guests. This week, after hosting my neighbor Mary Pat for a similar salmon dinner, I ended up with a little extra salmon — just perfect for spending the next morning working out what turns out to be a recipe for today’s Salmon on Parmesan Polenta with Fresh Cherry Tomato Sauce.

Continue reading →

Salsa Omelet on Avocado Toast (+ a few other fave egg dishes)

/ More Time at the Table / Leave a comment

above: omelet shown on two pieces of toast

Jump to Recipe

~after lightning, hail!

Back home after two glorious weeks away and facing a birthday dinner party as well as the 4th of July weekend, I somehow found myself getting a bit on the tired side of grilling. I mean, that’s summer; right? But occasionally it’s too hot — or too stormy — to get out on that deck. Or, like any other time of the year, I sometimes want a meal that’s done faster than the lightning I watch way out east. And that’s what eggs, now at a bit more reasonable price (thank you Jesus) are good for. But I’m not jonesing for something akin to boiled eggs with Triscuits, though I’d eat that happily and soon enough were I famished on a car trip. Or even if I weren’t famished, to be truthful. I’m leaning into an omelet on a nice plate with vegetables and toast, please and thank you. I don’t want to be hungry in an hour and I want something to snug up to a glass of very cold rosé. Or two. If you want testament to my egg love, just type “eggs” into the search box and see what happens. Or click on “Breakfast and Brunch” in the search cloud. Or you could just scroll down here to: “If you liked this, you might also like…” I do make a slew more than ever end up on the blog. You’ll have to follow me on fb to see at least a few more egg dream meals. But for today, let’s look at a quick and cheery salsa omelet slung over a piece (or two) of avocado toast, crowned with diced sweetly ripe tomatoes, then garnished with a sprig of basil (or cilantro? cheese? minced scallions?) on top for grins or giggles.

Oh, what’s a salsa omelet? Well, honey, I guess it could be a few things but at our house, it’s an omelet where the eggs are whisked together with salsa instead of water or cream. Yep. And it’s awfully good.

Continue reading →