Cornmeal & Honey Cake with Blueberry Compote & Candied Cornflakes

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I love having a few go-to desserts, you know the ones that your friends always ask you to make, the ones that you know like the back of your hand and can whip up to have people over or bring to a bbq. This cornmeal and honey cake with blueberry compote has that kind of potential.

Simple Black Bean Salad for an Easy Side Dish

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Whenever we’re hosting friends or family, I am always super focused on the side dishes. I think it’s what makes the meal really interesting, both visually and flavor-wise, and to be honest, surround me with 5 different salads and I’m a happy camper.

So I’m sharing this with you, but it’s definitely a non-recipe recipe. Measure with your heart, flavor it to your liking! It’s a really lovely salad and makes the table so colorful!

I grilled the corn inside over medium heat and then just sliced the charred kernels off. Added two cans of black beans, a bunch of quartered grape tomatoes, red onion, pickled red onion, cojita, cilantro, lime juice, elote seasoning and scallions, with a dash of red wine vinegar and olive oil and lots of salt. Avocado would be another great addition!

Non-Recipe Recipe for Black Bean Salad

We're measuring with our hearts and flavoring with taste buds on this one!

Equipment

  • grill or grill pan

Ingredients
  

  • 2 ears of corn, charred
  • 2 cans black beans, drained and rinsed
  • 1-2 cups grape or cherry tomatoes, halved or quartered
  • 2 scallions, thinly sliced
  • 1/4 c cojita, crumbled
  • 1/8 c sliced pickled onions
  • 1/8 c diced red onion
  • 1/8 c cilantro (leave it out if you don't like it!)
  • 2 limes, juiced
  • 1-2 tsp apple cider vinegar
  • 1-2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
  • 1 tbsp elote seasoning
  • salt, pepper to taste

Instructions
 

  • Combine all ingredients and taste for seasoning and lime juice; adjust accordingly.
  • Garnish with more charred corn, cojita, pickled onions and cilantro (if using).

How to Upgrade Store Bought Guacamole

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Store bought is always fine! But sometimes, we can make it a little better. Guacamole is definitely one of those, especially when you can’t get your hands on enough ripe avocados to make it all from scratch yourself.

Jump to Recipe

First, you’ll start with your store bought base; then you’ll mash up some just ripe avocados (also fully ripe, totally fine). To that, you add salt, chopped tomatoes, red onion, cilantro (if you like it, if you don’t just skip it), and lime juice. Stir it all together and then add that to your store bought guac. Mix it all together!

And then we dress it up! I added some chopped onion, pickled onion, cilantro, charred corn and cojita to the top. It was SUCH a hit!

How to Dress Up Store Bought Guacamole

Course Appetizer

Ingredients
  

  • 2 just ripe or ripe avocados
  • 1/4 c chopped tomatoes
  • 1/8 c chopped red onion
  • 1/8 c chopped cilantro leave it out if you don't like it!
  • 1/2 lime, juiced
  • salt, to taste
  • 1 container of store bought guacamole
  • for optional garnish: chopped tomatoes, cilantro, pickled onions, cojita, charred corn, more salt

Instructions
 

  • Combine all your ingredients in a medium bowl with your store bought guacamole. Adjust for salt and lime juice.
  • Add optional garnishes and serve!

Pan Con Tomate for a Quick and Easy Appetizer Idea

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Jump to Recipe

Of all the things I put together for our little cinco de mayo dinner party this weekend, the pan con tomate was one of the favorites! For good reason – the bread is perfectly crunchy without hurting your mouth, the tomatoes are bringing in tomato season, and salty, savory, the olive oil is velvety. Highly recommend. We may or may not have had these two days in a row!

It’s pretty simple to make. I recommend making the tomato mixture ahead and letting it hang out in the fridge for a few hours. Bring it to room temp before serving. You can also make it and enjoy right away, but those flavors really do develop after a bit of time.

I always laugh when Ina says “use the good olive oil!” – like, why are we contemplating anything other than good olive oil? But truly in a simple dish like this, a good quality olive oil is important. I’m a big fan of Graza Drizzle finishing oil – the price is solid and the quality is really wonderful – very flavorful. I get mine at Whole Foods!

Pan con Tomate

Perfect idea for a quick and easy appetizer or side dish.
Cook Time 20 minutes
Course Appetizer
Servings 12 toasts

Ingredients
  

Toasts

  • 12 slices ciabatta bread, about 1" thick
  • 6 tbsp butter (or more based on your preference)
  • salt, to taste

Tomato Mixture

  • 1 large beefsteak tomato
  • 1 large clove of garlic
  • 1-2 tbsp salt, or more, to taste
  • 1 pinch pepper, or more, to taste
  • 1 tbsp good quality extra virgin olive oil, plus more for garnish (optional)
  • finishing salt, like maldon, for garnish, optional

Instructions
 

  • Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prepare a baking sheet with foil and oil spray.
  • Slice ciabatta and spread 1/2 tbsp of butter on each side (or more. to be honest, I just eyeballed it all).
  • Pop bread into the oven for about 20 minutes, or until bread reaches desired color (I wanted to get that rich, golden color throughout the whole toast).
  • While the bread is in the oven, slice the bottom of your tomato and grate it against a box grater into a bowl.
  • Once done, microplane one large garlic clove into the mixture.
  • Add the olive oil, salt, pepper and stir well to combine. Taste for salt and pepper.
  • Top each piece of bread with about a tbsp of the tomato mixture, top with some crunchy salt and a little more olive oil for garnish.
  • See notes about making this ahead.

Notes

If you want to make this ahead, assemble the tomato mixture the day or a few hours before and cover and place in the fridge. The tomato mixture gets more flavorful the longer it sits. 
You’ll want your tomato mixture to be room temperature, so remove from the fridge when you start heating up the bread. Once the bread is done, top with your now room-temp tomato mixture and a dash more olive oil. Enjoy! 

🍊 Miso Orange Ginger Chicken Thighs

A little salty, a little sweet, a lot of flavor.

There’s something about this dish that just feels right for a cozy dinner. It’s casual enough for a weeknight but flavorful and elegant enough to serve when you’re hosting. The pan sauce is rich and silky with miso, orange juice, and just the right amount of ginger to make it feel warm and alive.

Peach & Burrata Salads with Rosé Vinaigrette

Now that summer is in full swing – heat and crazy storms and all – I can’t get enough of peaches, watermelon and grilling. So I guess expect a whole lot of that? The whole house – myself, hubby and Harper – were all loving this peach and burrata salad with rosé vinaigrette I made this week.

The peaches were so juicy and bursting with flavor. Harper kept running around with peaches in her hand, asking for more. Hubby and I topped some toasted sourdough with ours while we waited for dinner to come off the grill – it was the perfect appetizer.

Hot Chocolate Sweet Rolls with Marshmallow Frosting

If you follow on Instagram, you know that I have a ton of hot chocolate-related recipe ideas swirling through my head. But this one is the one I just couldn’t let go of – I knew I had to make these! I love cinnamon rolls for Christmas morning, but I wanted to try something new. So, here we are with these hot chocolate sweet rolls with marshmallow frosting!

You all know lately I’ve been into shortcuts and making things easier as we quickly approach baby #2. These are a most excellent short cut for sweet rolls! I used Pillsbury canned pizza crust and packets of hot chocolate. The most from-scratch part of this is the icing, which is only a few ingredients and a stand or hand mixer.

DIY No-Bake Cookie Boxes

What better day to talk about cookie boxes than on National Cookie Day?! I had high hopes for my Christmas baking this year, but the reality of the third trimester and a now-ten-month-old (!!!!) is that I just can’t bring myself to bake several different types of cookies.

I grabbed most of everything for these cookie boxes from Trader Joe’s. It’s always my favorite place for charcuterie boards, and basically that’s what we’re making here!

I added some customization by melting my favorite Dolci Frutta and dipping two of the cookies in them and then topping them with crushed candy canes and sprinkles.

Here’s what’s in these cookie boxes:

  • Triple Ginger Cookies and Christmas Tree cookies (Trader Joe’s – left them naked and tied the trees with ribbon)
  • Nutella stuffed chocolate chip cookies, for which I used Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies (from the regular grocery store)
  • Chocolate Batons from Trader Joe’s
  • Hershey Kisses, Trader Joe’s Almond Butter Cups, Trader Joe’s Peppermint Covered Almonds
  • Peppermint Joe Joe’s dipped in chocolate and crushed candy canes
  • Trader Joe’s shortbread dipped in chocolate and sprinkles (sprinkles from Target!).

Love these boxes for an easy way to DIY something for the holiday but also maintain your sanity. God bless all of you who have the patience to DIY actual cookie boxes from scratch!

Buttermilk Pumpkin Muffins with Pumpkin Spice Coffee Crumb Topping

Guys. This is the pumpkin muffin dreams are made of! I cannot tell you how good they are with coffee – you just need to try it for yourself!

The pumpkin spice is so warm and comforting, especially as the temps are getting cooler. The coffee crumb has the best crunch and reinforces that pumpkin spice in the base. And the base is moist and delicious and I’ve made them so many times in the past week – we can’t stop eating them!