Day: May 23, 2020

Gluten-Free Almond Orange Olive Oil Cake with Mandarins

Gluten-Free Almond Orange Olive Oil Cake with Mandarins

Spring/Winter Winter is supposedly long behind us (though you wouldn’t know it by looking out of the rain pelted quarantine windows into the whipping winds of 49 degrees), but I’m still citrus obsessed. It’s really quite simple: 1) Quarantine means your food shopping is limited. 

Croatian Almond Roll

Croatian Almond Roll

This classic Croatian sweet yeast bread is made with a homemade almond filling and swirled into a roulade shape. The end result is something in between a babka and a pound cake—moist from the addition of sour cream–bursting with sweet almond and topped with white 

The Old Man’s Chicken & Spaghetti

The Old Man’s Chicken & Spaghetti

Anniversary in Quarantine I talk about my Croatian father a lot on this blog. Though it is my mother who influenced my obsessive nature, my recipe collecting, my inability to cook anything less than a full pot size meal, and my drive towards baking, my 

Raspberry White Chocolate Pistachio Blondies

Raspberry White Chocolate Pistachio Blondies

Quarantine Blondies Hands down, this was one of the simplest and yet most elegant and flavorful example of the oh-so-popular elevating of flavors and textures. I’ve been obsessed with blondies since childhood…I knew them as pan cookies, bar cookies, or sheet cookies, the taste of 

Whiskey & Tea (Whiskey Tea Barmbrack)

Whiskey & Tea (Whiskey Tea Barmbrack)

Lazy Irish Afternoon There is something delicate and extraordinary about an Irish pub in the afternoon hours. Depending on whether you find yourself in a bustling Dublin pub, like the many I frequented while living there in the late 90’s, to a languid Galway pub 

Kerry Apple Cake

Kerry Apple Cake

The perfect Irish secret, this Kerry Apple Cake is light, fluffy, moist beyond belief, and filled with the ideal dice of autumn apples. No cinnamon needed, other than a sugar & spice top crust that creates a burst of cinnamon, nutmeg, and sugar upon an 

The Queen of Puddings (and Novels)

The Queen of Puddings (and Novels)

Her griddlecakes done to a golden-brown hue and queen Ann’s pudding of delightful creaminess had won golden opinions from all because she had a lucky hand also for lighting a fire, dredge in the fine self-raising flour and always stir in the same directions, then 

City of the Prairie

City of the Prairie

A Companion Essay to Cevapcici Feast Day By Maryana Lucia Vestic Cevapcici recipes found here Outskirts The crumbling facade of the apartment block stood idle under the pale Bosnian morning. No shadows existed, whether made by the Igman mountain, the remaining scorched birch trees, or 

Croatian Cevapcici

Croatian Cevapcici

Amnesia I have no memory of eating Cevapcici as a child. Wait, I’m moving too fast. For those who do not know, Cevapcici (also called Cevapci and Cevapi–Croatians sometimes like to add the ‘ci’ in the hopes of sounding more Italian) finds its history, as 

Love Stinks, but Cherry Pavlova Doesn’t

Love Stinks, but Cherry Pavlova Doesn’t

Hear me out. When I say “love” stinks, I mean the manufactured love that breathes down our necks each February 14th, forcing us into having a hard look at ourselves, our choices, our loneliness, and our ability to cram the idea of true love into