Culinary Adventures with Camilla

This post is sponsored  by Adagio Teas .  I received complimentary product for the purpose of review . All opinions are mine alone.   I received a care package from my contact at  Adagio Teas ,* and was excited to receive a limited release herbal tea called Bella Luna Blue . Only available during a blue moon, this is on their website right now; it will not be available again until August 2023. I'll talk more about it, but the color is stunning and the flavor is beguiling. Bella Luna Blue This is a blend of lemongrass, blueberry flavor, and blue butterfly pea flowers. It's that latter ingredient that gives this tisane its brilliant blue hue. Blue butterfly pea flower is not only brightly colored, but it changes color when pH changes. You can see that in this post: Color-Changing Nam Dok Anchan (Butterfly Pea Flower Lemonade) ; and it always makes me feel a little bit like a culinary magician or a kitchen witch! I toyed with different recipe ideas for this herbal tea a...

Last weekend, we celebrated my parents' birthdays. It's funny that their birthdays are two years and five days apart; Jake and I are two years and seven days apart. So, joint parties are the norm. In any case, it's taken me a week to get this written up. I had just gotten some blue butterfly pea flower powder, erroneously named blue matcha, and wondered if the color would bake out. When it stayed blue, on a test run, I decided to make a naturally blue birthday cake of Nonno and Nonna. You can read a little bit about "blue matcha" in my Magical Blue Moon Matcha Cocktail post. Ingredients makes one 9" layer (I made four layers - two blue and two plain) Cake 2 C flour 1 t baking powder 1 t salt 1/4 t baking soda 1 C whole milk plain yogurt 1-1/4 C cane sugar 3/4 C olive oil 2 large eggs 1 t organic vanilla paste or extract  Also needed: butter for greasing pans, parchment paper, 9" cake pan For the blue layers: 1 T blue bu...