Culinary Adventures with Camilla

Years ago I spent days and days baking gingerbread house pieces. Friends came over and covered every inch with icing and candy. Every inch. No one ate it...it was just for decoration. We had fun...but I've decided that, this year, I'm buying the house kits for construction and only baking for consumption. Makes sense, right? Jake put two tables together and covered them with plastic. The boys gathered round and started dividing out the frosting and swapping candies. Our littlest gingerbread construction worker got a helping hand from mom. The rest of the crew just went to town on their own. These were some of their creations. And this was our resident aspiring engineer. Despite the pre-fab kit, he had to modify it! "Mom, where's the saw?" he asked. I don't have a saw , I retorted. Daddy has a saw. "No, you do," he insisted. "The cookie saw." Oh, you mean a knife. Yes, I do ha...

In January, Wendy of  A Day in the Life on the Farm  kicked off her new group: Soup Saturday Swappers. And I love it every month. I always walk away with some great new recipes to try. What a fun year. What a great event. This month, Wendy is hosting with a theme of 'Thanks for the Memories.' She writes: "Share a soup that has special memories for you. Perhaps it is a soup that was served each holiday season. Maybe the soup your Mom or Grandma gave you when you were sick. A soup from a special dinner date or vacation. Share not only the recipe but the memories associated with it." Food - tastes and aromas - evoke so many memories. I was excited to put on a thinking cap for this one. Here's what everyone else shared. An InLinkz Link-up I wanted to share a memory of my grandmother. Naturally, my sweetest memory of my grandmother involved food. Here goes. Well, first some photos. I'm grateful that my boys were able to meet - and remember - my g...

As we race towards the holiday season, and the end of the year, Jill of L'Occasion invited the French Winophiles to post about French dessert wines. You can read her full invitation: here . "Just as a dessert wine beautifies the winding-down of dinner, this experience eases us through the end of 2017 to a new and bright 2018," she writes. What a beautiful sentiment for our fun, wine-loving group! What the Group is Pouring, Pairing, and Posting Discovering Maury AOC with Susannah at  Avvinare Quince Crumble with Lillet Blanc Cordials created by Camilla at  Culinary Adventures with Camilla Affordable France: Bordeaux Reds and Sauternes Wines  served by Gwen at  Wine Predator 2010 Cave de Rasteau “Signature” Vin Doux Naturel and Brutti Ma Buoni written by Martin at  ENOFYLZ Wine Blog 2011 Châteu Grand-Jauga Sauternes presented by Amber at  Napa Food and Vine The Sweet Secret of Barsac: Château Doisy-Daëne comes from Lynn at  Savor the H...

This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of  Moms Meet .  I received complimentary product for the purpose of review,  but all opinions are honest and they are my own.  This page may contain affiliate links. If you follow my blog, you'll know that I focus on food and our family's culinary adventures; I also write about food inspired by books that I've read. This is slightly different in that I'm writing not about actually food. I'm focusing on feeding kids' minds and creating life-long learners. In a blink of an eye, it seems, they go from this... ...to this. My boys are never far from books! This is R just after two different signings with his new books. The first was meeting Greg Mortensen in 2010 and the second from meeting Andy Weir just last week. Through my association with  Moms Meet  -I received a selection of books from National Geographic, including Hey Baby: A Collection of Pictures, Poems, and Stories from N...

If you've been following my blog for awhile, you'll know the history of these cookies. They are always my first large batch of holiday cookies each year because now  I can laugh about it. And the boys get a kick out of hearing the story while they eat them. But, when it happened, I cried and cried. You can read about The Great Oklahoma Cookie Diss of 2003 . This year's version includes twp different kinds of nuts and some coffee extract that gives them a little bit of a mocha flavor. They are so tasty. Ingredients  makes approximately 5 dozen cookies 4 C semisweet chocolate chunks, divided in half 2-2/3 C flour 1 t baking soda 1 t freshly ground sea salt 1 C butter 1 C organic dark brown sugar, lightly packed 1/2 C organic granulated sugar 1 t pure coffee extract 3 large eggs 1 C dried cranberries 1 C raw pecans, chopped 1 C slivered almonds 1 t ground cinnamon Procedure Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Melt 2 C chocolate in a double-boi...