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About Me

                       

I am a retired registered dietitian nutritionist who lives in Seattle, Washington with my husband, Bruce. I was born and raised in Seattle with a few relocations out-of-state here and there but always returned to my home.  Our last move was to Idaho in 1998 where we lived on a "mini farm" and I started this blog fourteen years ago. I was often emphasizing our backyard chickens that we raised for 17 years that came with the house when we moved in.



I worked as a clinical dietitian at two local hospitals, one with in-patients and the other in home care. Before retiring, I worked as a dietitian for a total of 30 years in hospital settings and out-patient settings including a private practice in Seattle counseling patients before moving to Idaho.  We moved back to Seattle in 2015 and couldn't be happier being home again. But our farm life in Idaho was quite the trip for this city girl.  I often made cream pies with our dairy goats' milk


and I did lots of canning and preserving from our two gardens and fruit tree orchard.


Anybody want an Idaho potato?



 
We never had a shortage of canned fruit, tomato sauce,  jams, jellies, or applesauce and apple butter.




I mainly started this blog after our two children moved back to the Seattle area and kept asking for "that recipe" from home. The kitchen has always been the center of activity in our house and we are always cooking up great feasts and entertaining with food for our many friends and family members. I raised my two children practicing child nutrition guidelines of Ellyn Satter, RD, that I still recommend.  You can get her book here.   Hence, both my children have developed a love of food, cooking and experimenting with new foods, just like their mom.  Here is our daughter, Lauren, preparing an Italian meal after studying one summer in Italy during college.   

  

Our son, Nick and his wife, Sachiyo, live in Japan with our two precious grandchildren. We all visit each other often so it doesn't actually seem that far away. 


When we visit Japan, we love to feast on all the Japanese food that Japan has to offer. Much of it Nick and Sachiyo prepare for us at their home.



This blog is mostly about my family and all the recipes I share with them.  They have taste-tested all my recipes and help me decide which ones to post on this blog.  Many don't make the cut but when they do, I post them.  When we are not cooking or eating, Bruce and I like to travel and explore around our beautiful Pacific Northwest and beyond. 


Wherever we are, we will dive into new dishes so I will post those, as well. I hope you enjoy my stories and family adventures with food and find some recipes you can also share with your family.




Popular posts from this blog

Trader Joe's Gluten-Free Oatmeal, Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Cookies

I don't have very many gluten-free cookies on my blog because quite frankly, I usually don't like gluten-free.  But occasionally, I do find a good recipe and this is one that is from the back of the Trader Joe's oatmeal and it's a good one.  My friend brought some over to our house last weekend when Nick and family were here for our birthday celebrations  and we all loved them. My friend lives a few blocks away and we walk the neighborhood together on weekends.  We can easily go 5 miles in no time, talking non-stop.  She loves exploring our neighborhood as much as I do and we discover so many favorite little spots.  We even found a property with a horse (or more like a pony, I should say.)   The views are always quite lovely, too.  Bruce and I had our thirty-ninth wedding anniversary on July 18th and I made a point of walking past the house where we had our wedding reception.  I told my friend, "Thirty-nine years ago today, t...
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Meatloaf by Mark Bittman

Once again, I turned on the television yesterday and saw that Mark Bittman was on the Today show and was making his version of  meatloaf .  This must be meatloaf season.  It was surprisingly similar to the  Pioneer Woman's version  who was also recently on.   I was a little surprised of his version because Mark Bittman is into healthy eating and has lost a lot of weight and improved his health by changing his diet which he writes about in his book,  Food Matters .  His meatloaf recipe also included bacon and cheese!  I must be doing something wrong.  The thing to remember, which he writes about in his book, is that you can eat healthy without going extreme or changing your whole life.    If you don't know who Mark Bittman is, he is a food writer and a four star chef with multiple cookbooks who loves to eat but changed his food philosophy to improve his health.  He tells his story in Food Matters and provides ...
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Two-Bean Soup with Kale

This hearty vegetarian soup warms up chilly nights.  Use any type of canned beans you happen to have on hand and add chicken or Italian sausage for a heftier dish, if you prefer. Makes 4-6 servings 3 Tbsp. olive oil 1 cup chopped onion 1/2 cup chopped carrots 1/2 cup chopped celery 1/2 tsp. salt, divided 2 cloves garlic, minced 4 cups vegetable broth, divided 7 cups stemmed, chopped kale (about 1 bunch) 2 (15-ounce) cans cannellini beans, rinsed, drained and divided 1 (15-ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained 1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper 1 Tbsp. red wine vinegar 1 Tbsp. fresh rosemary or 1 tsp. dried rosemary 1.  Heat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat.  Add olive oil to pan; swirl to coat.  Add onion, carrot, and celery, and saute 6 minutes or until tender.  Stir in 1/4 tsp. salt and garlic; cook 1 minute.   2.  Stir in 3 cups vegetable broth and kale.  Bring to a boil; cover, reduce heat, and simme...
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