Gingered Carrot Cake Cookies Yield: 18 cookies Prep Time: 15 minutes | Bake Time: 16 to 18 minutes 2 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking powder ½ teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon ground ginger Pinch of grated nutmeg ¾ cup (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature 2/3 cup granulated sugar 1/3 cup light brown sugar [...]

Have you noticed the brightly colored bell peppers in the market lately? They’re glorious. Here’s a quick and easy recipe for Italian peperonata, or fried peppers, with onions, fresh plum tomatoes, garlic, and basil. This is one of those “I almost ate the whole batch” dishes, only reluctantly shared with my parents who agreed they were terrific. Peperonata recipes come in many versions; some get cooked a good long time, some get cooked with potatoes, or without tomatoes. This dish is certainly open-for-improvisation. Rather than cooking the peppers until they were stew-like, we opted for a light sauté so there is still some crunch in the vegetables. A perfect side dish for chicken or fish, great on bread, and great on its own too.

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With fresh peach season coming to an end, now is the time to stock up on homegrown peaches — to use, can or freeze. These five recipes are a great way to take advantage of what little time we have left with fresh summer peaches:
Quick Peach Chipotle Salsa
Use not-quite-ripe peaches to lend some sweet-tart tastes [...]

One fine day, as the song goes, I got a note from Colette Becker of Saucy Mama (@SaucyMamaCafe on Twitter). She invited me to participate in this year’s Saucy Mama food blogger contest. Well, it’s hard to say no when an invitation is extended so graciously and a promise of a heap of Saucy Mama products is part of the gig. So of course I said, “Count me in.”

When the package arrived a couple of weeks later, I ripped into all the bottles and tasted each one. I especially loved the Chipotle Mustard and the humongous Garlic Stuffed Olives, so decided to use them together in some sort of easy summer main course. This flavor packed Italian Panzanella is the result.

Pan-Fried Onion Dip Yield: About 2 cups of dip Prep Time: 40 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes 2 large yellow onions 4 tablespoons unsalted butter ¼ cup vegetable oil ¼ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper 1 teaspoon kosher salt ½ teaspoon ground black pepper 4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature ½ cup sour cream [...]