Some fun weekend reading...enjoy the winks (weekend links)!

+ Have you guys been watching House of DVF? I kinda love it....John even got a little into it when shit hit the fan about Kier's giant gold bow. Anyways, I heart and admire Diane so I thought this article on Refinery 29 was an inspiring read from a very smart biz lady.

+ If you don't follow Megan's blog, what the heck is wrong with you? Add it to your RSS immediately. I loved this podcast she did with Jessica of One Part Plant. She gets real and talks cancer, menopause, adoption, her book, upcoming screenplay, and....why meth babies are a deal breaker. ;)

+ TXSC 2015 is on....pack your best plaid, find yourself a s'mores stick and reserve your spot! This year, the conference is about getting back to basics, so the theme is CAMP. I'm super bummed that I won't be able to go this year because of SXSW commitments - boo hoo!

+ This illustration on Cup of Jo had me laughing out loud. I can't help but eye roll when couples are all "Weeee're pregnant!!!" so I am 100% behind that one. Another one are those stupid BINGS on airplanes that scares the crap out of you when it wakes you up. What are your pet peeves?

+ The '60s are my most favorite decade - the fashion! the beauty! the decor! the movies! - so this post was definitely bookmark-worthy. It has me rummaging through my hair bin for my teasing comb within 10 seconds flat.

+Speaking of which, have you seen these classic films? With the exception of the Marilyn Monroe movies, I haven't watched any of them. I feel a movie marathon coming on....get ready, Netflix.

+ Flourless pumpkin almond butter bars with dark chocolate and coconut? Ummm, get in my belly.

+ Elsie and Emma hit it out of the DIY park with this rad marbled clay ring dish tutorial. Brilliant!

My love affair with watermelon goes way back to the days when I was a pint-sized (well....actually 'husky-sized) kid. I would jump up and down with glee when my Dad would make a detour on his way home from work and visit Stanley's, a local fruit and veggie market. The ultimate prizes that Dad would bring home in those humid summer months would be coconuts and watermelon. My little brother and I would patiently watch as Dad carefully sliced open the watermelon, and carved it up. He would toss each cube into our huge tupperware container, but not without first letting us cherry-pick the pinkest pieces. Before we polished off one half, I would make it my mission to be the first to the pull the uncut half of the watermelon out of the fridge and drill holes with my spoon straight into the heart, slurping up each morsel of juicy sweetness. Gosh, I was a really annoying kid. ;)

These days, when I'm not munching on straight-up watermelon, I am eating it as a savory salad. I'll tell ya, something magical happens when you put these 4 simple ingredients together: cubed watermelon, crumbled feta cheese, basil picked from our garden, and a dash of freshly ground black pepper. No recipes....just grab and toss it in a bowl. Make it, eat it, love it. Enjoy!

I first had this completely addicting and simple salad thanks to Ari, my sister-in-law who has a penchant for making delicious magazine-worthy dishes, flared pants, and growing adorable babies. She's basically the Martha Stewart in the family, minus the criminal record. To say I take mental notes on her meals each time I see her is an understatement. I'm basically mental novel-writing because they are always so friggin' good.  Considering I just made a Costco-sized batch, I figured I'd share one of my fave go-to salads for when I need a good dose of greens....tempered with a little bite of bacon-y goodness in every bite, natch.

Broccoli Salad

Ingredients

I large bag of fresh broccoli florets (I got the massive one from Costco)
1/2 red onion
1/2 pound bacon
1 cup dried cranberries
1 cup slivered almonds (walnuts or cashews would be tasty too)
Handful of cherry tomatoes (optional)
1 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup white sugar
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar (I subbed with rice wine vinegar because that's what I had)

Directions

1. Crisp your bacon. I baked mine on a foil-lined sheet in a 350 degree oven for 20-25 minutes. Sop up all the grease once crisped, cool and crumble.
2. Cut the broccoli into bite-size pieces, and quickly blanch it. Drain and let cool.
3. While the broccoli is cooling, cut the onion into thin slices. Combine with the bacon, cranberries, nuts and mix well.
3. Prep the dressing by mixing the may, sugar and vinegar together until smooth.
4. Combine all the ingedients into a bowl, and stir until evenly coated. Refrigerate to chill, and serve.

Happy new year, ladies and gents. Hope you all had a super fun time ringing in 2014, and are off to a good start with those resolutions! While most people are chattering about dropping a few jeans sizes, I was busy getting a sugar high and conquering the finicky little macaron in the kitchen with my high school bestie, Megan, and Mei, her very cool roommate, who both took a quick jaunt to visit Austin over Christmas break.

You see, these finicky little buggers have been on my list of skills to acquire since 20-freaking-12, alongside nun-chuck skills, bow-hunting skills and computer hacking skills. Ha, not really...but I'm doing well on my resolution to drop random quotes into casual conversation from only the best cinematic masterpieces of all time. So, +1 point there.  Anyways, after several epic attempts resulting in impressive failures (we hit every single problem on the list...go us!), I can finally swish a triumphant check mark on that box because, y'all....WE DID IT! We conquered the elusive macaron.

Now, this wasn't any regular ol' walk in the park. I trained for this bakefest like a marathon runner. I ate macarons, I studied macarons, I spent an absurd amount of time watching tutorials on Youtube and reading this book. With a little mixing and matching from both, I felt like Rocky ready for battle against these adorable little crunchy and chewy delights.

My rec for a successful batch? Watch this great macaron tutorial from Honeysuckle Catering. I think the three of us can recite it word for word now. ;) The recipe that she, and consequently we, used is adapted from the queen of impossible recipes herself, Martha Stewart. I'm not going to lie...I was a little worried these wouldn't turn out, but having video proof helped us forge onward. So, here's the how-to with my notes and recommendations that I picked up from reading the book.

Ingredients:

2 1/2 tbsp sugar
1 cup powdered sugar
3/4 cup almond flour
2 large egg whites, room temperature

Directions:

Sift confectioners' sugar and almond flour until combined. Whisk whites with a mixer on low speed until foamy. Add sugar while increasing speed to medium and whisk until soft peaks form. (TMT notes: Now is the time to add food coloring to the whites, if you want to.) Increase speed to high, and whisk until stiff peaks form. Slowly add the egg whites into the flour and powdered sugar mixture and fold until mixture is incorporated.

Transfer batter to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch plain round tip, and pipe 3/4-inch rounds 1 inch apart on parchment-lined baking sheets, dragging pastry tip to the side of rounds rather than forming peaks. (TMT notes: You must have evenly sized rounds for them to bake at the same speed and avoid imminent disaster. To do this, use a biscuit cutter and pencil to trace evenly sized and spaced rounds on parchment paper. Make the lines dark enough so you can see through the paper. Flip the sheet over so the pencil marked side is facing down. Actually, do this step FIRST so you don't let your batter dry out in the bowl while tracing all these circles.) Tap bottom of each sheet on work surface to release trapped air. Let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes (TMT notes: You want the macarons to not stick to your finger when you touch them. We had to let them dry for 20 minutes for the first batch, and 22 mins for the second.).

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.

Bake 1 sheet at a time, rotating halfway through, until macarons are crisp and firm, about 15 minutes. (TMT notes: You MUST double up on your cookie sheets! It helps prevent cracking and the bottom from cooking to fast/burning. Also, we let ours go for 17 mins because they were a bit undercooked in the middle.) Let macarons cool on sheets for 2 to 3 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. (Martha's notes: If macarons stick, spray water underneath parchment on hot sheet. The steam will help release macarons.)

To make my favorite buttercream filling, you will need 3 large egg whites, 1 cup sugar and 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature, cut into pieces.  

In the bowl of an electric mixer, whisk egg whites and sugar. Set mixer bowl over a saucepan of simmering water and heat mixture, whisking often, until it feels warm to the touch and sugar is dissolved, 3 to 5 minutes.

Transfer bowl to the mixer, and fit with the whisk attachment. Whip on high speed until mixture is stiff and shiny, 3 to 5 minutes. Add butter, one piece at a time, and continue mixing until butter is thoroughly incorporated. The filling can be kept, covered and refrigerated, up to 1 week. Bring to room temperature before stirring. Once that is the right consistency (I had to chill it in the fridge for a bit), go ahead and start piping.
 
Sandwich 2 same-size macarons with 1 teaspoon filling of your choice (buttercream, jam, etc). Serve immediately, or stack between layers of parchment, wrap in plastic, and freeze for up to 3 months.

*makes approx 30 cookies (15 sandwiches)

High on our glorious victory of poofy pink macarons with their adorable little pied, we whipped up a second purple batch accented with sprinkles that didn't quite turn out as well as we hoped because we didn't do the double pan trick. This resulted in slightly browned bottoms, domed tops and cracks. Shucks! They still tasted like heaven, though. No complaints there.

SO...who's going to give this infamous little cookie a try? Let me know how it goes if you do!

To celebrate my sis and her hubby's December birthdays, the fam got together for dinner. My mom cooked up an impressive spread of roast (lamb, fingerling potatoes, carrots and Brussels spouts). The rest of us brought cookies to do a holiday cookie exchange, because nothing says "Don't make me wear anything but stretchy pants during the holidays" like a good ol' fashioned cookie swap. While my cookies aren't anything as festive as the impressive reindeer cookies my sis and nieces whipped up, they each have an element of classic Christmas tastes. Here are three confections I brought to the table.

Double Chocolate and Mint Cookies

Just a few recipes I am craving and plan to cook up should I get the sudden crazy notion that I have some serious Martha Stewart kitchen skills and can cook a fresh and healthy meal, bake a pie from scratch, get it all plated at the right time, and not set off the fire alarm. More tastiness on Pinterest.

People often tell me that "You're your mother's daughter." Aside from the fact that she doesn't like coconut (blasphemy), we are alarmingly similar. So similar, in fact, that I didn't write a single thing down when she was schooling me in the ways of making the world's best French onion soup. You see, dear mom keeps all her recipes locked up in the ol' noggin and freestyles as she goes. Actually, I take that back...I wouldn't call her onion soup recipe 'freestyling'. Instead, she uses years of experience (her specially trained nose knew exactly when the onions had the first hint of caramelization) to make sure the recipe is adjusted just so. So, now I'm recording this recipe so I have it forever and share it with my friends and family, just as my mom does and her mom does. The measurements aren't an exact science, which may really irritate some of you and give you extreme anxiety. Take a Xanax, drink some wine and chill....because it'll all turn out magical in the end. Alright, here goes.

Olive oil, enough to coat the bottom of the pot
Onions (preferably vidalia), one big bag
Sugar, 1-3 wooden spoonfuls
Dry white wine (good quality), 2 bottles
Low-sodium beef stock, 2 boxes
Crusty bread, one loaf
Jarlsberg cheese, the more the merrier
Stock pot (you need the big one...I thought my pasta pot would work, but no way once you slice up all those onions)
Food processor, optional but very smart to use


1. Look at the clock. Do you have 7 hours to cook some soup? Then by all means, commence reading this epic recipe. If not, sorry....do not pass go. You can't rush this process, and if you speed through it, your French onion soup will be mediocre at best, slimy mush at worst.

2. Coat the bottom of your pot in olive oil, and turn up the heat to medium high. Start slicing the onions with the slicer blade on your food processor, and toss the sliced onions into the pot as the food processor cup fills.

3. After each batch goes in, sprinkle in the sugar and stir to coat. When I say sprinkle, I mean dump in a wooden spoonful. We did about three large wooden spoonfuls of sugar for this batch, since I bought the wrong onions at Costco (regular yellow instead of vidalia...total amateur move on my part). Mom explained that she normally only uses about one wooden spoonful when using vidalia onions, but these needed some sweetening to take the acidic onion taste down and help with the eventual caramelization process.

This was when the onions just started caramelizing, and got their first one or two stirs.

3. Now, this is the part where I was goofing up. Once you have stirred in the sugar and the onions start cooking down, don't touch them. At all. When do we stir them, you ask? This is the tricky part where my mom's hound-like nose came into play. She smelled the faintest scent of caramelization, and knew to stir. For novices like you and me with useless noses, I'd give it about 20-30 minutes. Once you see the faintest bit of caramelization, turn the heat down to just a pinch below medium and give it a quick mix.

This was about half-way through the caramelization process

4. Keep stirring every 20-40 minutes or so until most of the liquid is dissolved and you have a nice, even, dark color. You want to give the onions ample time on the bottom of the pot to develop that color and sweet flavor, so try and feel it out for when you should stir based on their progress. It's important not to rush this process - don't turn up the heat to speed it up. Just let time and heat do it's thing. When you stir, be sure to scrape up any bits that get stuck onto the pot bottom. There's some super flavors in that.

After adding the wine

5.When all the liquid is gone, your onions are getting some deep color, and they need to be stirred pretty often to prevent burning, then it's time to bring in the wine. We poured in two bottles of white, and scraped up any remaining bits from the bottom. We then added our low-sodium beef broth.

6. Bring your soup to a boil, then reduce heat to a simmer. Cover, and let cook for a few hours (our went for another 3 hours). The ideal goal is to get the liquid to reduce by almost half, so all those flavors intensify and blend together. Uncover in the last hour of cooking.

7. When ready to serve, slice up some pieces of crusty bread and Jarlsberg cheese. Place under the broiler, watching them carefully so the bread and cheese don't burn. When the cheese gets melted and bubbly, it's take to take them out. Place immediately in the soup using tongs (be careful not to drop it...the hot splash of soup will hurt!) and let it soak up that fantastic broth. Conversely, you can dish the soup into bowls that are oven-safe, put the bread and cheese in them, and place that directly under the broiler.

8.  Enjoy!

Note: My grandmother and mom both agree that it's best to wait a day to eat the soup, but you don't have to. Just make sure you have leftovers, because the day after is even better.

Imagine this all too common scenario in our household, if you will. I had a half container of almost-expired Greek yogurt in the fridge, a psychotic craving for something sweet, time working against me, and a broken oven. Cookies were out. Cakes take too long and are messy. I get annoyed that we don't have any popsicles left. All I want is some ice creeeaaammm, geez. Then bing...peanut butter fro yo to the rescue! A full 20 minutes later, John and I were eating a tangy, creamy, and protein-packed frozen yogurt drizzled with chocolate and sprinkles. A quick and easy dessert after a busy day at work.

Homemade Peanut Butter Greek Frozen Yogurt

2 cups plain Greek yogurt (I used non-fat)
1/2 cup milk of choice (I used almond milk)
Generous 1/2 cup peanut butter (or preferred nut butter)
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1/3 cup sugar

Directions

{Photo by Kirsten Stoddard for Triple Max Tons}

Épicerie, a small French grocery/bistro in the Rosedale neighborhood, caused a heck of a lot of controversy when in the 'planning to open' phase. I bet the residents who were anti-Épicerie feel pretty stupid right about now, because daaaaaang this place is amazing. After one too many "oh, I've heard about that place but haven't been" conversations, John and I recently went to check it out after we ran some errands in that part of town.

I didn't know what to expect really, but all I can say is my jaw dropped when we walked in. I mean, the place is super cute from the outside, but the inside? Ermahgerd, I died. It's a light-filled heaven of dark navy walls, slick Carrera marble, copper lighting, bubble chandeliers, baguettes, cheese, wine....I wanted to move in. Seriously. Just make that place my personal B&B. After mulling over a small but appetizing brunch menu, we both got the pastrami hash. It was awesome. Small portions, though - but the ingredients were all prepared to perfection. Next time I make a hash (which would coincidentally be the first...not a lot of hashing in this household), I am totally copycatting and putting apples in there. It's magical in that dish. We polished our meal off with housemade beignets, because they are housemade warm beignets drenched in powdered sugar, for heaven's sake. Might as well call them Kryptonite.

What's a gal to do when she picks up two enormous jars of peanut butter at Costco? Put a dent in the gallons and gallons of PB by making peanut butter cookies, that's what. John has been up in Connecticut visiting with the fam (I stayed behind because plane tickets cost as much as a Birkin bag....lame), so I made a batch to welcome him home today. Nothing says "I love you and freaking missed you like woah" like warmed homemade cookies and a cold glass of (almond) milk. I also like pairing these cookies with berries....it's kinda like a dessert version of PB&J.

Peanut Butter Cookies

1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup peanut butter
1 egg
1 1/4 cup flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions

{Recipe via Simply Recipes; Photo by Kirsten Stoddard for Triple Max Tons}