This recipe came from my younger daughter, who used to buy these chocolate-covered and salted rice cakes at Itsu, a high quality sushi chain in London. It’s so simple to make this low-calorie, sweet-and-salty snack – all it takes are 3 ingredients and a microwave. This is a great sleepover snack if you’ve got kids coming over because it’s also an activity; it’s fun to brush the chocolate on the rice cakes and sprinkle them with salt, and then wait […]
Homemade ice cream without the machine! Who knew this could be so easy? Hats off to Martha Stewart for finding a way to make ice cream at home without an ice cream maker. This doesn’t involve rock salt, Ziploc bags, constant stirring, or residual mess. It does make a really rich, sweet ice cream: the kind of dessert you eat in small portions and savor for its freshness. I used fresh blackberries and threw in a couple of tablespoons of […]
I had an unusual experience the other day: I had to bake a pie while being interviewed about my childhood. It’s no big deal for food bloggers to make videos and talk about how to make food, but when you’re concentrating on crimping a pie crust while answering a question about what kind of adolescent you were, it can get weird. This all came about because a very nice filmmaker is making a documentary about former White House social secretaries, […]
There are times when chocolate is called for, and when the need arises, I say, go Big or go home! These cookies will assuage any chocolate craving, however long you’ve had it and no matter how badly you deserve to be compensated. Chocolate is often about compensation: something that was supposed to happen didn’t – and so you need chocolate. Or something you never wanted to happen did – and so you need chocolate. It can’t be a daily occurrence; […]
The former White House social secretaries are a congenial group, and we gather regularly to catch up and pass tales, for much the same reason veterans flock to the VFW: we share an experience that others cannot fully appreciate. I love them all, but one who has a special place in my heart is Ann Stock, who served in the Clinton Administration. During my second week at the White House, feeling overwhelmed by the volume of events in that pre-Christmas, […]
