Every year I love to celebrate my half birthday, much to the chagrin of my friends and family. A half birthday obviously calls for a half cake. But how do you make a half cake without just making a whole cake and cutting it in half? If you're not into half birthdays, this is also a great option if you just want a smaller cake for any occasion. Here's how to make a half birthday cake: 1) Review the cake recipe you will be using, and divide it in half. I find it really helpful

In my previous post about sweet hamantaschen, I promised to share their savory counterpart. This one was a bit more of an improvisation adventure but after some setbacks they turned out amazing. I couldn't find any recipes for a savory (or just not super sugary) hamantaschen dough online that wasn't essentially pie crust, and I really wanted the dough to be more of a savory cookie dough than pastry. Mostly because I was feeling lazy, and even though making pie crust isn't har

The Jewish holiday Purim is beginning as I write this at sundown. Purim is traditionally a holiday filled with debauchery and comedic skits; however given that we are in a global pandemonium, I'm celebrating this year by making hamantaschen, the traditional cookie of Purim. Hamantaschen are supposed to represent the three-cornered hat worn by the bad guy of Purim, Haman. You can learn more about them here. The best thing about hamantaschen is you can be really creative with t

This past Christmas, my partner gifted me an ice cream machine. This has been a true game-changer, and I've spent the past couple months working on perfecting my ice cream recipe. I started with simple vanilla so I could test different variables in each batch, and just recently branched out into chocolate. I knew the chocolate ice cream would taste good, because it's pretty impossible to ruin chocolate ice cream. However, this chocolate ice cream blew our minds. It's rich, bu

I combine recipes like it's my job. (And hey...if you keep visiting this website regularly, maybe it will become my job.) Beef bulgogi and meatloaf are probably not two dishes you'd immediately think of as going together, but it worked. And it was delicious. The other night I made lasagna and I forgot to add the ground beef, so I had a pound of ground beef thawed in the fridge and didn't know what to do with it. I consulted my trusty culinary brainstorm buddy Rachel and one o

Smashed potatoes seem pretty trendy lately, and they are a really easy and delicious side dish to accompany any meal. The wonderful thing about potatoes is that they taste good with so many different seasonings and flavor profiles, so you can dress them up to fit within a variety of cuisines. I made these gochugaru garlic smashed potatoes to accompany a bulgogi-inspired meatloaf (recipe coming soon!) and they were fantastic. Gochugaru is a Korean red chili flake - it's the re

Today I ventured outside of my house (a rare activity) to try the sandwiches from Marty's Deli, a newish sandwich pop-up in Minneapolis that my friend recommended to me. Marty's Deli calls themselves "the best sandwiches in Minneapolis." While I haven't tried every sandwich in Minneapolis and thus can't confirm or deny this assertion, I can confirm that the sandwiches where incredibly delicious. I had the Uncle Pete, which has bacon, pickled green tomato, lettuce, basil, and

I recently shared an Instagram story that revealed the fact that I do not own (nor do I want to own) a coffee grinder. This was met with a wide range of reactions from my friends, ranging from scolding to affirmation to bemusement ("But Clare, you own an ICE CREAM MACHINE!") to making an entire video tutorial for me to illustrate that it is not, in fact, too much trouble to grind your own coffee beans. (The tutorial came from Emma, whose family runs a really fantastic coffee

I learned the technique of cooking fish en papillote (literal translation: in foil; figurative translation: in some sort of packet) from the illustrious Queen Ina Garten's cookbook, Make It Ahead. Her Herb Roasted Fish is one of the easiest and versatile recipes in the book. It appears to be a later incarnation of a similar recipe available online here. You cook the fish inside a packet made of parchment paper and the result is incredibly moist and flavorful fish - even if yo

Anyone who has known me for longer than an hour or so knows that I am quite fond of the film "Ratatouille." In fact, "Ratatouille" is hands-down my second favorite in the world (after "School of Rock") and I doubt that any movie will ever surpass it. In the words of the illustrious Billy Eichner, Ratatouille is simply "enchanting" and I make a point of watching it quite regularly. I also make a point of cooking ratatouille every once in a while. It is a great way to get your

Although this is a rare occurrence, it's possible that at some point in your life, you may find yourself with extra French fries. If this is ever the case, I recommend making a breakfast poutine. Drawing inspiration from our neighbors to the north (Canadians), breakfast poutine simultaneously clogs the arteries while providing the miraculous health benefits of everyone's favorite superfood (avocado). Disclaimer: this "poutine" would not be up to the standards of a poutine pur