Month: November 2015

Canadian Butter Tarts

Published by Miri Nadler

I know what you’re thinking. “Miri, it’s the day before Thanksgiving, an American holiday. Why on earth are you posting a recipe for a Canadian dish?” Because these butter tarts are dang delicious – that’s why! Actually, a former colleague-turned-friend of mine who happens to be Canadian recently asked on Facebook if anyone had a recipe for butter tarts, because she wanted to bring some Canadian treats to her American Thanksgiving celebration. I did, and was only sad that I wasn’t able to share the recipe with her from my own blog. I think sharing food and recipes from different cultures is more than appropriate at the Thanksgiving table. No matter how you feel about British colonialism, the pilgrims were true religious refugees. And while they had less than stellar opinions of the native population at first, their desire was not to conquer, and ultimately both cultures learned a lot from each other and lived peaceably for over 50 years. So if you are looking for something different to bring to …

Fun with Headboards

Published by Miri Nadler

I had mentioned in a previous post how the pain medication for my gallbladder surgery had sent me on a 3 hour bender looking at blue tufted wingback headboards. Well, to tell you the truth, this post by Emily Henderson really sent me there. Our current home is an historical Spanish-style cave-ish dwelling tucked in a canyon around LA County. It isn’t anything if not quirky and charming and… cavernous. What I mean to say is, our house is dark. Don’t get me wrong, I really love it. I love the cozy, homey vibes. I love how strange it is. I love how it’s just authentically itself and not trying to achieve some era-gone-by architectural style. It was built in the 1920s to accomplish its purpose. That said, in a few months we will need to leave our unique home. It works just fine as long as the bebe can’t go anywhere, but once he becomes mobile, this house is not baby-friendly, and there is no possible way to childproof it, unless you …

Sticky Honey Balsamic Chicken Drumsticks

Published by Miri Nadler

So yesterday I posted about sticky coffee cinnamon rolls, so why not expand on the theme with this scandalously sticky drumsticks? Believe it or not, sometimes it’s hard for me to be inspired to make dinner. Usually I’ll log onto Pinterest and just choose something that looks good. This often results in Asian dishes – perhaps I was born on the wrong continent! It also may have something to do with the fact that Asian dishes don’t usually require a rack of lamb or some other specialized meat of which I can’t find a kosher version. My other method of figuring out what to make involves just seeing what’s available at the store. Whenever I go to the grocery store I usually have a pretty comprehensive list of all the things I need for the things I’ll make, and I rarely deviate; however, I will stop by the kosher meat section and see what’s available. If there’s something I haven’t seen before or never worked with, I’ll always pick it up and keep …

Fluffy Coffee Cinnamon Rolls

Published by Miri Nadler

Nothing’s better than ooey, gooey, chewy sweet cinnamon rolls and these ones are made with coffee! The original recipe used instant coffee grounds, so I went to Trader Joe’s to pick up some, and I knew I would regret it. I’ve bought instant coffee grounds before, use them for one recipe, and they sit on my shelf for 7 years after that. So while I was at TJ’s the clouds parted and the sky opened! They have cold brew coffee concentrate – perfect! Not only is cold brew less bitter, I knew my husband would have no problem finishing it off.

Next Best Thing to the Swaddle!

Published by Miri Nadler

If you’ve been following my blog, you know how much I believe in swaddling to ensure your little one gets a good night sleep, and even did this easy Russian swaddle tutorial a few weeks back that has been keep to helping our guy to sleep through the night. Well, eventually your little one will break through the swaddle, and it happened to us. Hello 4am – it’s been a while since I’ve seen you!

After a few nights of waking at 4am to find my lovely swaddle in shambles, we decided it was no longer safe to swaddle the baby, because the extra loose fabric could be a SIDS risk. As far as I knew the only other option was a sleep sack. So we put S in a sleeper and zipped up the sleep sack leaving his hands free to roam about. Yeah, that worked for one night. All the following nights we still had that lovely 4am scream.

During that same time I had joined a few mommy groups on Facebook. There was all this chatter about Baby Merlin’s Magic Sleep Suit, and the mommies would exclaim “it really is magic!” I saw pictures and I just kept thinking this contraption is so odd looks so hot and I moved on. But the suit would come up again and again, and I decided to do a little more research.