Category: How to…

Don’t buy “cinnamon coffee”, put cinnamon in your coffee.

Flavored coffees have always bothered me. Ā I don’t mean coffee with flavored syrup – I mean coffee that has some mysterious chemical layer of something-ness that infuses coffee beans to somehow taste like cinnamon, or french vanilla, or pumpkins.

You know me…. I’m a girl who likes to keep things au naturale.

But I get it. Ā Sometimes I don’t just want a plain black cup of coffee either. Ā Instead of buying cinnamon flavored coffee, just add some cinnamon to your coffee. Ā Grounds, sprinkle of cinnamon, brew, enjoy. Ā It works for a french press; it works for a drip brewer. Ā And yes, it’s really that simple.

Ok, cinnamon seems simple enough, but what about those other flavors? Ā Here are some popular flavors, and my solutions for infusing your coffee instead of coating it with chemicals:

2012-12-31 09.48.27Cinnamon: Duh, we already covered this… add powdered cinnamon, or a fresh grated cinnamon stick

French Vanilla: Pinch of raw sugar and a whole vanilla bean

Hazelnut:Ā Grate a few hazelnut shavings into the grounds

Pumpkin: Sprinkle of pumpkin spice

“Christmas”:Ā Mulling spices (go easy on them… a little goes a long way)

I’m all ears for other ideas…

What do you do to add pizzazz to your daily cup?

Video: How to core and quarter tomatoes

I spent a lot of my Labor Day in the kitchen with lots and lots of tomatoes. Ā I bought 10 pound from my local farmers market and though my intended sauce turned out like juice (this is the topic of another post, perhaps), I thought that it would be fun to start a tiny little how-to video series!

I have tons of recipe books, but sometimes instead of browsing through index after index I find it’s just easier to google stuff that I want to know instantly.

So here I am on the YouTube, in my teensy apartment kitchen (hey, a lot of awesome stuff comes out of that little room…), giving a quick lesson on how to core tomatoes. Ā The video is tiny, like my kitchen, because it was taken by iphone… but you’ll get the idea.

So, what do we think? Yay? Nay? Ā Want more of these? Let me know!