We were in Haiti for four days scouting a fellow Episcopal church to partner with. Because of a four-hour flight delay and a paralyzing rainy traffic jam between Port au Prince and Carfourre, we were way behind schedule and still three hours from our destination in Torbeck. That’s when we pulled up to the washed

When Caesar salad made the leap from first to main course, it happily shared the plate with chicken, crab, salmon, and steak. But I found that boiled egg is also a great match. Making croutons out of hash browns–even better! In this week’s USA Weekend video, we show you how to make a deliciously substantial

I’ve never understood the appeal of those plates with carefully separated compartments. I like messy, saucy, long-simmering food. I am a sucker for stews, curries, soups, rich tomato sauces, braised meats, and saucy pastas chock full of veggies. Anything that requires a good hunk of bread dragged around the inside of the bowl to clean

If I had to name my top five pies, fresh strawberry would be among them. It’s one of the simplest pies to make. In this USA Weekend video we demonstrate just how simple this pie is to make. Once you pre-bake the crust, you’re done with the oven. Just make the glaze, slice the berries

When Sharon and her fiancé found themselves with a freezer full of hot dogs and buns at the end of last year’s cookout season, she observed, “when push comes to shove, everyone wants hamburgers.” In this USA Weekend challenge, I decided to see if I couldn’t improve the hot dogs’ odds at this year’s cookouts.

It’s been about 36 hours since we launched Bloggers without Borders and our fundraising efforts for tornado victims, so we thought it was time for a progress report. As of midnight, we had raised over $1,200 for tornado victims across the United States. We can’t thank you enough for your quick and generous response

Bloggers without Borders (BwoB) is a blogger-based charity whose mission is to help people—bloggers and readers alike—by harnessing the good will of the blogging community. Its founders are Maggy Keet of ThreeManyCooks, Erika Pineda-Ghanny of The Ivory Hut, and Aimee Wimbush-Bourque of Simple Bites. BwoB officially launches in July

Some people tolerate their family, some people like their family and other people love their family. I loooove my family. So when I learned that I would be attending a conference in Atlanta, I tacked on a few extra days so that I could stop in and see my aunt and uncle, Sue and Steve,

Maggy is not usually a difficult person to buy presents for—this is the girl who used to send Mom, Dad, and me a link to the exact item she wanted for Christmas. It was the right size, right color, right brand…all we had to do is click “add to cart” and punch in our credit

In this week’s USA Weekend video, we demonstrate how to make Spanish Chicken and Rice, a dish that’s simple enough for weeknight, special enough for having people over. For those who have saffron in your pantry, you can substitute a big pinch of it for the turmeric, and if you can find chorizo (it’s worth

I wrote this post on the plane home from Monterey, California where I was fortunate enough to be the guest of Dole for their first-ever Salad Summit. Despite a two-hour flight delay and only making my connecting flight with seven minutes to spare, I arrived on Thursday evening where we were taken to the best

On Saturday, bloggers in major (and minor!) cities around the U.S. held bake sales to benefit Share our Strength, a charity whose mission is to end childhood hunger. When my friend, Gaby, asked if I would head up the New York City bake sale, I happily accepted

You may think you need a recipe to make a bean and grain salad, but with this formula, you can build one based on what you’ve got around, what’s in season, or what you’ve got a taste for. In this week’s USA Weekend video we demonstrate how simple it is to create your own. Just

Some of us love the baby phase. Others adore our energetic toddlers and wide-eyed young children. There are those with a strong appreciation for the teen years (though I’ve never met a soul who loved a child the summer before they left for college). I appreciated all those phases, but right now feels like the