Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

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Kiwi and Peach has officially been steaming along for one whole year! What a year it’s been?! Y’all have traveled to 5 different continents with us, made a transatlantic move with us and weathered a few storms with us. Y’all have been an integral part of this journey and we want to thank you for being so wonderfully supportive and game for adventure.

Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

Food is the lens through which we experience the world. It’s been a way of expressing myself creatively, and I love getting to share that with y’all. In turn, y’all have shared your experiences with me helping us both to learn and grow. It’s beautiful, this blogging thing. As we look ahead to what the future holds for Kiwi and Peach, we are nothing but excited. There are some huge things coming up in the next year like the launching of our meal planning service, The Seasonal Supper and the opening of our very own Etsy shop! We can’t wait to be able to continue to share our lives with you.

Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

We started the year out as strictly a food and travel blog and have some how ended up more squarely in the lifestyle category. If there is anything I’ve learned, it’s that you have to write from your heart. As we continue to grow, pass through big changes and experience life’s milestones, I find more and more that my heart is leading me to share more than just recipes. We always want to provide you guys with great content that is helpful and insightful and something you can connect to, but life isn’t as black and white as a recipe. You can’t just add one cup good food, half cup decent beer, five teaspoons adventurous travel, throw in a slice of bacon and have a perfect cake every time. Life is more nuanced than that

Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

I’ll be honest. While my heart has been telling me that this is the direction the blog is moving for a while, I have been hesitant to start calling ourselves a ‘lifestyle’ blog because I’m afraid. I’m afraid that y’all just come here for recipes. That my voice and what I have to say about life in general isn’t as strong of a pull as my granola recipe. Maybe it isn’t. But if there is one thing I have learned about this blogging thing it’s that it pays to follow your heart. As long as your voice is true and authentic people will connect with it. So that’s what I’m doing.

Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

Don’t get me wrong, I’ll still be sharing recipes, just not as many. If you are just here for the recipes, I highly suggest you subscribe to The Seasonal Supper. You’ll get 20+ recipes, meal planning tools, and super cute calendars and organizational print goods every three months and all the support I can give to help make meal time at your house go a smoothly as possible.

On the blog though, we are going to diversify a little bit. There will probably be more than a few posts about our home and building a life in a new town. There will be posts about our outdoor adventures in these beautiful mountains we live in. There will be posts about how we orchestrate this DIY lifestyle and how you can streamline the process. And there will be posts about other stuff—fears, joys, fears, success, trials. We sure hope you’ll stick around for many years to come!

Kiwi+Peach Turns One + Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

 

You guys just want to eat some cupcakes, don’t you? I’ll stop rambling then and get to it. How better to celebrate this blog’s 1st birthday than with a boozy cupcake stuffed full of peaches and garnished with a slice of kiwi fruit. This is not a ‘healthy’ dessert—this is a pastry flour and lots of sugar kind of dessert, and you know, there is nothing wrong with one of those every now and again. Remember, our favorite saying; “Eat what you want, just make it yourself.” So let’s get to making!

Spiked Peach Cupcakes with Bourbon Buttercream

{makes 10-12 cupcakes}

1/3 cup butter, room temperature
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla paste {or extract}
2 tsp bourbon
3/4 cup all purpose flour
heaping 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
pinch of baking soda
pinch of cinnamon
1/2 cup creme fraiche {or sour cream}
1/2 cup diced fresh peaches

Preheat oven to 350°F.

Beat together the butter and sugar until it’s light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. Then add the egg, vanilla, and bourbon. In a separate bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon. Alternate between adding the flour mixture and the creme fraiche to the wet ingredients until everything is incorporated. Gently fold in the the peaches. Line a cupcake pan with liners and fill each cup 3/4 of the way full. Pop them in the oven and bake for 22-24 minutes. When they’re finished, turn them out onto a cooling rack.

Bourbon Buttercream

3/4 cup butter, room temperature
3 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbsp bourbon
1 tsp vanilla paste {or extract}

Beat the butter and powdered sugar together until they form a ball around the paddle. Gradually add the bourbon and the vanilla paste until the mixture is light and fluffy. Pipe onto to cooled cupcakes and enjoy!

 

What To Do with Dried Beans

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There is a home video of my parents cooking dinner when I was about one. I was obviously doing something adorable while my mom was fixing dinner and my dad whipped out the massive 80’s video camera to document it. What he actually documented was the state of our family dinners at the time—a couple of LeanCuisines being heated up and dinner was ready at the beep. I can’t fault them. This stuff was billed as ‘healthy,’ and they were both working full time in demanding jobs. Dinner was an afterthought.

You see, I grew up in a canned bean kind of family. ‘Healthy’ convience foods were the name of the game, and if it couldn’t be made in 30 minutes, it wasn’t going in the rotation. I’m not saying it was all LeanCuisine (or God forbid Hamburger Helper), but there was definitely a reliance on pre-made seasoning packets and canned vegetables, beans, etc that I thought was completely normal and even ‘healthy.’

I’ll be the first to admit that there are much worse things out there in the world of processed food than canned beans, but when we started this journey of buying as close to nature as possible and making the stuff in our pantry as opposed to buying it, I learned a bit about this alternative to the can. I use the word alternative sarcastically because really, this is the way people have been doing it for thousands of years and how much of the world still prepares beans which are a staple in loads of traditional diets around the world. For the last few years we’ve mostly used the dried variety for all of our bean needs for a few reasons:

What To Do with Dried Beans from Kiwi and Peach

Dried beans are cheaper than their canned cousins by a significant amount and they last almost indefinitely. In Germany, I also found more variety of beans in the dried form which meant I could eat black eyed peas which made me a very happy southern woman.

By using dried beans we avoided the BPA in the plastic linings of some cans. BPA reacts in the body like a hormone and I don’t need anything else throwing that our of whack! BPA is actually banned in the EU in items for children and there has been an overwhelming push as of late for companies both here and abroad to make BPA-free cans because no one wants that gunk in their food. (Though most of us are screwed anyway because we’ve been eating it our whole lives. Wunderbar!)

You avoid the extra sodium and random seasonings that get stuck in the can with the beans. I always, always, always ended up rinsing my canned beans because I wanted to add my own seasoning. It was a pain and I was always irritated that I was probably paying more for the can because it had the seasonings in there.

But the biggest reason that we’ve stuck with using dried beans once we returned to the States is this…

Using dried beans isn’t hard. It’s actually pretty straight forward. They do require a little bit of forethought, but they’re really hands-off and they freeze beautifully. A little bit of work goes a really long way.

I also have a little trick that makes dried beans my go-to for weeknights. At the weekends, make a big batch and freeze it in 1½ cup sized portions. That way, on weeknights, you can pull them out of the freezer just like you would pull a can out of your pantry.

Are you convinced? Let’s pretend you are and let’s make some beans! There are two different ways I like to go about cooking beans and I’ll talk about them both. Here goes:

What To Do with Dried Beans from Kiwi and Peach

What To Do with Dried Beans

If your recipe calls for 1 can of beans you are going to want to use about ½ cup of dried beans. Dried beans will produce, on average, about 3 times the amount when cooked.

½ cup dried = 1½ cups cooked = a 15oz can of beans

The Quick Soak
This is the method I use most often because I usually forget to put them on to soak the night before.

Bring a stock pot full of water to a boil and then remove from the heat. Measure and rinse your beans then add them to the pot. Cover with a lid and let them soak for at least 2 hours.

After those 2 hours, drain off the water. Fill the stock pot with fresh water and salt it well. Bring the new water to a boil add the beans to the pot. Reduce the temperature to medium low and let them cook for about an hour to an hour and a half. Drain and you’re ready to go.

{The length of time depends on how firm you like your beans and how you will be cooking them later. If I’m going to be making chili, I usually only cook them for an hour. Burritos I’ll cook them a bit longer because I’m going to mash them to make refried beans.}

The Overnight Soak
First thing you want to do is grab a bowl that won’t stain. Measure and rinse your beans then add them to the bowl. Fill the bowl with a generous amount of water, cover with a tea towel and let it sit overnight.

When you’re ready to cook them the next day, bring a stock pot full of salted water to a boil, drain off the water the beans were soaking in and add the beans to the pot. Reduce the temperature to medium low and let them cook for about an hour to an hour and a half. Drain and you’re ready to go.

 

{JAM} Conor Oberst: Another Travelin’ Song

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My inner 15 year-old’s dreams came true last Friday. The Kiwi and I went to see Conor Oberst at the Orange Peel in Asheville. I’ve seriously wanted to see him for so long and this was the first time it worked out. They say good things come to those who wait, and let me tell you, it was a.m.a.z.i.n.g. If you’re a fan, or even if you’re not {yet}, go see him live. He will rock your world.

This one has been in my head all week long. What are you listening to? Doing any travelin’ this weekend?

Salt and Vinegar Kale Chips

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The kale phenom is not really a thing in Germany yet. While the foodies here in the States were having a heyday with The Chosen Brassica, those of us in Germany were left in a kale desert just wondering, why is it so special? Upon our return to the States, my mission was to find out.

I am a pretty big fan of the dark leafy green family as a whole. Collards, turnip greens, spinach—get in my belly! While I don’t think that kale is a particular stand out among the family, I do think it is delicious and a wonderful thing to eat. Western North Carolina seems to be a very happy place for kale (and it’s friend chard) to grow, so we are literally up to our ears in kale now. From desert to bounty!

One of my favorite ways to eat it though is the ever popular kale chip. Salt and vinegar potato chips are definitely my kryptonite, so the finding something with the same crunch and flavor profile with tons more vitamins and minerals (and like a tenth of the calories) was pretty exciting. You guys know me though, there is no way I’m paying those kinds of prices for something I can make for just the price of a bundle of kale, and there is no reason you should have to either. So let’s make some shall we?

Salt and Vinegar Kale Chips from Kiwi and Peach

Salt and Vinegar Kale Chips

1 bunch of kale
3 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp sea salt
2 tbsp apple cider vinegar

Preheat the oven to 375°.

Destem the kale and shred it into chip sized pieces.

Toss with the olive oil, salt, and vinegar. Spread them out into a single layer on a couple of lined baking sheets and pop them in the oven for 13-15 minutes. Keep an eye on them towards the end. You want them crispy, but not charred.

There you have it—enjoy those guilt free chips! If you are going to eat them straight away, I like to toss the finished chips in a bit more vinegar because I like them super vinegary, but that is totally up to you!

Rustic Stag Silhouette Wall Art Tutorial

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There are a lot of not-so-fun parts of moving house, but it’s not all heavy lifting and phone calls. My favorite thing is having a completely blank slate to make into a space that reflects the personality of the people that live there.

I’m pretty crafty. I haven’t talked much about how it extends to our home here on what is usually a food blog, but that motivation that inspires me to make my own ketchup or pizza dough is the same one that makes me totally game to build our own bed as opposed to buying it. I love DIY and I’m really lucky that my brain seems to have the bent. Since moving in back in January, we’ve been busy, busy doing lots of projects. Based on y’all reactions to the Kiwi’s post about building our own bed (it’s had almost 20,000 views!), I don’t think y’all will mind my sharing a few of these projects with y’all. I want to give y’all the tools, inspiration, and how-to know-how to take your creativity out of the kitchen and make the rest of your home just as homemade and beautiful as your dinner.

One of these days we are going to do a tour of our whole little bungalow, but since we started in the bedroom with the bed, why don’t we hang out there for a while. Our lath and plaster, 1920s walls were just begging for some love, and while nailing into them hoping to find a stud was out of the question, going big and doing the lean was totally doable. In Bavaria, deer heads or antlers are everywhere and while we certainly aren’t gunning for Uncle Bubba’s taxidermy collection, we needed a little stag to make us feel at home. Plus I’m loving silhouettes right now, because class, so obviously this had to happen.

Stag Silhouette Wall Art Tutorial from Kiwi and Peach

Rustic Stag Silhouette Wall Art Tutorial

Supply List
wood
stain
2 pieces of wood just shorter than the whole project
screws
drill
acrylic paint
brushes
stag template

I started by scrounging up some leftover bits of wood. We had just built a bed, so we had plenty of scraps laying around. I ended up using 1×3’s and a couple pieces of old siding found in my folks basement. I wanted it to be as wide as the dresser it would be sitting on which was 19 inches, so I cut my pieces to 19 inches and stacked them until I liked the height:width ratio. If you don’t have a specific size in mind try going for one of the standard picture frame sizes like 11×17 or 16×20. It doesn’t have to be exact.

Stain the wood and give it time to dry, about 24 hours.

Once dry, stack the pieces to your liking and flip the whole project over. Sit the 2 extra pieces of wood on top of the project so that it is perpendicular to the other pieces. These braces are what is going to hold the whole project together, so make sure it covers almost the length.

Use a drill to screw the braces to the wood starting at the bottom and working your way up. Make sure to put a screw into each piece of wood and at least two in one of them to prevent twistage. You also might want to pre-drill the ones at the top and bottom so that it doesn’t split like ours did. If you wanted to hang this, it would be a piece of cake to screw two eye hooks to the inside of the two pieces and run picture hanging wire between them.

Stag Silhouette Wall Art Tutorial from Kiwi and Peach

Now flip it back over and let’s get that deer on there. I just free-handed it, but if that makes you a little anxious, I’ve made a template you can follow. Some  printers will do enlargements, but if yours doesn’t, you can head over to Kinkos or Staples and have them blow it up to the size of your project for about a buck.

Cut it out and lightly trace around the template then just color within the lines with your paint. Let it dry for a quick minute and voila, your very own stag silhouette art.

Stag Silhouette Wall Art Tutorial from Kiwi and Peach

Just a few more weeks to sign up for our meal planning service, The Seasonal Supper! Our first collections roll out on June 1st, and I know you don’t want to miss out on a single day of fresh, seasonal recipes and loads of meal planning tools. At just $19.99 a season for four weeks of recipes, meal line-ups, grocery lists, calendars as well as blank tools that you can tweak to make work for you and your life, it’s a steal!

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Let’s Chat

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Let's Chat | New Post from Kiwi and Peach

Hello there my dears! How was your weekend?

I kind of kept it on the down low, but my birthday was last week, hence the little mini break! Man, we sure have been doing 26 up right. Of course by doing it up right I mean I was sick, running a ridiculous fever, and lost my voice BUT I ate lots and lots of birthday Derby Pie so there’s a silver lining.

Thankfully the Kiwi and I celebrated at the weekend, before mystery illness struck. He cooked for me all weekend making my favorite and said birthday pie. We went hiking with the pup to some gorgeous waterfalls near Asheville and then made it back to civilization in for our dinner reservation at Curate, a slammin’ new tapas place in downtown. The food was amazing and the moonshine/ginger ale cocktail, well let’s just say that might have been the nail in the coffin to my immune system, but it was worth it.

I spent my actual birthday curled up in bed reading, but then again, that sounds like a perfectly lovely way to spend a day anyway.

Thankfully the mystery illness seems to have passed. Perhaps there really is something to this oils thing. I was using liberal amounts of eucalyptus and lemon (they are the only two I know about) and seriously bounced back in about 3 days. Not bad Jim.

All that said, I don’t have any recipes for you or clever DIY projects, but I did want to check in and have a chat. So grab a nice glass of tea and spill. What has been on your mind this week?

We are doing a little container garden this year on our back deck. We’re doing pole beans, lots of basil, tomatoes, leeks, oregano, rosemary, and spinach. All my little seedlings, except the tomatoes, have now been transferred to their pots and they seem to be doing well. Our spinach was a disappointment as none of it really germinated, but I think I’m going to try again in a different container with better drainage. (I was trying the ole’ Pinterest favorite of using egg cartons. Fail.) Are you growing anything this year?

Do you use essential oils? Do you want to tell me all about them? I have been so curious about them since the Kiwi’s mom convinced me to switch up my Vick’s nose spray for eucalyptus oil with amazing results. I’m all about trying a more natural approach with health related matters, so I really want to love oils, but I’m so overwhelmed!

We finally finished our fireplace project just before Easter. I thought I was incredibly clever to come up with such a cool way to use an old mantle that I salvaged from on old house in my hometown, then of course Pinterest exploded with numerous examples of similar projects. Sing it with me, it’s all been done before. Oh well. I’m still going to share it…eventually.

Apparently I’ve been living under a rock for the past two years in terms of advancements in processed foods. Did you know they make watermelon Oreos now? And apparently instead of lemonade packets they have these little drops now? I can’t say that both of those things don’t make me completely skeptical of their ingredient lists, but what will they think of next?!

I just finished re-reading The Perks of Being a Wallflower. I forgot how much that book made me think. It also inspired me to re-read To Kill a Mockingbird which I haven’t read in about 10 years. True story, when I was little I used to think it was Tequila Mockingbird, which obviously made me want to read it more. I was a little disappointed when I realized the truth. What are you reading? I’m always looking for a good read.

My friend Shannon, who is also from Georgia, who also lived in Bavaria, and who is also transitioning back to the States right now has been hitting the proverbial nail on the proverbial head recently. She has been much more eloquent than I think I ever could be about transition and uprooting and starting over. In case I haven’t said it before, thanks for making me feel like I’m not in this alone.

That’s all I have my friends. Now it’s your turn! Spill it.

ANZAC Biscuits

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One of the most prominent and contentious differences between the American and English languages is the word ‘biscuit’. Most people would tell you that the American translation is ‘cookie’ and leave it at that. Of course, the delicious fluffy buttermilk biscuits we enjoy here in the Southern US are a completely different thing, unknown to the rest of the world. Express a hankering for a fried chicken biscuit to your English-speaking colleagues and hilarity will likely ensue (as Lauren once found out).

We believe there’s more to it than that though—there’s a distinct difference between English biscuits and American cookies. Biscuits are traditionally hard, whereas Americans like their cookies soft. (A quality that appears to often be achieved by loading them up with so much sugar that the other ingredients can barely hold it together.) So we have an agreement on how to resolve the language dispute: soft cookies are cookies and hard cookies are biscuits.

ANZAC biscuits, then, are definitely biscuits. Legend has it that soldiers of the Australia-New Zealand Army Corps, serving in Europe in the First World War, used to receive them in care packages from home. They were baked hard to survive the journey of many weeks or months across the world.

Early on the morning of the 25th of April, 1915, ANZAC troops (under British command) began landing on the shores of the Gallipoli peninsula, in modern-day Turkey. It was the beginning of an ill-fated campaign to wrest control of the Dardanelles straight from the Ottoman Empire, thus opening access to the Mediterranean for the Russian Black Sea Fleet. And every year on the 25th of April, ANZAC Day, New Zealanders and Australians the world over pause to remember just what a colossally bad idea that was. Lest We Forget.

ANZAC Biscuits from Kiwi and Peach

ANZAC Biscuits

{makes 10 biscuits}

The Dry
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup old fashioned oats
1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut
1/4 tsp baking soda

The Wet
1.5 ounces (5o grams) butter, melted
2 tbsp golden syrup
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat your oven to 350°F (160°C).

In a large bowl combine all of your dry ingredients. In a separate bowl, melt your butter then whisk in the golden syrup and vanilla. Add this to the dry ingredients and start mixing. If it is too crumbly to roll into a ball, add up to two tablespoons of warm water. Roll the dough into golf-ball-sized balls and place staggered on a parchment paper lined baking sheet.

Pop them in the oven for 15 minutes. You’ll know they’re finished when the edges start to brown. Take them out and let them cool completely before gobbling them up. And obviously, they last forever—just not in our house.

Lemony Chicken Rice with Spring Vegetables

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Oh spring! I’m so happy to see you.

This winter was rough and if I’m being honest, pretty lonely. Moving to a new town is isolating in an of itself but add the coldest winter in recent history and you have yourself a recipe for a rough transition. I had to get out of the house!

I started volunteering with a non-profit here called FEAST—fresh, easy, affordable, sustainable, tasty— which is what we think food should be. The goal is to give kids the opportunity to have hands-on experiences with fresh fruits and vegetables whether that’s growing it in the garden or cooking it in the kitchen. The hope is that if they grow it themselves and cook it well they’ll want to eat it and enjoy the taste! We use introduce  lots of seasonal vegetables, teach them how to use them, and try show the kids that, when prepared well, veggies can be really tasty! A few weeks ago I was officially got the offer to contract with them and teach the middle school after school programs. It’s amazing and absolutely the perfect job for me. I am so, so happy to be back in middle schools talking about my favorite thing, food! To say it was a sanity saver is an understatement.

Working with beaucoups of vegetables is so refreshing to me after that long winter. I love celebrating these lovely little gems that the earth {and our local farmers} have given us and learning how to craft them in a way that brings out their unique flavors. Eating close to the earth like this keeps us completely mindful of what is in season and what the earth is giving us at this moment in time.

It certainly draws parallels to our meal planning service, The Seasonal Supper. When pulling together our sneak preview, I snuck in one of my favorite new spring recipes that hadn’t made it on the blog yet. While you should absolutely go download the sneak peek {and you should sign up for The Seasonal Supper while you’re at it}, I couldn’t resist sharing it here too.

So this Earth Day, let’s eat close to the earth and let’s be mindful and thankful for all it gives us.

Lemony Chicken Rice with Spring Vegetables

Lemony Chicken Rice with Spring Vegetables

{serves 2}

for the rice:
1/2 cup brown rice
1 1/4 cup well salted water

for the chicken:
drizzle of olive oil
1 chicken breast
dash of salt and pepper
half a head of broccoli
half a bundle of asparagus
dash of red pepper flakes
1 Tbsp chopped preserved lemon {or juice from 1/2 of a fresh lemon}

for the sauce:
2 Tbsp honey
2 Tbsp soy sauce
2 tsp chopped preserved lemon {or zest and juice from 1/2 of a fresh lemon}

Get the rice started first because it is going to take about 50 minutes to cook. Just follow the directions on your pack of rice and make sure that your water is well salted.

Once the rice is on, go ahead and chop your veggies. Cut the woody end off the asparagus and put them in the compost. Then chop the stalks into about thirds. For the broccoli just cut the flowers off the stalk.

Drizzle a bit of olive oil in your skillet and start heating it up on medium-high heat.

On a separate cutting board, because food safety, cut the chicken breast into bite sized pieces. Sprinkle with sea salt and a few grinds of black pepper.

When the pan is hot, add your chicken. Let it cook for a couple of minutes stirring occasionally until it’s sealed on all sides, then add the asparagus, broccoli, red pepper flakes, and preserved lemon. Stir well and cook for an additional 5 minutes or until the broccoli and asparagus are tender and the chicken is cooked through.

While that is cooking, whisk the sauce together in a small mixing bowl.

Once the chicken and vegetables are done cooking, remove the skillet from the heat and pour the sauce into the pan. Give everything a stir to make sure the sauce is fully incorporated.

When the rice is finished, plate it up and enjoy!

 

The Seasonal Supper

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Last weekend, the Kiwi and I hit up the Mother Earth News Fair. It was incredible and worthy of a post of it’s own, but one thing I heard there really struck me. Joel Salatin, of Food, Inc. and The Omnivore’s Dilemma fame, talked about today’s norms, the orthodoxies of our age. He also mentioned that most of us there were, well, heretics, because we went against those norms and that was for the better because they were kind of mind-blowing. One of those orthodoxies in particular though especially burnt my britches.

49% of meals are prepared outside of the home. That’s almost half of our meals being made by other “people”.

If you read our post about our food philosophy then you know why that doesn’t sit very well with me. Usually the other “people” that are making that food are corporations that care more about their bottom line than your nutrition. We also tend to indulge in not-so-healthy treats more often when other “people” are making it for us. When people take a moment to prepare their supper, to sit down at a table and eat, it leads to healthier relationships with food and in turn healthier people. And thats the goal isn’t it? To be healthy?

He followed it up with this—70% of folks don’t know what’s for supper at 4pm. I’m definitely not saying there is something wrong with that. I’ll be the first to admit that is absolutely true for us more often then I’d like to admit. However, I am saying that you’re much more likely to grab fast food, order take-out, or resort to convince foods like TV dinners and frozen pizzas if you don’t have a plan.

Our goal, our mission, is to get people cooking for themselves and having fun with it. Whether you’re cooking just for yourself, for you and your significant other, or for you, your significant other, and your persnickety little people that think vegetables are weird trees, we want dinner time to be a respite, not just another chore. It’s so easy to get stuck in a rut eating the same thing over and over again until you never want to see another baked potato ever again! Eating the exact same thing week after week just isn’t exciting, but we also know that meal planning isn’t easy. It takes planning, time, and lots of mental muscle to do this on a daily basis, so let us take care of that for you. That is why we are introducing…

seasonal-supper-logoEach season {every three months} we will send our members 4 weeks of flexible week night dinner line ups and their corresponding grocery lists. These meals will be balanced, healthy, and definitely in line with our food philosophy, so you’ll only find whole foods on our ingredients lists. You will also receive 20+ healthy recipes, some of which have not made their way to the blog yet, to help you prepare those meal as well as loads of juicy info on seasonal produce and tips on ways to simplify week night cooking. Almost all of our meals take less than an hour and most only require 30-40 minutes of actual hands-on time. We want this to WORK for you, so we are also including meal planning resources like blank meal plans, blank grocery lists, and monthly calendars to pop up on the fridge and keep you organized.

And of course, they’ll be cute. Even the most mundane things can be so much more fun when you have cute paper products on which to organize you life. Don’t you think?!

Here is what you’ll get each season’s collection:

  • 20+ healthy, whole-food recipes that serve 2 people
  • 4 week night line ups + 4 corresponding grocery lists
  • a blank weekly meal plan
  • a blank grocery list
  • 3 monthly calendars
  • plus other surprise seasonal goodies

The whole collection will be emailed to you as PDF files. From there you can download them and print out as many copies as you need. All files are formatted to print easily on normal computer paper and have helpful crop marks on pages that need to be trimmed. Use the meal planning tools to mix and match your four weeks of recipes so that you have an ever-changing dinner schedule that keeps your eater’s tastebuds on their toes and you having fun in the kitchen!

Ready to join?! Members pay $19.99 per season. That’s JUST $7 per month for us to do all your meal planning for you! If you don’t want to subscribe, you can still buy individual seasons for $24.99 per season. We will be rolling out our first complete Seasonal Supper collections on June 1st for the summer and winter seasons depending on your hemisphere. Subsequent seasons will be released September 1st {Fall/Spring}, December 1st {Winter/Summer}, etc.

If you are interested, and if you made it to the end of this blog post I’m pretty sure you are, click the join now button down there to get your name on the list. You’ll fill out a little form that will send me your contact information {no worries, your info is safe with us} and I’ll be sure to get in touch with you when the collection is ready!

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You’re pumped about this, right?! I won’t keep you waiting then. Our first complete season won’t be available until June 1st, but I have a little treat for you guys.

Today, you’re getting a sneak peak—one week of spring suppers! In addition to the line up and the grocery list, we are giving y’all five recipes for wonderfully seasonal week night meals and two bonus recipes that tie in with those meals. We are also giving you a blank weekly meal plan, grocery list, and calendar for the month of May. I really hope y’all have just as much fun using them as I had designing them! To access them you can either click the image below {or here} or visit our freebies page.

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