Rachael Ray

My mom has always loved coconut cream pie. Her birthday was last week and we met for lunch at a local deli and lo and behold, there was coconut cream pie in the dessert case. We talked about getting a slice for dessert in honor of her bday, but ran out of time. I decided to take a stab at it for Mother’s Day and it was delicious, even though there was no chocolate involved. Anything that is a vehicle for whipped cream is worth having in my book. I happened to have a refrigerated pie crust dough in the fridge so I used it and no one noticed it wasn’t homemade (at least no one said anything - what good guests:-)). Coconut Cream [...]...

I hate to admit that my kids are huge fans of the refrigerated cinnamon rolls in the biscuit-type tube. So easy, so fun to whack the tube and open it up, full of ingredients I can’t pronounce with lots of consonants. That said, I’ve stopped buying them but that doesn’t mean my kids have stopped asking for them. I wanted to make some quickly last weekend which means I needed a recipe without yeast so I could avoid rising time (and yeast - I am a yeast-a-phobe). I had all the ingredients on hand, plus the recipe was super quick and took no time to whip up. The dough was veeeery soft however and required a ton of flour while rolling it [...]...

The introduction of fantasy hair colors made its debut in the late 1970s when two young New York City entrepreneurs Tish and Snooky (not to be confused with our Jersey shore Snooky) created, Manic Panic catapulting ultra-vibrant hair tones to a mass level of appeal. While the underground punk rock scene’s anti-establishment virtues got the ball rolling today’s main stream acceptance has made it clear that these tones have made their mark and are here to stay! From eccentric unique haircuts to creative color schemes and placement the kids of the 80s set the stage! At home, self-taught color sessions became the norm, ranging from all over color to multiple tones, over processing their hair with bleach for a clean [...]...

Half the fun of discovering a new restaurant is sharing it with people you know will enjoy it. As Rachael Ray’s resident restaurant guru, here’s an inside look at what I report back to Rach about some of my favorite restaurant finds and food experiences! From: Kappy To: RR Sent: Wednesday, April 11, 2012 11:16pm Subject: Aaaaand… BACK to Hill Country Chicken! Hey Rach - I think I told you about the time I went to Hill Country Chicken when it first opened a little while back. I was with some former co-workers from the South Beach Wine and Food Festival. Chef Elizabeth Karmel was there and gave us a serious tasting of the menu, serving up fried chicken (served two ways, skin on and [...]...

I remember having congo bars when I was little so I was psyched to stumble upon this recipe online a few weeks ago. I have made them three times since - a testament to how crazy good they are. They are thick, rich and “toothsome” - thanks to lots of butter and all brown sugar - no white. Call them blondies, call them chocolate chip cookie bars (another favorite recipe - calls for melted butter though which results in a different texture - still good, mind you). For the life of me I cannot track down the origin of the name congo bars - if anyone has knows, please post! Congo Bars (click here for printable recipe) Ingredients 2 3/4 cups all purpose [...]...

People are always asking me for tricks on getting their kids to eat better. The short answer is, there are no tricks only persistence and patience. I always tell them to lead by example and keep offering and usually things fall into place. There really is no magic trick. Some kids like to eat and some kids don’t. Some will happily eat sashimi with a side in foie gras and others will only eat french fries. if you have always offered them healthy choices and continue to do so, rest assured, their picky eating phase is more about them asserting their independence and less about your failed parenting skills. It’s hard and can be very trying on a parent who [...]...

I didn’t grow up with paprika.  I am Italian, so I never saw it make an appearance except when sprinkled on Deviled Eggs, which I was told was done “for color” but that paprika had no flavor.  This was probably true, because at the time, the only paprika I ever saw was sitting in my mom’s spice cabinet for decades and therefore void of all flavor.  But that didn’t matter, because it was used “for color.” I continued to ignore this spice, even as I got older and became a very interested and adventurous home cook.  It wasn’t until Rachael used this product one day when we were shooting some web videos: Pimenton de la Vera, which from what I can tell [...]...

This blog, strictly speaking, is for home cookers; competition barbecuers are another breed of person, half-mad from the smell of smoke and meat, and lusting for a glory that is all-too-elusive, even for the masters of the game. But that game has become corrupt. It’s become about specialty equipment, about pellet cookers and automated fans, remote smartphone thermostats and vacuumn tumblers. The art of smoking meat, so pristine and primal a skill, has become as shrouded in fraud and technology as the meat it buries in foil and margarine. It has gotten away from the true path. I am therefore founding the Bare Bones BBQ Contest, an all-natural, back-to-basics, IROC-style skill contest. It is for master barbecuers only. No special equipment [...]...

I am usually all about making dishes completely from scratch, but last week did me in, and some corners needed to be cut. The stomach bug hit all three kids in succession over the course of five days, starting with my son who needed to be picked up from a slumber party at 2 am, and ending with my daughter who was sick in bed on her 12th birthday, while the family party in her honor continued downstairs. My daughter’s favorite meal is from a much loved local restaurant - Chef’s - and she always orders spaghetti parm. I decided to try and make it at home in her honor, while she battled through the stomach flu upstairs. It took no [...]...