SMiLes by Meg

Tag: summer

Strawberry Sorbet

Hi friends. A word on the murder of George Floyd before I get into this week’s post below. I, like many of you, have felt a lot of things. Anger. Sadness. Hopelessness. Restlessness. I’ve been thinking a lot about what my role can or should be as an activist. I really struggled to decide whether to say anything here at all. But, in the end, I decided it would be irresponsible to let another week go by without using this platform in some way, and I think this blog reaches a different audience than my Instagram account, where many of …

Classic Blueberry Pie

Today’s recipe was both the first thing my mom wanted me to make and the last thing. She started with “please make me something with these blueberries.” Then we went down the rabbit hole of “should we make a braided bread instead?” And then we decided yes, we should definitely make a braided bread. The grocery store disagreed – no yeast to be found anywhere, except the local French bakery, which only had fresh yeast, and that seems like way more work than I wanted. So we came back to blueberry pie, and I got to play with pie stamps! …

Salted Chocolate Caramel Tart

Alexandra always gets me to make the most fun things. Last year, I made one of the things I’m most proud of – a Rainbow Explosion Cake. This year, even though we aren’t in the office, I promised another birthday treat and the request was “something with chocolate and caramel.” So here’s a chocolate caramel tart! Start by making the crust. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the butter, confectioners sugar and cocoa until smooth. Add the egg yolk and vanilla extract and beat until creamy. Add the flour and beat until dough comes together. Press …

Bourbon-Vanilla Ice Cream Sandwiches

I don’t think I’m patient enough to make ice cream sandwiches. I can make cookies – those are quick. I can make ice cream – at least then I can throw it in the freezer and let it finish making itself. But I’m not good at the make-ice-cream-then-wait-long-enough-but-not-too-long-to-fill-the-cookies part of things. This time, I ended up with too melty ice cream when I wanted to fill the sandwiches. Sometimes I end up with rock hard ice cream that doesn’t sandwich well. Someday I’ll find the right balance. Either way, These are filled in my freezer right now, and I think …

Cookie Dough Ice Cream

My favorite ice cream is cookie dough ice cream. It always has been. My favorite cookie dough ice cream is from Farfar’s in Duxbury, and is served with M&Ms because they don’t have sprinkles. So, having just finished my sixth year of this blog, I was SHOCKED to find out I had not yet made cookie dough ice cream. I’ve made a couple varieties of vanilla ice cream base over the years. I could have used one of those again, but cookie dough ice cream is special to me, and deserved the best. So I pulled out a book I …

White Chocolate Peanut Brittle Ice Cream

Photographing ice cream continues to be one of my weaknesses in the food blog world. I really enjoy eating ice cream, but usually do so out of a mug, which is not really the best presentation. I could probably start keeping cones around for this purpose, but who, sitting on the couch late at night with a glass of wine, wants to eat an ice cream cone? It also didn’t help that I was making this ice cream on a rush basis before heading down to Rhode Island for a wedding, so didn’t actually get to take a picture of …

Chocolate Zucchini Bread

Calling this a “bread” feels kind of like lying. Sure, the base of this is a zucchini bread, and there is definitely a LOT of zucchini. Which makes you feel like it’s healthy. But then it’s moist, full of chocolate chips, and seems like a better pair for ice cream than coffee. Which makes you feel like it can’t possibly be healthy. However, I’m not one to make such decisions for you, so if you want to call it a vegetable bread, and therefore basically a salad, I’m not going to stop you. If you want to call it more …

Blueberry Rhubarb Compote

People will probably have a number of complaints about this post. For example, you may be thinking, “Meg, you just made a Blueberry Rhubarb Galette. You can’t repeat flavor combinations so quickly.” If you have that complaint, you obviously aren’t in Alaska right now. When I arrived in Alaska last week, Erik had acquired, no joke, an entire trash bag full of rhubarb, cut out of a friend’s yard: And then, while I was there, another friend, Nate, brought over a full Tupperware of blueberries he had picked himself along a trail somewhere. When you have access to rhubarb and …

Strawberry Fool

What a difference a week makes! Today, I came home from 3 days on Nantucket with my mom, where we shopped, biked, and ate/drank particularly well. Then, when we got back to Duxbury, I got to see my cousin, Jim, get married! And now I’m sitting on my couch, watching Stranger Things (don’t worry, Erik, I’m rewatching the first couple with my mom, not watching new ones), and tomorrow I still have another day to enjoy the sun! Now, everything hasn’t been all sunshine and daisies (though there were definitely a lot of both). If you were in the Boston …

Blueberry Rhubarb Galette

When I tried to explain to my brother what a galette was, I told him it was kind of like a deconstructed pie. You use pie dough, it’s filled with fruit, but instead of a pie plate you just kind of fold the edges over themselves and leave it a little open in the middle. He responded, “so hipster pie?” That’s kind of right. But I’d never made one before, so I decided to go for it. And i’m glad I did! Because I then had my friends over for dinner (hi, Josh and Sungho!), and served it for dessert, …