A Party in your Pantry

Special Fork celebrates Entertaining Week. Stay tuned for party tips and recipes from our Special Fork bloggers all week long. This week also kicks off our annual holiday kitchen tools sweepstakes. Please check our Facebook page to learn about the tools we've selected for the sweepstakes and how you can enter to win our prize package (estimated retail value: $122).

By Lori Powell
For One or Two Bites, a blog for singles and couples

Over the years I’ve learned a lesson: you don’t always have to make everything from scratch. Yes, that would be nice in a perfect world where we are all kings and queens of our domain and life is a bit less hectic. Let’s face it …it’s a rare moment these days.

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DIY Colored Decorating Sugar

Special Fork celebrates Entertaining Week. Stay tuned for party tips and recipes from our Special Fork bloggers all week long. This week also kicks off our annual holiday kitchen tools sweepstakes. Please check our Facebook page to learn about the tools we've selected for the sweepstakes and how you can enter to win our prize package (estimated retail value: $122).

By Katie Barreira
For Cooking Newbie, a blog for beginner cooks

Want to add some sparkle to your holiday entertaining without breaking the bank? Make your own shimmering sugars in a rainbow of customized colors! All you need is sugar, food coloring and a few resealable plastic bags.

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Stalk-Up On Holiday Savings with Broccoli

By Katie Barreira
For Cooking Newbie, a blog for beginner cooks

Doing any entertaining this holiday season? You may have the makings of a simple and remarkably healthy appetizer in the crisper right now and not even know it. Roasted, stir-fried or smothered in cheese, broccoli is one of my favorite fall veggies, but I tend to gravitate towards the dark green florets, relegating that clunky stalk to the trashcan. What a waste! Especially during a time of year when every penny saved is a present earned.

These addictively pop-able broccoli bites are so tasty guests may have trouble believing that they’re eating the infamous veggie.

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Roasted Herb Chicken with Pistachio Salsa

By Zoe McLaughlin
A new video for Video Friday

Roasted chicken thighs are easy to make, but ordinary. Dress them up by rubbing an herb paste under the skin to season the meat and create a ton of flavor without a lot of work. It’s important to use fresh herbs when making the paste because fresh herbs have a brighter, cleaner flavor than dried ones.

Use a mortar and pestle or finely chop the herbs together to release the oils, intensifying the fragrance. This recipe uses chicken thighs but you could use skin-on chicken breast or even a whole chicken. The key is to separate the chicken skin from the flesh, leaving the sides of the skin attached, creating a pocket for the herbs, to seal in the flavor.

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Imagining a Sustainable World

By Andrew Hunter
For The Family Table, a blog for busy families

Teaching children to think and live sustainably is an obligation we have to our children, ourselves and to our planet. Sustainability can be fun and it certainly should be delicious. Children are passionately curious. Digging hands into dirt, planting seeds and harvesting is an experiential way for them to learn about food from its source.

A recent day with Dan and Nanette Bercu at Sunset Ranch showed the fifth grade class from our boys’ school the cycle of life, from planting and harvesting to eating healthy and delicious food while it’s still warm from the sunshine. For city kids in Los Angeles, it’s not every day that they get to pick dry-farmed tomatoes, fetch warm eggs from a chicken coop, carve home-cured prosciutto, pluck squash blossoms, wild basil and pungent red onions, and eat the fruits of their labor on wood-fired pizza on a mountaintop farm in Malibu.

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