Trail Mix – Mom’s Best Friend

By Marilyn Hunter

First comes hunger and then comes attitude. All you moms out there know what I’m talking about. Two hungry boys and one tired mom can be an awful combination.

To keep everyone happy, I never leave home without healthy snacks. Our healthy snack of choice is trail mix…perfect to stave off hunger and chock-full of natural energy and protein, carbs, and even potassium for important electrolytes on a hot day.

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The Squash of Summer: Recipe for a Rainy Day

By Lori Powell

Squash is the gift that keeps on giving. Those of you who have ever grown squash of any variety are nodding your heads in agreement at the thought of so much bounty and having to deal with what to do with it all.

The bounty I’m dealing with is what to do with tomatoes this year. Since I am sensitive to their acidity I walk around with a rather tender palate during the last days of summer. Why should I have to stop eating them? Really the pain and discomfort is not that bad – at least not yet!

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That’s What Friends Are For

By Katie Barreira

In this burgeoning, melting pot of a nation, most of us have cross-cultural buddies who, if prompted, are at least conversant in a foreign cuisine. My friend Graciel, for example, spent only the first four years of her life in the Philippines, but as the granddaughter of an established Filipino restaurateur, her ancestral fare remained salient across the Pacific…lucky us!

Cooking an unfamiliar cuisine is like speaking a new language; the ingredients, a vocabulary of tastes that when strung, tossed or whipped together, create something that is greater than the sum of its parts. And, as with language, the best way to learn is immersion. So, enlist a pal who’s fluent in anything from a single heirloom recipe to an entire gastronomy and dive in.

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Inside Special Fork: Behind the Scenes of our Video Blogs

By Sandy Hu

It’s a gorgeous Sunday morning in San Francisco. But instead of going out to enjoy it – and heaven knows we’ve had few perfect summer days to revel in – my son Dave and I are dutifully chopping and measuring and getting ready to shoot another Special Fork video blog.

Fridays are video days on our blog site and we are committed to introducing a new video blog every week. Dave and I comb through the Special Fork beta site looking for recipes to spotlight that are quick, easy and delicious, and that offer a teachable moment. Sometimes, we simply want to show how do-able a recipe is, even for beginners.

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Stuffed Asiago Mushrooms - it's Time to Party!

By David Hu

Whether you’re hosting a party of going to a potluck, it’s good to have a sure-fire, easy appetizer you can make to impress your friends.

Today’s video recipe is a great party dish – Stuffed Asiago and Basil Mushrooms. It looks really fancy but there are only 6 ingredients. In the video I’ll tell you how to clean and store your mushrooms and you’ll see how easy this dish is to make.

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