Quick Suppers are a hallmark of Kitchen Parade, perfect weeknight meals for busy families looking for fast, healthful meals at home. Pepper Steak & Mushrooms is a personal favorite and it's featured in this week's Kitchen Parade column . (c) Copyright 2006 Kitchen Parade

The rhythms of food blogging are fascinating. Time and again, we hear: "It started as a lark, then it took on a life of its own." "I started a blog to organize my recipes, then discovered the world of food blogs." Both could apply to Weekend Herb Blogging, whose first anniversary is being celebrated this week at Kalyn's Kitchen . Stop in to chuckle over the first lark-ish weeks , then see all the nationalities represented in Week 51 . And for Week 52, you play too , even if you haven't before, for the anniversary. It's an herb party! And all the guests are unveiling their favorite herbs, which with all due respect to Kalyn, to my mind is as impossible as naming a single favorite pie, cookie or yes, vegetable. It depends on the day, the season, the mood. Who'd give up summer's sweet basil for winter's rosemary? Who'd pick only tarragon or dill or thyme for fish? Who'd forgo the sweet specialness of lavender for the everyday-ne...

My mother was a child of the Depression. She knew how ~ and why ~ to scrimp and save. She stretched fresh milk with powdered milk, she substituted margarine for butter and yes, Parmesan cheese was poured from a green can. Even as a child, I despised all three. But when Tummy Treasure raved about Kraft's new Grate It Fresh product , I wanted to try it for myself. Within a week, it seemed to show up everywhere ... at one grocery end cap after another, then at Wal*Mart ... always on sale for the equivalent of $6 - 7 a pound. So I bought some. At least I thought I bought some. I really truly didn't know, until just now checking Erika's review to link to this post, that what I really bought (and cooked with) was Kraft's green-can-in-new-clothes Parmesan cheese. I didn't know the packaging had changed! I bought the stuff so hated as a child. And oh dear oh dear ....... my foodie credentials are SO about to be yanked. You see, I did side-by-side taste tests in this brocco...

Creamed spinach lovers, here's a special treat, just silky Swiss chard and a little cream with crispy bread crumbs on top. It makes up in minutes and is simple enough for a weeknight and special enough for the weekend. Simple, Sumptuous. Real Food, Fast & Casual. Budget Friendly. Weeknight Easy, Weekend Special. Low Carb. Vegetarian.

Hello Sugar High Friday fans ... Does it happen with every Sugar High Friday? So many entries to this month's Surprise Inside edition used the word 'fun' ... and if there's anything worth striving for in both cooking and eating, it's the fun quotient. Many thanks to everyone everyone who played along! Each entry was a perfect surprise ... and surprisingly perfect. There were so many surprises: unusual ingredients for desserts (Israeli couscous, brown rice for example to say nothing of the vegetable dessserts, three cheers for those!) and spices (wattleseed, anyone?) and a few surprises outside , too (orange cups and egg cups!). And just wait until you see what we've done with caramel and chocolate and oh my! nuts and oh swoon! fruit . A few extra atta-cooks to ... the Sugar High Friday debutantes - nine ten eleven TWELVE now THIRTEEN! FOURTEEN no! FIFTEEN of you! the Australians, who turned out in force the St Louis/nearby food bloggers, learn mo...

"We start food blogs for reasons a-many ... to record and share our recipes, to stay connected with family afar, to break writer's block ... but we KEEP blogging because of connection and community." - Current theory, yours truly One of the great joys of food blogging is getting to know fellow foodies from across the world. But a second joy, one I've watched with some envy in San Francisco and the United Kingdom, is getting to know the fellow foodies who live just a few miles away, the ones we might run into at the farmers market or the grocery store, the ones whose kids we meet and whose spouses know our last names AND our blog names. This connection among the St Louis food bloggers (and several other nearby food bloggers we're pleased to adopt!) is just now beginning to form. Many participated in Sugar High Friday and may be new to you. Please say hello to ... Many of you already know Nupur from One Hot Stove . But wait, doesn't Nupur live in New Y...

[Are you visiting for Sugar High Friday? Welcome! All the details are here . And here's my own veggie-surprise-inside contribution . Isn't blogging fun?!] When the air conditioning goes off, the oven goes on: it's fall cookie-baking time! First up are a long-time family favorite, oatmeal raisin cookies. The especially good thing about these classic home-baked cookies? Raisins are optional. Just read this week's Kitchen Parade column . [For newcomers, A Veggie Venture is pure blog, a food playground just like all the others except focused on vegetables. Kitchen Parade is the food column I write for small-town newspapers; I publish it online too, just because it's fun to share recipes with lots of people. Kitchen Parade is known for 'fresh seasonal recipes for everyday healthful eating and occasional indulgences'. Oh. And Quick Suppers .] (c) Copyright 2006 Kitchen Parade