Baking with Less Sugar

June 2016

While on a recent trip to New York I came across Joanne Chang book BAKING WITH LESS SUGAR. It is exactly what I had been looking for. Both sides of our family have a history of diabetes. We have been eating healthier and leading a more active lifestyle. I had been cooking lower carbohydrate and less sugar meals for my family for awhile now. But, sometimes you crave a little something, not necessary sweet but with a great mouthfeel to end the meal or as a pick me up.

Faced with the shelves full of Cookbooks that I have to cull for the move, I was trigger shy of buying yet another book. Luckily, I was able to borrow the ebook version of it from our local library. Joanne Chang of Boston's Flour Bakery, is of the Sticky Buns Throwdown with Bobby Flay fame. She beat the Master Chef.

My first try was the Blueberry Bran Muffins. The recipe looked so promising I purposely went out to buy the wheat bran.  2 1/2 cups of blueberries provided moisture, sweetness and drama! You peel of the muffin wrapper and are greeted deep purple promise of deliciousness. It is buttery and delicious. Yum!

Baking with Less Sugar

June 2016

While on a recent trip to New York I came across Joanne Chang book BAKING WITH LESS SUGAR. It is exactly what I had been looking for. Both sides of our family have a history of diabetes. We have been eating healthier and leading a more active lifestyle. I had been cooking lower carbohydrate and less sugar meals for my family for awhile now. But, sometimes you crave a little something, not necessary sweet but with a great mouthfeel to end the meal or as a pick me up.

Faced with the shelves full of Cookbooks that I have to cull for the move, I was trigger shy of buying yet another book. Luckily, I was able to borrow the ebook version of it from our local library. Joanne Chang of Boston's Flour Bakery, is of the Sticky Buns Throwdown with Bobby Flay fame. She beat the Master Chef.

My first try was the Blueberry Bran Muffins. The recipe looked so promising I purposely went out to buy the wheat bran.  2 1/2 cups of blueberries provided moisture, sweetness and drama! You peel of the muffin wrapper and are greeted deep purple promise of deliciousness. It is buttery and delicious. Yum!

Pared Down Garden

June 2016

The garden is looking quite bare. You can see right through to the back of garden to Pomelo and Kumquat trees.

The banana grove has been removed. I miss those gorgeous banana leaves swagging in the wind. In all the years I never put up window dressing on the windows. The Banana leaves from the outside provides all the window dressing I ever needed.

How Do You Move a Garden?

May, 2016
The past couple of months and weeks has been strange and uneasy for me. I had been purging and packing our offices for the office move. If that is not unsettling enough, I had also started the same purging and packing on our own San Diego home. But my most ambivalent feeling might be regarding my garden. Over the years, we have grown our San Diego garden in the style of the lush tropical garden we grew up with. The San Diego weather has allowed us to grow tropical fruits like bananas, mangoes, Sapote Ciku, longan as well as figs, persimmons, and citrus like pomelos and kumquats. In anticipation of our move and sale of the house, we had started clearing out and tidying our San Diego garden. Not everyone appreciate the "Jungle Look" we favored. 

The plan is after we tidy up the garden, we can plant a more acceptable palate of plants to prospective buyers.