I thought it was time to share some recipes. You should be warned- I don’t measure, I make things up as I go along, and I change recipes all the time.

Leftover Chicken Salad

I tend to like to use herbs instead of lettuce when I can. I don’t stuff tacos with watery iceberg, I use cilantro instead. So I did the same for this chicken salad and used flat leaf parsley for the greens. Be sure to chop it really fine or you will end up with stringy salad.

Mix chopped up leftover chicken, chopped celery, chopped green onions (chop as high up the stalks as you can before they get yucky) chopped parsley. drizzle with some lemon juice, sprinkle with pepper and garlic salt. My chicken got marinated in tarragon before I cooked it, so I didn’t add any other herbs, but you could add some chopped fresh tarragon or dill if you like. Add enough mayo to make it creamy.

If you want to skip all the chopping and you want a really fine salad that will work better on bread- throw everything in the food processor instead.

If you don’t like mayo, use some sour cream or add some extra greens and drizzle with a good vinagarette.

Chocolate hazelnut pie

I got this recipe out of a very fancy cookbook, and it was called ice cream pie. The instructions didn’t work well- so I fixed it. It is super easy for us non-bakers (cooking is art- baking is science, I’m an artist)

1 and 1/3 cups whipping cream plus another few tablespoons for softening the nutella
1 jar of nutella
a little more than half a stick of butter (5 tablespoons I think) melted
1 pack of chocolate graham crackers, made into crumbs in the food processor
vanilla

Make the crust first. It’s a basic cookie crust. Preheat oven to 350. mix crumbs, melty butter and about a teaspoon of vanilla together. Press into a pie pan and bake for about 6 to 8 minutes till crisp. Let cool completely before adding filling

Mix the whipping cream and another teaspoon of vanilla till it forms soft peaks. put nutella into another bowl and add some whipping cream to soften. Mix well with a hand mixer (if it is too thick, add a bit more cream- but be careful no to overdo it or you’ll have runny pie).

Fold nutella mix into the whipped cream in small batches. Once it is all in, use hand mixer to fluffy it up a bit more. pour in pie shell and let set up in the fridge for at least 4 hours.