It was Memorial Day, and our barbecue was just about ready when I suddenly got a craving for some sort of lemonade. I mentally ran through a list of fruits that I could combine with the lemons and decided on raspberries…both because I liked the idea and because I had a bag of frozen raspberries on hand.

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I’m always looking for easy weeknight meals, and this beef stir fry fits the bill nicely. Marinating the beef actually takes longer than making the dish once the beef is ready to cook. I like to take the 30 minutes while the beef is marinating to prepare my mis en place. About twenty minutes into the marinating process, I start the rice so it will be ready at the same time as the stir fry. I took a shortcut in using a frozen Asian medley vegetable blend to add to the peppers, which saved me a good amount of prep time.

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My first gluten free baking experience happened when I decided to eliminate all wheat products from my diet for a little while. Let me tell you, if you couldn’t already guess, that it’s tough to do this type of elimination diet. I soon discovered just how many food products have wheat in them and just how much I couldn’t eat. After a few weeks, I was desperate for something “cakey” and decided to dive in to my newly acquired stock of gluten free flours.

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I had an ambitious plan to make the best coconut rice that I’ve ever tasted and, unfortunately, it failed miserably. Well, the rice itself wasn’t so bad, but about half of it ended up burnt and stuck to the bottom of the pan. Oh well, I suppose I shouldn’t complain, as I’ve had pretty good luck when it comes to making rice on the stovetop. You have to expect some failures sometimes. The rice that I was able to scrape from the pan was good, but it definitely wasn’t the tastiest coconut rice that I’ve ever had, so I’m not going to include the recipe here. Now, when I finally do make the tastiest coconut rice ever, you’ll be the first to know.

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Baking with whole grains has opened up a new world of possibilities for me. Although I’m currently dealing with a wheat sensitivity and can’t partake of half the pan as I’d like, I seem to do somewhat better when I use whole wheat flour instead of white flour in recipes. Although these sticky buns are made with whole grains, they’re still an ooey gooey indulgence.

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I picked up some asparagus at the supermarket during my last shopping trip and wanted to make dish that included it in some way. As I was flipping through my copy of Everyday Food : Great Food Fast — can’t get enough of the food photography in any Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia publication, I saw the gorgeous photo of this meal and had to try it.

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