Beautifully Balanced

Happy Memorial Day Weekend! I hope you have some fun planned!

When you make a cocktail it’s all about balance. That’s always my main focus when I’m putting together a drink. For this weeks cocktail recipe I went for something sweet and sour. But, I wanted to add something fresh because I hate artificial flavors. In my kitchen I have a basil plant and decided to use that for a simple syrup as I absolutely love making flavored syrups.

Here is how you make this one:

what you do:

Simply add these three ingredients to a shaker and shake, shake, shake! I rimmed the glass with sugar for a little extra sweetness.

This recipe is a really good example of flavor balance. The sour of the lemon is the perfect counterpart to the sweet basil syrup. Not only is this recipe so fast and easy, it’s fresh and delicious too. A perfect sip for Memorial Day weekend!

Be safe, have fun, and get a delicious cocktail in that hand!

The Eyes Eat First

My, my, it’s been a minute since I’ve been here. With Mothering (sick kids, too), the photo biz, and travel I have had no time to blog. I do hate being too busy to get the creative out. Anywho, here I am today with another fancy stack. I love when food is pretty and healthy. And if you’re not new here then you know I simply live for a stack.

As a busy Mom I rarely sit down throughout the day. One of my goals is to force myself to sit down at least for lunch. That sure is easier when you have a pretty lunch to look at.

For the most part, I’m currently vegan with the exception of eggs. So, when I was really craving a sushi vibe I turned to this fun cauliflower recipe.

what you do:

For the cauliflower:

When I’m making any batter I always use almond flour and almond milk but feel free to use regular flour too. It’s always equal parts. Since I was only making this for myself I didn’t need too much cauliflower or batter. Stick it in the oven on 375 for about 20 minutes or so. Or until you deem it done. Then toss in the teriyaki sauce.

Sticky Rice:

Sure you can make your own but since I’m making a fast recipe here, just buy it and stick it in the microwave for 90 seconds.

Stack it:

You can use a one cup measuring cup or the tool I use which is a stainless steel ring and pusher that I talked about and linked in my previous post “Fancy & Stacked”.

If using a measuring cup think about it backwards because you’ll flip the cup so start avocado and then rice. However I started with my rice, added avocado, and packed it in really well. Once I was happy with how that looked, I added my cauliflower. Since I hate wasting food, I sautéed some baby portobellos that I needed to use and they made the perfect addition to this meal. Top it with spicy mayo and sesame seeds and you’ve got yourself one delicious stack.

Have a wonderful Wednesday! Thanks for stopping by!

Kilgore Kitchen Remodel

Welcome to The Kilgore Kitchen!

I can’t believe I’m finally getting to post this! Our kitchen remodel is (almost) complete. We have a few odds and ends to do. Also, my shelves for my cookbooks need done but I wanted to make sure I got to show you the backsplash before they go up.

ANYWAY. We are the third owners of our house and this was the original kitchen. When we moved in we knew it was going to need done but we did many other projects before that like my closet, the sunroom, the bar, and the kids rooms of course.

I cook constantly so doing that and having to do dishes in my powder room were…difficult.

After MK and I tossed around the idea of green or blue cabinets we decided that our kitchen was going to be black, white, and gold. It immediately felt like “us”. The first major thing we got was the light. I had my eye on it for a very long time and as soon as I showed it to MK he immediately agreed that it needed to be ours.

I saw this stove in Food & Wine magazine and immediately sent it toMK and was like this is our stove” to which he replied “yes it is”. We knew we wanted some kind of gold backsplash accent wall behind the stove and within minutes of being on Tile Bar we found it. Hard to cut? Yes. Very. But, hey, its easy to clean.

The stove is Zline and the backsplash is from Tilebar.

One thing we really wanted was a cooler way to get to our bar than just a door. We looked into a lot of options but landed on a pantry door. I didn’t want regular handles either so I searches far and wide for the snake handles. They came in a little bigger than I imagined but once they were on it just felt like that how it was supposed to be.

The backsplash is from Tilebar.

Let’s talk backsplash. Originally, we planned this white to be everywhere but behind the stove. However, due to it being extremely hard to put up we thought it best to go with a different one. Isn’t it funny how things work out sometimes? I couldn’t imagine having anything other than the black and gold backsplash now. Anyway, this is where my shelves will go with my (many) cookbooks on it. But this wall needed a moment before she gets styled.

Another happy accident? This space wasn’t supposed to be this big. We were accidentally sent two 36 inch cabinets instead of a 32 and a 36. I said immediately said we had to make it work so we just moved the pantry door over. I was so happy to have those couple extra inches.

Easily, one of my favorite parts of the kitchen is the island. Our original thought was to have white countertops but when I saw the sample for this I completely fell in love and we decided to make the island it’s own and make it different. It makes me happy every single day. Another important addition was to extend it out so that we could eat here as a family, giving us the informal dining area we were missing.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Now I’m off to get cooking!