Roasted Creamy Tomato Soup + being in my first cooking class

Hello, friend.

It is almost Christmas! Do you have all of your gifts bought and wrapped? I know I don’t!  Though, if you don’t celebrate Christmas then….happy Boxing Day, I guess?

The fall semester is officially over! Woohoo! No more final exams, no more late night studying, and no more stressing out from academia (or at least for the next few weeks!). While I’m home on break, I am taking this opportunity to work in some blog posts while the time permits. I hope to have a handful of potential blog posts queued up and ready for the coming year. Will it happen? Probably not! But I can dream.

Baked Spicy Tomato & Makeshift Béchamel Pasta for Two + Musings from the Mountains

Hello, friend.

I write to you from the mountains. The hill-song of the South. The Smoky Mountains bare (or should I say ‘bear’) its tranquility and peace unto my soul. Inspiration is striking deep. It soothes my spirit and breathes new life into my work. The words seem to cascade like water droplets off bending leaves. Everything about the mountains is as it should be. Purity and silence fill the space. Rustling branches and the flowing streams teach us to walk a bit slower and learn to pause and listen. Take grandeur of the woods and their shadows. The bending of light and the crossing of the day. Everything living kept in time to the rhythm of the land. The mountains seem to move to an almost unnoticeable beat. The mountains have given me an escape.

I’ve been on a small hiatus. After my most recent post where I collaborated with the Homer Soda Company, I closed my laptop, packed my bags, and set out for the mountains. My family and I took a week vacation to the Smokey Mountains. The past week was full of scenic drives, cast iron cooking, and moments in the woods. We lodged in a quaint log cabin outside Pigeon Forge for our stay. The area is rather touristy and diluted with overpriced dinner shows, corporate chains restaurants, and T-shirt stores with the words “Great Smokey Mountains” written in bold neon colors, all up and down the strip. I wanted desperately to get off the beaten path and experience the sounds of the forest, and luckily our cabin fit that criteria.