A meal fit for a birthday queen

This weekend we are celebrating my sweet daughter, Poppy’s, first birthday. They say that “the days are long and years are short”, but as far as I’m concerned, it’s all been entirely too short. I can’t believe that one year ago, we had just brought home our tiny little peanut.

As this is a food newsletter, I’ve been thinking about our memories with Poppy over the past year through the lens of food. Like when I was 7 months pregnant and frantically making a dozen breakfast burritos to freeze, only to later learn that they take approximately one hour to defrost and heat up in the oven before eating. Not such a quick and efficient I-have-a-newborn breakfast after all. Or how we introduced Poppy to solids entirely too early, and the only food she didn’t make a disgusted food at was cheese. That’s my daughter.

I’m so excited to raise Poppy in a family that loves cooking, food, and making memories around the kitchen table together. Happy Birthday to our marvelous Poppy girl!

Baked Mac & Cheese

The 411: Yes this is the mac and cheese you’ve read about in the Taste-to-Time explainer. Martha Stewart’s recipe is also the birthday dinner I requested my mom cook every year growing up, and now the one that I make for my husband and friends on their birthdays. It takes time. It takes a lot of pots. But it is 100% worth it.

Zoe’s Tips: The best part of this recipe is the crunchy breadcrumbs on top, yet the recipe only calls for 6 slices of bread. In our home, the adaptation is an entire baguette and I’d highly recommend you do the same.

Taste-to-Time Ratio¹: 10:3

Pop of Lemon Poppy Cake

The 411: If you’ve never made an olive oil cake before, you’re in for a moist and delicious treat with Eden Grinshpan’s recipe. My issue with most lemon desserts is that they simply aren’t lemony enough. But fortunately, that’s not an issue with this loaf, which has both lemon zest in the batter, and a pucker-your-lips lemon glaze on top.

Zoe’s Tips: I am not a big baker. I generally find it to be fussy and too particular. Part of the reason why I love this recipe is because even if you don’t follow baking best practices and bring your yogurt to room temp, perfectly measure out your flour, or realize you don’t have whole milk and instead use half oat milk and half heavy cream, it will turn out just as delicious. Definitely not speaking from experience with any of these anecdotes.

Taste-to-Time Ratio: 9:6

1. The Taste-to-Time Ratio is a ratio that evaluates flavor on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the highest) with time on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the fastest). For example, our family favorite mac and cheese that requires 2 types of cheese, toasted baguette breadcrumbs, approximately all your kitchen pans, and 2 hours of baking is a 10:3 - insanely delicious, but not a quick weeknight meal.