The Occasion: As the featured cookies on the dessert buffet at a family picnic or graduation party. Yes, it’s “just” a cookie, but oh, Cookie – just look at you now!

Why? One of the rare memories I have of my mother’s home cooking was German Chocolate Cake, loaded with sweet coconut, chopped pecans, and that gooey caramel frosting holding it all together. She didn’t bake very often but this she did extremely well. So when I spotted this cookie recipe during an online search for yummy treats I was immediately drawn to it. This excellent recipe for German Chocolate Cake Cookies comes from A Dash of Sanity, a fun-to-read food blog with great photos and lots of dessert - check it out!

​Serve With: A glass of milk.

If you really are filling out a sweets table for a special event, add one more plate of cookies or bars of a simpler style; a pie and/or layer cake; and some fresh fruit.

​You can make the cookies smaller and standardize the topping placement for a more refined presentation. Personally I like them large and rustic-looking as you see here.

The Playlist: Frequent readers know that I often include a song or short playlist to accompany the featured dish. Today is a little different – I ran across a delightful music video and simply must share it with you. Can you relate to Cookie Monster’s quest for true love? Please enjoy Me Lost Me Cookie at the Disco – thanks, Sesame Street!

The Verdict: Winner! Give this cookie all the trophies, it’s just that good. I’ve been trying to cut back on sugar lately but lost all resolve when these babies came out of the oven. Ilise took some to her office colleagues and our neighbors received a care package as well. They shared with their bridge group, and EVERYONE loved them. Now it’s a movement. What more do you need? It’s time to get baking. 

Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.

German Chocolate Cake Cookies
Recipe source: A Dash of Sanity
 
INGREDIENTS:

Chocolate Cookie

• 2 sticks butter, softened
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs, beaten
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch salt

 
German Chocolate Frosting

• 1 cup evaporated milk
• 1 cup sugar
• 3 egg yolks
• ½ cup butter
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 1/3 cup sweetened shredded coconut
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• Optional: ¼ cup chocolate chips, melted for drizzle

DIRECTIONS:

Chocolate Cookie:

• Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.
• In a stand mixer or large bowl using a hand mixer, blend the butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar, vanilla and eggs. In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt. Gradually add the flour mixture into the butter mixture and blend until combined.
• Drop the dough by tablespoonful onto the prepared baking sheets, 12 cookies per sheet, and bake 8 to 10 minutes. Cool on a baking rack.

German Chocolate Frosting:

• Add evaporated milk, sugar, egg yolks, butter and vanilla to a large pan and place on stovetop over medium heat.
• Stir so that it becomes well combined. Continue stirring until thickened, this takes approximately 11-12 minutes. I set my time for 11 minutes and 30 seconds, this seems to work every time.
• Once thickened remove from heat and add coconut and pecans. Beat until thick enough to spread.
• Spread frosting over the tops of cooled cookies.
• Optional: Drizzle with melted chocolate and let set up. 

Cheers and many happy returns to our little chocolatey friends on their special day! I admit it has only just occurred to me that one can home-make chocolate covered raisins, but of course you can. Let’s get on that right away!

Follow the link to The Nibble’s great how-to with recipe, photos, and historical info about Raisinets. 

​And then we invite you to enjoy one of the early California Raisin commercials – way back from ye olde mid-80s. Oh yeah, these raisin fellas were big stars back in the day – yuuuuuge.
​

Warning: This post represents stream-of-consciousness rambling and oddball connections from within the depths of my brain. Proceed at your own risk.

As a onetime theatre professional and a longtime lover of the creative arts, I am prone to flights of fancy in which I look for below-the-radar connections between diverse things.

We all do this to some extent. Look at a fluffy cloud in the sky and see a wooly mammoth or an ice cream cone. Listen to a piece of orchestral music and picture a waterfall or fawns in the forest. View an angsty painting by Edvard Munch and hear the music of My Chemical Romance blasting in your inner ear. 

Well, when I look at these perfectly kitsch mid-century appetizer plates featuring soulful (demonic?) big-eyed kitties my mind goes to the AWESOME 1960s cult classic film Faster Pussycat! Kill Kill directed by B-movie auteur Russ Meyer. According to Wikipedia, “Meyer is known primarily for writing and directing a series of successful sexploitation films that featured campy humor, sly satire and large-breasted women.”

​Mr. Meyer died in 2004 and we did not know each other, but I think he would have enjoyed eating his critics’ lunch from these feline-festooned appetizer plates after finally earning recognition and kudos from filmmaking’s Big Dogs including Quentin Tarantino who has named Meyer as a major influence.

Here now, for your camp-loving enjoyment, is the trailer for Faster Pussycat! Kill Kill.

And P.S. if you're interested in the plates check them out at Entertaining Vintage.

Singer, dancer, actress, trail-blazing civil rights activist (she refused to perform for segregated audiences in the U.S.), and active in the French Resistance during World War II, Miss Josephine Baker has worn many hats and costumes – including the famous banana skirt.

Born on this day in 1906, she was known by many nicknames including the “Black Pearl,” “Bronze Venus,” “Jazz Cleopatra,” and the “Creole Goddess” prior to her death in 1975.

Learn more about this inspiring woman here and here.

And please take a moment now to enjoy this vintage video clip of La Baker (wearing an awesome headdress!) performing in Paris, 1955. 

Bon anniversaire, Josephine!

​h/t Jean-Marie Terrasse

A couple weeks ago an NYC business trip came up for Ilise, conveniently adjacent to a weekend, so I tagged along and we made it a party. We’ve learned over time that our best Big Apple strategy is to schedule just a few things, avoid overdoing it, and leave the rest up to chance. I must say, it worked like a charm this time!

• 4 days/3 nights  
• 1 Broadway show (Fun Home – dark but funny and excellent)
• 1 dynamite Jazz at Lincoln Center concert – a 14-piece band playing the Ray Charles Songbook with featured vocalists Diane Schuur and the Raelettes. You can watch a high quality webcast of the event here. Highly recommend!
• 2 restaurants I’d be happy to visit again: Colicchio & Sons Tap Room (Chelsea) and Gabriel’s (Columbus Circle) where the personable host is almost more delicious than the menu
• 1 new favorite cocktail spot: Bookmarks Lounge on the 14th floor of the Library Hotel on Madison Avenue. There’s a clubby library theme indoors and two small outdoor patios perfect for sipping lovely craft cocktails and admiring the nighttime skyline

We also enjoyed 2 uniquely NYC experiences, both even better than anticipated:

Chelsea Gallery Crawl: Went for the fabulous new Cindy Sherman exhibit at Metro Pictures. Stayed for:  

• David Hockney’s Yosemite Suite of iPad drawings at PACE
• Richard Serra’s large steel sculptures at the Gagosian Gallery
• Desire Obtain Cherish’s show titled Servant to Infinite Distraction at the Unix Gallery – Lovely floral still life designs which upon close viewing reveal  that they’re made of colored pill capsules 

Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.

Also worth noting:

• Songs and the Sky: An Exhibition of Art + Music at the Bruce Silverstein Gallery
• Leda and the Swan – Hyperrealism courtesy of Carole Feuerman at the C24 Gallery
• And the list wouldn’t be complete without the taxidermy wolves posed in an action diorama in the entry to Jim Kempner Fine Art. The installation by Andy Rosen is titled UNPACK.

Still more art: The next day I amused myself at MoMA while Ilise worked, and was especially moved by a powerful installation titled the Mapping Journey Project by Bouchra Khalili which uses video clips of migrants telling their stories while outlining their journeys on a map. 

Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.

The 2nd Annual Harlem Eat-Up! Festival held in Morningside Park featured an abundance of food and wine tastings, cooking demonstrations, artistic and cultural presentations, and more. The event’s chief organizer is Chef Marcus Samuelsson who was everywhere – introducing guest chefs on the demo stage, directing traffic for the booth vendors, and posing for selfies with his many adoring fans.

We saw a cooking demonstration with Chef Aarón Sanchez who brought helpers onstage including his mama and a child who had appeared on the TV show Chopped Jr. And another one which paired master mixologist Karl Franz Williams with TV personality and everyone’s favorite homegirl, Carla Hall. They were delightful! We even heard a Hootie Hoo!

Click on the photos to enlarge them and read the captions.

All in all, we had a wonderful time at the Harlem Eat-Up! Festival. If you’re in town mid-May next year, make it a point to attend, you won’t be sorry.

As for us, it was a most excellent weekend, capped off with people-watching on a lazy afternoon in beautiful Bryant Park before heading home. Thank you, NYC! We’ll be back again soon because we just can’t stay away. 
​

Legendary world-class trumpeter, bandleader, and mad genius Miles Davis was born on this day in 1926. He died in 1991 at the age of 65. You can and should read about his life here and  here and listen to his music every chance you get. Here’s a good place to start.

But today I want you to turn your eyes to this awesome piece of video of Miles and Prince performing together in concert. Yes. I know nothing about it except god bless the internet for bringing such joy into my life – and now yours too! Thank you Fayçal ZOUMHANE for this gift.

And thank you, Miles, for being a musical innovator and disruptor, long before that became everyone’s bread and butter. Happy birthday, man. 

Born Cherilyn Sarkisian, our fearless leader (not to mention singer, actress and Twitter enthusiast) Cher is celebrating a birthday today. How old is she now?

Doesn’t matter.
​
She can turn back time. 

Janet Jackson turns 50 today – Happy Birthday, Miss Jackson! (if you're nasty) Long established as a fine artist in her own right, along with her famous siblings, Janet has been moving and grooving, body-rolling and shimmying, executing precision-edge choreography like it’s nothing for her whole career. All the while singing her heart out with a kitten-soft yet powerful voice.

Check out this video (it's a little silly in the beginning but gets real good starting at 2:40) and then crank up the playlist -- it’s time to start dancing. Miss Jackson wants it that way.

There has been a long dry spell since our last Afternoon Dance Break so to make up for lost time today’s post is a two-fer. We'll take a look at two entirely different dance styles called “jerk”, one from the 1960s and the other from the late 2000s.
​
Until I began writing this post I had no idea about current day jerkin’, which comes from West Coast hip-hop culture. For a little tutorial, peep this video from The Ranger$ dance crew.

​And for the youngsters out there who had no idea there even was a 60s jerk, take a look at this video clip. 
​

Alright, let’s put it all together in one cool playlist and start dancing! We’ll start with the old school jerk and finish with the new.

Programmer’s note: Although The Capitols recorded Cool Jerk in 1962, this playlist features a cover by Human Sexual Response which was my very favorite new wave dance song in 1980. Enjoy!
​

I was first turned on to the The Rocky Horror Picture Show during my freshman year of college. (Thanks, Paul!) This was not long after it became a smash hit cult film and there was still a counter-culture vibe to it (so a million years ago). If you were cool enough to dress up in wacky clothes and face paint, stand in line for a midnight show, and throw toilet paper at the screen week after week, boy oh boy, you were Arctic in the best possible way.

Tim Curry starred as Dr. Frank-N-Furter and forever after secured his fame as the “sweet transvestite from transssssssexual Transylvaniaaaaaaaaah.”
He went on to play many other roles onstage and in the movies – including Mozart in Amadeus and King Arthur in Spamalot on Broadway, and the butler Wadsworth onscreen in Clue. He also had a brief career in pop music, recording such hits as I Do the Rock and Paradise Garage in the early 1980s, both of which were in high rotation at my house.

But to me Tim will always be first and foremost the lascivious, lip-licking, eyebrow-cocking, corset-wearing, high heel-strutting s/hero of Rocky Horror. Please join me in celebrating today’s birthday boy – 70 years old on April 19 – with a video clip of the iconic song “Don’t Dream It, Be It.” Words to live by, Tim – and Happy Birthday to you!

Rachel Maddow is not only an author, political commentator, and host of The Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC but also a classic cocktail enthusiast and amateur bartender.

Cocktail Moments are an occasional feature on her TV show wherein Rachel drops a little mixology knowledge on the viewers, mixing drinks and telling stories. Highly entertaining! You can find some of them here.
​
For your viewing pleasure today, please enjoy this fun clip of Rachel making a Donald Trump-inspired cocktail for Jimmy Fallon. “It’s really a terrible drink.” 

Happy birthday, Rachel, and Happy Friday to us all – cheers!

The Occasion: When your favorite TV show returns from hiatus and you CANNOT WAIT to see what the hell kind of crazy they’re going to bring this time. And above all WWCW – What Will Cookie Wear?

Empire is back on Wednesday night. Here’s a taste featuring my girls Porsha and Becky:

I know I’m going to want a snack during this nutty show, and these simple yet craveable Sweet Potato Chips are just the ticket. Pretty easy to make – yes, in the microwave! – and deliciously satisfying. Some say that salt is optional but I say it’s a must. Still pretty healthy compared to regular chips. I mashed up a few different recipes/techniques to arrive at my version below, but the inspiration for this evening's snack comes from the By Stephanie Lynn blog - thanks!

Basically you slice a sweet potato very thinly (I used a mandoline), place the slices on parchment paper, zap 'em with a little cooking spray, salt and pepper, and then cook in the microwave for a few minutes. It's not at all difficult but takes a little time, mostly because you'll want to make several batches. As they say, you can't eat just one!

No-Fry Sweet Potato Chips
Recipe adapted from a post on By Stephanie Lynn blog
 
INGREDIENTS:

• Sweet potatoes – as many as you want; I used 2
• Unflavored cooking spray such as PAM or olive oil spray
• Salt and pepper (I recommend using a good quality flaky sea salt)
• Optional: Dried herbs or spices, such as thyme, rosemary, cumin

 
TOOLS & EQUIPMENT:

• Mandoline or VERY sharp knife
• Parchment paper
• Microwave

 
DIRECTIONS:

• Scrub the sweet potatoes well and slice off any bad spots. Or you can peel the potato entirely if you prefer.
• Thinly slice the potatoes – less than 1/8-inch thick. A mandoline is the ideal tool for this job, but if using a knife be sure that your slices are of consistent thickness to ensure even cooking.
• Cut a piece of parchment paper to fit the turntable inside your microwave. Spray one side very lightly with cooking spray. Place potato slices on the sprayed side of the paper – not overlapping each other. Spray the slices very lightly with cooking spray. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. If you'd like to add additional herbs and/or spices, now is the time.
• Carefully transfer the parchment paper with potato slices into the microwave and onto the turntable.

NOTE: I tried taking the turntable in and out of the microwave but it didn’t work as well as transferring the loaded parchment paper.  

• Cook the sweet potato slices in the microwave at Power Level 8 for 3 minutes. Check the chips for doneness (they will turn color and be nearly-but-not-all-the-way crisp). Continue cooking the chips at 20 second intervals on Power Level 8. Total cooking time will probably be no more than 4 minutes.
• Remove chips to a rack for cooling and continued crisping.
• Repeat the process with the remaining raw potato slices. You can re-use the same parchment round several times.  

If your experience is anything like mine, the first batch of chips will be a disaster but you’ll quickly get the hang of it after that. 

The sweet potato chips are best on the day they’re made. Storing extras in a sealed container will cause them to lose crispness although the flavor will still be good.

So now I've got my snack, I've got my adult beverage, the remote is nearby. I'm ready for the show.

Welcome back, Empire!

​Will you be watching? Let's dish about it in the Comments. 

The occasion: Entirely hypothetical. I don’t know Fabio and we've never shared a meal. However if we did it might look something like this:

• I Can’t Believe it’s Not Butter spread lightly over an organic brown rice cake. Please do yourself a massive favor and watch these awesome commercials starring today's birthday boy.
• Whey Protein Shake from his company, Healthy Planet Nutrition
• One (1) fish oil capsule from Healthy Planet Vitamins, to keep his hair shiny and silky
• Big bowl of berries, the birthday boy's favorite dessert per one of several fan clubs

​Several years ago I saw Fabio in person outside the Chicago Omni Hotel en route to his waiting limousine. He looked like nothing so much as an elegant, purebred afghan hound, with the long, glossy hair flowing well past his shoulders, and his beautiful, angular face. That sounds like an insult, comparing him to a dog, but it’s not meant to be. He was/is beautiful, which accounts for his successful multi-faceted career as a model in fashion as well as for romance novel cover art, soap opera actor, product spokesman for Old Spice and I Can’t Even, and now, at 57, a fitness and nutrition entrepreneur.

And now, just because there’s some wacky s#!@ to be found on the internet, please enjoy this absolutely insane Happy Birthday Fabio video. Hey, you’ve stuck with the post this far, might as well click it. 

In honor of National Pistachio Day – Friday, Feb 26 – I made a super-easy and deeply flavorful pasta supper using roasted, unsalted pistachios mixed into a pesto. Really good! This deserves a place on your short list of dinnertime options for a crazy-busy weeknight. Heck, it’s a good option for company dinner too. Not the prettiest dish in the world, but a little garnish (fresh mint leaves?) would help with that. It’s all about the accessories, amirite?!

Before you dive into the recipe, why don’t you take a little break – maybe pop a few pistachios as a snack? – and view some of the Wonderful Pistachios commercials at the link here. I especially like the ones with Snoop Dogg, the dominatrix, and the new Facebook emojis. Here’s another fun one:
​

Mint and chocolate. Two great standalone flavors that bring out the best in each other. Better together indeed.

Let’s explore a few sumptuous recipes. Starting things off right is a classic, Mint-Chocolate Chip Ice Cream.

• Mint Chip Ice Cream – from David Lebovitz
• Andes Mint Cupcakes – from Your Cup of Cake
• Mint Chocolate Swirl Bark – from Sally’s Baking Addiction
• Mint Chocolate Truffles – from Ree Drummond for Food Network
• Chocolate Thin Mint Pie – from Completely Delicious blog by way of Something Swanky

Speaking of Thin Mints, please enjoy this helpful how-to video for making your own version of Girl Scout Thin Mint Cookies:

​Please continue to support your local Girl Scouts as well. I loved my scouting years. There’s an option for donating boxes of cookies to U.S. military troops overseas, in case you’re trying to resist keeping any in the house. Believe me, I understand. 

From his beginnings as a sardonic cartoonist (Life in Hell) to creator of TV shorts (The Tracey Ullman Show) to current day status as a multi-award-winning writer, producer, voice actor, animator (and yes, still a cartoonist), Matt Groening has achieved more than most artists ever dream of. Let’s wish him Happy Birthday as he celebrates his 62nd on Monday, February 15th.

And because, this year, it is also Presidents Day let’s dig into this classic Simpsons video clip in lieu of birthday cake. (Especially that kinda-great, kinda-scary Bender cake in the photo above, I don't want to mess with that. I swear it's watching me.)
​

 In case you’re interested – I was – Matt’s favorite foods are Vietnamese spring rolls, Thom Kha Gai soup, and bananas. If you’d like to make these dishes/send to Matt/enjoy them yourself, here are a few yummy-looking recipe links:
​

• Vietnamese Shrimp Spring Rolls with Spicy Hoisin Peanut Sauce – from Bowl of Delicious blog
• Thom Kha Gai (Chicken Coconut Soup) – from Bon Appetit
• Black Bottom Banana Cream Pie – from Chiquita

Please enjoy this video clip from Revelations, one of the Alvin Ailey Dance Theater's signature pieces. So beautiful. So powerful. If you have the chance to see them perform live, take it. You will be moved. Today would have been choreographer Alvin Ailey's 85th birthday. 
​

Afternoon Dance Breaks are a recurring feature that invites you to get up from the desk, crank up the tunes, and dance your fool head off for a few minutes before resuming the daily grind. 

Let’s start the New Year dancing! Monday is Michael Stipe’s birthday – lead singer for R.E.M., the seminal alt-rock band from Athens, Georgia, that came up in the early 80s and peaked in the 90s, paving the way for indie bands to make it big without selling out.

Click here to learn more about Michael Stipe and R.E.M.

Click here for a cool video of the band.

Click the playlist below for your Afternoon Dance Break. Get up from the desk (or whatever) and shake it/ don’t break it for a few cool tunes from birthday boy, Michael Stipe and R.E.M. 
​

Check out this one-take video showcasing the chameleon-like musicality of Scott Bradlee's Postmodern Jukebox as they mix and match popular songs with a wide range of musical genres. 
​

The "making of" video is also fun to watch. If you like this, dig a little deeper. There's lots more including the Thong Song in vintage Louis Prima style, and Nicki Minaj's Anaconda done in a vintage bluegrass hoedown style. Enjoy! I think you will. 

In honoring the marvelously talented actress Angela Lansbury who has enjoyed such a long and storied career, I feel bad that my go-to reference is of her character Jessica Fletcher, the slightly dowdy professional writer, nosy neighbor and amateur sleuth of a certain age living Down East in Cabot Cove, Maine. But I truly adored the TV series, Murder, She Wrote, which aired from 1984 through 1996, anchoring CBS’s Sunday night programming along with Matlock, perennial favorite among the gray-haired set.

Jessica was so clever, with an acerbic wit and a keen eye for detail, presenting her findings in a schoolmarm-y way as she solved crimes ranging from fraud to robbery to murder most foul, all within a tidy 60 minute time frame (really 47 with commercial breaks).

But Dame Angela Lansbury deserves better recognition than that. Star of stage and screen, some of her most famous roles include:

• The Picture of Dorian Gray (1945)
• The Manchurian Candidate (1962)
• Mame (1966)
• Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971)
• Sweeney Todd (1979)
• Beauty and the Beast (1991)

Please click through to the next page to enjoy some video clips showcasing a few of Angela’s many talents and then join me in wishing her a very Happy Birthday. There’s no mystery about it – Mrs. Fletcher rules my heart.