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Improvised Life

Improvised Life

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    • All topics
      • apparel
      • bathroom
      • bedroom
      • before + after
      • blogs + sites
      • books + zines
      • celebrations
      • cool spaces
      • creative process
      • diy
      • entertaining
      • floors
      • food + cooking
      • fun stuff
      • furniture
      • garden
      • gifts
      • housewares
      • how-to
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      • inspiring people
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      • kitchen
      • leaping + flying
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      • living room
      • materials for making
      • mindset
      • music
      • nature
      • office
      • paths + processes
      • poems
      • practice
      • productivity/work
      • quotes
      • recipes
      • renovation
      • repurpose + reclaim
      • rules for living
      • signs + reminders
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      • storage
      • table/food
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      • tools/wares
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      • video
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All articles filed in Improvisational Cook

celebrations entertaining food + cooking recipes table/food

Brown Sugar Coconut Layer Cake with Lemon or Dulce de Leche

Years ago, I developed a brown sugar-scented play on the classic American 2-egg /1 bowl cake known as Lightning Cake (because it only takes 15 minutes to throw together). Buttery, tender, and fragrant, its deliciousness and fine texture belies its ease. On a pretty plate and dusted with powdered sugar, it looks like the lovely…

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entertaining food + cooking recipes table/food

Magic Peppers (Oven-Roasted Peppers with Many Flavors + Uses)

My favorite hors d’oeuvre is also a brilliant material for improvising; oven-roasted pepper slices are so easy, delicious and versatile I call them Magic Peppers. I learned the basic approach in Italy: brushing pepper slices with olive oil and roasting them at a high heat, with whatever flavorings I feel like, from slivers of garlic—and—anchovy…

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books + zines celebrations food + cooking gifts housewares table/food tools/wares

A Cook’s Favorite Gifts for Cooks of all Stripes

Every so often, a friend calls to ask me what cooking equipment to recommend. LONG story! You’ll find an extensive list of equipment for a basic kitchen in A New Way to Cook, along with 700+ pages of essential techniques and recipes. For now, here are my tried-and-true favorites, from high to low and back.

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books + zines food + cooking material recipes table/food tools/wares

Weekend Fun: Oops Cookies

Brilliant entreperneur baker Lexi just reframed the odd-shaped-not-quite-as-intended cookies into something charming: Oops Cookies. Brilliant. Worth doing with all sorts of things that routinely go out-of-control. Here are our favorite cookie recipes that go OOPS while being delish.

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Copyright Sally Schneider 2020
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