Carrie Saum

Visiting my family in the Sierra Nevada foothills is one of the great pleasures of my life. I get to work, cook, and play while my amazing folks keep an eye on my kid. My inspiration and productivity skyrocket when I'm able to step away from my version of the daily grind and get a little refocused and centered. The food I make tastes a little better, and I move a little easier without a three-year-old constantly in tow.

Thin Mints are my favorite. They’ve ALWAYS been my favorite. I would hide a sleeve in our freezer as a kid, and wait for my brothers to leave the house so I could eat them in peace. As an adult, not much has changed. I look forward to that time of year when Girl Scout cookies make winter doldrums bright again.

Bitter Buddy Mix is a take on an old familiar recipe of rice cereal mixed with chocolate and peanut butter, then coated with powdered sugar.

For the first time in my life, I was lost after leaving Evangelical Christianity. I watched the shores of everything safe and familiar wash away.

It was a life-altering mouthgasm of flavor explosions, and I totally wanted to pack my bags for India and Bali to have my own Eat Pray Love experience.

We are tired and hurting and don't know what else to do.

No real measuring, no special ingredients, and it makes cookies that even the snobbiest cookie connoisseur will crave? It might seem too good to be true, but it's absolutely real.

I know it feels like you're falling apart. It's the kind that happens when I have overcommitted and then something goes wrong and everything else spirals.

My BFF has been trying to go easy on the grains lately.

Spring is fully coming to life this month.