Happy New Year, everyone! I sincerely hope you’ve been enjoying yourselves the past weeks, shopping, cooking, baking, gift wrapping, and generally making merry. I spent much of December fighting a severe respiratory plague which may or may not have been whooping cough, and, after days and nights spent hacking myself into near-oblivion, am FINALLY feeling normal again. It’s beyond great to be back among the living!
The sad news, apart from feeling like death warmed over for oh-so-long, was that I missed holding my beloved Daily Dish annual holiday bake-off, with its umpteen dozens of delicious cookies – many of which I’d normally pass on to friends and family along with our Christmas cards. Not only were zero cookies + zero cards produced this year, the one “holiday photo” my family managed for 2012 (as seen above) was less posed portrait than pure spontaneity. Oh well. That’s life. If Meniere’s has taught me nothing else, it’s to appreciate the good days and tolerate the rest with as much grace and patience as possible. I was exceedingly grateful to get a Christmas tree up this year, give and receive more gifts than any of us deserve, and enjoy a post-Christmas visit with my parents. As far as I’m concerned, our Christmas tree is staying up until February, just to make up for lost time. Good thing we positioned it as far away from the wood stove as possible.
I’ve had so many pots (posts) simmering on the back burner for so long, I hardly know where to begin… I’ll simply start with the most effervescent. The lovely Johanna from Low Sodium Blog will be featuring an Everything DASH Diet Cookbook FREE GIVEAWAY!! Next week! WOO! I have two low-sodium slow-cooker recipes, along with a fabulous low-so broth alternative I discovered weeks ago and am super eager to share. I’ve perfected perhaps the single most important cookie recipe known to western civilization — that’s right; CHEWY CHOCOLATE CHIP! — these lil’ babies look perfect and taste DIVINE, are low-sodium, vegan, and so honking good you won’t be able to contain yourself. Oh yessss. So until next week, I leave you with happy thoughts, warm wishes for a wonderful weekend, and many thanks for all of the comments, emails, and cards sent saying I MISS YOU. I’ve missed you too!
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
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