Featured Food Blog: Sugar, Spice & Bacon

Name: Tara
Name of blog: Sugar, Spice & Bacon
Twitter: @Sugarspicebacon

How would you describe your culinary style?
I love to experiment in the kitchen. A lot of the recipes I make are a result of my looking around my kitchen and fridge and trying to creatively put ingredients together. I lead a very active lifestyle and I think that reflects in my cooking. I try to use healthy, in season ingredients. I am known to try my hand at “healthifying” dishes by cutting out or substituting ingredients, while trying to maintain (or bump up!) the flavor of the original dish. While I truthfully enjoy cooking and eating healthy, colorful foods, I also love a good cocktail and/or glass of wine! I am also a firm believer that there are times when only a cookie or cupcake will do! I guess to sum it up…Everything in moderation, lots of colors on the plate, stick with whole foods as much as possible, always have Greek Yogurt on hand. 

What is the main source of inspiration for your recipes?
This one is easy! :) Definitely my mom and my grandmother. Anyone that reads my blog can see that a lot of my recipes are inspired from things I’ve learned from my mom and Ginny (my grandmother). My mom is a fantastic self-taught cook. Growing up we ate EVERYTHING. I was one of the only kids I knew who ate runny eggs, sushi (growing up in Spokane, WA in the early 90′s there wasn’t a lot of sushi going on!), all kinds of seafood, and even (gasp!) cooked spinach! My mom’s motto was, “you can’t say you don’t like it until you try it,” and she was so good at making everything taste great, we almost always cleaned our plates. Ginny is what you might call a “down home” cook. I was incredibly lucky to grow up in the country and we had a garden at my house, but Ginny had a GARDEN. Acres of super fresh fruits and veggies. Ginny and Papa also raised chickens (you’ll read in my blog about my love of farm fresh eggs), pigs, cows, and lambs. I have access to the best and freshest meat around. I remember thinking it was funny when people started talking about “free range” animals, because all the meat I ate was not only free range, but came from the backyard ranch at Ginny and Papa’s. Because I grew up this way, I think I have a different view of where food comes from, how we treat and how we grow our food. Don’t get me wrong, I love a good steak, but I learned from an early age that just because the cows in the pasture were going to become our dinner one day didn’t mean they shouldn’t be respected. In fact, we should respect them more. I’ve also been able to start my own garden with tips from my mom and Ginny. While it is no where near either of theirs, I love being able to use fruit and veggies and herbs I grew myself in my latest dishes! 

If you could have one food while stranded on a desert island, what would it be? 
I don’t know if this is cheating, but FRUIT! All kinds! I am a fruit-a-holic. If I wasn’t so embarrassed, I could sit down with a spoon and eat an entire watermelon without thinking twice. I have never met a fruit I didn’t like either. My husband says he thinks the guys at Costco would have a good laugh if they knew that the massive quantities of fruit I buy are not, in fact, for a small army, but just for me! 

For someone new to your blog, which recipe do you recommend they try first? 
This one is tough!

• For Breakfast (or dinner): Sweet potato Hash
• Lunch: Best Chicken Salad Ever
• Cocktail: Avocado Margarita
• Something Sweet: Fresh Strawberry and Rosemary Scones

What is your ultimate guilty food pleasure? 
Tough one! You, or at least I, hear guilty pleasure and immediately think sweet, but I think actually my guilty food pleasure is a really good burger and fries. My papa would always say a burger is the perfect food because it has every food group, and I think he’s right! I would have a super juicy burger, medium rare, with everything. Shoe string fries please. Might as well throw a glass of red wine in there as well, just for good measure. Woah, my mouth just started watering! ;) 

Define Yummly.
To me yummly is just a different kind of yummy. You know when something is so good you have to invent another word for it? Like, it can’t just be good, it has to be ohmygawdthatis “cheesetastic”, “creamylicious”, “fanfreakingamazing”, “saltsational”, “YUMMLY!” The best thing ever is when you eat something that makes you feel that good. Actually, I take that back. I think the best thing ever is making something that makes someone else feel that good.