Seared Scallops with Bacon Braised Chard

The fabulous Domestic Diva is back with another of her healthy farm to table recipes. I spent quite a bit of time with her last week between our time at Camp Blogaway and hitting some fab restaurants while I was in LA, it was a foodie and food blogger's dream. Don't forget to check out her blog Domestic Divas and her articles on West Hollywood Patch after you drool over this recipe.

Braising anything with bacon just sounds sinful, doesn't it?

Even something disgustingly healthy like chard.

However, we all need a little bacon in our lives from time to time. Otherwise it's like going through life with lumps of coal in your stocking and sugar-free, fat free ice cream in your freezer.

I'm shuddering right now as I type this, and you're probably shaking your fist angrily at the sky and shouting, "They make sugar-free, fat-free ice cream? What kind of world are we living in!" A Skinny Cow world, but I digress with my existential bacon musings...

Loving Big with Potatoes

Tania from Love Big Bake Often is back again to share one of her fabulous recipes, made with love.

Hi there....Tania again! So happy to be guest posting again, thank you Jen.

I have another savory dish here for you....there aren't that many on my own blog (working on that), so I thought it would be fun to come up with a couple for here.

Jason bought a new grill....for himself. He will tell you that he bought it for us, that he even bought a RED one to go with MY red kitchen. And I love him for it. Seriously. It makes me giggle. He loves to grill. He will admit that he is still on the learning curve...especially with chicken. So lately these days (when he is home in time) I work on the sides and he grills the meat. Perfect combination. Just need to get the timing down, like I said - a learning curve. But there is no challenge to these potatoes, they are simple, easy and delicious. You can mix it up with spices, citrus, and different vinegars....but I like to stick with Balsamic. It's so yummy.

Happy Brandy Alexander Day

Now I am definitely not big on keeping up with most of the food holidays, but Susan over at She's Becoming Doughmesstic started a site that celebrates each food holiday for the year.  I check out the list of upcoming holidays and saw that today happens to be Brandy Alexander Day.  I'm going to venture a guess that many of you have no idea what a Brandy Alexander is and probably wonder why I would care about this specific day.   You can find out if you head on over to the Food Holidays site and get the recipe for this insanely rich and grown up morsel I made in honor of the day.

Enjoy!