I love May when all the seasonal farmers markets start to open. For the next 4 weeks, I'll be visiting the markets weekly near where I live in Northern California and buy ingredients to make a simple, vegetarian dish to share with you. This week there were gorgeous rainbow carrots at the market, along with lemons from a neighboring table. A fresh veggie fettuccine was definitely on the menu.

My mother is an avid baker, but when she moved to Thailand after college to work at a leprosy hospital, she didn't have access to the peaches, fresh berries and apricots that filled the cobbler recipes in her old copy of the Betty Crocker Cookbook. Instead, she had mangos. Lots of mangos. She only mentioned her mango cobbler once many years ago, so I'm sure it will surprise her to learn I never forgot about it. But it stuck in my head, that mango cobbler, begging to be brought to life. And I'm so glad it did.

Q: I love grilling pizza and want to host a grilled pizza BBQ in the next few weeks. I have thought about precooking the dough on one side before the party, and then putting it back on olive oiled parchment paper so people can either build their own pizzas, or I can top several and have them ready for the grill. 

Strawberry season is starting! Strawberry season is starting! You'll find me stuffing strawberries in my face from now until the last pints leave the farmers' market. These scones are a riff on one of my favorite combos: fresh strawberries dipped in sour cream and coated with brown sugar. They're just the thing for a lazy weekend brunch with the windows open and bottomless cups of coffee close by.

Where there's brunch, there are Bloody Marys. So at this Sunday's Cinco de Mayo brunch celebration, it just makes sense that we'll be happily sipping Mary's Mexican cousin: the Bloody Maria.

Oh boy. If you often find yourself lost in the galleries of Tastespotting, you know that the deliciousness borders on overwhelming. With that in mind, you may be thrilled or dismayed when we tell you about the latest crowd-sourced recipe site. CookieHound is basically like Tastespotting, except it's only cookies. Repeat. Only cookies. Lots and lots of cookies. 

Where I come from, the first thing to show up at the market is rhubarb, not strawberries. So as temptingly spring-like as a strawberry rhubarb pie might sound, if I were to make one now, it would be with strawberries flown in from a faraway place. 

Besides, why mess with rhubarb? Have you had it on its own? It's edgy, indeed. Sour and bright, it needs some sweetness, but not too much. 

Making authentic Mexican food can sometimes feel out of my comfort zone, but after discovering delicious carne de puerco at a favorite local joint, I knew it was high time I try. Now that I know how easy it is to achieve this dish of tender pork smothered in a charred tomatillo sauce at home, I may never again need to "go out" for Mexican ever again.

Any trip to Texas will likely include an experience with chicken fried steak and Cholula hot sauce. Chicken fried steak (lovingly called CFS) is a southern classic, while Cholula hot sauce (introduced to the states here in Austin, TX) is a popular condiment that adds a Texas kick. See what happens when these icons get hitched in this new take on a Lone Star tradition.

Miso is often seen as more of a savory ingredient — mixed into salad dressings, rubbed on salmon or chicken, stirred into a soup, or used as a simple sandwich spread. But how about adding it to some of your favorite desserts instead?