Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

One of the things I’ve been doing for years on travel days, when we are moving from one campground to another, is packing hearty salads into jars and tucking them into the cooler. This allows us to eat lunch inside the truck, usually at a truck stop, with everything contained neatly within our individual jars.

Since adding a sailboat to our modes of transportation, I’ve learned that lunch in a jar is also the perfect meal while sailing. But honestly, this is the kind of salad that travels well in almost any situation—packed lunches, hikes, picnics, beach days… you get the picture.

It doesn’t, of course, have to be packed into jars. A few weeks ago, I brought a bowl of this salad to a potluck with friends. It’s the kind of easy salad that can be prepared in advance, tossed together quickly, and goes well with anything.

This is also the kind of recipe in which every single ingredient should be taken as a suggestion, not a rule. Add anything you like—additional vegetables, herbs, or pickled things like banana peppers. Swap anything you don’t particularly like for something you do. And add more or less of anything to your heart’s content.

When Steve and I eat this for lunch as a main dish, I usually add some protein. Tuna, rotisserie chicken, and hard-boiled eggs are my go-to choices. But if you want to keep it plant-based, add some nuts and seeds or simply increase the ratio of beans to pasta.

One final note about the pasta: For the photos you see here, I used trafilata al bronzo, a type of small pasta that was gifted to me by a friend who lives in Italy. It was delicious, but any kind of small pasta will do, such as orzo, farfalline, ditali, or macaroni. You could also use rotini or small pasta shells.

Four more salads that travel well

1. Pearl Couscous Salad: This healthy, vibrant pasta salad is made with pearl couscous (toasted Israeli-style pasta), whatever fresh herbs and vegetables you like, and dressed simply with lemon juice and extra virgin olive oil. The salad keeps well for days and can be packed into mason jars for the perfect packed lunch or camping meal.

2. Kale and Broccoli Salad with Lemon Vinaigrette: This salad is crunchy, chewy, salty, sweet, and loaded with flavor and texture in every bite.

   Tossed with farro, parmesan, dried figs, peanuts, and cherries, it’s a hearty salad that manages to feels both wholesome and indulgent. Make it for lunch, pack it for a picnic, or serve it with any kind of grilled or roasted meat, poultry, or seafood. This is the kind of salad that plays nice with everything.

3. Israeli Salad with Pomegranate Vinaigrette: This Middle Eastern salad recipe is low in calories, vegan, dairy-free, and gluten-free, making it the perfect option for dietary restrictions and anyone interested in clean, plant-based meals. But don't let its health benefits fool you. Israeli Salad is also bursting with flavor and easy to prepare. So whether you're looking for a quick lunchtime bite or a tasty side dish for dinner tonight, this salad has got you covered.

4. Sesame Chicken Salad with Tahini Dressing: This sesame chicken salad is one of our favorite travel-day and lake-day meals. I pack it into mason jars that I place inside a small cooler and it makes a delicious high-protein lunch on days when we’re driving around the country from one campground to the next and want to save ourselves from truck stop food.

Twelve chefs. Twelve classes. One delicious reason to upgrade.

I am honored to be one of 12 incredible food writers, bakers, cooks, and teachers in the CookStack Collective. Together, we’ve created a year-long series of live cooking classes that are all about cooking with and learning from one another.

Also, we are a hoot! This is a party you’re going to want to attend.

Over the twelve months, paid subscribers get access to a monthly live Zoom class featuring a different host, fresh recipes, and the chance to cook along, ask questions, and learn directly from some very talented cooks.

Access to The CookStack Collective is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). In addition to all the other perks, paid subscribers receive:

• 12 live Zoom cooking classes

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A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Paid subscribers also receive THREE free cookbooks and other exclusive content throughout the year. If you’ve been thinking about upgrading, this is a deliciously good reason.

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The Complete Class Calendar!

July: ME!!!

I was tickled pink to kick off the very first CookStack Collective class! I led the class from the galley of our sailboat where we made three fresh, easy summer meals that are exactly the kind of food I want to eat in the middle of summer and especially when we are on the boat: A colorful hummus platter, sesame chicken salad, and watermelon and feta salad.

August: Betty Williams

Friday, August 21, 2026, 3 pm EST: Join Betty Williams for a fermentation primer and learn to make 2 kinds of Korean kimchi: quick-pickled Cucumber Kimchi and fermented Cabbage Kimchi.

September: Anna Vocino

Sunday, September 20, 2026: Join Anna Vocino to cook through some of the best recipes from her new cookbook, Eat Happy Cocktail Hour! Anna will show us how to make some low-carb party food, including Low Carb GF Pigs In A Blanket, Caprese Martini, Dill Pickle Ranch Dip, and Pom Pom Mocktails.

October: Nicki Sizemore

Friday, October 16, 2026, 1 pm EST: Join Nicki Sizemore to make two seasonal staples — a whipped ricotta dip and a grain-free pumpkin apple cake — alongside simple practices for cooking with more intention and joy.

November: Kerry Faber

Tuesday, November 10, 2026, 4 pm EST: Join Kerry Faber to make a cozy fall favorite, Cabbage-Wrapped Chicken Parm Meatballs!

December: Stephanie Hansen

Friday, December 4, 2026, 6pm EST: Join Stephanie Hansen to make three holiday recipes including Baked Brie with Sun Dried Tomatoes, Cranberry Jalapeño Salsa, and Roasted Shrimp!

January: Rachel Ciordas

Sunday, January 24, 2027, 4 pm Eastern: Join Rachel Ciordas to make Focaccia Pizza, Ice Water Salad, and a Champagne Cocktail, all Gluten Free!

February: Emma Frisch

Tuesday, February 27, 2027, 12 pm EST: Join Emma Frisch to make a Classic Italian Bolognese Pasta with a Frisch Twist + batch-cooking for families, tips for picky eaters, and dietary restrictions

March: Kate McDermott

Tuesday, March 16, 2027, 7 PM Eastern: Just in time for St. Patrick’s Day, join Kate McDermott and learn to make a Classic Irish Apple Tart in this virtual session live from her Pie Cottage kitchen. You will receive a bonus recipe for a delicious custard sauce to serve with the tart, too!

April: Lolly Martyn

Sunday, April 18, 2027, 1 pm EST/7 pm Italy time CET: Join Lolly Martyn to meal prep like an Italian nonna: We’ll make the simply delicious family favorite pasta e ceci (chickpeas) and effortlessly whip up some veggie broth and sugo (red sauce) for your freezer or fridge at the same time!

May: Steve Sabicer

Friday, May 7, 2027, 3 PM EST: Buying the Best Meat. Join butcher and sustainable food advocate, Steve Sabicer, for a practical one-hour workshop on navigating today’s confusing meat landscape. Learn what meat labels actually mean, how to buy on a budget, and the questions you should ask your butcher, meat counter, or online vendor. You’ll also learn a few simple at-home butchery techniques to help stretch your dollars with minimal effort.

June: Sheryl O’Connell

Thursday, June 3, 2027, 1 pm EST: Join Sheryl O’Connell for a fresh, summer-themed class featuring legume-based, portable salads.

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

*Steve and I are on a sailing trip, so this issue is a reheat. It was originally published on March 14 of this year.

The impossible contradictions we live with every day

Friends of ours from the Palm Springs area came to San Diego this week to celebrate my birthday with us. The morning after a delightful birthday dinner on Coronado Island, my friend Judy and I drove to an area of San Diego with a high Korean population to visit Aqua Day Spa, a traditional Korean bathhouse.

Judy had been there before and knew the ropes, which was excellent because I think I would have made a half dozen social errors in the first few minutes had she not been there to guide me.

Traditional Korean bathhouses (Jjimjilbang) include hot tubs, saunas, and salt rooms and the option to get scrubbed down like you’ve never been scrubbed before.

After checking in, we were given baskets with a towel, robe, and a key to a locker. The protocol is to strip down (all the way, no exceptions, naked as the day you were born), put your stuff in your locker, and then head into a room with a couple of saunas, a hot tub, a cold plunge and massage tables with surprisingly strong and energetic middle-aged Korean women diligently scrubbing away on their completely nude clients.

The key, if you’re a stereotypical American white woman with all the hang-ups and baggage you’d expect from a stereotypical American white woman, is to leave all that bullshit at the door and get comfortable fast. And also, do what the strong and energetic middle-aged Korean women tell you to do.

I learned later that the colloquial term for these no-nonsense women who spend their days scrubbing, polishing, washing, and massaging client after client is ajumma, which can be translated as auntie.

When it was my turn, my ajumma took my hand and led me to her table, and for the next 60 minutes I obeyed her every command. She scrubbed me down from head to toe, moving me this way and that, absurd amounts of dead skin sloughing from my body like I was a reptile slithering out of my skin. I turned when she told me to turn, showered when she told me to shower, and allowed her to polish and oil my skin to a level of softness I doubt I’ve experienced since I was an infant.

At one point, as I lay on the table, buffed and polished, a cucumber mask on my face, while she washed my hair, I was overcome with the tenderness of it all… these women spending their days caring for other women.

It was breathtakingly beautiful.

I returned home and listened to news reports of an American bomb dropped on an elementary school full of children while I prepared dinner for friends.

We humans are violent animals. We are intent on inflicting harm on others, on ourselves, on our environment, on everything we touch. We’ve had many years of practice and we are exceptionally good at it.

And also there are aunties. There are mothers and fathers, nurses, child care providers, hospice workers, social workers, and therapists. There is me in my kitchen, preparing a meal for friends.

The gift of caring for others is offered in a thousand different ways, in every location on the globe, imperfect people taking care of imperfect people. We are violent and we are kind. We are terrible and we are wonderful. We harm and we heal. We destroy and we repair.

All these things are true.

I do not know the name of my ajumma. She did not offer it. She did not ask my name. No attempt was made at small talk, no energy given to pointless social niceties. She was all-business, completely focused on the task at hand, and the task at hand was to care for the person on her table. To care for me.

And this is the part in the story where I offer some little nugget of insight that helps us make sense of a world that includes bombs and school children and kind aunties, tucked into a neat little package, a pretty bow covering the strain of the string that’s fighting to contain the impossible contradictions stuffed inside. But the string will break. The bow is a mirage.

Because as I type this word and as you read it, there are terrible, unspeakable things happening everywhere. And also, there is a no-nonsense middle age Korean woman diligently caring for the person on their table.

I cannot explain it, let alone contain it. I just know that both things are true.

This is the world, beautiful and terrible. May the side of us that cares overcome the side that destroys.

This week’s menu

I’m going all in on the comfort level with this week’s menu of Smoky braised beef brisket with onions, Brown butter carrots, Buttermilk whipped potatoes, and Oatmeal raisin cookies

Smoky Braised Beef Brisket with Onions

Brisket has a reputation for being dry and honestly, its earned that reputation fair and square. The problem is that brisket is a tough cut of beef that needs to be cooked low and slow for a long time to soften the muscle fibers and render them tender. This long, slow cooking often results in dry, chewy meat that even a generous spoonful of gravy or BBQ sauce won’t cover up.

The solution was inspired by a recipe I found in an issue of Cook’s Illustrated and it’s genius. Oven-braise the brisket in a sauce made from wine, broth, and caramelized onions until it’s very tender. Then, let the cooked brisket rest overnight in the sauce.

While the meat chills out in it’s saucy bath, it reabsorbs some of the juice it lost while cooking, resulting in plump, juicy slices that are far from dry.

Another benefit to this cooking method is that most of the work is done in advance. This makes it a fantastic dish to serve when you’re having guests for dinner, or on busy weeknights when you’ve had a chance to do some meal prep the weekend before.

Growing up, one of my favorite meals at my grandma’s house was brisket. And (sorry grandma), it was pretty dry. But, I still loved it. It was full of smoky flavor and later I learned that was because she added some liquid smoke.

I’ve done the same thing in this recipe, adding a couple of teaspoons of liquid smoke to the sauce along with smoked paprika and some tomato paste. The combination gives the sauce a gorgeous rich, smokey flavor that I’m certain she would approve of.

Braised Beef Brisket

Brown Buttered Carrots

Slowly cooking carrots in brown butter creates a rich, indulgent side dish that’s the perfect compliment to a wide variety of main dishes. This simple recipe requires just 5 ingredients and is the perfect match for nostalgic, comforting dishes like braised brisket and meatloaf.

Brown Buttered Carrots

Buttermilk Whipped Potatoes

Buttermilk and plenty of butter gives these whipped potatoes a creamy, light, and fluffy texture and tangy flavor that is out of this world delicious. This recipe uses Russet potatoes and includes instructions for additions and substitutions.

Buttermilk Whipped Potatoes

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I find that oatmeal cookies most often fall into two categories - thick, soft, and chewy or thin and crispy. This recipe is unusual because it produces oatmeal cookies that are thin, soft, and chewy.

You can make them whatever size you like, but I prefer to bake them into huge two-handed cookies because they are the kind of thing I crave when I need an excess of all things warm and cozy.

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

This newsletter exists because of the generous support of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A subscription is just $35 a year.

Upgrade to paid

Join me for the September CookStack Collective Class!

The incredible is teaching the September CookStack Collective class and, friends, you do not want to miss this one. Anna is a multi-talented recipe writer, photographer, comedian, and voice actor - she plays Mrs. Potato Head in Toy Story 5!

She also has a line of super premium pasta sauce , and has written four cookbooks: Eat Happy and Eat Happy Too, Eat Happy Italian and Eat Happy Cocktail Hour, her brand NEW book that comes out in October!

Like I said, multitalented superstar, this one.

In this class, she’s going to teach us how to adapt classic appetizers to be not only gluten free but low carb, along with a Mixology 101 crash course on making fresh, balanced cocktails and mocktails with ingredients you probably already have on hand.

Here’s where to find out more and sign up!

September CookStack Collective Class

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

Those Damn Fishing Boats

*Steve and I are on a sailing trip, so this issue is a reheat: It was originally published on September 27, 2025

For new sailors, the fishing boats that hang out in the mouth of the channel connecting Muskegon Lake to Lake Michigan are annoying.

The currents from boats coming and going and the constricted opening of a channel disorients and concentrates the number of small baitfish, which then, of course, attracts the larger fish that the fishermen are trying to catch. So, that’s why they like to hang out there. Or so I’ve learned from googling WHY, oh WHY do fishing boats hang out at the mouth of a channel???

But, trying to navigate around them along with all of the other boats coming and going, is stressful. Especially when you’re new and trying to figure everything out.

This being our first year on the water, one of the things that I’ve noticed is that there’s no love lost between the fishing boats and the sailboats. We exist in the marina like high school cliques. Like with like. We wave and greet each other accordingly. Except for us, who are new and don’t yet understand the social structures and therefore wave at everyone. Even the fishing boats, although inside we are screaming, Why do you hang out in the mouth of the channel??? Don’t you know we’re new? Don’t you know how hard it is to get around you? (I should say waved at everyone. Past tense. We are learning.)

Once, in a restroom at a marina in Pentwater, I stood at the sink, fixing my hair and makeup after a shower when a woman who had just come in off a fishing boat came in to clean up. Upon learning that we were new sailors she launched into a monologue about how much she hated all of us. Well, not all of us. I think she said something along the lines of, “Not everyone with a sailboat is an ass, just most of you.”

Having just sailed past a fishing boat at what was, I felt, at too close a range, I didn’t know how to defend myself or if I even should. We are new! I wanted to tell her. We’re learning how all this works! We were taught different rules of the road in our ASA sailing classes than what it appears you all live by. We don’t want to be the biggest dicks on the lake but also, why do you hang out in such inconvenient places? And also, we’ve met some of the sailboat owners in our marina and they are lovely people! Are all sailors assholes? I don’t think so! But, what do I know?

I just smiled at her and left the building.

I might be new to sailing, but I’m not new to being a human and I know I don’t have to participate in every argument I’ve been invited to.

So, here we are, two and a half months later, and I no longer feel like we need a giant “Caution! New Driver!” sticker on the hull of the boat. We’ve sailed a lot. As much as possible. In a relatively short amount of time, we’ve moved from everything feeling clumsy and a bit stressful to everything feeling easy and fun. So fun! So easy! Look at me pulling our headsail from one side to the other as we glide through a tack! Look at us coasting in and out of our slip in the marina, elegantly grabbing and casting off the dock lines like we’ve been doing this our whole lives!

And still, those fishing boats at the mouth of the channel are still annoying as….

Moving on.

We didn’t grow up with boats. We lived in Colorado! And yes, there are lakes in Colorado. People own boats there. My uncle had a sailboat when I was very young and my dad had a small speed boat for a couple of years. But, it’s not the same as here, on the coast of Lake Michigan. When I told a friend of mine from Colorado that we were going to learn how to sail she said, “That’s so unique!” Unique for someone who lives in Colorado perhaps, but not at all unique for someone who lives in Michigan. Here, it feels like everyone has a boat.

For me, the experience of learning how to sail felt monumental. We signed up for classes, received our textbooks, and studied them like our lives depended on it because we thought they did. (They did not.) The first few days of class felt incredibly intense. Our instructor took his job very seriously. Which was cute because he was probably 24, but also we approached the task as if the fate of humankind hung in the balance. I stressed over each and every one of the three 100-question tests we took that week, convinced I wouldn’t pass. (My lowest score was a 93%. I might have a history of over preparation. And over thinking. All the things you can put an over before. Until I’m over it.)

I am being a bit over dramatic, of course.

And, we adored our instructor, who did, in fact take his job vey seriously, and as a consequence, we learned a LOT. Much more than from our second instructor who did not take the job seriously at all.

Anyhoo, flying high on the excitement of having passed three levels of ASA training in a week, we celebrated with fish and chips (probably caught by the disgruntled fisherwoman) and realized immediately that if we wanted some actual experience, we were going to have to buy a boat. We were like new drivers with a permit but no actual driving experience. How do you get experience? You get out on the road. Hard to do without a car. Or, in this case, without a boat.

Three weeks later, Steve and John, the now former owner of our new sailboat, motored it into our freshly leased slip in the first marina we found. John yelled, “I sold my boat!” I shouted back, “What a coincidence! We bought a boat!”

John and his friend Dean helped us secure the boat in the slip (Dean, patiently giving me instructions while looking at me sideways because it was immediately apparent that we had no idea what we were doing) then walked away. And there we were, sitting in the cockpit of a boat that was now entirely our responsibility, with no sails, and a cabin full of stuff accumulated by the former owner over 30 years of sailing. We stared at each other for a bit. Silent but thinking the same thing… what do we do now?

Steve said, want to put the sails on?

Do you know how to do that?, said I.

No.

But we figured it out.

The first few times we took our new boat out on the water were not what I would call fun and relaxing. Exhilarating, maybe. A little bit intoxicating. Anxiety producing but weirdly addictive. I was simultaneously relieved to return from a sail and eager to go back out. At first, Steve and I struggled to communicate and work together.

But then we found our stride. Gradually and then suddenly. Like everything always is.

Three months ago sailing felt like an exotic dream. After years of dreaming, of stopping to walk through marinas every time we traveled to a place with water, of saying to each other, Wouldn’t it be fun to someday learn how to sail? Wouldn’t it be great to have a boat? What if we LIVED on a boat? That would be something!, here we are.

We’ll take the boat out of the water soon and tuck it away for the winter. That’s ok too. We’ve got other places to go and people to see and a motorcycle that’s been poorly neglected this summer and needs to run. But, next May we’ll be back for a new season, not quite as green, but still in that delicious new stage of things where everything is an adventure.

And the fishing boats will still be as annoying as…

This week’s menu

Poached Salmon with Dill Sauce + Crispy Fried Potatoes + Vanilla Cake with Lemon Mascarpone Cream

Poached Salmon with Dill Sauce

Last week, Sheryl O’Connell who writes Just Really Good Recipes posted a recipe for Mediterranean Salmon with Dill Sauce. The recipe was inspired by a restaurant meal she had enjoyed but also paid $37 dollars for. When she got home, she decided that she could do better for less, and while I don’t have the comparison of the restaurant meal, I made her dill sauce this week and I think she nailed it.

Sheryl air fried her salmon. I opted for one of my favorite techniques - gently poaching the salmon in white wine with lemon, garlic, and dill.

I love this technique for poaching salmon. I first shared it last year in this recipe for Poached Salmon Salad with Honey Lime Dressing, a recipe that also made it to the Let’s Get Lost Cookbook.

Adding alcohol to the pan lowers the boiling point of the poaching liquid. This produces more vapor which helps the fish cook more evenly.

Laying the fish on top of lemon slices creates a part poaching and part steaming situation that prevents the fish’s flavor from being washed away and keeps the bottom of the fish from overcooking.

For the dill sauce, I followed Sheryl’s recipe exactly, opting for sour cream instead of yogurt and not thinning it with water. The sauce takes mere minutes to make and would be so good over so many things! It’s a keeper!

Total Time: 30 minutes

Serves: 4

Ingredients:

• Creamy Dill Sauce (recipe from Sheryl O’Connell)

• 2 lemons, sliced into 1/2 inch rounds

• 3 or 4 cloves of garlic, peeled and sliced

• A few sprigs of dill, left over from making the sauce

• 1 cup dry white wine or dry vermouth

• 4 skinless salmon fillets that are about 1-inch thick - about 1/2 pound fillet per person

• Water - just enough to come about halfway up the sides of the salmon fillets

• Salt

Instructions:

1. Make the dill sauce and place it in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

2. Slice the lemon into rounds that are about 1/2-inch thick and lay them across the bottom of a 12-inch skillet or cast iron braiser (It’s important to use a pan with a lid. Alternatively, cover your pan with a sheet of aluminum foil).

3. Peel and slice the garlic, and sprinkle the pieces over the lemon slices. Toss in a few sprigs of dill. Pour in about a cup of dry white wine (or dry vermouth).

4. Sprinkle the salmon fillets with salt and place them on top of top of the lemons. Add enough water to the pan to cup about halfway up the sides of the fillets.

5. Set the pan over medium high heat and bring the liquid to a boil. Cover the pan with a lid, reduce heat to low, and maintain a very gentle simmer until the thickest part of the salmon registers 125 degrees - 11 to 14 minutes.

6. Remove the skillet from the heat and gently lift the salmon out of the pan onto serving plates. Serve with the dill sauce.

Crispy Fried Potatoes

Poached salmon with dill sauce is one of those things that can be served with any number of side dishes but potatoes sounded particularly good to me this week, so that’s what we went with.

I vacillated between making these crispy fried potatoes and cream cheese mashed potatoes, ultimately opting for crispy fried potatoes for no other reason than there would be one less dish to wash.

This simple technique results in potatoes that are soft and creamy on the inside, and golden and crispy on the outside. I make them quite frequently not only because they’re so simple and delicious, but because it’s easy to make as many or as few as you like.

Crispy Fried Potatoes

Vanilla Loaf Cake with Lemon Mascarpone Cream

Earlier this year I published a recipe for Grilled Apricots with Lemon Mascarpone Cream. Grilling apricots was a revelation to me but also, I kept thinking about all the other delicious ways to use the mascarpone cream, like dolloped over slices of cake, swirled onto cupcakes, or as a decadent topping for fresh berries.

This week, after our lunch of poached salmon with dill sauce, we ate slices of vanilla loaf cake with a generous spoonful of lemon mascarpone cream and spent the rest of the day feeling enormously happy and satisfied in the way you do after a really good meal. We all need more days like this, yes?

Vanilla Loaf Cake

This simple vanilla loaf cake is one of my most used recipes. It’s delicious on it’s own but is also a kind of blank canvas for dressing it up with anything you like. Try it with whipped cream and berry sauce (pictured below), a drizzle of hot fudge or salted caramel sauce, or lemon mascarpone cream, of course.

Vanilla Loaf Cake

Lemon Mascarpone Cream

Ever since making this mascarpone frosting recipe, I’ve been a little bit obsessed with using mascarpone in desserts.

Ok. So if you’re Italian, or have visited Italy for 5 minutes (me too!), you’re maybe rolling your eyes right now because it’s not like mascarpone and desserts is a new thing.

But I’m not Italian and, even though I spent one glorious week in Italy a few years ago, Mascarpone cheese is not something those of us in the US can even find in a lot of grocery stores.

This is changing. Thankgod. Because mascarpone is marvelous. Marvelous mascarpone! Someone should name a brand that. Perhaps they have?

I digress.

Last summer, when Steve and I spent 7 weeks living on on our sailboat, I was only interested in super simple recipes that take only a few ingredients, not much equipment, and very little time.

And that, my friends, was where lemon mascarpone cream was born. I originally made it for these grilled apricots with honey, but it’s so easy to make and so good on, well, everything that I did kinda start putting it on everything. Make it, and you’ll understand why.

Lemon Mascarpone Cream

By the way, the basic vanilla loaf cake recipe is also the starting point for 4 flavor variations:

1. Chocolate Chip Loaf Cake: simply stir 1 cup mini chocolate chips into the batter before folding in the whipped cream.

2. Blueberry Loaf Cake: Fold fresh or frozen blueberries into the batter.

3. Cinnamon Swirl Loaf Cake: Swirl in thick gooey ribbons of cinnamon sugar.

4. Raspberry Swirl Loaf Cake: Swirls of raspberry throughout rich vanilla cake.

This newsletter exists because of the generous support of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A subscription is just $35 a year.

Upgrade to paid

Join me for the September CookStack Collective Class!

The incredible is teaching the September CookStack Collective class and, friends, you do not want to miss this one. Anna is a multi-talented recipe writer, photographer, comedian, and voice actor - she plays Mrs. Potato Head in Toy Story 5!

She also has a line of super premium pasta sauce , and has written four cookbooks: Eat Happy and Eat Happy Too, Eat Happy Italian and Eat Happy Cocktail Hour, her brand NEW book that comes out in October!

Like I said, multitalented superstar, this one.

In this class, she’s going to teach us how to adapt classic appetizers to be not only gluten free but low carb, along with a Mixology 101 crash course on making fresh, balanced cocktails and mocktails with ingredients you probably already have on hand.

Here’s where to find out more and sign up!

September CookStack Collective Class

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

Happy almost September everyone!

Steve and I are taking a couple of weeks off to sail up the coast of Lake Michigan, possibly all the way to Mackinac Island, but who knows? We are taking it day by day, going where the weather and our inclinations want to take us.

The next few issues are “reheats” - bits and pieces from some of the most popular issues I’ve published over the past couple of years with a few new recipes thrown in. (Don’t miss the seared scallops and brownie sundaes below!)

I might pop in from time to time with a sailing update, but no matter where September finds you, I hope the end of summer and the start to fall is gentle and filled with ease. And maybe some apples.

I originally published this essay September of last year. So, I guess it’s been a year since I’ve (mostly) left social media behind. I still don’t have the answers I ask here, but I also don’t regret the decision to step away and certainly don’t feel any desire to go back.

I apparently need someone to tell me how to enjoy my life

I loved facebook in the early years. It was such an exciting way to stay connected to people. I was able to keep up with the lives of friends and family from all over the world who I would have likely lost track of. I can also say that facebook is the reason why I’m friends with a handful of people whom I otherwise would not have met or gotten to know. Back in the day, it was a place where you could have actual conversations with people that turned into real relationships.

But those years are long gone, aren’t they?

What began as a tool that allowed people to talk about what they’re up to, what they think, and the things they are interested in, has turned into a series of funhouse mirrors. We’re seeing other people’s lives and viewpoints, but they’re all twisted and confused. And it’s twisting and confusing our own ideas in return.

What I’m trying to say is that, these days, when I spend time scrolling on facebook or instagram, my brain feels twisted and confused.

For the past couple of years I’ve tried to find some happy medium with social media. I’ve posted very little. I removed the apps from my phone so I have to be deliberate about the time spent there. I’ve tried to curate what I see there and who I’m connected to in a way that still allowed me to keep up with the people I’m interested in and cut out the rest.

It’s not going very well.

Also, quite frankly, there are people in this world for whom I don’t want to know what they think or what they’re up to. I would not subscribe to their Substack or sit next to them at a dinner party. I’ve tried to avoid them on social media.

That also is not going very well.

As a business owner, the relationship with social media is even more complicated. Because, can you be a business owner without a social media presence? Especially if your business exists mostly online?

I don’t have an answer to this but I am willing to ask myself some questions: How can I continue to do what I do without being a part of the problem? Or, how can I continue to do the work that I love without subjecting myself to a place that makes me feel twisted and confused?

A while back, I read an issue of Sam Harris’s Substack, We Are Losing The Information War With Ourselves. His last lines are these:

“Get off social media.

Read good books and real journalism.

Find your friends.

And enjoy your life.”

Perhaps social media has made me markedly stupider because I seemed to need someone to spell this out for me in profoundly simple terms.

Aside from 5 minutes when it was brand new, I haven’t spent any time on twitter and everything I’ve heard about the platform since confirms the wisdom of that decision. Facebook almost always makes me feel gross, so why am I spending any time there? Instagram makes me feel less gross, but also like I’ve wasted time that would, unquestionably, be better spent reading any one of the books on my bookshelf or the newsletters in my inbox.

Read good books and real journalism. Find your friends. Enjoy your life.

Ok, Sam. You’ve convinced me.

(If Sam’s closing words didn’t convince me, these certainly would have, “President Trump is a creature of social media, and his presidency would be unthinkable without it.”)

And yes, I know, Substack is social media. But, for now, it’s not the same.

The purpose of Substack is to provide a platform for writers to write and readers to read. And there are some really, really good writers here.

There is also plenty of not so good writing here. At least, not so good according to me. The beauty is that we each get to decide for ourselves what is good and not so good and fill our inboxes accordingly.

We get to do that because the incentives are different.

Substack, as a company, is not incentivized by ad spend because there are no ads. The subscription model changes the playing field. Substack makes money when it’s writers makes money. The writers make money because there are readers who want to support their work. This is an important distinction from other social media companies who maximize their own profits by selling user attention to advertisers.

I am in control of the content I consume on Substack. I choose who I subscribe to, what I choose to read, and which newsletters to support with a paid subscription. If I could afford it, I would pay for many, many more subscriptions than I do. But, I pay for some and try to rotate my subscription dollars around to support as many as I can.

In any case, I am in the drivers seat for what I consume and whose work I support. This does not make me feel gross. Quite the opposite, in fact.

I am also forming real relationships here. I have met other Substack writers and readers in person this year and it has been utterly delightful.

So, this is where I’m hanging out these days, with you wonderful people. For now at least, it’s a place where I am free to write what I like for an audience who wants to read it.

Like everything else, Substack has it’s problems. And, I can’t remember who wrote this, but I read something recently that is also important to say: Don’t thank Substack for the connections you’ve made here, thank the people you are connecting with.

Thank you. Thank you for reading and commenting and sharing. Mostly, thank you for being here.

This week’s menu

Pan Seared Scallops with Chorizo and Creamy Roasted Corn

I have served this dish to more dinner guests than probably anything else and it is always a huge hit. It’s a dish that’s built around contrasts: sweet and smoky, rich and tangy, tender, creamy, and crisp.

Steve just admitted that, when fresh sweet corn is in season, it’s his favorite meal. And, I don’t think I’ve ever served it to dinner guests when they haven’t asked for the recipe.

What I’m trying to say is this: If you’re looking for a recipe that is a slam-dunk, sure-to-please, and easy-to-make situation, this is it.

One of the best things about this recipe on nights when you’re entertaining is that all the main components can be prepped in advance. Roast the corn, sear the chorizo, and chop the veggies ahead of time. Then, about 15 minutes before you want to serve dinner, start cooking, preferably over good conversation and cocktails.

Scallops with Chorizo and corn

Hot Fudge Brownie Sundaes

Here’s how to guarantee a good mood no matter what else is happening in your life and in the world: Make a pan of these dark chocolate fudge brownies. Then, make some old-fashioned hot fudge, the kind that thickens almost instantly when it hits cold ice cream into a sticky, chewy layer of intensely chocolate fudge.

Stack a brownie or two in a bowl, top it with some really good vanilla ice cream, and a very generous spoonful of hot fudge.

What could be better?

Dark Chocolate Brownies

Old Fashioned Hot Fudge

Homemade Vanilla Ice Cream

A few weeks ago I wrote about how much I LOVE my Nina Creami ice cream maker. I have since heard from quite a few of you who tell me you recently ordered one and are loving it as much as I do.

So I thought I’d share this recipe for the the best vanilla ice cream you’ve ever had. And I know that’s an extraordinary claim. There is always the possibility that you’ll make it and disagree with me. But, I think that’s highly unlikely.

Here’s what you need:

• 4 large egg yolks

• ¾ cup (150 grams) sugar

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 2 cups whole milk

• 1 cups heavy cream

• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract

• 1/2 teaspoon almond extract

How to make it: Add the egg yolks, sugar, and salt to a 3-quart or larger saucepan. Stir them together with a wire whisk then whisk in the milk and cream. Set the pan over medium-low heat and cook, stirring constantly, until the mixture starts to thicken.

The key is to get it to 150°F. Using a thermometer is, of course, the easiest way to know if you’ve gotten to the right temperature. But, you’ll also know because the mixture will start to thicken. It’s done when, if you run your finger across the back of the spoon you’re using to stir the custard, the custard will hold the line.

Remove it from the heat and stir in the extracts. Let the mixture cool slightly then pour it into your Ninja Creami containers and freeze for 24 hours. At that point they are ready to be processed into ice cream. Put them in your Ninja Creami and press the ice cream button.

Once processed, the ice cream will stay perfectly smooth, creamy, and ready to eat in the freezer for weeks. I usually make several containers at a time and process them all at once so the ice cream is ready to eat when we are!

This newsletter exists because of the generous support of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A subscription is just $35 a year.

Upgrade to paid

Road Food: Good food that travels well

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, boat days, beach days, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

Last week’s Road Food Recipe: Roasted Eggplant Dip

And from two week’s ago: Spicy White Bean Harissa Dip

Blueberry pie bars

For the past several weeks, I’ve brought a giant box of blueberries home from my weekly trips to the local farmers market here in Michigan. I pour them by the cupful into our oatmeal and over bowls of Greek yogurt. And I bake them into all my favorite blueberry recipes, which now include these blueberry pie bars.

I “road tested” these bars on the sailboat last weekend and am happy to report that, when wrapped individually, they gave us something to snack on from Friday through Sunday. They’ll keep perfectly well at room temperature (or boat temperature) for several days.

These are perfect for picnics, lunch boxes, hikes, beach days, camping trips, and maybe especially on days spent running from one thing to the next when a sweet, portable treat is just the reward you need for being a grown up and doing all the grown up things.

Individually wrapped, these will keep well in the freezer for up to 3 months.

Recipe: Blueberry Pie Bars

Join me for the September CookStack Collective Class!

The incredible is teaching the September CookStack Collective class and, friends, you do not want to miss this one. Anna is a multi-talented recipe writer, photographer, comedian, and voice actor - she plays Mrs. Potato Head in Toy Story 5!

She also has a line of super premium pasta sauce , and has written four cookbooks: Eat Happy and Eat Happy Too, Eat Happy Italian and Eat Happy Cocktail Hour, her brand NEW book that comes out in October!

Like I said, multitalented superstar, this one.

In this class, she’s going to teach us how to adapt classic appetizers to be not only gluten free but low carb, along with a Mixology 101 crash course on making fresh, balanced cocktails and mocktails with ingredients you probably already have on hand.

Here’s where to find out more and sign up!

September CookStack Collective Class

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

Blueberry Pie Bars

For the past several weeks, I’ve brought a giant box of blueberries home from my weekly trips to the local farmers market here in Michigan. I pour them by the cupful into our oatmeal and over bowls of Greek yogurt. And I bake them into all my favorite blueberry recipes, which now include these blueberry pie bars.

I “road tested” these bars on the sailboat last weekend and am happy to report that, when wrapped individually, they gave us something to snack on from Friday through Sunday. They’ll keep perfectly well at room temperature (or boat temperature) for several days.

These are perfect for picnics, lunch boxes, hikes, beach days, camping trips, and maybe especially on days spent running from one thing to the next when a sweet, portable treat is just the reward you need for being a grown up and doing all the grown up things.

Individually wrapped, these will keep well in the freezer for up to 3 months.

Recipe Notes

You can use a 21-ounce can or jar of prepared blueberry pie filling to make these bars, or make the filling yourself.

In the bars you see here, I used my favorite homemade blueberry pie filling. You’ll need about 2 1/4 cups of filling, which just happens to be exactly half of one full blueberry pie recipe. To make the exact amount you’ll need for these bars, just cut the recipe in half.

Or, make a full recipe and use the rest of the filling to make something else. For example, when I made the bars you see pictured here, I used the other half to make two mini blueberry pies!

I found these disposable 5-inch pie plates, lined two of them with my favorite foolproof pie crust, divided the remaining 2 1/4 cups of blueberry pie filling between them, added a top crust, and that night, Steve and I each got a little blueberry pie all to ourselves.

You can also use the remaining blueberry pie filling to make a batch of these Blueberry Pie Cookies with Granola! Last year I taught a class on how to make these cookies and you can watch the replay here.

Extra blueberry pie filling will also freeze well, so you could just pop the remaining filling in the freezer for the next time you want to make a batch of blueberry pie bars!

Earlier this week, I asked this question on Substack Notes: What do the words comfort food mean to you? And what dish meets that criterion for you more than any other?

Most of the responses were predictably full of carbs and fat … mashed potatoes with salted butter, creamy pasta, mac and cheese, grilled cheese sandwiches. But also homemade fruit pies and warm berry cobbler, and anything chocolate. For a lot of people, comfort food conjures up memories of meals from their childhood. The kind of dishes that are served with warm feelings of being cared for.

I think my friend said it best when she equated comfort food with “our needs met.”

Those words made me stop and think for a long while. Because sometimes I crave comfort food because I already feel content and I want to eat something that matches my mood.

And sometimes I reach for it when I’m feeling discontent and want to feel better.

Put another way: sometimes it’s a statement about how I feel my needs are being met, and sometimes it’s an attempt to meet them.

This week’s issue is filled with many of the recipes that I equate with comfort food. But before we get there, I’d love to hear your answers to these questions…

What do the words comfort food mean to you? And what dish meets that criterion for you more than any other?

Talk to me in the comments.

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

The easiest way to read this and every issue is directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

12 recipes that feel like comfort

1. Meatloaf: This is not the meatloaf of my childhood, but there is still something about a thick slice of meatloaf and a pile of mashed potatoes that sends me back to meals at my Grandma’s table. It’s funny, because I probably only had meatloaf at Grandma’s house a couple of times. But I still associate it with her for some reason, and that feeling of being utterly loved and cared for.

2. Mashed potatoes: No further explanation is necessary. I have two favorite recipes for mashed potatoes - Cream Cheese Mashed Potatoes and Buttermilk Whipped Mashed Potatoes. Give me either at any time of any day and I’ll be happy.

3. Smoky Poblano Corn Chowder with Corn and Bacon: This soup checks all the comfort food boxes for me. It’s creamy, cheesy, and packed with potatoes, chilies, fresh summer corn, and crispy bacon. It’s the kind of soup you can almost eat with a fork, and an effective reminder of the power of pleasure. No apologies. No regrets.

4. Braised Beef Brisket with Onions: This should, of course, be served with mashed potatoes and brown buttered carrots. And because we’re not messing around here, it should also be served with homemade dinner rolls or flaky buttermilk biscuits.

5. Those rolls: I’ve made these buttery, pillowy homemade dinner rolls more times than I could ever count. They are warm and comforting in the way only homemade bread can be, but they are also inexorably linked to memories of family holidays, birthdays, and dinners with my favorite people at the table.

6. Flaky buttermilk biscuits: In my mind, the perfect biscuit is soft on the inside, slightly crispy on the outside, and filled with many flaky, buttery layers. That’s what these are. Also, this recipe for Loaded Blueberry Biscuits starts with this buttermilk biscuit recipe and then stuffs it with a whole bunch of fresh blueberries.

7. Cinnamon Rolls: My mom LOVES cinnamon rolls, so that’s probably one of the reasons they land in the comfort food category for me. Cinnamon rolls were (and still are) a special occasion food. I’ve made them many times for Christmas morning, but they’re also the kind of thing I sometimes make when I want a normal Sunday to feel special.

8. Pork Green Chili: I was very surprised to learn that if you live anywhere outside of the southwestern states, there’s a good chance that you don’t really know what green chili is. In Colorado, where I grew up, it’s a THING. We take it seriously and have strong opinions about it. This is my favorite way to make it, which will infuriate some people because I love to add red chili to my green chili. My favorite way to eat it is ladled over crispy cheese-filled chili rellenos.

9. Double Crust Chicken Pot Pie: This was one of the first things I ever learned how to cook and is, to this day, one of our family’s absolute favorite meals. Our son was a super fan of this meal, requesting it for every birthday and learning how to make it himself around the age of 16, from-scratch pie crust and all.

10. Vanilla Ice Cream with Homemade Hot Fudge: This is my favorite dessert, which always surprises people. As a baker, most people expect my answer to be something a bit more elevated and, you know, something that requires baking. But I honestly can’t think of anything better than really good vanilla ice cream topped with gorgeously rich and chewy hot fudge. It’s unbeatable and something I will never, ever get tired of.

11. Lasagna Bolognese: "Traditional" lasagna bolognese does not include the addition of grated cheese within its layers. But traditions are made to be broken, and I nearly always add some grated cheese between the layers of pasta, Bolognese sauce, and béchamel. And I think you should too.

12. Oatmeal Raisin Cookies: Like a warm bowl of soup or a thick slice of homemade bread, these are the kind of thing that makes me feel grounded, cozy, and a little bit better about the world.

Road Food: Good food that travels well

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, boat days, beach days, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

Last week’s Road Food Recipe: Spicy White Bean Harissa Dip

And from two week’s ago: Paprika Chicken Bites

Roasted Eggplant Dip

This roasted eggplant dip is smoky, garlicky, just a little bit spicy, and exactly the kind of thing I want to eat with pita chips or warm buttered naan—and maybe a stash of cut vegetables and a handful of roasted nuts.

It’s a lose interpretation of baba ganoush - similar, for sure, but straying too far from the traditional for me to actually call it that. Still, if you like baba ganoush, I feel quite confident that you’ll like this recipe.

Also, I’d like to mention that my husband does not care for eggplant but loves this dip. I mean, LOVES it. So, if you have a similar aversion to eggplant, that doesn’t mean you won’t like it when it’s roasted and pureed with chili and garlic.

Recipe: Roasted Eggplant Dip

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

Watch the replay of the August CookStack Collective Class and register for the September Class!

Yesterday, taught us all how to make two different kinds of kimchi and now both versions are in my refrigerator just waiting to make the weekend more delicious. 😋

To all of you who joined us live, thank you for being there! For anyone who missed it, here’s where you can get the recipes, watch the replay, and register for the September class with !

August Replay + Register for September

In September, Anna will show us how to adapt classic appetizers to be not only gluten free but low carb, along with a Mixology 101 crash course on making fresh, balanced cocktails and mocktails with ingredients you probably already have on hand.

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

This roasted eggplant dip is smoky, garlicky, just a little bit spicy, and exactly the kind of thing I want to eat with pita chips or warm buttered naan—and maybe a stash of cut vegetables and a handful of roasted nuts.

It’s a lose interpretation of baba ganoush - similar, for sure, but straying too far from the traditional for me to actually call it that. Still, if you like baba ganoush, I feel quite confident that you’ll like this recipe.

Also, I’d like to mention that my husband does not care for eggplant but loves this dip. I mean, LOVES it. So, if you have a similar aversion to eggplant, that doesn’t mean you won’t like it when it’s roasted and pureed with chili and garlic.

To make the dip, start by roasting eggplant at very high heat until the surface is charred and the flesh is meltingly tender. Scoop all that roasted goodness into a food processor…

And blend it up with some toasted garlic and spices, plus a bit of tahini and lemon juice. That’s it!

The result is a gorgeously silky dip that’s layered with smoke and spice, and just enough acidity to balance everything out. This dip keeps well in the refrigerator for up to 4 days and in a cooler for as long as your cooler keeps things cool.

It’s also safe to leave at room temperature for up to two hours—or one hour if the temperature is above 90°F. Pack it with naan, pita, crackers, or sliced vegetables for road trips, picnics, potlucks, packed lunches, and anywhere else a very good snack might improve the entire situation.

Read more

It’s late. We are at the top of Lookout Mountain in Golden, Colorado, 7,000 feet above the Denver skyline on a summer evening in 2018, and I am losing my shit.

I’m crying and talking way too loud. Steve is doing his best to calm me down but I’ve hit a breaking point and am starting to panic.

Let’s rephrase: Panic is in the driver’s seat.

I am desperate for him to understand something that is more true than anything else I’ve ever felt: I want to run away. I need to run away. To finally get out of the state I was born in and go somewhere new. Somewhere else. Somewhere I haven’t lived for my entire life.

On that evening in 2018, I was 43 years old and had lived in the same part of the same state for my whole life. I was born in a small town in eastern Colorado and when I was 6 years old, my parents moved us to Brighton.

At the time, Brighton was a small farming town that wasn’t far from Denver but felt like it was. By the time I was in high school, Brighton was threatening to grow into a proper Denver suburb. But in 2018 the town felt more like a 40-year-old kid still living in his parents’ basement. I don’t know why, but some cities have a failure to launch problem. And, no disrespect to those who love the town, but Brighton has never quite reached its potential.

I met Steve in 1992 at Brighton High School. I was a senior, he was a junior, and we married just a few months after he graduated. For the first few years of our married life, we lived in several Denver suburbs, out of Brighton but not far away.

In 2003, we moved back. We had three kids and the grandparents were there. We bought a house and thought we’d live there until the kids were teenagers, then move somewhere else… somewhere we chose, not somewhere that chose us.

But there I was in 2018, on the top of Lookout Mountain, freaking the fuck out because we were still living in Brighton, Colorado. I thought we might never get out.

At some point, at the top of that mountain, Steve got it. He took my face in his hands and said calmly but with conviction, “By my next birthday, we’ll get out of here, I promise.” It was late summer and his birthday isn’t until June, but I stopped crying and took a deep breath. We had a deadline. I had an escape route.

A lot has been written about the importance of deep social connections and the benefits of being a part of a community. All of it true, all of it necessary to our happiness and wellbeing.

And also, there are some of us, perhaps all of us, who want to run away. We may not admit it, but we’ve entertained fantasies of leaving. Of packing only the essentials and taking off to a place where no one knows us and we can be anyone we want to be. There is an electrifying thrill to the idea of starting over.

I had been trying to run away my whole life. It didn’t happen by Steve’s next birthday, but it did happen. In 2020, when I was 45 years old, we finally drove away from the town we grew up in, the place we met and raised our kids, the place I’d been trying to escape for decades.

When we did, it was under the most terrible grief I’ve ever known. We’ve said that travel saved us, but that suggests leaving for a time and then coming back home. We didn’t do that.

We ran away. Running away saved us.

I have been thinking a lot lately about this common desire to run away. About how often it shows up in books and movies, and how escaping into someone else’s story for a while can sometimes scratch that itch.

We thrill at the boldness of those who embark on grand adventures, far from home, with unknown dangers and wonders around every corner. We love stories of escape, of happily-ever-afters found at the end of a long and arduous journey. We delight in tales of secrets, lies, disguises, and people who aren’t quite what they seem. We are captivated by stories of people running from things that happened long ago and far away. We eat it up. We can’t get enough.

My story is, unquestionably, about running away. But it’s also a story of staying.

I have stayed, for nearly 32 years, in a happy, fulfilling marriage that wasn’t always so. I have been doing the same job since 2013, a job I love but that also pushes me to my limits. Some of my closest friends have been in my life for decades. When the kids were young and it felt like the walls were closing in, I stayed. When our son died, our now family of four turned in, toward each other, forming a kind of fortress that, despite the miles between us, remains impenetrable and unmovable.

I know how to run, but I also know how to stay.

And maybe that’s what every single one of us is trying to do in one way or another. We are trying to find the delicate balance between leaving what we need to leave, shaking the dust from our heels and not looking back, and staying when we need to stay, stubbornly steadfast, feet firmly planted, even when it’s hard.

Both things can be true. Both things are true.

As a non-coincidental aside, I realize while writing this that running away in one form or another is embedded in the people watching stories I’ve written and shared here.

There’s Edna, who ran away from the expectations, conventions, norms, rules, desires, and opinions of other people.

There’s Erin, who ran away from her midwestern family, but not too far, to create a life where she could be as loud as she likes and live a life of adventure without actually having to be adventurous.

And Roger and Caroline, who run away in pieces, wandering aimlessly to nowhere in particular, piecing themselves back together one road trip at a time.

And Henry, who represents hundreds of people we’ve encountered at campgrounds across the country. People who have the urge for adventure and heed the call to the extent they are ready for it, should they ever gather the courage to go.

And even Joey, who hasn’t run away yet, but who I think will find his escape route someday soon.

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

This week’s menu

Pan-Fried Chicken Thighs with Honey Lemon Chili Glaze

This dish is so packed with color and flavor you won’t believe how simple it is to throw it together.

Give chicken thighs a 20-minute soak (longer if you like) in lemon juice and chili garlic sauce then fry to crispy perfection. Add some honey to the marinade, coat the chicken with this sweet and spicy glaze, and finish them in the oven. The skin gets crisp and crackly and becomes completely infused with the flavors of lemon, honey, and chilies.

After roasting, simply reduce the pan juices into a spicy-sweet syrupy glaze and serve over lemon-dressed greens and wild rice.

This dish is basically all my favorite flavors on one plate. If you’re nodding your head in agreement right now, I guarantee you’ll love this recipe as much as we do.

Chicken with Honey Lemon Chili Glaze

Fresh corn salad

This could be an excellent addition to the new Road Food Series because it’s so effortless to make and easy to transport. But it’s actually a recipe I created last summer while living on our sailboat, on a day when it was way too hot to turn on the stovetop.

The salad requires no cooking, takes less than 20 minutes to prepare, and will keep well for at least 24 hours. It's perfect for backyard cookouts, packed lunches, picnics, camping trips, road trips, or days spent on the beach or on the water! I like to pack it in small, individually portioned mason jars tucked inside a cooler.

Fresh Corn Salad

Peach Crumble with Coconut and Almonds

A while back, I baked this peach coffee cake, which has a toasted coconut, almond, and brown sugar crumb topping that I wanted to eat by the spoonful. (I might have even done so.)

I’m kind of obsessed with it and want to put it on everything. And because peaches are so good right now, it seemed like a good idea to use it as a topping for peach crumble. And, yes, yes it was a very good idea.

Peach Crumble

The August CookStack Collective Class!

The CookStack Collective is a monthly live Zoom class featuring a different chef, fresh recipes, and the chance to cook along, ask questions, and learn directly from some very talented cooks.

Access to The CookStack Collective is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). If that’s you, you’ll see a registration link below for the August class and I hope you can join us!

If you’re not a paid subscriber but this sounds interesting to you, here’s where to find out more.

Road Food: Good food that travels well

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, boat days, beach days, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

Spicy White Bean Harissa Dip

This dip is the kind of thing you could take anywhere. Even on a Friday night sunset sail.

It’s snack food that could easily be the whole meal. Because it’s made from beans, it’s high in fiber and protein, plus all the other good stuff that beans contain.

Also, there’s no mayonnaise or sour cream in this recipe, so it’s a little more forgiving when it comes to sitting out for a while.

Toss in a bag of tortilla chips, some pita bread, crackers, or veggie sticks. What more could you need?

Okay… As I typed that, I thought of what else I needed. Cheese. Any kind, but this marinated feta has many of the same flavors and would pair beautifully with this dip. Also, I’d like some roasted nuts and some dried fruit. Please and thank you.

Spicy White Bean Harissa Dip

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

This dip takes less than 15 minutes to prepare, will keep in the refrigerator for days, and in a cooler for many hours.

I was the host of the July CookStack Collective class and one of the things we made was hummus. I’ve always made hummus with a drizzle of ice-cold water. The water is like a magic trick, helping the oil and fat emulsify into a creamy, dreamy consistency.

During the class, several people said they toss an ice cube into the food processor instead. One of the people cooking along was having trouble getting her hummus to a creamy consistency, so she tried the ice cube trick. After a while, she happily reported that the ice cube had done the job and her hummus was gorgeously creamy. So there you have it.

I’ve used the same trick in this recipe. It might seem strange to toss an ice cube into your food processor along with a can of beans and some spices. But the freezing temperature of the ice cube helps the fat and oil emulsify and, as it melts, it incorporates tiny pockets of air into the dip. The result is a light, ultra-smooth and creamy texture.

This dip is the kind of thing you could take anywhere.

It’s snack food that could easily be the whole meal. Because it’s made from beans, it’s high in fiber and protein, plus all the other good stuff that beans contain.

Also, there’s no mayonnaise or sour cream in this recipe, so it’s a little more forgiving when it comes to sitting out for a while.

Toss in a bag of tortilla chips, some pita bread, crackers, or veggie sticks. What more could you need?

Okay… As I typed that, I thought of what else I needed. Cheese. Any kind, but this marinated feta has many of the same flavors and would pair beautifully with this dip. Also, I’d like some roasted nuts and some dried fruit. Please and thank you.

Read more

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

A little housekeeping before we dig in

Last week I waxed poetic about how much I love my Ninja Creami ice cream maker and then promptly provided you with a broken link. 🤦🏻‍♀️ This is the kind of mistake I am known for and I’d like to tell you it’ll get better, but we are who we are and it will most certainly happen again. Here is an actual link that will work, godwilling.

ALSO! As I was checking, and double checking, and triple checking the link, I noticed that it’s on sale. Kismet!

Ninja Creami Ice Cream Maker

The August CookStack Collective Class!

The CookStack Collective is a monthly live Zoom class featuring a different chef, fresh recipes, and the chance to cook along, ask questions, and learn directly from some very talented cooks.

Access to The CookStack Collective is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). If that’s you, you’ll see a registration link below for the August class and I hope you can join us!

If you’re not a paid subscriber but this sounds interesting to you, here’s where to find out more.

The Blueberry Issue

It's August, and I'm feeling both the abundance of the season and the sense that summer is slipping quickly through my fingers. On Tuesday morning, I made a quick trip to the local farmers market and came home with two bags of fresh veggies and a humongous box of blueberries.

We’ve had blueberry oatmeal for the last two mornings in a row and neither of us are mad about it.

Blueberries are my least favorite berry to eat fresh but my absolute favorite to bake with. I read somewhere that this hasn’t been a good year for blueberries. A late freeze and drought conditions in some of the country’s blueberry growing regions have made an impact. But the woman behind the blueberry stand here in Michigan told me they’d had a bumper crop.

So, who am I to look a gift horse in the mouth? If there’s a bumper crop in Michigan, I’m happy to take full advantage.

As an aside, there’s something about writing common phrases that makes me stop and wonder at their strangeness. This was my experience as I typed “look a gift horse in the mouth.” My fingers typed it and my eyebrows furrowed as I read it because what the heck does that even mean???

I paused in my newsletter writing to look it up. Here’s what I discovered: People used to check a horse’s teeth to uncover clues about its health, age, and other factors that might affect its value. If you were so fortunate as to have been given a horse as a gift and your first reaction was to inspect its teeth, that would be considered rude and ungrateful, I think for obvious reasons.

This is according to a group of people on Reddit and I won’t admit to how long I got sucked into their conversation about horses, and similar phrases in other cultures, and why giving someone a horse is actually a terrible gift because of how much it costs to keep one (very strong opinions there). I eventually emerged with that little piece of trivia which may or may not be true, but sounds right to me.

Anyhoo. Blueberries. I’ve got a ton of them and I also have several really great ways to use them, and that’s what I’m sharing with you today, starting with a brand new recipe for Blueberry Biscuits.

This is not the first blueberry biscuit recipe on the internet but it might be the first to include this many blueberries. Most recipes call for little more than a nod to the humble blueberry. These, on the other hand, are loaded with them. So much so that I named the recipe Loaded Blueberry Biscuits.

You’ll get eight buttery, flaky biscuits from this recipe layered with two full cups of fresh blueberries, an almost unreasonable amount, which feels like precisely the correct amount of blueberries to me.

Loaded Blueberry Biscuits

Blueberry Pie

This is one of the most popular recipes on my baking website. I first published the recipe in 2019 and have since received many emails, comments, and messages that all go something like this…

"This is definitely THE Blueberry Pie recipe to bake. Look no further. I made this blueberry pie filling several times last summer, with excellent results and many, many compliments. I've saved it to my computer, a card for my recipe box, as well as a printed copy. Thank You so much Rebecca, for sharing this amazing, mouthwatering recipe. I am so thrilled to have 5 star Blueberry Pie recipe in my recipe box!" - Claudette

A few weeks ago, I asked my daughter Anne, a pastry chef at The Denver Convention Center who now takes many of the photos for my two recipe websites, to update the photos for this recipe.

I have not yet gotten around to adding those gorgeous new photos to the site (soon!), but I will tell you that she brought the remnants of that photo shoot to work with her, as she often does.

One of the other pastry chefs can always be counted on to offer (ahem) helpful criticism. This pie was the first recipe for which she had nothing but compliments. We were shocked and dumbfounded, and if that’s not a reason to make it, I don’t know what is.

Blueberry Pie

Blueberry Pie Cookies

These soft blueberry and oatmeal cookies are chewy, crunchy, blueberry-filled bites of bliss. Think chewy oatmeal cookie meets blueberry crumb pie, with a granola crunch for good measure. If you're into things like buttery cookie dough, jammy fruit centers, and a snack that doubles as breakfast (and c'mon, who isn't?), these might just become your new favorite cookie.

Blueberry Pie Cookies

Last summer, I showed you how to make these cookies on a Substack LIVE and you can watch the recording of that fun cookie class here.

How To Make Blueberry Pie Cookies

1. Blueberry Pancakes: These vanilla, almond, and cardamom-spiked blueberry pancakes are thick and fluffy, melt-in-your mouth, and bursting with blueberries.

2. Blueberry Crumb Cake: Blueberry sauce is swirled into tender butter cake and topped with a generous layer of New York-style crumbs for a blueberry crumb cake that's perfectly at home at the breakfast table, next to your afternoon mug of coffee or tea, or sliced up and served for dessert after dinner.

3. Blueberry Corn Muffins: These blueberry cornbread muffins are tender and buttery, lightly sweetened with honey and brown sugar, and packed with blueberries.

Here’s what I want to say about these last four blueberry recipes…

Last week, I kicked off a series called Road Food. These are recipes that are easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

Blueberry muffins and blueberry loaf cake are shoe-ins for this category. I mean, what’s more transportable than a muffin? And slices of loaf cake are standard around here for any kind of packed lunch.

Here’s the secret to that: Keep a few individually wrapped slices of loaf cake in your freezer. Right now, our freezer contains:

• Several slices of Dori Greenspan’s Miso Maple Loaf (my favorite recipe in Baking With Dori). This was one of the first things I baked at the beginning of the summer just so I could pull out individual slices to bring on sunset sailing trips and that’s exactly what I’ve done.

• Two lonely slices of lemon olive oil loaf cake, likely to get eaten this weekend.

• And now, thanks to Tuesday’s trip to the farmer’s market, 6 slices of blueberry loaf cake, which you will see proudly represented in the photos of this week’s Road Food recipe for dippable paprika chicken and veggie bites.

It’s all finger food and super easy to make ahead and take with you wherever you go.

1. Sour Cream Streusel Blueberry Muffins: These are light and tender, can be made with either fresh or frozen blueberries, and laced with the flavors of vanilla, almond, and a touch of lemon. But my favorite part is the handfuls of buttery, crispy, brown sugar streusel they are topped with.

2. Crumb Topped Blueberry Lemon Muffins: When our oldest daughter was a teenager she said she wanted to build a shrine to these muffins and worship them. And, earlier this year, I made these for a food writers’ retreat and a bakery owner in attendance said they were the best muffins she’d ever eaten. So I think that’s all you need to know.

3. Blueberry Zucchini Muffins: These are for those of you who have been blessed with an abundance of blueberries and zucchini. These have been topped with an almond and oat streusel because I love me a streusel topped muffin.

4. Blueberry Loaf Cake: This simple loaf cake is quick and easy to make, can be made with either fresh or frozen blueberries, and has a delicious soft and tender crumb that practically melts in your mouth.

Road Food: Good food that travels well

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, boat days, beach days, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

Paprika Chicken Bites

I have been making versions of this recipe for many years. I’ve used bone-in and boneless chicken, thighs, breasts, legs, and wings, grilled and baked, served hot, at room temperature, or even cold, spooned over rice or onto a sandwich, sometimes with yogurt sauce, or with a dipping sauce like ranch or Caesar dressing.

In 2019, Steve and I rode from Colorado to Alaska on a motorcycle, then we rode all over Alaska in the week we had to spend there before turning the bike towards home. One day we found ourselves in Valdez and were so awestruck by the beauty we found there that we didn’t want to leave. Valdez is a small town and this was the middle of July, so there wasn’t an empty motel room to be found. But we desperately wanted to stay for at least one more night, so we kept searching and found a tiny house for rent on Airbnb.

At the time, living our lives in an RV or on a sailboat was not on our radar, so the novelty of a truly tiny space was great fun. We’d been on the road for a couple of weeks by then and I decided that what I really wanted to do was make dinner in that tiny kitchen that we could eat outside, on the little porch, next to the gurgling stream that ran through the property.

So, we went to the local grocery store and piled ingredients for the night’s meal into the back of the bike. What did I make? Paprika chicken. I don’t remember what I served with it, I just remember it being the most obvious choice: just a small handful of ingredients, one pan, and a home-cooked meal I knew we’d love.

Now that we live our entire lives on the road, I’ve come up with ways to make our old favorites more travel-friendly. That’s what this recipe is.

This recipe requires about 5 minutes of prep time and can be served hot, at room temperature, or cold. It’s one of my favorite things to take on travel days, boat days, or picnics. Pack it in to-go containers, pile them into a cooler, and off you go.

This also makes an excellent packed lunch. If you’re shuttling kids to sports practices, dance lessons, or other extracurricular activities, it’s an easy way to feed yourself, and everyone else in the car, a high-protein, home-cooked dinner with less effort than a trip through the drive-through.

If you want some veggies to go with your protein, cut up raw veggies or a simple tossed salad are both great options. I also sometimes like to boil veggies just until they are crisp-tender in heavily salted water or really flavorful broth. Drain the veggies, let them cool, and then pack them in their own to-go container. If you’ve salted the water well enough, or if the broth contains enough seasoning, they won’t need any additional seasoning.

And slices of loaf cake are standard around here for any kind of packed lunch. I do my best to keep a few individually wrapped slices in the freezer. Thanks to a recent trip to the local farmer’s market, we have more blueberries than we know what to do with, so we now also have slices of blueberry loaf cake in the freezer. There are certainly worse things.

Recipe: Paprika Chicken Bites

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Find out more about becoming a member of the Lost Supper Club.

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series of recipes is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers).

The Let’s Get Lost Newsletter is available to everyone, for free. This is only possible because of the generous support of paid subscribers. As a thank you, Lost Supper Club Members have access to exclusive content and some cool free stuff including three free cookbooks, access to The CookStack Collective, and this series of Road Food Recipes.

Upgrade to Paid

I have been making versions of this recipe for many years. I’ve used bone-in and boneless chicken, thighs, breasts, legs, and wings, grilled and baked, served hot, at room temperature, or even cold, spooned over rice or onto a sandwich, sometimes with yogurt sauce, or with a dipping sauce like ranch or Caesar dressing.

In 2019, Steve and I rode from Colorado to Alaska on a motorcycle, then we rode all over Alaska in the week we had to spend there before turning the bike towards home. One day we found ourselves in Valdez and were so awestruck by the beauty we found there that we didn’t want to leave. Valdez is a small town and this was the middle of July, so there wasn’t an empty motel room to be found. But we desperately wanted to stay for at least one more night, so we kept searching and found a tiny house for rent on Airbnb.

At the time, living our lives in an RV or on a sailboat was not on our radar, so the novelty of a truly tiny space was great fun. We’d been on the road for a couple of weeks by then and I decided that what I really wanted to do was make dinner in that tiny kitchen that we could eat outside, on the little porch, next to the gurgling stream that ran through the property.

So, we went to the local grocery store and piled ingredients for the night’s meal into the back of the bike. What did I make? Paprika chicken. I don’t remember what I served with it, I just remember it being the most obvious choice: just a small handful of ingredients, one pan, and a home-cooked meal I knew we’d love.

Now that we live our entire lives on the road, I’ve come up with ways to make our old favorites more travel-friendly. That’s what this recipe is.

This recipe requires about 5 minutes of prep time and can be served hot, at room temperature, or cold. It’s one of my favorite things to take on travel days, boat days, or picnics. Pack it in to-go containers, pile them into a cooler, and off you go.

This also makes an excellent packed lunch. If you're shuttling kids to sports practices, dance lessons, or other extracurricular activities, it's an easy way to feed yourself, and everyone else in the car, a high-protein, home-cooked dinner with less effort than a trip through the drive-through.

If you want some veggies to go with your protein, cut up raw veggies or a simple tossed salad are both great options. I also sometimes like to boil veggies just until they are crisp-tender in heavily salted water or really flavorful broth. Drain the veggies, let them cool, and then pack them in their own to-go container. If you’ve salted the water well enough, or if the broth contains enough seasoning, they won’t need any additional seasoning.

And slices of loaf cake are standard around here for any kind of packed lunch. I do my best to keep a few individually wrapped slices in the freezer. Thanks to a recent trip to the local farmer’s market, we have more blueberries than we know what to do with, so we now also have slices of blueberry loaf cake in the freezer. There are certainly worse things.

Read more

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

I am not one for New Year’s resolutions.

They feel too much like goals, and I feel a strong resistance to words like goals and goal-setting.

Some of the best decisions I’ve ever made, and the best experiences I’ve ever had, came from abandoning the original plan, taking an unexpected turn, and saying yes to possibilities I didn’t know existed until they appeared in front of me. Doggedly sticking to a goal misses the point.

In other words: Resolutions restrict my freedom. And we can’t have that.

I do however, start the new year with a kind of theme… a general idea of something that I want to grow into. It might be something I want to incorporate more of, or less of, or it might just be a word that I want to use as a kind of lighthouse for the thousands of decisions that come up on a daily basis.

I started 2026 with this simple question typed at the top of my to-do list so I would see it every single day: What if this were easy?

I know why this felt like the right question to ask. I ended 2025 with the kind of existential crisis I’ve perfected over the years. I won’t go into that now, but I know you know what I mean because you also have many years of practice perfecting your own brand of existential crisis.

My personal brand is hallmarked by questions of competence, capability, and a deep sense of failure. It’s a good time. For me and everyone around me.

I am also prone to overthinking and have a tendency to make things much harder than they actually are. So, stepping into January, I thought it might be wise to give myself a daily reframe for how I approach the daily pressures of life.

What if this were easy?, I ask myself while staring down a difficult problem, or shuffling an impossible schedule, or confronting all the worries and heartbreak that comes with being a human.

So, here we are heading into August and I have realized my mistake. The universe has seen my question and countered with a steady supply of challenges that has me, once again, questioning my competence and whether I am actually capable of being a successful business owner. Honestly, let’s just forget the word successful and say a business owner who manages to stay in business.

My challenges are not unique. Every business owner knows what I’m talking about and the reality is, not all businesses survive. It feels like this is a particularly difficult time to be in business. The other business owners I know are also struggling. I am not alone.

And it’s not just business owners, is it? My husband’s company just went through yet another huge round of layoffs. There’s no such thing as a guaranteed paycheck. Job security is an illusion and that’s true if you work for someone or for yourself.

The only thing that’s certain is that nothing is.

What if it was easy?

What if nothing is easy and it’s just, really, really hard?

Well, ok then. What if it is?

In 2020, after our son died, I learned something that is maybe the truest thing I know about being a human: We are capable of experiencing two seemingly contradictory emotions at the same time. For example, extreme pain and extreme joy.

I don’t know where you’re reading this from, or what is happening in your life as you do. But, if you’ve stayed with me this far, it’s likely you relate on some level. Possibly on every level.

And, this points to the thing I needed to work out when I sat down to write to you this morning: When I manage to raise my nose from all my navel gazing and look around the world, I am forced to acknowledge the real truth of the situation: Even when it’s hard, my life is easy.

And this, my friends, might be the entire perspective shaping moral to this story. We are only able to see the truth when it’s reflected back to us in others. The truth of our life exists within the context of others. Within the context of the whole, wide world.

Hey, Rebecca, before you look inward, look up. Look out.

I am but one person, experiencing a tiny part of the world during a very small period of time in a universe that’s too large and vast for my comprehension. The experience is not meant to be easy or hard. It’s just meant to be my experience.

Everything as it is.

Road Food!

A new series for Paid Subscribers (members of The Lost Supper Club)

Let’s give credit where credit is due and the idea for this new series came from the incomparable . My husband and I have built our entire life around travel and somehow it never occurred to me to create a collection of recipes for life on the go.

This is why we need friends.

Here’s what this series is about: Yes, these recipes are for road trips. But they are also for airplanes, hikes, picnics, beach days, potlucks, boats, camping trips, and even trains. Those of you with kids in sports who spend a LOT of time in bleachers, they are for you too. They are for all the occasions when you need to take your lunch with you, to work, to school, or anywhere else you happen to go.

More than anything, these are recipes for real life because so much of real life happens on the go.

I hope, with all my heart, you are going on a trip somewhere soon. But even if you’re not, there’s a good chance you’re driving to work, taking the kids to school, running errands, squeezing dinner into busy weeknights, or simply trying to be better about eating more real food and less of what’s handed to use through a drive-through window.

Some of you love to cook and some of you would happily never wash another cutting board again. But, we all have to eat and sometimes we have to eat on the go. That’s what these recipes are for.

If you’re a paid subscriber, you’ll see the first recipe in this series below. If not and this sounds like the kind of thing you could get into, I invite you to upgrade. You’ll also receive some other awesome goodies like cookbooks and an entire year of the most fun cooking classes you’ll ever attend. ❤️

Upgrade to Paid

A few photos from my current corner of the world

*The homemade goodies in the last photo are from . Thank you, my friend. We are enjoying them immensely.

Small luxuries

Some of my favorite things.

August is for ice cream!

Ok. I actually feel that every day of every month is for ice cream. But maybe especially August, because that’s what month it is right now.

Our daughters gave me a Ninja Creami for Christmas in 2025 and I actually don’t think it’s possible to use it more than I have since then. I love it so much I’ve considered getting a second one just so I have a backup. (Not really, but also, yes really.)

If you already have one you know what I mean.

Here’s how it works: You pack whatever you want into the pint containers it comes with. Freeze the container for 24 hours then, put it into the machine and in 2 minutes you have ice cream.

What do I mean by “pack whatever you like”? I mean, pack whatever you like.

I mean, ice cream base, obviously. I just recently published this recipe for Matcha ice cream and I won’t admit to how much of that I’ve eaten so far this summer.

But I have also packed those little containers with nothing but chopped-up fruit and it comes out tasting like ice cream. One day I decided to see how far I could push it and packed one of those little containers with nothing but canned fruit cocktail. Even that somehow came out tasting like ice cream.

In the summer, I keep at least one container of frozen yogurt in the freezer at all times: Unsweetened Greek yogurt, some Stevia, chopped up fruit or berries, and lime juice. Sometimes I puree it in the blender before freezing it and sometimes I don’t. Either way it tastes like eating ice cream for breakfast.

The only thing I don’t love about it is the name because, first, I get annoyed when brands think they are being cleaver by misspelling a word, and second, saying it out loud makes me feel like I’m being wildly inappropriate.

Other than that, I love it so, so much. And if you are a fellow ice cream lover I can guarantee that you will too.

Ninja Creami

(*The Ninja Creami link is an affiliate link which means if you click on it and buy one I will earn a commission. A tiny commission, I confess, but every little bit helps, doesn’t it? Thank you. )

This week’s menu

Creamy Braised Chicken and Zucchini with Potatoes

Some nights (maybe most nights?) quick and convenient are the only way to go. This recipe for quick skillet chicken and potatoes is on a regular rotation around here because it’s quick, inexpensive, unfussy, and delicious.

But it doesn’t have a sauce that makes me want to bathe in it.

This meal is not trying to win the weeknight race. It’s the kind of meal that’s meant for lingering.

• Chicken and potatoes slowly braised in a creamy Dijon mustard sauce inspired by French country cooking.

• Tender bone-in chicken thighs cooked until the meat practically falls off the bone.

• Crackly chicken skin, roasted separately and added at the end so it crackles when you cut into it

• Creamy potatoes, braised slowly with the chicken so they absorb the sauce and become so buttery, they could almost be described as confit

• Chunks of zucchini, added at the end and cooked until tender but still firm, and never mushy

• A bright, lemony pan sauce flavored with garlic and thyme, enriched with mustard and a bit of cream, and just enough anchovy to give it some backbone without being too assertive

This is the very definition of one-pot comfort food... the kind of late-summer farmhouse supper that makes you imagine wraparound porches and golden sunsets over a well tended garden - even if you live in a tiny apartment in the middle of the city.

It tastes like something that requires an entire afternoon of cooking when, in truth, the technique is simple, straight forward, and easy enough for any skill level. In fact, your oven will do most of the work.

It’s the kind of thing you make when friends are coming over for dinner, when the garden is overflowing with zucchini, or when all you really want is the lingering smell of garlic and thyme and the feeling of being deeply nourished.

Braised Chicken, Zucchini, & Potatoes

Buttermilk Biscuits

If we’re leaning into comfort food, let’s go all in, shall we?

These are fluffy and tender and bake up tall with hundreds of flaky layers. What more could we want? Oh, I know! 🙋🏻‍♀️ The ability to freeze them and bake them straight from frozen. Done!

If you ever find yourself in my home I invite you to peer into the freezer where you will find a bag of little biscuit hockey pucks that are ready to bake. That’s honestly my favorite part of this recipe. Make the dough, cut out the biscuits, and freeze them. Whenever warm, buttery, homemade biscuits sounds like the thing you need right now, heat up your oven and bake them straight from frozen.

Buttermilk Biscuits

Blueberry Pie Cookies

These soft blueberry and oatmeal cookies are chewy, crunchy, blueberry-filled bites of bliss. Think chewy oatmeal cookie meets blueberry crumb pie, with a granola crunch for good measure.

If you're into things like buttery cookie dough, jammy fruit centers, and a snack that doubles as breakfast (and c'mon, who isn't?), these might just become your new favorite cookie.

Recipe: Blueberry Pie Cookies

Last year I taught a class on how to make these Blueberry Pie Cookies and you can watch it here if you like.

LIVE Blueberry Pie Cookie Class

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including…

• Three free cookbooks

• The NEW Road Food series

• And access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Find out more about becoming a member of the Lost Supper Club.

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Whether you’re heading across the country, across the world, or simply across town, this series of recipes is made for life on the move. They’re easy to make, easy to pack, and taste just as good hours later as they do fresh from the kitchen. Perfect for road trips, picnics, hikes, airplanes, potlucks, packed lunches, busy weeknights, and anywhere else you need to go.

This series is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscrib

ers).

The Let’s Get Lost Newsletter is available to everyone, for free. This is only possible because of the generous support of paid subscribers. As a thank you, Lost Supper Club Members have access to exclusive content and some cool free stuff including three free cookbooks, access to The CookStack Collective, and this series of Road Food Recipes.

Upgrade to paid

White Bean Tuna Salad

Road food notes: No cook • Packs easily • No reheating required • Pantry-friendly • Cooler-friendly

This bright, protein-packed salad is tossed in a simple lemon-Dijon vinaigrette and loaded with crisp scallions, creamy white beans, flaky tuna, and your favorite briny vegetables. It’s endlessly adaptable, requires no cooking, and is perfect for meal prep, road trips, picnics, or easy lunches on the go.

Read more

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

I didn’t really have a choice in the matter

Earlier this week I listened to a podcast discussion with about her new book.

The title of the book is what drew me to listen to the podcast. Original Sin: On the Genetics of Vice, the Problem of Blame, and the Future of Forgiveness

Tell me more, Kathryn.

This was the first I’d heard of Kathryn Paige Harden. I have not (yet) read Original Sin. But after listening to her speak, the book is in my Kindle library, taunting me to start reading instead of being a responsible adult and, you know, doing my job.

And now is when I say the thing that is practically guaranteed to annoy, possibly infuriate, some of you. (I speak from experience.) I think the idea of a self-made person is a fantasy and that almost everything in our lives can be attributed to luck.

I have a very complicated relationship with the word “choice”. Here is something that I wrote about recently that begins to sum it up.

Many of the choices I have been afforded are exceedingly generous in a world where choices are generally quite limited. We don’t choose where and when we are born, the people we are born to, and the circumstances we are born into.

We don’t choose our personality, or our brain chemistry, or the overall state of how everything grew together before we even were allowed to take our first breath. We are born with the genetic makeup of the many generations that came before us and we had no say in its particulars. We are the product of everyone else’s choices long before we have a chance to make one of our own.

There is no such thing as a self-made anyone.

I am happy to take credit for creating a life I love. But my ability to do so is a pure stroke of luck.

So, you can see why I was drawn to Katheryn’s book.

In a conversation with last week, during which I was laying out an idea for yet another collaboration in which I want her to take part, she suddenly said, “Rebecca, were you always like this?”

Ummmmm… probably?

I am not a competitive person. In fact, if I suddenly find myself in a competitive situation, I freeze up and start looking for an exit strategy.

Part of it is that I’m terrible under pressure. I used to run (figuratively and literally-but in this case, I mean literally) and I was never tempted to enter any kind of race. I would be the first person kicked off of a competitive, high pressure cooking show because once the cameras started rolling I’d forget my name and how to boil water.

I love playing board games but don’t care at all about winning. And if the people I’m playing with care deeply about winning, it loses the appeal.

I’m not into competitive sports (surprise, surprise), but love watching any sport with people who are really into it. The fun is in watching the people who are really into it. I couldn’t care less about who wins or loses.

I don’t want to rank things or be ranked.

The best way to deplete me of all motivation is to pit my effort against someone else’s.

I am, however, very collaborative.

As a kid, I always had so many ideas for the next thing that my friends and I could do. Which is perhaps not the most honest way of stating it? More accurately, I had big ideas and needed people to make them happen.

But, the thing I’ve been thinking about is that my big ideas generally require the involvement of other people. There are a lot of big ideas. Not all of them require other people. So it feels significant that mine usually do.

Earlier this year we passed through Phoenix and had dinner with an old childhood friend we hadn’t seen in over a decade. At one point, as we were weaving our way through childhood memories, he said, “We never had to come up with ideas about what to do because you just told us.”

Have I always been like this? I suppose I have.

I started my first recipe site in 2013 and until I started writing this newsletter here on Substack, my work was a mostly solitary endeavor.

I like this too. It’s the other side of the coin. I’ve mentioned before that one of the first things I learned how to say was, “Leave alone. I do it myself.”

I rarely tire of being alone, and too many social engagements leave me drained and depleted.

But, over the past couple of years my collaborative nature has been pushing itself forward. Rather forcefully, I might add. And I’m having a marvelous time. In fact, if the number of collaborations in your life guaranteed wealth, I’d be a gazillionaire.

(It doesn’t, by the way, make you a gazillionaire.)

The very nature of collaboration requires generosity. It starts with the belief that there’s enough for everyone and that by working together, the end result will be better for all of us. It isn’t a zero-sum game. No ranking occurs. Win or loose, we’re in it together.

The CookStack Collective is one of these collaborations. We’ve just begun and it is already so much fun. Twelve food writers have come together to create a 12-month series of cooking classes. To participate you only need to be a paid subscriber to one of our publications. Not all of them. Not two of them. Just one.

The truly wonderful thing about this group is that we are all food writers and recipe developers working hard to make a living doing what we love to do. So, you might think we’d see one another as competitors.

Instead, we’ve chosen collaboration. It’s the kind of collaboration that only works if we all believe there’s enough for everyone. This is a big table, and if it gets too small we’ll just build a bigger one.

Mastermind For Food Writers is another example. Every month, a group of food writers gathers over Zoom and share ideas, insights, knowledge, and information. Openly and freely.

And look. I know this isn’t some sort of new revelation. Open collaboration happens in ways big and small in most of our lives every single day. Even the simple act of offering advice to a friend, sharing some hard-won experience with a co-worker, tag-teaming your to-do list with your spouse, or a neighborhood garage sale requires generous, open, non-competitive collaboration.

And also, it sometimes feels like the world is a harsh, polarized, competitive, zero-sum game that I don’t want to play. These generous opportunities to work with people instead of against them is like a balm. I am soaking it in.

So, yes, Kate. I suppose I have always been like this.

But I didn’t really have a choice in the matter, did I?

The best yellow cake of your life

Speaking of collaborations, I’ve recently started thinking of cookbooks from a collaborative perspective. Because isn’t that exactly what they are? The author openly shares recipes, tips, ideas, and stories that we incorporate into our lives, making them part of our kitchens and part of our story.

Case in point: I just purchased Obsessed With The Best by Ella Quittner. It’s a masterpiece. Five stars. Ten out of ten. Highly recommend.

In the book, she talks about using white wine to improve your yellow cake. Of course I had to try it, and holy smokes, if it didn’t make a noticeable difference in the yellow cake I’ve been making for years!

Here’s what you do: Replace half of the buttermilk in this recipe with white wine. I know it sounds a little bit nuts, but it gives this cake an even softer, tighter crumb that just melts in your mouth.

If you’re not a wine drinker, know that the buttermilk-only version is very, very good. I’ve been making it for decades with no complaints. There is no need to buy a bottle of wine that you won’t drink.

But if you have a bottle of white in your fridge, try it. You’ll be amazed by the results.

Yellow Cake with Chocolate Buttercream

Recipes that start with chimichurri

If I could keep one sauce in my refrigerator all the time, chimichurri would be very high on the list.

And when I say could, I can and I do.

Especially in the summer when I want easy recipes that require very little cooking.

Chimichurri sauce is one of the best ways I know to instantly brighten a dish with fresh flavor and color. Aside from being totally delicious, it’s healthy, versatile, and quick to prepare, and doesn’t require turning on your stovetop.

It also keeps well in the refrigerator for several days. So make a big batch and use it all week long.

Below, you’ll find my favorite chimichurri sauce recipe, plus a collection of recipes that put it to very good use.

Chimichurri Sauce!

One of the most traditional ways to eat chimichurri is spooned over a perfectly cooked steak. But there are few savory foods that won’t benefit from the intense, bright flavors of this sauce.

Chimichurri Sauce

1. Hamburger Bowls with Cheddar, Chimichurri, and Crispy Cabbage Slaw: The combination of juicy beef, melted cheese, crunchy sweet-and-sour slaw, and bright, garlicky chimichurri makes these burger bowls ridiculously flavorful and deeply satisfying. Even better, the whole meal takes just over 30 minutes to prepare, making it an easy high-protein dinner for any night of the week.

2. Steak and Rice Bowls with Garlic Aioli and Chimichurri: These gorgeous high-protein bowls start with thin slices of perfectly cooked reverse-seared steak piled over bowls of fluffy rice and oven-roasted veggies. Then we kick it up a notch with smoky garlic aioli, a bright, flavor-packed punch of chimichurri sauce, and fresh cherry tomatoes.

3. Chimichurri Steak Sandwiches: This is one of those sloppy two-handed sandwiches for which you need a stack of napkins and a hearty appetite because there is no chance you'll be leaving even one bite behind. No one has that kind of self control.

4. Chimichurri Steak Fries: I have discovered the secret to happiness and it comes in the form of saucy steak covered french fries.

5. Flank Steak with Chimichurri: Grilled flank steak with Chimichurri Sauce is a ridiculously simple meal for the amount of flavor it packs. The steak is seasoned with a dry rub of cumin, chili powder, garlic and oregano, then grilled on an indoor or outdoor grill, or a Blackstone Griddle. Or, if you prefer, the recipe includes instructions for cooking the steak with a Sous Vide Cooker or under a broiler.

6. Fried Summer Squash with Chimichurri: This super simple technique for crispy fried summer squash produces a light, lacy golden fry that makes the perfect side dish or appetizer.

7. Vegetarian Chili with Pico de Gallo and Chimichurri: Vegetarian Chili packed with beans, onions, poblano peppers, red bell peppers, zucchini, and tomatoes that are simmered in a spicy red wine broth, then topped with chimichurri sauce, fresh Pico de Gallo, fried tortilla strips, and, if you like, some shredded cheese.

8. Chicken Nachos with Chimichurri Sauce: Chips, cheese, marinated chicken, and chimichurri. Yes, please.

In other news…

• I spoke about collaborations being the most important thing for food writers in our new AI driven world in this podcast for Food Blogger Pro. I also talked about a bunch of other things, income not really being one of them, so I feel the title of this episode is a bit misleading. But I didn’t have a choice. 😉

• The Food Writers Business Lab has a new home and a new, more collaborative structure. Naturally.

• If you’re someone who’s always wanted to write a cookbook, this class is for you! DIY Cookbook Proposals is taught by who is one of the most insightful and knowledgeable people you’ll meet on this topic.

• And speaking of Kelsey, the two of us did a LIVE Q&A earlier this week to answer common questions about writing a cookbook proposal and you can watch the replay here.

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including three free cookbooks and access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Find out more about becoming a member of the Lost Supper Club.

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

What To Eat On A Sailboat

Or, Super Easy Meals For the Middle of a Very Hot Summer

Last year, Steve and I spontaneously bought a sailboat and then, because it’s difficult to find a place to park a 43-foot RV in touristy coastal towns along Lake Michigan when you haven’t secured an advance reservation, we put the RV into storage and moved onto the boat.

All this happened almost exactly a year ago and you can read about it here and here.

We learned a lot from that experience but mostly this: We love sailing and we bought the perfect boat for sailing. And it’s not the right live-aboard boat for two people who work from home full time.

This year, our experience is much more chill. We found a campground that’s happy to let us stay all summer long in a location that’s about 12 minutes from our marina. Our normal, daily, working lives happen as they have for the past 6 years - in the comfort of our RV.

This has made the sailboat more of a toy. And sometimes a vacation home. We had a custom mattress made for our very weird shaped bed, replaced all the cushions in the salon (the main seating area), and stocked the bathroom and kitchen with everything essential to a short term stay.

A few weeks ago, we took off on our first long sailing trip. I use the word long lightly because I follow people like who has sailed all the way to Tonga! Long for us right now is a 9-day trip from Muskegon, Michigan to Door County, Wisconsin.

And here’s the thing: Last year, when we rushed on board with absolutely no planning or experience, one of the things I found the most challenging was cooking in my tiny galley kitchen. When I say challenging, what I really mean is maddening. I was maddened.

This year, cooking in my tiny galley when I’m on vacation because I can and I actually want to, is so much fun.

Same space. But a completely different experience. There are some lessons in perspective and mindset there that we won’t go into right now except to say that when things aren’t working perhaps it’s the approach to the thing and not the thing that needs to change. This also may apply to people.

Anyhoo, today I’m sharing with you some of the meals I cooked on that trip because, presumably, you aren’t living on a 37-foot sailboat (or maybe you are?), but it’s the middle of the summer and hot almost everywhere and I don’t have to presume anything to know that easy meals are of the moment. That’s what these are.

Because refrigeration on our boat is limited, I’m learning a lot about how many delicious, nutritious meals can be made from pantry ingredients. If you are someone like my friend , who is prepared for many unforeseen events with an enviable preparedness pantry, you already know this.

My preparedness strategy is to make sure we’re located near a local grocery store which obviously means not being prepared at all.

We are who we are.

BUT, one of the recipes I’m sharing with you today is a white bean chicken chili that I made while underway, sailing down the coast of Michigan, using only pantry ingredients. So also, I can be taught.

Also, have you looked at all the great pantry items that are in most supermarkets these days? I generally stick to the outside aisles of the grocery store, preferring fresh ingredients over anything with a shelf life. This I thought was admirable and I’ll admit it, I felt a bit snobbish about my cart full of fresh produce.

Well. The joke’s on me because the number of whole food items that can be found in the inner isles are kind of awesome. Here are a few of the things I have stocked, and will continue to keep stocked, in one of the storage compartments on the boat:

• Coconut milk and a carton of oat milk

• Canned beans

• Anchovies

• Fruit and veggies: Green chilis, corn, diced tomatoes, Calabrian chili and Fresno chili peppers, roasted artichoke hearts, roasted red peppers, pickled banana peppers, pickles, olives, pineapple chunks, and mandarin oranges

• Jars of tuna and a couple cans of chicken (I have never, in my life purchased canned meat of any kind, but I used it in the chili and was pleasantly surprised. Don’t judge me.)

• Salsa

• Tomato-based pasta sauce and a jar of pesto

• A tube of concentrated tomato paste

• Brown rice, white rice, couscous, and dried pasta

• A couple of jars of Better Than Bouillon (Roasted chicken and vegetable)

• Vegetable oil and extra virgin olive oil

• A few spices: paprika, cumin, chili powder, oregano, Italian herb blend, garlic powder, and onion powder + salt and pepper, obviously

• Bottled lemon and lime juice. I know some of you feel strongly about bottled juice and I don’t wanna hear about it. Sometimes it’s the best option. Also, the Santa Cruz brand is awesome.

There are SO MANY different meals that can be made from those ingredients alone. On our 9-day trip I also brought along a couple of onions, some fresh garlic, tomatoes, a couple of bell peppers, a cucumber, a carton of eggs, a package of corn tortillas, a few sandwich rolls, a jar of mayo, Dijon mustard, and several kinds of cheese and chocolate because we are not savages.

Everything else we ate on board came from pantry ingredients.

The two recipes I’m sharing with you today are made almost exclusively from pantry items.

Q: If the opened pantry item needs to be stored in the refrigerator once opened, does it cease to be a pantry item? These are the kinds of questions that keep me up at night. Also, war and famine and that badly worded email and the person I forgot to get back to and the imminent threat of all forms of disaster. The 2am brain is not rational and actually believes there is something to be gained by laying in bed obsessing about such things.

Pantry White Bean Chicken Chili

• 1-2 tablespoons of oil (vegetable, canola, avocado, or extra virgin olive oil)

• 1 chopped onion, any variety

• Several cloves of garlic, peeled and minced (I like garlic, so “several” means 6-8. You do you. Or, sub in some garlic powder with the other spices.)

• About 1 tablespoon tomato paste - you don’t need to be exact here.

• Chili powder, paprika, and cumin: Again, the amount is up to you. How spicy is your chili powder? How spicy do you want your chili to be? How much do you love paprika and cumin? If you’re unsure, start with a teaspoon of each and go from there.

• A can (or two or three) of diced green chilies

• A jar of roasted red peppers, drained and chopped

• A 15-ounce can of diced tomatoes

• 4 cups vegetable broth, OR Better than Bouillon Vegetable Base mixed with water

• A can of corn (sub in fresh or frozen if you prefer)

• A can or two of white beans, drained. Using one can or two cans really just depends on how many people you’re feeding.

• 4-8 ounces shredded cheese. I used cheddar but would have used pepper jack if we had any. How much you use depends on how much you like cheese. We can all guess how much I added.

• A 12-ounce can of chicken (No, of course you don’t have to use canned chicken. You are most likely cooking in a normal kitchen and not far from a store with a rotisserie chicken. Great. Use that. Or any kind of cooked chicken. Or, let chunks of raw chicken simmer away in the chili until it’s cooked through. You could also leave the chicken out entirely.)

• Lime juice, to taste. I used bottled lime juice. YES I DID. If you have fresh limes, use those.

• Salt and pepper, to taste

• Optional: A splash of cream, half-and-half, or sour cream

• Optional: tortilla chips and diced fresh tomatoes, for serving

Instructions:

1. Add the oil to a large saucepan or Dutch oven along with the chopped onion. Set the pan over medium heat and cook until the onion is soft, translucent, and just barely beginning to brown.

2. Add the chopped garlic, tomato paste, and spices. Cook, stirring constantly, for about a minute.

3. Add the green chilies, chopped roasted red peppers, and a can of diced tomatoes, juice and all. Stir to mix then add the vegetable broth, corn, and white beans. Bring the liquid to a boil, then turn the heat down to maintain a gentle simmer. Let the chili simmer for 15-20 minutes.

4. Remove the pan from the heat and stir in the shredded cheese. Stir until it melts into the soup. Add the can of chicken and stir very gently to distribute it. Add as much lime juice as tastes good to you. Taste and add more salt and some ground black pepper if you like.

5. Optional: To make a creamy chicken chili, add a splash or two of cream, half and half, or sour cream. You won’t need much to give the soup a deliciously creamy texture.

6. Also optional: Serve the soup topped with some crushed tortilla chips and diced fresh tomatoes. SO GOOD.

More about the chicken: If you’re using raw chicken, cut it into bite-size pieces and add it with the broth. If using pre-cooked chicken, add it at the same point in the recipe where I’ve added the canned chicken. Since it’s already cooked, you’re just warming it up.

Add something fresh: If you have a really great summer tomato, or some sweet cherry tomatoes, chop those up and scatter them over steaming bowls of chili. Ditto with chopped fresh cilantro and green onions, or chopped red onion.

Serving suggestion: Tastes best served in paper bowls while sailing.

A few other things we ate on our sailing trip

Veggie Omelette Pizza with Hummus

In May wrote a fabulous guest post about her life on a boat and slow-traveling around the world (read it here). She shared two delicious, super easy meals that don’t require an oven and can be made in any size kitchen. I made one of them - Veggie Omelette Pizza with Hummus - the first night of our trip and it hit the spot.

As you can see, “omelette” is a very generous word for the mess of eggs on my plate. What can I say? The pans on board came with the boat and EVERYTHING sticks to them. This did not affect the flavor one little bit. But, it might be time to upgrade my pans.

Sesame Chicken Salad Sandwiches

Sesame Chicken Salad Sandwiches. I made these for lunch while we were underway. This chicken salad is one of our favorite travel day meals. Usually I make it when we are hauling the RV from one part of the country to another. I pack it into mason jars and we eat it from the truck, usually while stopped at a truck stop.

For our sailing trip, I made the chicken salad before we left so all I had to do was pile it onto sandwich buns. I wrapped the sandwiches in plastic wrap for easy handling. The water was pretty rough that day and having them wrapped up meant easier handling.

Speaking of Sesame Chicken Salad… I made this last night for the very first CookStack Collective class which was a total blast! Those of you who were able to join me, how fun was that????

Crispy Corn Tortilla Quesadillas

We arrived in Door County on a Monday evening at at around 8pm, about 30 minutes before sunset. After getting the boat secured to the dock, I quickly whipped up two crispy corn tortilla quesadillas so we could sit on the deck and eat while watching the sun set.

But, these super easy crispy quesadillas have been a favorite around here for a very long time. They are made from ingredients I almost always have on hand and take about 5 minutes each.

I sometimes serve them topped with a fried egg, and sometimes not. In Door County we ate them without the egg but with plenty of Herdez roasted salsa verde.

Small luxuries

Some of my favorite things.

Here is something that you may or may not know about me. I am addicted to two things: chapstick and coffee.

I always, and I mean always, have a chapstick in my pocket, a few in my bag, one in my wallet, a couple in the truck, and some extras in various place throughout the RV and the boat and your house if I’ve ever visited. Because I can never, NEVER, be in a situation where I do not have a chapstick.

And also, if I could not have my morning cup of coffee I would fall into a pit of despair.

Brief aside: Our oldest daughter, Kate, told me that if the apocalypse happens her plan is to get in her car and drive to wherever we are because we have a generator and she will need to charge her kindle (her primary addiction). In exchange, she will stop at every opportunity to gather as much chapstick and coffee as she can get her hands on. This seems a solid plan.

Thankfully, I do not have a sensitive stomach and am not bothered by the high acidity in coffee. But, I know a lot of people are.

I also know that a lower tolerance for coffee is something that happens to many people as they age. So, I’ve done some proactive research because, as I’ve mentioned, a pit of despair hangs in the balance.

That research led me to Lavender Coffee, which just happens to be based in Colorado. Before moving into an RV in 2020, I lived my whole life in Colorado, so you would have thought I’d have heard of them. But they only opened in 2023, so that explains it. They have a couple of gorgeous looking cafes in Denver that I’d very much like to visit the next time we are there. They also make several varieties of low acid roasted coffee, which you can order online.

So, I ordered a couple of bags to try it out and it is DELICIOUS. I tried the Pearl Street Blend and Platt Park Blend. Of the two, I prefer the Platt Park because it’s a dark roast and I’m a dark roast girl. But they are both fantastic.

Lavender Coffee is not paying me to say this. I’m sure they have no idea I exist. :-) But if you are one of those coffee lovers with a sensitive stomach give their coffee a try. I think you’ll like it.

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free. As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including three free cookbooks and access to The CookStack Collective, 12 months of cooking classes with 12 incredible chefs!

A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Find out more about becoming a member of the Lost Supper Club.

Attention Food Writers, Recipe Developers, and Food Bloggers

Join me on Thursday for a LIVE Cookbook Proposal Q&A!

I’m talking with the incomparable on Thursday about cookbook proposals: what they are, what they need to include, and how to start turning a cookbook idea into something agents and publishers can understand. We’ll talk through the major pieces of a strong cookbook proposal, including concept, audience, comp titles, sample recipes, author platform, visual direction, and why your book belongs in the market now.

Find Out More

The most valuable skill I’ve learned as a recipe developer and food writer

In all my years as a recipe developer, nothing has done more to draw people to my work than my photographs. Without a doubt, nothing has moved my business forward more than learning to take stronger, better, more intentional photographs.

On Friday I am teaching a class with two master food photographers about how to make more intentional choices that help your photographs tell the story you want them to tell.

If you’re a food writer, food blogger, or recipe developer, I hope you’ll join me for The Visual Language of Food Photography.

Participants will learn:

• How to plan a shoot around the story you want your photographs to tell

• How to use color to convey mood and emotion

• How to incorporate texture to transform a mediocre photograph into a stellar one

• How to use lighting as both a styling and technical element

• The best strategies for incorporating the human element into your photographs

If you’ve ever looked at one of your photographs and thought, This is fine, but it doesn’t quite feel like me. Or, This is fine, but I KNOW it could be better. This class is for you.

I hope you’ll join us.

Your $99 registration includes TWO 90-minute live sessions: Friday, July 24, and Wednesday, August 5, from 12:00–1:30 p.m. ET.

The Visual Language of Food Photography

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People watching has always been one of my favorite activities. So, when we moved into an RV, I was delighted to discover that the people watching opportunities in campgrounds are spectacular.

Campgrounds (and marinas) are busy places, filled with all sorts of people constantly coming and going. Some of these fellow campers capture my imagination and I make up stories about them.

I give them names, spin up a history, and weave together a story. This is the fifth such story I’ve shared here. You can read the others here.

Joey is not a sailor

Joey is an average 17-year-old. At least, that’s how Joey thinks of himself. What average means, of course, depends entirely on who you compare him to.

Compared to the boys on the high school football team, Joey is considerably less than average. He is not tall or athletic or quick on his feet, and he doesn’t really care that he’s none of those things. He has never had a real girlfriend and does not feel especially deprived by this. His level of ambition is what some might call low and what others, especially his parents, might call alarming.

Joey does not see the problem.

He cannot understand why everyone is always in such a hurry to become someone or get somewhere. He is already someone. He is already somewhere. He is Joey. He lives in Michigan. That seems sufficient.

And besides, he is good at some things. He is very good at math. He is a considerably above-average gamer. He can solve a Rubik’s Cube in less than 20 seconds. Last year he picked up a guitar and discovered he could make sense of it almost immediately. Now he can play many of his favorite songs, though only in the privacy of his room because he can’t imagine ever wanting to play for other people.

The way Joey sees it, this all evens out. The trouble is that Joey’s parents do not appear to be using the same scorecard.

His parents are, objectively, above average in nearly every measurable way. They are healthy and attractive and athletic and successful and efficient. They have good careers, good posture, good insurance, and the kind of pristine, fashionable home with a bowl of perfectly ripe fruit on the kitchen counter that suggests no one in the house has ever lost their keys.

Joey does not especially mind that he is not like them. But it is increasingly clear that they mind.

They seem to regard Joey’s lack of sparkle as a personal affront. As if their life report card would be a flawless 4.0 if not for the glaring C-minus next to raise an exceptional human.

So now Joey has a summer job.

His father, standing in the kitchen with his sleeves rolled up, presented it as an opportunity! A lesson in real life! An honest day’s work! Character building! And fun!

One of his dad’s college friends owns a marina. A nice one. The kind with a pool and a clubhouse and a sun-kissed staff in matching T-shirts with bright smiles on their faces 24/7. Or at least during working hours.

Except, the sun-kissed staff is kinda sparse this summer because, as Joey’s father explained, kids these days don’t want to work.

But Joey is different, right son?

Joey nods. Sure, Dad.

So here he is on a Saturday in June, on the fuel dock of a resort marina, beginning his second day on the job with absolutely no idea what he is doing.

Joey’s parents own a boat, of course they do, but Joey has not retained any of the information his dad has tried to impart to him while onboard. Mostly, Joey looks out at the water and thinks about whatever song he’s composing and wishes he was back in his room with his guitar. Sometimes he brings a backpack filled with Rubik’s Cubes.

The marina owner’s training method appears to be optimism and osmosis. He deposited Joey at the dock the day before, introduced him to Brad, and said, “Show him the ropes,” which would have been more helpful if Joey had any understanding of ropes. Or cleats. Or boats.

Brad is 20, blond, and suntanned. He looks like the kind of guy who kite surfs or plays beach volleyball in his spare time. Probably both. He’s competent. Patient, even. But he has never trained anyone before so most of Joey’s day is spent watching Brad do things while peering awkwardly over his shoulder, trying to pay attention and hoping he’ll never have to do any of it on his own.

This morning the owner arrived with another new hire. Amy is 18, a year older than Joey, tall and tan, with dirty blond hair pulled into a ponytail and the easy confidence of a person who has spent a lot of time on boats actually paying attention. Her family has one too, but unlike Joey, she has apparently noticed what happens on it. She knows how to move without looking uncertain. She asks questions that make her sound capable. She is learning quickly.

Also, Brad clearly has a crush on her.

For most of the afternoon, Brad and Amy do the work while Joey hovers nearby, summoned occasionally to hold something, fetch something, or perform a task too minor to do much damage.

His shift is nearly over when a sailboat motors toward the fuel dock. Brad is on the phone with a customer, so Amy motions for Joey to follow her out to help tie the boat off.

A woman stands at the bow with a line in her hand. Joey places one hand on the marina’s dock line and freezes. Should he throw it to her? Will she throw hers to him? Is there a boat etiquette to this? Almost certainly yes.

Amy comes to his rescue and tells him to get ready to catch the line the woman throws. The woman throws.

Joey catches it on the first try. Relief and triumph flood his body and he holds up the line like a trophy.

Then the boat keeps moving and Amy tells him to walk with it and tie the line to a cleat. Joey chooses one at random and wraps the line around it in a way that looks, even to him, improvised. Amy helps the man at the wheel tie off the back of the boat then removes the line Joey has secured, moves it to a different cleat, pulling the boat tightly to the dock and securing it with the crisp, slightly irritated efficiency at which some girls seem to excel.

Brad walks out onto the dock and asks the couple what they need.

“Top off the fuel and a pump-out, please.”

Joey has already learned that a pump-out is the worst part of working at a marina. Yes, there are gloves. And yes, a machine does the work. But you are still pumping shit out of a boat and there’s no way to make that an enjoyable experience.

Brad grabs the fuel pump and tells Amy and Joey to handle the pump out.

There follows an awkward, smelly stretch of time during which Amy tries to remember the pump-out procedure while Joey does his best to look useful and avoid breathing through his nose.

The woman steps off the boat and asks if she can pay for the fuel, pump-out, and transient slip all at once. They’ve never stayed at this marina before, she explains. She also needs directions to their slip.

Amy goes with her into the office.

Joey is left on the boat holding the hose, the machine roaring away, completely unsure how he is supposed to know when the thing is finished. Thankfully Brad appears, turns the machine off, takes the hose from Joey, and drops the end into the water to rinse it.

Joey, relieved to no longer be in charge of sewage, turns and notices the man from the sailboat standing on the cabin roof, doing something with the sails.

Suddenly, in one swift and terrible motion, the man disappears. He has slipped off the cabin roof, smacking his head in the process and landing hard in the cockpit.

Everyone goes still.

The woman comes running out of the office. Amy stops just inside the doorway, looking alarmed and terrified. Brad, usually so competent, looks as stunned and helpless as Joey has felt all day.

The woman gets onto the boat and tells the man to get up. Brad offers a first-aid kit. She says they have one and disappears down into the cabin to fetch it. There is blood, but not much. She patches him up quickly, the three of them standing there awkwardly, and then turns to ask them for directions to their transient slip.

Amy points to the marina map. The woman asks whether they’ll need bumpers on the port or starboard side of the boat, receives no useful answer, so studies the map and figures it out.

Then Amy says the thing Joey wishes with all his heart she would not say. “Would you like us to meet you at your slip to help you tie off?”

“Yes,” the woman says, looking sideways at the knot growing on her husband’s forehead. “That would be great.”

Inside the office, the phone rings and Joey can see that another boat is already approaching the fuel dock. Brad says he can handle the approaching boat on his own and tells Joey to untie the sailboat and go with Amy to meet them at the slip.

Joey feels filled with dread but he does as he’s told. He follows Amy down the dock, carrying with him the increasingly sickening awareness that there are many kinds of knowledge in the world and he is missing all the ones currently required.

When the sailboat glides toward the empty slip, Joey says, trying to sound casual and maybe even self-deprecating in a charming kind of way, “I don’t really know what I’m doing here.”

Amy gives him a look that suggests she does not find him charming and says, “Just catch the lines and tie them to the dock.”

Right, then.

The woman tosses Joey a line from the bow. It is, though Joey does not know it, the spring line and meant to be secured to the center of the slip to keep the boat from hitting the front of the slip. Joey catches the line (another triumph!) and pulls the boat forward. Towards the front of the slip.

The woman yells that they are going to hit the dock.

At the back of the boat, Amy ties another line too far forward, which does nothing to hold the boat back while Joey pulls it forward.

The woman, who is leaning over the bow of the boat, gesturing wildly, yells, “We’re going to hit the dock!”

The boat hits the front of the dock.

Joey just stands there holding the line, frozen. Like an idiot.

Amy rushes forward and takes the line from Joey’s hands. The man, his probable concussion not preventing him from realizing they’d have been better off on their own, loosens the rear line while putting the boat in reverse.

The woman directs Amy to tie the line to the appropriate cleat, which Amy does. The man puts the boat into neutral and comes forward to help. Amy tells Joey to grab the rear line.

Joey grabs it. And then, because no one has yet explained what one does after grabbing a line, he simply stands there holding it while the back of the boat drifts toward the boat in the next slip.

The woman rushes back to help just as Joey drops the line into the water. Of course he does.

The man, now on the dock, hollers for the back line. Somehow the woman gets it to him. Somehow he pulls the boat in. Amy and Joey stand there uselessly, watching the people they were sent to help finish the job themselves.

Then Amy, to her credit, says with a crooked smile, “I’ll bet this is the smoothest docking you’ve ever had.”

The woman laughs. “Yes,” she says. “So smooth.” Then she adds, “Thank you for your help. We’ve got it from here. Really.”

Amy and Joey walk back to the fuel dock. They are both quiet.

Then Amy starts to laugh, so Joey laughs too.

What else can they do?

By the end of the day, Joey knows he smells faintly like gasoline and strongly like humiliation. His shoes are wet. His shirt is sticking to his back. He has been useless in at least six different ways. He has helped crash a sailboat into a dock. He has not shown promise or ambition and is aware that the adults of the world have probably put him in the category of young people who don’t want to work.

When his father asks, “How was work?” Joey shrugs and says, “Fine.”

Which is not true. But it is also not entirely false. Because, an hour earlier, as Joey peddled his bicycle slowly toward home, he thought about how the day’s mishaps just might make a good story and now a song was beginning to form in his mind. He goes upstairs and picks up his guitar.

This piece was written by with AI generated illustrations.

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

Are you a fellow food writer or recipe developer? Here are three resources just for you!

A few weeks ago, Steve and I ventured out on our first real sailing trip. We sailed north for 2 days on the Michigan side of Lake Michigan, then across to Door County, Wisconsin. On the way back home, we stopped for the night in a marina that seemed to have hired some teenagers that day and then set them to work without any training.

I wanted to share that experience with you, but from the perspective of the teenagers. Below you’ll find a fictional story I’ve created about our experience. The events described in the story actually happened but I’ve created names and personalities for the teenagers, and written the story from the imagined perspective of one of those teenagers. I hope you enjoy it!

Also in this issue —> Recipes for Mississippi Pot Roast, Buttermilk Whipped Potatoes, and Matcha Ice Cream!

But first, a word from our sponsor. 🙂

This issue is supported by Pique! If you’ve been around here for a while, you know I’m a fan of the Pique B•T Fountain Electrolyte Powder and their Sun Goddess Matcha powder.

That has not changed. I am still gulping down a glass of B•T Fountain Electrolyte Powder mixed with water every morning and using the matcha powder in everything from shortbread cookies to matcha banana shakes to ice cream!

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Joey is not a sailor

Joey is an average 17-year-old. At least, that’s how Joey thinks of himself. What average means, of course, depends entirely on who you compare him to.

Compared to the boys on the high school football team, Joey is considerably less than average. He is not tall or athletic or quick on his feet, and he doesn’t really care that he’s none of those things. He has never had a real girlfriend and does not feel especially deprived by this. His level of ambition is what some might call low and what others, especially his parents, might call alarming.

Joey does not see the problem.

He cannot understand why everyone is always in such a hurry to become someone or get somewhere. He is already someone. He is already somewhere. He is Joey. He lives in Michigan. That seems sufficient.

And besides, he is good at some things. He is very good at math. He is a considerably above-average gamer. He can solve a Rubik’s Cube in less than 20 seconds. Last year he picked up a guitar and discovered he could make sense of it almost immediately. Now he can play many of his favorite songs, though only in the privacy of his room because he can’t imagine ever wanting to play for other people.

The way Joey sees it, this all evens out. The trouble is that Joey’s parents do not appear to be using the same scorecard.

His parents are, objectively, above average in nearly every measurable way. They are healthy and attractive and athletic and successful and efficient. They have good careers, good posture, good insurance, and the kind of pristine, fashionable home with a bowl of perfectly ripe fruit on the kitchen counter that suggests no one in the house has ever lost their keys.

Joey does not especially mind that he is not like them. But it is increasingly clear that they mind.

They seem to regard Joey’s lack of sparkle as a personal affront. As if their life report card would be a flawless 4.0 if not for the glaring C-minus next to raise an exceptional human.

So now Joey has a summer job.

His father, standing in the kitchen with his sleeves rolled up, presented it as an opportunity! A lesson in real life! An honest day’s work! Character building! And fun!

One of his dad’s college friends owns a marina. A nice one. The kind with a pool and a clubhouse and a sun-kissed staff in matching T-shirts with bright smiles on their faces 24/7. Or at least during working hours.

Except, the sun-kissed staff is kinda sparse this summer because, as Joey’s father explained, kids these days don’t want to work.

But Joey is different, right son?

Joey nods. Sure, Dad.

So here he is on a Saturday in June, on the fuel dock of a resort marina, beginning his second day on the job with absolutely no idea what he is doing.

Joey’s parents own a boat, of course they do, but Joey has not retained any of the information his dad has tried to impart to him while onboard. Mostly, Joey looks out at the water and thinks about whatever song he’s composing and wishes he was back in his room with his guitar. Sometimes he brings a backpack filled with Rubik’s Cubes.

The marina owner’s training method appears to be optimism and osmosis. He deposited Joey at the dock the day before, introduced him to Brad, and said, “Show him the ropes,” which would have been more helpful if Joey had any understanding of ropes. Or cleats. Or boats.

Brad is 20, blond, and suntanned. He looks like the kind of guy who kite surfs or plays beach volleyball in his spare time. Probably both. He’s competent. Patient, even. But he has never trained anyone before so most of Joey’s day is spent watching Brad do things while peering awkwardly over his shoulder, trying to pay attention and hoping he’ll never have to do any of it on his own.

This morning the owner arrived with another new hire. Amy is 18, a year older than Joey, tall and tan, with dirty blond hair pulled into a ponytail and the easy confidence of a person who has spent a lot of time on boats actually paying attention. Her family has one too, but unlike Joey, she has apparently noticed what happens on it. She knows how to move without looking uncertain. She asks questions that make her sound capable. She is learning quickly.

Also, Brad clearly has a crush on her.

For most of the afternoon, Brad and Amy do the work while Joey hovers nearby, summoned occasionally to hold something, fetch something, or perform a task too minor to do much damage.

His shift is nearly over when a sailboat motors toward the fuel dock. Brad is on the phone with a customer, so Amy motions for Joey to follow her out to help tie the boat off.

A woman stands at the bow with a line in her hand. Joey places one hand on the marina’s dock line and freezes. Should he throw it to her? Will she throw hers to him? Is there a boat etiquette to this? Almost certainly yes.

Amy comes to his rescue and tells him to get ready to catch the line the woman throws. The woman throws.

Joey catches it on the first try. Relief and triumph flood his body and he holds up the line like a trophy.

Then the boat keeps moving and Amy tells him to walk with it and tie the line to a cleat. Joey chooses one at random and wraps the line around it in a way that looks, even to him, improvised. Amy helps the man at the wheel tie off the back of the boat then removes the line Joey has secured, moves it to a different cleat, pulling the boat tightly to the dock and securing it with the crisp, slightly irritated efficiency at which some girls seem to excel.

Brad walks out onto the dock and asks the couple what they need.

“Top off the fuel and a pump-out, please.”

Joey has already learned that a pump-out is the worst part of working at a marina. Yes, there are gloves. And yes, a machine does the work. But you are still pumping shit out of a boat and there’s no way to make that an enjoyable experience.

Brad grabs the fuel pump and tells Amy and Joey to handle the pump out.

There follows an awkward, smelly stretch of time during which Amy tries to remember the pump-out procedure while Joey does his best to look useful and avoid breathing through his nose.

The woman steps off the boat and asks if she can pay for the fuel, pump-out, and transient slip all at once. They’ve never stayed at this marina before, she explains. She also needs directions to their slip.

Amy goes with her into the office.

Joey is left on the boat holding the hose, the machine roaring away, completely unsure how he is supposed to know when the thing is finished. Thankfully Brad appears, turns the machine off, takes the hose from Joey, and drops the end into the water to rinse it.

Joey, relieved to no longer be in charge of sewage, turns and notices the man from the sailboat standing on the cabin roof, doing something with the sails.

Suddenly, in one swift and terrible motion, the man disappears. He has slipped off the cabin roof, smacking his head in the process and landing hard in the cockpit.

Everyone goes still.

The woman comes running out of the office. Amy stops just inside the doorway, looking alarmed and terrified. Brad, usually so competent, looks as stunned and helpless as Joey has felt all day.

The woman gets onto the boat and tells the man to get up. Brad offers a first-aid kit. She says they have one and disappears down into the cabin to fetch it. There is blood, but not much. She patches him up quickly, the three of them standing there awkwardly, and then turns to ask them for directions to their transient slip.

Amy points to the marina map. The woman asks whether they’ll need bumpers on the port or starboard side of the boat, receives no useful answer, so studies the map and figures it out.

Then Amy says the thing Joey wishes with all his heart she would not say. “Would you like us to meet you at your slip to help you tie off?”

“Yes,” the woman says, looking sideways at the knot growing on her husband’s forehead. “That would be great.”

Inside the office, the phone rings and Joey can see that another boat is already approaching the fuel dock. Brad says he can handle the approaching boat on his own and tells Joey to untie the sailboat and go with Amy to meet them at the slip.

Joey feels filled with dread but he does as he’s told. He follows Amy down the dock, carrying with him the increasingly sickening awareness that there are many kinds of knowledge in the world and he is missing all the ones currently required.

When the sailboat glides toward the empty slip, Joey says, trying to sound casual and maybe even self-deprecating in a charming kind of way, “I don’t really know what I’m doing here.”

Amy gives him a look that suggests she does not find him charming and says, “Just catch the lines and tie them to the dock.”

Right, then.

The woman tosses Joey a line from the bow. It is, though Joey does not know it, the spring line and meant to be secured to the center of the slip to keep the boat from hitting the front of the slip. Joey catches the line (another triumph!) and pulls the boat forward. Towards the front of the slip.

The woman yells that they are going to hit the dock.

At the back of the boat, Amy ties another line too far forward, which does nothing to hold the boat back while Joey pulls it forward.

The woman, who is leaning over the bow of the boat, gesturing wildly, yells, “We’re going to hit the dock!”

The boat hits the front of the dock.

Joey just stands there holding the line, frozen. Like an idiot.

Amy rushes forward and takes the line from Joey’s hands. The man, his probable concussion not preventing him from realizing they’d have been better off on their own, loosens the rear line while putting the boat in reverse.

The woman directs Amy to tie the line to the appropriate cleat, which Amy does. The man puts the boat into neutral and comes forward to help. Amy tells Joey to grab the rear line.

Joey grabs it. And then, because no one has yet explained what one does after grabbing a line, he simply stands there holding it while the back of the boat drifts toward the boat in the next slip.

The woman rushes back to help just as Joey drops the line into the water. Of course he does.

The man, now on the dock, hollers for the back line. Somehow the woman gets it to him. Somehow he pulls the boat in. Amy and Joey stand there uselessly, watching the people they were sent to help finish the job themselves.

Then Amy, to her credit, says with a crooked smile, “I’ll bet this is the smoothest docking you’ve ever had.”

The woman laughs. “Yes,” she says. “So smooth.” Then she adds, “Thank you for your help. We’ve got it from here. Really.”

Amy and Joey walk back to the fuel dock. They are both quiet.

Then Amy starts to laugh, so Joey laughs too.

What else can they do?

By the end of the day, Joey knows he smells faintly like gasoline and strongly like humiliation. His shoes are wet. His shirt is sticking to his back. He has been useless in at least six different ways. He has helped crash a sailboat into a dock. He has not shown promise or ambition and is aware that the adults of the world have probably put him in the category of young people who don’t want to work.

When his father asks, “How was work?” Joey shrugs and says, “Fine.”

Which is not true. But it is also not entirely false. Because, an hour earlier, as Joey peddled his bicycle slowly toward home, he thought about how the day’s mishaps just might make a good story and now a song was beginning to form in his mind. He goes upstairs and picks up his guitar.

This week’s menu!

Mississippi Pot Roast

Decades ago, when I started making this pot roast, I had no idea it was called "Mississippi Pot Roast". I don't remember where I got the recipe, but I was a new cook and the recipe looked like something I could handle. 5 ingredients and 5 minutes of prep work? Sign me up.

Three decades later, I’m still making this same recipe on the regular. Eventually, I learned it was called Mississippi pot roast. The recipe was originally published in a church cookbook, but then, with the rise of the internet and social media, it became something of a viral sensation.

Back when our kids were young and I was making this pot roast all the time, I didn’t know any of that. I just wanted an easy way to get dinner on the table. I am hopelessly late to the party with anything trendy or viral. I spend very little time on social media. I am not on TikTok. So, while this recipe was busy getting famous, I was just making dinner.

Mississippi pot roast was a particular favorite of our youngest daughter, Anne, who immediately asked me for the recipe when she went away to culinary school. After culinary school, Anne worked as a Sous Chef and Pastry Chef before becoming the recipe tester, videographer, and photographer for the recipes published here and on my baking website, Of Batter and Dough.

This was one of the first recipes I ever published, and the photos left a lot to be desired. So, in July of 2026, Anne retook all the photos, which feels like a full-circle moment: my youngest daughter, who is now a chef, taking the photos for a recipe she’s loved her whole life. ❤️

If you’ve never made Mississippi Pot Roast, let this be your invitation. I’m not sure an easier recipe exists, and the rewards are about a thousand times greater than the effort.

Recipe: Mississippi Pot Roast

Buttermilk Whipped Potatoes

I know, I know, that most recipes for mashed potatoes say to treat the potatoes with gentle care, but I am here to tell you that beating potatoes with an electric mixer creates a light and fluffy texture that’s almost ethereal.

I’ve been using an electric mixer to make my famous cream cheese mashed potatoes for years and they are ridiculously creamy and one of my family’s absolute favorite things.

For this recipe, I just took that one step further, using the wire whisk on my stand mixer to beat the potatoes until they were fluffy and light as air. One of the keys to their light and fluffy texture is buttermilk.

Buttermilk has a tenderizing effect on everything from roast chicken to coffee cake. And the same principle applies here, giving these whipped potatoes a tangy flavor and a light, tender texture that will have everyone at your table going back for more.

Buttermilk Whipped Potatoes

Matcha Ice Cream

Over the past couple of weeks, the temperatures in Michigan have jumped by 30 degrees! Summer has arrived, and with it, a weekly (sometimes daily) ice cream habit. There are worse things! There’s a great ice cream shop just down the street from the marina where we keep our sailboat, but more and more I opt to make it at home.

Homemade ice cream is just so easy to make and gives me complete control over the ingredients and flavors. This recipe starts with a rich custard base flavored with Pique Sun Goddess Matcha Powder, vanilla, and a hint of almond extract. It’s cool and refreshing, and exactly the right thing for a hot summer day.

Matcha Ice Cream

This newsletter would not exist if not for the members of The Lost Supper Club, who show their support with a paid subscription, thus ensuring that the vast majority of readers can keep reading this newsletter for free.

As a thank you, I try to provide those paid subscribers with some cool stuff, including 12 months of LIVE cooking classes!

—> Paid Subscribers! Register for the July Class Here!

I am honored to be one of 12 incredible food writers, bakers, cooks, and teachers in the CookStack Collective. Together, we’ve created a year-long series of live cooking classes that are all about cooking with and learning from one another.

Also, we are a hoot! This is a party you’re going to want to attend.

Access to The CookStack Collective is exclusively for members of The Lost Supper Club (paid subscribers). In addition to all the other paid perks, over the next twelve months, paid subscribers will receive access to:

• 12 live Zoom cooking classes

• Recipes and class materials

• Access to every recording

• The opportunity to cook alongside some incredibly talented teachers

A paid subscription is just $35 a year. Paid subscribers also receive THREE free cookbooks and other exclusive content throughout the year. If you’ve been thinking about upgrading, this is a deliciously good reason.

—> Paid Subscribers! Register for the July Class Here!

Resources and recommendations

Last month I had the absolute honor of being a guest on the Food Blogger Pro podcast, a podcast I’ve been listening to for years. In the episode, we talked about the business of food writing, the importance of community, and how AI is changing the game for writers and creators like me.

Here’s where to listen —> How Rebecca Blackwell Turned Food Blogging into a Six-Figure Digital Business from an RV

If you’re a food writer or recipe developer, here are three really great resources to take advantage of: A free monthly Mastermind meeting, a series of classes and workshops for food writers, taught by food writers, and 1:1 SEO coaching and consulting.

I recently taught a class about food photography with Shelly Waldman and Jessie-Sierra; The Last Bite. We talked about how to make intentional creative choices before you pick up the camera: what mood you want to create, what story the recipe is telling, where the photo will live, and how you want the reader to feel. Here’s where to watch it:

If this free class sparks ideas for how you might improve your own photography skills, we’d love to invite you to join us for the next Food Writers Business Lab: The Visual Language of Food Photography where we will dive deep into how light, shadow, color, texture, styling, composition, and human elements can shape the story a photo tells.

The Visual Language of Food Photography

❤️ Did you know that if you hit the heart or recycle symbol at the top or bottom of this post, it makes it easier for other people to find this newsletter?

Over the past couple of weeks, the temperatures in Michigan have jumped by 30 degrees! Summer has arrived, and with it, a weekly (sometimes daily) ice cream habit. There are worse things! There’s a great ice cream shop just down the street from the marina where we keep our sailboat, but more and more I opt to make it at home.

Homemade ice cream is just so easy to make and gives me complete control over the ingredients and flavors. This recipe starts with a rich custard base flavored with Matcha powder, vanilla, and a hint of almond extract. It’s cool and refreshing, and exactly the right thing for a hot summer day.

Recipe Notes:

I used the Ninja Cremi ice cream maker to make the matcha ice cream you see in these photos. Regardless of the kind of ice cream maker you use, this matcha ice cream is smooth, creamy, and the perfect thing to help us beat the summer heat.

You don’t even have to have an ice cream maker to make this ice cream. Pour it into a loaf pan, cover with plastic wrap, and freeze for at least 24 hours. It won’t be quite as creamy as it is when you run it through an ice cream maker, but it will still be absolutely delicious!

As you’d expect from homemade matcha ice cream, the matcha flavor really comes through in this recipe. So it’s important to use high quality matcha powder. The kind I love more than an other is Pique Sun Goddess Matcha Powder. It’s 100% organic, ceremonial-grade & screened for purity.

Also try Pique Sun Goddess Matcha Powder in these Matcha Shortbread Cookies!

They are buttery, tender, and full of bright citrus flavor. Made with high-quality matcha powder, they have the perfect balance of earthy, sweet, and tart and a delicate texture that makes them hard to stop eating. If you’re looking for an easy spring cookie recipe that feels a little elegant and a little unexpected, these citrusy matcha shortbread cookies check all the boxes.

Also, isn’t that bright green color just gorgeous????

Matcha Shortbread Cookies

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure. Find out more.

Welcome to Let’s Get Lost! I’m Rebecca, a recipe developer, food photographer, passionate people watcher, and chaser of new experiences. You might know me from my recipe websites, Of Batter and Dough and A Little and A Lot.

My husband and I are nomads without a home base but with many modes of transportation, namely an RV, a motorcycle, and a sailboat. I write recipes and stories for curious people who believe experiences are more important than things and who want more adventure.

—> Get this and every issue and recipe directly on rebeccablackwell.com.

For everyone in the states, happy 4th

Since our son died in 2020, the 4th of July has been a rough holiday for our two daughters. The 4th was their holiday… Corey loved fireworks and the three of them would spend hours together setting them off in our front yard.

Since loosing their older brother, neither of our daughters has been interested in celebrating the 4th. But, this year we are changing that story. I’m not sure about time healing all wounds, but it does make the wounds easier to live with.

This year our girls are joining us in Michigan for the weekend and we are spending today out on the sailboat, hanging out until after the sun sets to watch the fireworks from the lake.

To say I have complicated feelings about celebrating the anniversary of our nation is an understatement. I love this country. I also hate so much of what’s happening here. I love this holiday. And also, it’s a rough one.

For those of you in the US, I hope you are spending the day doing something you love with people you love, because in the end, that’s really all there is, isn’t it?

I’ll be back next week with a “normal” newsletter.

I hope each and every one of you has a wonderful weekend.

xo

-Rebecca

Just in case you’ve missed previous announcements, I am honored to be one of 12 incredible food writers, bakers, cooks, and teachers in the CookStack Collective. Together, we’ve created a year-long series of live cooking classes that are all about cooking with and learning from one another.

Also, we are a hoot! This is a party you’re going to want to attend.

Find out more