10 of Our Favorite Places
+ Cheeseburger quesadillas, Almond Cake, a recipe writing class, and free cookbooks!
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.
Well, here we are. 2026! Happy New Year, friends. 🥂
Last night we set up a digital photo album that my in-laws gave us for Christmas. I loaded a bunch of photos from the last few years on it and we sat there watching them roll by for quite some time.
Steve commented on how many incredible places we’ve visited since moving into our RV almost 6 years ago. And it really is something when you put them all in one place.
One of my favorite things about life as a nomad is that we don’t have to wait for vacation days to visit new places. Our normal life - eating, sleeping, working, and all the other things that go along with daily life - has occurred on the edge of a canyon, next to an ocean, in forests, on pebbled beaches, next to rivers and streams, in major cities and in tiny towns. Every year we get to visit more places than we could otherwise see in 10 years.
And that’s why we do it. To experience, even if it’s just for a week or two, what it’s like to live here, and here, and here, and there.
If you want to see where we are heading this year, here’s where you’ll find our 2026 travel schedule.
One of the most common questions we receive is, “What is your favorite place?”
This is an impossible question to answer. But, I think we can narrow it down to the top 10. So, here goes…
San Diego, California. One of our favorite places to start the year, where you’ll find us almost every night walking Coronado beach at sunset.
Flaming Gorge, Utah. We spent a peaceful two weeks on an isolated corner of the Flaming Gorge where we parked right on the beach.
Glacier National Park, Montana. The photo above was taken kayaking on Lake McDonald in Glacier.
Dead Horse State Park, Utah. This is a great state park in an incredible location. The park overlaps Canyon Lands National Park, is just outside of Moab, and next to Arches National Park.
Little Grand Canyon/ Wedge Overlook, Utah. A remote, isolated canyon that weaves through central Utah. We were able to pull our camper right up to the edge of the canyon.
Door County, Wisconsin. This peninsula in Wisconsin, with Lake Michigan on one side and Green Bay on the other, is one of our favorite places.
Bryson City, North Carolina. Located right next to Smoky Mountain National Park, this is one of the best places in the country to watch the changing leaves in the fall.
Woodhead Park, Idaho. This beautiful state park sits on the Idaho side of the Snake River, with Oregon on the other side.
The Pacific Northwest: I’m cheating a little bit with number 9 because I can’t decide where in the PNW is my favorite. It’s all my favorite.
Michigan. We’ve spent two summers on the coast of Lake Michigan and after buying a sailboat last year, it’s now where you’ll find us from May until October.
Apparently, I can’t actually narrow the list down to just 10 places because I can’t help but mention….
Have you been to any of these places? Do you have travel plans in 2026? Where are you headed?
This week’s menu
Cheeseburger Quesadillas and Almond Cake
Cheeseburger Quesadillas
Last October, we spent a few weeks camped next to Lake McConaughy in Nebraska. One day we got on the motorcycle and rode to Pals Brewing Company in North Platte.
Pals is a great place. We’d been there a few times before and the food and drinks are excellent, the atmosphere is always lively, and there’s usually something fun going on.
On this particular day, the thing on the menu that jumped out at me was the cheeseburger quesadilla. And friends, it was sooooo good. Layers of cheese, hamburger, onion, and plenty of pickles were sandwiched between crispy flour tortillas. The quesadilla came with a fantastic cheeseburger dipping sauce and I devoured every last bite.
I started working on this recipe the very next week because I’m not going to wait until the next time we’re in Nebraska for another cheeseburger quesadilla. If you happen to live near North Platte, head over to Pal’s and order yourself one. For the rest of us, here’s how to make them!
Almond Cake
I’m not sure when I first made this cake, but it was many years ago. Most likely, it was after reading Thomas Keller’s book Bouchon, but it’s difficult to remember.
Regardless of the origins of this particular recipe, versions of this simple one-layer almond cake have been around for centuries. A quick internet search will turn up a wide variety of recipes, served plain or dressed up with whipped cream and fruit.
This particular almond cake recipe includes a generous combination of almond paste and butter, a surprisingly small amount of sugar, plus amaretto mixed into the batter and brushed over the cake after it’s baked.
The result is a decadently buttery cake that’s incredibly moist and tender, richly flavored with almonds, and not overly sweet.
We fell in love with it the first time I made it and it’s been a favorite in our house ever since. This is also a very simple and easy cake to make and will keep well for several days.
I’ve made it for every occasion you can think of, dinner parties, birthdays, work parties, holiday gatherings, and just because I was craving it. It’s one of those cakes that’s gorgeous in it’s simplicity and always the perfect thing.
I honestly don’t know what took me so long to share the recipe, but here it is. I hope you enjoy it as much as we do.
This and that
Last month, my friend Robin published 22 cocktail recipes in a row during a solstice countdown. If you weren’t following that, you can click here to scroll through every single one of those incredible cocktail recipes.
At one point during that series, Robin sent me two bottles of Bittercube Bitters - Grapefruit Hibiscus and Chipotle Cacao. I loved them so much that I ordered several bottles of their other flavors and we’ve been happily mixing them into cocktails and mocktails ever since.
After all the excesses of the holiday season, you’ll find mostly non alcoholic drinks around here and, trust me, a few dashes of bitters will really up your mocktail game.
How To Write Better Recipes
Hosted by Kelsey Erin Shipman and Hannah Howard
Great recipes don’t just taste good; they read clearly, flow intuitively, and work every time. If recipe writing is something you’re interested in, join Betty Williams and me for a practical workshop where we’ll break down what actually makes a recipe successful on the page. This session focuses on recipe writing, with an emphasis on clarity, structure, and voice especially for writers publishing online or preparing cookbook proposals.
The conversation will cover the essential parts of a recipe, how to structure ingredients and instructions, how to write effective headnotes, and where to place substitutions, variations, and helpful notes. The panel will be followed by live recipe critiques and an open Q&A, so attendees can bring their own questions and works-in-progress. This session is ideal for food writers at all stages who want their recipes to be clearer, stronger, and more publishable. And, one lucky attendee will win one of our favorite books about recipe writing!
Here’s where to get more information:
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 all three of the cookbooks below. Find out more about becoming a member of the Lost Supper Club.
Let’s Get Lost Cookbook, Volume 2
All the recipes from every issue published in 2025
Last year’s cookbook is HERE and it’s exclusively available, for FREE, to members of the Lost Supper Club.
The book contains 92 recipes, each with full color photos, spread across 124 pages.
Let’s Get Lost, Volume 1
All the recipes from every issue published in 2024
Let’s Get Lost, Vol 1 includes 143 recipes with full page color photos of every dish and, scattered amongst the recipes, a handful of the stories from our life on the road. This book is exclusively available, for FREE, to members of the Lost Supper Club.
FOUNDING MEMBERS are people who have chosen to support this publication with a donation that is truly above and beyond. Every founding member receives a signed, hard cover printed copy of Let’s Get Lost, The Cookbook, Vol 1, mailed to them personally by me.
The No Recipe Required Cookbook
No Recipe Required dishes are more of a formula than a recipe. They are designed to be thrown together with whatever ingredients you like with one thing swapped out for something else, increased, or reduced as you like. This book is exclusively available, for FREE, to members of the Lost Supper Club.
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Happy new year Rebecca!!
Beautiful reading, glorious photography, recipes are as expected - bliss. And may I say what a list of travels - just wow !