As promised – here is the recipe for the crunchy banana muffins.  If it looks like a whole lot of flour, sugar, and butter… well, it’s because this recipe makes a boatload of muffins….  30 anyway, and that’s a bunch from one recipe. Enjoy!

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This fourth brunch recipe makes two casserole dishes of sausage and egg goodness. And it’s another overnight casserole… breakfast for dinner two nights in a row… just saying! Once again, I thank the photographer, Laura, for providing the photo of her dish. (down a little farther, not the photo directly below)

Before Laura’s dish, here is a final description of the last recipe not yet included in the “four days of  le brunch”.  It’s all about Tram’s Banana Crunch Muffins.  You see, long story short, Tram got crunched for time and her hubby, Steve, couldn’t make it, so she brought her friend (and my friend too!) Matt. Matt is not only our friend, but also the producer of Tram’s afternoon show EVB Live, and the former producer of the old Valley Dish. Matt made the muffins, but since he doesn’t really like full-on banana flavor in his muffins, he made banana-pineapple muffins… yes that’s the short version! Matt’s muffins were a huge hit. But since I don’t have Matt’s recipe to share, I will share my “Crunch” recipe tomorrow.

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The best thing about the four brunch recipes my friends made is that they can all be fully or partially made ahead. Anne’s “overnight” French toast obviously fits the bill. Or if your family enjoys “breakfast for dinner” – throw this together before you head out the door in the morning, take it out when you walk in the door, then pop it in the oven and you’ll have dinner (and dessert all-in-one; it’s pretty dang sweet!) on the table with almost no effort after a long hard day.

So another guest who made a dish that won’t be featured in the four days of brunch recipes, is Amy’s Smoked Salmon Platter with Dill Sour Cream. It was one of the “no-cook” recipes and was basically thinly sliced smoked salmon artistically laid out on a platter with minced shallots and capers sprinkled on top and sour cream with fresh chopped dill mixed in – served with bagel chips or sliced baguette on the side.  So easy, SO good, and oh so pretty!

Once again, I didn’t get a photo of Amy’s dish or even of Amy for that matter, but I did get a nice shot of her hilariously humorous husband, Scott (and Bubo – Sloane’s pooch).

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Next up is the recipe that my sweet sister, Sloane, made. It’s one of my favorites!

A few of the other guests brought recipes that have already been featured here on the blog… for instance, Peggy made THIS great salad that I wrote about back in September 2009.  And Peggy’s fabulous sister, Terrie, made a beautiful platter of roasted asparagus that was generously topped with crumbled goat cheese, crispy bacon, and lemon.  Regretfully, I didn’t get a picture of either Terrie’s asparagus or Peggy’s salad, (you can go to the link above to see the salad).  But thankfully I did snap a lovely picture of gorgeous Peggy!

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Here is the first of four brunch dishes that I’d like to share with you from our New Year’s Eve Brunch. Since I wasn’t the one cooking any of these, there will only be the one picture… no preparation photos. And in some cases, as with this one, I even forgot to take the picture myself and had to ask the creator of the dish to email me the photo taken from the leftovers they brought back home – thanks for this one, Mary!  Oh, one more thing – This is my 800th Post! Wow 800!

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I am completely “committing to the chai” with this French toast. It goes without saying that this is delicious served with the Vanilla Chai Tea Hot Toddy for a perfect fall brunch. Enjoy!

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Cookies for breakfast?  Sure, why not?  These particular cookies are packed with healthy stuff – dried fruit, almonds, cereal… and…. bacon. OK, not healthy bacon, but yummy breakfast-time bacon. Plus they aren’t too sweet, just right.  Great to eat if you have no time in the morning. Pop them in the freezer and just grab one or two on your way out the door and you have breakfast!

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I’ve scrolled through all 1,577 of the comments left on this site and found that well over 30 of them are from my darling daughter, Marissa, saying something like this – “Send me some!”  “Save some for me.”  “Make that for me when I come home!”  and most recently, “I’ve decided I’m going to comment on every post of something I want, asking you to send it to me, until you actually do send me something.”  

What’s a mother to do? My girl used to live in Tucson, so it was easy to plan a quick trip and just drive down to stay overnight and cook for her and her darling roommates. But now she lives about 750 miles away in San Francisco.  And although I would love nothing more than to hop on a plane every few weeks and spend time in that gorgeous city with my gorgeous girl, that isn’t very practical or even possible.

So I’ve made muffins.  Muffins to freeze and ship to her.  Marissa, please share them with your new darling roommates and rest assured, they are made with enormous amounts of love. xoxo

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These are some super good pancakes, so airy and fluffy. Sour cream is the secret. And they are the perfect vehicle for the delicious rhubarb-strawberry compote recipe I gave you yesterday. Make any morning extra special by whipping up a batch of these!

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I love to go on vacation but what I love even more, is coming home.  Isn’t everyone like that?  Dave and I had another lovely week up in the North Woods of  Wisconsin with our BFF’s Jeff and Jen and their 3 boys; Travis, Blake, and Jack. They (as in the 6 of them, not me) love swimming in the lake, boating, fishing, water skiing, tanning, hiking in the woods, and being outdoors.  I love staying inside their gorgeous log-cabin home, and relaxing. They can have all that sun, water, nature and mosquitoes!  Even though I do everything in my power to avoid those blood-sucking devils, they find me.  Oh well, it’s worth it to live in the beauty of the pines and be with the people I love.  Another thing I love is making meals with Jen. She’s a great cook and she and I are totally in tune with each other in the kitchen.  Can’t wait until next year…

While we were out of town, we missed a big happening in “the Valley of the Sun” – and I’m not talking about the All-Star game (although we did unfortunately miss that too).  We missed the “now famous haboob” that occurred here on July 5th!  I have two links for you to watch it – as I did – from the comfort of my laptop.  Here is the first video and here is another view.  Amazing!  And here is a picture of a damp paper towel that I used to wipe off the center island kitchen counter … mind you, my house was completely and professionally cleaned by Gabby, my “twice-a-month house cleaner” earlier that very same day – July 5th!  And no other living creature has been in the house since.  This is a small sampling of the dirt that came in through our closed and locked windows and doors when the massive wall of dirt rolled over our defenseless little house!

Disgusting!   On to better and more appetizing things…

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