I grew up thinking paprika was the fancy orange stuff you sprinkled on deviled eggs – a decoration for special occasions. While on a recent trip in Boston, I had the pleasure of ordering a plate of deviled eggs perched on a bed of arugula at Coda Bar & Kitchen. The paprika was the star flavoring, whipped vigorously into the yolk until silky smooth and then piped into the center of each egg white divot, creating golden mounds that were then topped with basil pesto.

Paprika is more than a fancy garnish. This sweet and smoky spice has the same versatility as a c-list celebrity attempting to revive his career on Dancing with the Stars. Often a principle ingredient in sausage making, it is also used to season and add color to rice, soups and stews in wide-range of ethnic and regional cuisines.

In this recipe, paprika is the principle ingredient. Coating the pork in the spice allows the flavors to release into the sauce during the cooking process. I love the addition of sour cream at the end to help add a sharp contrast and coolness to the dish.

Have you ever had that moment when you opened a can of evaporated milk and realized the recipe called for sweetened condense milk? That happened to me the other day while assembling ingredients for a pumpkin tart.

You read that correctly. I baked a pumpkin tart with a ginger snap crust for spring. Who says pumpkin is only for fall holidays anyway, right?

Since I was already planning to marinate chicken in buttermilk for dinner later in the week, I decided to make an equivalent to buttermilk by using my open can of evaporated milk and vinegar.

The process was really easy. Simply measure out ¼ cup white vinegar or fresh lemon juice in a glass-measuring cup. Next, pour the evaporated milk into the measuring cup, and stir. The acid of from the vinegar will thicken the evaporated milk. Since evaporated milk is fresh milk with 60% of it’s water removed, some recipes suggest adding roughly a half a cup of water to reconstitute the milk. Since I was planning to use this to marinade chicken, I opted to pass on the reconstitution step, thus creating a higher ratio of acid to help tenderize the meat.

Of course, you can always use good ole’ fashioned buttermilk if you don’t have an accidental opened can of evaporated milk lying around. The results are equally as delicious.

This always happens to me. I buy bananas and a couple turn brown before I finish the bunch. While flipping through my collection of twelve community fundraiser cookbooks – a collection boardering on obsession at this point – I found eight different variations of banana bread. But I wasn’t quite in the mood to try any of them out.

A quick search online came back with a couple of interesting options like Fried Chocolate and Banana Ravioli or Banana Rum Fizz. Deciding to pass on fancy, I focused my creative energies on baking something familiar, only with a twist.

Then I saw it, a block of cream cheese, and immediately thought…cream cheese frosting! “I should bake a banana cake with cream cheese frosting,” I said to my dog, Sophie. Which is far more socially acceptable than standing in the middle of my kitchen, alone, eating cream cheese frosting with a spoon. Sophie just sat in front of the refrigerator, staring with her huge brown eyes, and waited for me to spill a few crumbs at some point.

The end result was a moist cake with just a hint of banana and vanilla flavor throughout. Not too dense. Not too sweet. The cream cheese frosting makes up for that part.

Side Note: You will notice in the picture above, I was really excited about sampling this cake. So much so that I frosted the top and cut a slice while it was a little too warm. The semi-melted cream cheese frosting was amazing!

These hoisin chicken wings make a great appetizer with friends or a main dish worthy of curling up on the couch with your favorite movie. I chose the latter when I decided to bake up these beauties.

The Chinese five-spice powder, a blend of ground star anise, cloves, cinnamon, Sichuan pepper and fennel seeds, added an aromatic depth to the wings. The hoisin and apricot jam was the right amount of sticky sweetness. As for the movie, it was still just as fantastic as the last thirty times I’ve watched it.

One of the best compliments I have ever received for my chili was when a friend’s wife told me, “If you feed my husband chili again, he’s sleeping at your house.”

This recipe has considerably less beans than my slow cooker version, which will make all of my friends’ wives very happy. Instead, I decided to throw in hot Italian sausage for a meatier texture. The result was a hearty and spicy chili that is perfect with a side of crusty bread.