Every year, my mom plants an herb garden. This year we also got some salad bowls! Lettuce in one pot and arugula in another. This is always one of my favorite things--I love cooking something in the kitchen and being able to just randomly go outside for some fresh basil or chives.

We planted these about two weeks ago and they're growing further already. Spring is here and summer is on the way!

Sometimes you have a very rainy weekend that was supposed to be 74 degrees and sunny, but then Sunday rolls around and the sun comes out and it's warm and all the winter-y rain from the two previous days have made the afternoon smell like spring, so you go to the grocery store with bare arms and your best friend and you buy fresh berries because it's time for some muffins.

I came up with this recipe by accident one time when I was making mini-muffins for this post on Skunkboy. I was going to follow a recipe and just substitute regular flour for coconut flour, and then I messed up the measurements and added a bunch of random things like shredded coconut and honey, but what I ended up with was actually the blueprint for a pretty good Paleo muffin base recipe. Then, you can add whatever you want to make a flavored muffin--this time I chose raspberries and chocolate chips.

There's a tiny bit of baking powder in these muffins and if you're a Paleo snob who's going to freak out about it instead of simply choosing not to include it, then we probably can't be friends anymore.

Ingredients:

Makes twelve big boy muffins.

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6 eggs

4 tablespoons coconut oil

1 cup coconut flour

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup coconut milk

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

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A 6 ounce container of fresh raspberries, washed and chopped

1/2 cup of Enjoy Life Chocolate Chips

(Save a few of the chocolate chips for the top.)

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

2. Melt the coconut oil in a bowl and add flour first, then eggs, and then all other ingredients.

3. Mix the batter together and spoon into greased muffin tins (you can use more coconut oil or an olive oil spray).

4. Bake for 25 minutes, (halfway through you can top them with the extra chocolate chips), broiling at the very end to brown the tops if necessary.

(I had to open one up so you could see inside. And also so I could take a bite.)

Whether it's rainy and cold or sunny and warm, muffins are perfect for whatever season you happen to be in.

My new friend Tony and I have christened 2013 "The Year of DIY."

I'm going to go to Goodwill and have dresses altered and paint things and glue things on things.

With that in mind, I've decided to try my hand at some "How To" posts this year.

Because I am an expert at a large number of very random things.

Let's begin with a Burger Party.

Burger bowls are pretty much my favorite dinner because it's quick and easy and Paleo and absolutely delicious! It's all about the toppings--mushrooms, sauteed onions and spinach, banana peppers, pickled jalapenos, tomato, avocado, lettuce, bacon, perhaps a fried egg! You can add whatever you want to it. Whatever you want!

Maybe I'm a freak, but most of the toppings I already have in my fridge on any given day. So the morning before I had friends over for what quickly became known as The Burger Party Extravaganza, my mom and I cooked the spinach, mushrooms, bacon, and onions so they'd be ready. 

Everything else just needed to be chopped. Then we put them in cute little bowls and covered them with plastic wrap, stuck them in the fridge, drank some coffee, woke up the boys, and went to see Les Miserables! When we got home from the movies, my brother put the burgers together and into the fridge they went, as well. 

(A word about burgers: you could obviously make whatever kind of burger you'd like. Turkey burgers would be good, maybe a crab cake if you don't do meat, and a veggie burger would do just fine, too. Ours are beef and come from my high school cross-country coach's farm just about twenty minutes away.) 

When you're having people over and feeding them, doing as much as possible ahead of time is huge. When my friends arrived that evening, I had a margarita pitcher ready and all that needed to be done was grill burgers!

Once everyone has a drink and is ready for dinner, take everything out of the fridge, grill the burgers, heat up the stuff that needs to be hot (onions, mushrooms, spinach), set it out on a counter! I got buns and cheese for my non-Paleo friends, so I set out both plates and bowls and let everyone DIY!

If I were trendier, I'd have little flags labeling each bowl with washi tape or whatever that stuff is called.

If you end up polishing off two margarita pitchers and end the night with a dance party, you've probably done it right.

Does anyone have a request for a future How To post?