Hello! Welcome to my blog! My name is Lauren and I am a lover of all things food, wine, dogs, yoga, and sunshine.

I was born and raised in the beautiful state of Arizona where the sunshine is plentiful and the scenery is always gorgeous. I live with my husband, AJ, and our 2 spoiled beagles who are always at my feet in the kitchen ready to taste test scarf down my recipes.

I am a self-taught cook who got my love of cooking from my dad. Growing up he would always throw meals together, never following a recipe, and somehow they always turned out amazing.

During a particularly stressful time in my life, I turned to yoga, meditation, mindfulness and cooking to calm my anxious mind. I found that when I am in the kitchen creating recipes and cooking for the people I love, I feel Zen! For me, the kitchen is my happy place where I can learn new recipes and create tasty meals without worrying about what else is going on around me.

I love experimenting with new recipes I find in cookbooks, online, on The Food Network, and even sometimes attempting to mimic recipes from restaurants. I started creating recipes and keeping them in a journal in my kitchen and after some time I decided I should start a blog to put all those recipes in one place and share them with others. The focus for my blog is on simple and easy to follow recipes that make cooking fun and stress-free.

Join me in cooking yourself ZEN!

Meet my pups, fur-kids, side kicks, taste-testers, loves of my life- 

Baylee and Barklee!