The starring ingredient in his chili is stout beer. The stout leaves a lingering bitter flavor in the chili, but can be counteracted with a few tablespoons of brown sugar.

Unfamiliar with chocolate fridge cake, I was pleased to see that it’s basically like making fudge with a bunch of crunchy, chewy, chunky stuff thrown in the mix.

The addition of briny green olives at the very end gives a little twang to the dish, and the whole thing is served up on soft, pillowy rice. Even if your version of doing yoga is simply sitting on a sticky mat and shoveling a bowlful of stew into your face, then so be it.

The ingredients are inexpensive and a big pot lasts for several meals, and it’s hard to get any heartier than sausage and potatoes. My secret ingredient? A bottle of beer for depth of flavor.

Smeared on a piece of good bread with butter, the slightly wild flavor gives you the feeling of being in the Swiss Family Robinson tree house, eating exotic fruits and lounging in a hammock.

I have embraced the earthy flavor of beets, and I just know that something so vibrantly colored has got to be doing amazing things to my insides, besides making them look like I’m dyeing Easter eggs in my mouth.

Flipping through cookbooks for ideas, all I found was peach crumble this, peach cobbler that, peach pie blahdeeblah. Been there, done that! Give me something new, something fresh, something… stuffed?

Instead of piles of cheese and mystery meat, I filled our calzone with sautéed veggies, summer pesto and a few liberal handfuls of Swiss cheese. My calzone was close to food-porn status, if I may toot my own horn.

In my usual style, I tweaked a buckwheat pancake recipe, confident that I was only making the final product better and tastier – and definitely not royally screwing things up. What could possibly go wrong… right?

Old school ice cream sandwiches are damn good, no doubt. But as always, there’s something even more decadent out there – and it’s coming from my kitchen.

My smoothie trend recently morphed into making my own at home, with frozen fruit, yogurt and honey. That way, I know exactly what’s going into my glass, and I can experiment with ingredients and flavor combinations.

Guacamole is a classic summertime staple, and you don’t need to go all out in order to make it special. Trust me, simple is best. And by best, I mean the freaking BOMB. …Cool people still say that, right?

Once the syrup is cooled, these drinks come together in the blink of an eye. They are frothy and cold, and taste like a refreshing nip of summer: sweet and herby.

A super-easy summer dessert of whipped cream folded with a fresh berry sauce, topped with even more sauce, even more berries and crumbly shortbread to boot.