All posts tagged: Featured

Winter Picnic ~ Malibu Wines

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When the leaves turn colors and start falling from the trees and that winter chill finally hits the air after those hot October nights, there’s nothing better than layering up in your wooly finest and heading out for a winter picnic with friends. Our favorite spot to gather for some lazy mid-winter’s revelry is Malibu Wines. A local vineyard tucked away in the Malibu Mountains just off of Kanan, Malibu Wines offers a sprawling picnic area complete with farm tables, chairs and flaming heat lamps to cuddle up and get cozy around. Lay out a sumptuous spread, sample some house wines, take in the live music and soak in the glorious afternoon. Order a couple bottles of wine for your table or try individual “flights” from the wine tasting bar. You can pick the flight of your choice and sample wines at your own pace throughout the day. Outside alcohol is understandably not allowed in, but you are welcome to bring any non-alcoholic beverages with you. We highly recommend bringing plenty of water to make …

Cauliflower Crust Pizza

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Pizza, pizza, pizza! We at Sirens & Scoundrels are always ones to initiate a gathering and a “Build Your Own Pizza Party” is an instant crowd pleaser. It’s a fun way to feast while accommodating any dietary restrictions. With all the different crust and cheese alternatives available now and an assortment of toppings, everyone can have it their own way! I have been experimenting with Cauliflower Pizza Crust because it’s a wonderful gluten-free alternative. The first time I tried to make this vegetable-based crust, I learned a lot.  I found that the drier my ingredients, the crisper the crust.  All of it was delicious, especially the crisp edges, but the center of the pizza had more of a polenta consistency than a crust. We ended up eating the pizza with a fork, which goes against that satiating feeling of picking up a slice with your hands and devouring it. As your resident foodie, I went back to the drawing board. I’m a fan of New York-style thin crust, so here’ s a few tips: TIP 1: The smaller you make your crust, the …

Stargazing ~ Joshua Tree, CA

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Looking for a fun, easy, affordable excursion to entertain your out-of-town visitors this Holiday season? Jump in the car and head out to Joshua Tree for a night of midwinter stargazing! Less than two hours away, Joshua Tree is one of our favorite places to get away from it all and get in touch with that deep desert stillness that always stirs the soul. In these winter months, the best way to camp out is in a little desert hacienda—so you can be sure to stay toasty and warm when it comes time for sleeping. Joshua Desert Retreats has become our go-to purveyor of desert retreat houses. With twelve adorable, well-appointed and very affordable rental properties ranging in occupancy from 2 to 14 people, they have every kind of getaway home to fit your needs. All houses come with fully stocked kitchens, so you never have to leave the property unless you want to. So cooking and sharing meals together becomes a part of the fun. Most houses also include an outdoor fireplace, pool and …

Vegan Roasted Vegetable Stew

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This weekend I was cooking for our Women’s Meditation Retreat in Big Bear. With the beautiful blanket of white snow outside our log cabin windows, it finally felt like winter had arrived in California. In honor of the holidays coming up and the brisk air outside, I wanted to ring in the season with a hearty stew to warm the soul and belly. I experimented with making this stew vegan to accommodate the dietary restrictions of some of our attendees. With some toasted gluten-free garlic bread on the side, this veggie stew was a warm delicious hug in a bowl. This could be a perfect addition to your holiday menu as we step into the season of sharing, gathering and feasting. Makes 6 Ingredients 2 sweet potatoes 2 zucchini 4 carrots 1 butternut squash 4 stalks of celery 1 onion 1 cup de-stemmed kale 5 mushrooms 1/2 can of chickpeas 6 cloves garlic 1/4 cup chopped ginger root olive oil salt & pepper to taste avocado & cilantro to garnish Instructions Preheat oven to 425 degrees. …

Go Rogue! ~ Opt Outside on Black Friday

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This Friday, instead of facing the real-life version of The Walking Dead at your local retailers–witnessing throngs of people stampeding each other in a crazed daze for a cheap(er) wide-screen TV…why not reclaim your sanity (and your humanity) and Opt Outside instead? REI started this inspired movement by pledging to close its doors on Black Friday and #OptOutside in an effort to get families to bond out in nature instead of under glaring fluorescent lights buying a bunch of crap no one needs. You can find awesome hikes in your area just by entering your zip code here. Save the Redwoods League has even upped the ante—offering free day passes to 49 California State Redwood Parks in Northern California. Happily, there has been an overwhelming response to this rogue reclaiming of the day after Thanksgiving and some park passes have already sold out. But there are still plenty of parks available. You can find a list here. For those of us in Southern California looking for a place to spend November 27 in peace, we have some …

Cauliflower Crust Egg-in-a-Hole

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This year, I’ve had an ongoing weekly Sirens & Scoundrels cook date with fellow Siren, Pippa. Every week, we come together and experiment with rogue ideas in the kitchen. Some were failures, some were delicious triumphs. When I went gluten-free 5 years ago due to an allergy, pizza was the only thing I felt deprived of, since it was my favorite go-to meal. So I thought it was time I started experimenting with some crust alternatives. I’ve always been curious about cauliflower crust. Here’s the thing: because cauliflower is a vegetable, it sweats liquid when cooked down, which makes it difficult to get a really crisp crust. I theorized that if you make the crust into smaller, more personal sizes, then the middle of the “dough” will be as crisp as the edges. This led me to an enticing vision of combining my two favorite things: Pizza & Brunch.  Thus, the idea for the Cauliflower Crust Egg-in-a-Hole was born! Makes 4 Crust Ingredients 2 cups packed riced cauliflower  (Follow the instructions for Ricing Cauliflower: Here) 1 egg ½ cup grated parmesan ½ cup grated low-moisture mozzarella Preheat oven …

Rain Room ~ LACMA

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For a city in the midst of a Megadrought, there is something strangely poetic about going to a museum to visit the rain. In Rain Room, LACMA’s latest interactive environment exhibit from their Art + Technology initiative, that’s essentially what we’re doing. When Random International originated the concept in London in 2012, followed by an insanely popular run at MoMA in NYC, it’s probably not what they had in mind. But just as every great work of art changes in relationship to its environment, this is no exception. What could be just a really cool sensory experience anywhere else, within the context of Los Angeles begins to take on a larger meaning. Our first piece of advice is to go in knowing as little as possible. So honestly, you should just stop reading right now, buy yourself a ticket through this link and go. Trust us on this one… Still reading? Okay, so you like to be prepared. In that case, we’ll let you in on a few key tips for getting the most out …

Apple Picking Season ~ Oak Glen, CA

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Every Fall I go apple picking. And each time I come back with my bags of apples and Mile-High Apple Pie in tow, everyone asks, “WAIT!—You can go apple picking in LA?” YES. Yes you can. Meet Oak Glen, CA. Nestled up in the mountains about an hour & a half east of Los Angeles, the folks in Oak Glen have been growing apples since 1867. If you imagine Autumn-in-Vermont Pioneer Village meets 1950’s Frozen-in-Time Americana, you’ve got Oak Glen. It’s a magic combo that makes you feel like you’ve just stepped inside a Charles Wysocki puzzle. Located a mile up the mountain, this 5-mile loop of sweet old-fashioned apple orchards actually experiences all four seasons beyond just “warm and warmer”. Official apple picking season runs September to November, when the trees explode with ripe juicy apples of every flavor and the surrounding landscape bursts into an impressive show of bright yellows, reds and oranges. The best time for apple picking is the start of the season. But if you wait until later, there is …

Apple Bake

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Returning from our recent day-trip to Oak Glen’s apple orchards with massive bags of farm-fresh apple bounty in hand, our Sirens were inspired to turn our treasures into tasty treats. We invited the ladies over for a leisurely afternoon of apple baking, followed by a roundtable tasting with our Sirens and Scoundrels. There were some soul-stirring gems, as well as some disasters. (TIP: Guava and apples don’t mix.) We’re sharing the best of the bake-off with you here. Try our recipes out yourself at your next Autumn-into-Winter dinner party. Happy baking!           CLICK LINKS BELOW FOR APPLE BAKING RECIPES~ Apple Castles Gluten-Free Apple Crumble (with Vegan option) Vegan Sugarless Apple Oat Cookies >>For your baking pleasure, enjoy these Farm Fresh Folk tunes!<< Be sure to subscribe to Sirens & Scoundrels for more awesome recipes & adventures delivered straight to you! Enter your email address on our home page & hit “SUBSCRIBE”!  Follow us on Instagram: @sirensandscoundrels Words by Christina Huntington // Photography by Sarah Prikryl © 2015 Sirens and Scoundrels

Apple Castles

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Serves 4 Ingredients   4 apples 1 lemon 2 tsp cinnamon pinch of nutmeg pinch of ground ginger 2 Tbsp coconut oil 2 Tbsp brown sugar 1/2 cup pecans Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease cookie sheet. Set aside. With a melon baller or pairing knife, cut out apple core leaving the apple intact. With a pairing knife or peeler, peel a long strip of apple skin from the very top of the apple and the very bottom, leaving the skin on in the middle. With a mandolin or knife, slice the apple into rings 1/8 inch thick. Squeeze lemon juice onto apple rings. Mix cinnamon, nutmeg and ground ginger together. Rub/lightly dust tops and bottoms of the apple rings. Stack the rings back into the apple shape on the cookie sheet. With the apple peel from the top and bottom, curl the skin, inside out, around your finger to create a rosette. Place the rosette in the apple stack hole on the top. Drizzle a little bit of coconut oil on each castle. Bake in the oven …

Integratron ~ Landers, CA

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Do you feel like your life is really missing an alien-designed-cell-regenerating-perfect-acoustic-chamber-and-possible-time-machine-in-the-middle-of-the-desert? If so, we’ve got you covered. The Integratron—that afore-mentioned chamber—is kinda unlike any other experience you’ll have on Planet Earth. People throw around words like “magical” and “mystical”. We’d say it’s insanely cool and relaxing. A huge white dome in an empty stretch of desert in Landers, CA just outside of Joshua Tree, you could easily believe this thing is ready for lift-off at any moment. The folklore is definitely other-worldly. It goes something like this: in 1953, George Van Tassel supposedly got instructions from an alien race from Venus declaring that humans were the most annoying species in the galaxy because we spend our entire lives being ignorant and destructive and by the time we finally learn what life is really all about, we die. What a waste! Their plan was to help us humans live longer, so we could actually do some good in the world and evolve human consciousness beyond being the bratty teenagers of the galaxy. Tassel’s idea was to …

Kensington Presents The Dustbowl Revival at The Viaduct

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Stepping into The Viaduct feels like unlocking the door to The Secret Garden—if that garden was a tiny park and entertainment venue hidden under Downtown’s Buena Vista Bridge beside the LA River with the MTA line zooming like a silver bullet overhead. If you’ve ever wondered what it would feel like if Downtown LA itself invited you to it’s “closest friends only” living room party, this is it. Located deep in the far end of Los Angeles State Historic Park with the sweeping cityscape twinkling in the background, it really doesn’t get much cooler than this. Kensington, the folks behind the Angeleno Heights free porch concert series, has teamed up with the California State Parks Department to bring completely unique one-of-a-kind nights to this intimate space. We checked out their summer concert event, featuring local Americana roots faves The Dustbowl Revival and openers The Eagle Rock Gospel Singers. Dustbowl had the crowd on its feet all night–stomping, jumping and dancing along in a full-blown LA hootenanny. We chowed down on BBQ ribs from Earlez Grille …

Ricing Cauliflower

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  Being allergic to gluten, I plan to experiment with gluten-free recipes for our Sirens & Scoundrels. Riced cauliflower is a great alternative to flour for pizza crusts and a healthy alternative to traditional starches like rice or potatoes. I don’t own a microwave. I choose to cook “old school”. So here’s some tips I’ve learned along the way for ricing cauliflower. Dice the cauliflower tops off the head. You will be using the tops only, not the stalks. In a food processor, puree the cauliflower heads. Pour a small amount of water in the bottom of a pot, just enough to not touch the bottom of the colander that you will place inside. Bring to a boil, then add the pureed cauliflower into the colander in the pot. Cover and cook 5 minutes and remove from steam and heat. Let the cauliflower drain and cool to room temperature. Place 2 Tbsp of cooled cauliflower onto a cheese cloth (I used a linen napkin) to ring out any excess moisture. Quick Tips: Let the cauliflower cool to room temp so as …