Well, I’ve moved! Better in French has moseyed on over to BetterInFrench.com

Until I can figure out how to have my virtual cake and eat it too, by somehow meshing my Tumblr site with my new-and-improved site, you’ll have to check out all new posts by visiting me there.

Tell me how you like the new digs!

See you soon.

XOXO Miranda

During my recent trip to Las Vegas, we took a window shopping stroll through the Wynn, where my in-laws were staying. I was calm, cool, and collected until I saw this, and stopped dead in my flat, equestrian-chic boots:

Spellbound, I dropped Paul’s hand, and floated toward the open doors of this store, my eyes and mouth wide open. I may have stopped breathing.

“It’s, it’s…” I silently opened and closed my jaw, willing the words to form in my throat and come out. They didn’t. I lovingly fingered the stately black plaque on the wall, and peered around the corner.

The salesman looked at me, and smiled. I tripped into the store, breathless, and out came each and every word I had been trying to produce for the last minute. All at once:

“Ohmygosh! It’s—you’re—they’re! Manolo Blahniks! They’re so beaaauuuutifuuuul! Look! Oh, feathers! Ohmygosh ohmygosh ohmygosh! Could I, um, take a picture? Please!”

Too amused by my reverence to be concerned about the accompanying threat of hyperventilation, he kindly let me snap away to my heart’s content.

I was particularly fixated on these feathered beauties:

As I lingered over them lovingly, cooing, my brother-in-law Justin strolled in.

“Justin!” I gasped. “Look!”

Justin is an acclaimed jewelry designer in New York, and isn’t quite as bowled over by encounters of the exquisitely feathered kind as I am—such things are de rigueur in his beautifully decorated world, but he’s sweet enough to humor me.

“Wouldn’t they tickle your toes?” he asked.

I turned to face him.

“Honey—I haven’t felt my toes in years.”

I am thankful for all sorts of things on this Thanksgiving eve, including this insanely easy berry pie I adapted from two existing recipes.

The fantastic thing about it is not only that it’s yummy, and relatively healthy—as far as pies go, anyway—but that it’s so easy to make, and completely adaptable.

I happened to have 1 bag of mixed frozen berries in my freezer, and a lone apple when I first attempted this, so that’s what the below recipe reflects. But, you can use any combination of berry/apple, or just apple/just berry you desire. That’s why I’ve dubbed it “Whatever’s Clever Pie”.

Also, if you want a fuller, chubbier pie, just up the amount of fruit, and scale the other filling ingredients accordingly. Feel free to make tweaks as you see fit—the ingredients are so simple, it’s virtually impossible to screw up!

I’ll be making it tomorrow for Thanksgiving, and know it’s going to give the traditional pumpkin version a run for its money. If you are still on the lookout for an easy holiday pie, try this one—you’ll love it. And perhaps more importantly, so will everyone else.

Whatever’s Clever Pie w/ Streusel Topping

Pie Filling:

1 bag of mixed frozen berries  (if strawberries are included, I would recommend

that you slice them into thirds before adding them into the mix)

1 Apple, thinly sliced

2 heaping tablespoons of cornstarch—or more if you want a thicker, less juicy, cobbler-like pie (flour can be used in place of cornstarch)

1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1/2 teaspoon coriander

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 —1/2 cup brown sugar

Pie Crust:

One 9-inch piecrust (I used a frozen whole wheat version from Whole Foods)

Streusel Topping:

3 tablespoons cold butter, cut into pats

1/4 cup whole wheat all purpose flour

2 tablespoons brown sugar

1 – 2 packages of instant blueberry oatmeal, uncooked

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees

Mix your dry ingredients for the pie filling in a bowl

Then, add in the mixed berries and apple

Sprinkle the lemon juice into the bowl

Now, toss the filling with your hands, mixing gently (no squeezing—that comes later!). Make sure that every piece of fruit is properly covered with the mixture

Finally, pour the contents of the bowl into your piecrust of choice, and set aside

Now, onto the Streusel topping:

Again, mix the dry ingredients together in a (clean/dry) bowl

Drop in the butter pats, and start squeezing and mixing with your fingers. You are working the dry oatmeal, flour, and brown sugar together with the butter, so that the butter will be dispersed completely, and bind the ingredients together—we don’t want clumps of butter, or dry and lonely bits of oats/flour

Keep at it—the consistency you are aiming for is similar to raw cookie dough

If you find the mixture is too wet, add a bit more flour, conversely, if it’s too dry, add a bit more butter

Once this is achieved, drop bits of the streusel topping onto the waiting pie, until you’ve used up all of the streusel

Get ready to pop the pie into the oven

The pie is done when the streusel topping has become lightly toasted, the pie filling is bubbling, and the fruit is cooked and soft, approximately 45 minutes. It will look like this:

Let the pie cool for a bit—so you don’t burn your mouth like I did—and enjoy!

Paul and I took advantage of the sunny fall Sunday, loaded our pups Bailey and Lola into the car, and headed for Huntington Beach Central Park.

We stopped first for NY Style bagels at Bagelmania in Huntington Beach—now my destination for perfect bagels in an adorable setting, with colorful old school sodas, and the best service—and then parked at the Park Bench Cafe adjacent to the park. Because HB Central Park is such a popular spot for dogs and the people who love them, the Park Bench Cafe offers both a human and canine menu, which can be enjoyed al fresco at one of their many picnic tables. We spent two hours walking through the park, where we met ducks, a baby Beagle named Zoe, and discovered that Southern California really does have seasons.

And although we were still full from breakfast, we picked up dessert for our tired puppies on the way out.

I spent last week/end in Las Vegas, celebrating my in-laws’ 35th wedding anniversary. We had a lovely time, adored our hotels (reviews and photos coming, soon) and even managed to catch a show: Cirque du Soleil’s Le Reve, which was phenomenal. My MIL and I sat next to each other so we could have someone to squeal to, but were both so breathtaken, I could only blindly bat her arm a few times, eyes jumping around the stage. I may have managed a squeak or two, but really can’t be sure. I also may have bruised her with those aimless hand swats, but am double crossing my fingers that this isn’t the case—I have beyond lucked out in the in-law department.

Since it was fabulous Las Vegas and all, we gussied ourselves up, and I debuted my new vintage (oxymoron, I know) dangly costume diamond earrings. I matched them with a blue dress from F21—you’d never guess—and perfect red pumps from Miss Sixty. The perfection of my shoe selection became even more apparent during the show; there is a magical number during which a dozen water acrobats perform a peppy dance number fully submerged, save for their red heels flashing in the air.

My shoes have been dying to do the same ever since, and although I fear they’ll never reach such heights of stardom and glamour, the least I can do is post a photo of them. The images are a bit blurry, I realize, but a promise is a promise.

You’ve heard that phrase, right? Use it or lose it? It’s true, you know. Don’t worry if you don’t believe me; it just means that you’re under the age of 25. And at the wizened—er, wise—age of 27, I can tell you with conviction that you’ll soon understand exactly what it means.

This photo below, for example. I made this sandwich three weeks ago, tops. It’s a vegetarian version of a BLT, using grilled BBQ tempeh in place of the bacon, spinach instead of lettuce, plus cheese.

I was going to do a blog post about it, extol the virtues of my grill pan, and try to make your most likely meat-loving mouth water at the sight of tofu. And of course, give you instructions for how to recreate the yummy.

That’s when I made the fatal error. Instead of writing down the sandwich instructions—I mean, seriously, it’s a faux BLT, how hard can it be to remember? —I snapped the photos, and saved them to my computer for a rainy blog day.

And so, here we are. And no matter how hard I squint at my screen, bite my tongue, and make my totally unattractive “what the…?” face, I can’t retrieve the memory of what cheese I used. I can see from the photo that it’s melty like Cheddar or Swiss, but…I’m running through our past few Whole Food trips in my mind, and I can’t say for sure.

Any guesses? If so, for heaven’s sake email them to me, don’t tell me in person. I’m clearly in need of a paper trail.

So, I finally got around to setting up a Flickr account, because all the kids are doing it, and my husband Paul has sworn it will improve my quality of life by, oh, 3%. At least.

Last night I uploaded a few blog photos, and lo and behold: upon waking, I had very sweet Flickr comments waiting on my screen.

While people saying nice things about you never, ever, ever gets old, I was most intrigued by an offer to upload the Jeffery Campbell shoe shot I posted here awhile back, to this website: FootEarth.com, where they are…well, they say it best on one of the spiffiest sites I’ve ever seen, so I’ll let them do the honors: