In a matter of days my vegan soul sister Melisser (The Urban Housewife) is moving to Vienna. Amazing, right? It’s silly, because she’s all the way in San Francisco now anyway, but I admit I’m a little sad knowing that soon she’ll be even further away from me. Of course, once her book The Vegan [...]

Do you love cake, but hate cancer? Are you looking for something fun to do this week end? Are you conveniently located near the middle of this fine country of ours?Well then come on out to Hometown Days in Verona, WI and join me for Baking Magic for Kids‘ Inaugural Pie and Cake Bake-off to [...]

Hey everyone! It’s your friendly neighborhood monster slayer with something cool to do this month if you like monsters, pretty ladies and art! It’s the Full Body of Horror Drink & Draw event at Lucky Number Grill on May 28th. Drink, draw and be merry – just bring your own sketch book! Live models will [...]

This Thursday, May 6th, I’m making my second appearance on WTTW’s Chicago Tonight along side Dana Joy Altman of Real Food Rehab and Angie Montroy of Angie’s Pantry. If you watched our last appearance you may remember the Great Macaron Misunderstanding. Well rest assured that we will be clearing up the difference between a French [...]

A few weeks ago I received an email from the peeps Threadless that literally made me squeal with joy on the El. To paraphrase, it said, “Hey Natalie, I see that you are awesome. We at Threadless are also awesome. Perhaps you’d like to be a Threadcakes judge this year?” After I got done making all [...]

Earlier this month I was honored to be invited to judge the inaugural Baking Magic for Kids Bake Off! It takes place on June 13th at Verona Wisconsin’s Hometown Days. First of all, it has been a life-long dream of mine to judge a cake contest at a country fair-type joint. I mean, that is [...]

Mad love to everyone who came out to see Lisa and I at the WildClaw Dance of the Demented! Even though my voice was shot I had lots of fun gawking at mostly-naked ladies and watching Lisa get hit on all night. One of the highlights was catching (amazing) costume designer Thomas Spanos not-so-sneekily taking [...]

Last week I dubbed myself a “crusty old bake sailor” because of my new found love of bake sales. This week end I’m sailing the bake sale seas once more, this time to raise money for Chicago’s fabulous WildClaw Theater. You may remember that in October I was a judge for their awesome old time [...]

First of all, thank you to everyone who stopped by the Arluck’s Tender Bakery table at Arluck Time this past Thursday night. Lisa, Shannon and I (from here on out known as the ladies of Brutal Snack) had so much fun slangin’ cupcakes and educating Chicago’s metal scene about proper French macarons! Thanks to our [...]

If you were to walk by the Chicago Tonight green room last night you would have seen what appeared to be three very different women nervously making conversation over a basket of peanut butter cookies. Had you come inside with us, though, you would have met three people on a similar mission – to de-stigmatize [...]