Butternut Squash Ravioli

This butternut squash ravioli recipe is the ultimate fall cooking project! Pockets of homemade pasta surround a rich, creamy squash and sage filling.

If you’re ever wondering how to spend a rainy, gray fall day, here’s your answer: make this butternut squash ravioli recipe! It’s a bit of a project, as you’ll make both the pasta and the filling from scratch, but Jack and I can attest that it’s a total blast. Your kitchen will fill with the mouthwatering aroma of roasting squash, shallots, and sage, and you’ll have a chance to get a little crafty as you carefully fill and punch out each piece of butternut squash ravioli. Then comes the best part: you eat! I love to serve my butternut squash…

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Sautéed Kale

This easy sautéed kale recipe is healthy, delicious, and versatile. Serve it as a side dish, or add it to grain bowls, pastas, frittatas, and more!

If you’ve never cooked sautéed kale before, now’s the time to try it! It’s a versatile side dish, just as at home alongside a bowl of soup as it is next to a pile of pasta, but it’s also a fantastic cooking component. My recipe calls for 6 ingredients (3 of which are olive oil, salt, and pepper), and it cooks up in under 5 minutes. Because it’s so simple, it’s one of my go-to additions to clear-out-the-fridge frittatas, quick weeknight pastas, improvised grain bowls, and more. As an added bonus, it’s jam-packed with nutrients, and it tastes delicious. Kale…

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Almond Flour Pancakes

These almond flour pancakes are light, fluffy, and filled with delicious nutty flavor. They're an easy, satisfying gluten-free breakfast or brunch!

If you like pancakes that are light, fluffy, moist, and flavorful (who doesn’t?!), you’re going to LOVE these almond flour pancakes! I had the idea to make them last spring, when Jack and I were saving our limited supply of regular flour for baking projects like pita, bagels, and no-knead bread. All-purpose flour is easier to come by now, but in our house, these almond flour pancakes are sticking around for good. This almond flour pancake recipe is totally grain and gluten-free, but it’s just as good as any traditional pancake recipe I’ve tried. The pancakes are soft and tender,…

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Roasted Delicata Squash

If you've never roasted delicata squash, get ready to fall in love! It's a breeze to prepare, and it has a rich, creamy texture and delicious sweet flavor.

If you’ve never roasted delicata squash before, get ready to fall in love! When winter squash appears at farmers markets and grocery stores each year, I’m excited to get my hands on all of it – acorn squash, butternut squash, sugar pie pumpkins, and more. But delicata squash is my favorite by far. Nicknamed the “sweet potato squash,” it has a sweet, velvety flesh that caramelizes beautifully in the oven. But that’s not all. Thanks to its small size and thin, edible skin, it’s super easy to work with. That’s right – you don’t have to peel it! In fact,…

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Pear Salad with Balsamic and Walnuts

Sweet, juicy pears balance a tangy balsamic vinaigrette in this pear salad recipe. Simple, elegant, and delicious, it's a perfect autumn side dish.

This pear salad recipe celebrates some of the fall produce that we don’t talk about often enough. For just a moment, we’re all going to forget about apples and squash. This is the season of crisp fennel, tender greens, and sweet, juicy pears that just beg you to eat them. Together, these three fall ingredients create a salad that’s simple, flavorful, and gorgeous. It’s elegant enough for a special occasion meal, but it’s so easy to make that you’ll toss it together for everyday dinners and lunches too. Chopped pecans, walnuts, and hazelnuts add rich, nutty flavor and crunch to…

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Apple Crumble

This apple crumble recipe is easier than pie, but it's just as delicious. An oat-y, nutty topping covers a thick layer of warmly spiced fall apples.

Fall might technically begin on September 22, but in our house, it never really arrives until I make this apple crumble recipe. Of all the apple desserts out there, it’s the one I come back to every year. An oat-y, nutty crumble topping covers a thick layer of warmly spiced fall apples. It’s eons easier than pie, and for my money, it’s just as good. So if you have a surplus of apples from a trip to an orchard, a farmers market, or the store, I hope you try this apple crumble recipe! It takes just over 30 minutes to…

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Homemade Soft Pretzels

We love making this soft pretzel recipe on weekend afternoons! It's super fun to make, and the pretzels are always chewy, flavorful, and delicious.

If you love fall baking but need a break from pumpkin spice, make homemade soft pretzels! Way back in the early years of Love and Lemons, Jack and I shared a vegan soft pretzel recipe that continues to be one of the most popular recipes on the site. A few weeks ago, when we were in the mood for a fun weekend project, we decided to give the old recipe a go. Our homemade pretzels came out pretty well, but we thought we could make them even better. This soft pretzel recipe is a new and improved version of the…

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Jalapeño Poppers

These baked jalapeño poppers are the ultimate game day snack! They're crispy on top, creamy in the middle, and packed with delicious savory flavor.

If anything could turn me into a sports fan, it’d be these baked jalapeño poppers! Like all the best game day snacks (looking at you, salsa and guac), they’re simple, tasty, and really darn fun. The day I took these photos, I planned to eat just one or two jalapeño poppers straight from the oven, to check that the flavors were right. Before I knew it, I’d had 3, 4… I think it’s safe to say that the flavors were a-ok. 🙂 Of course, I couldn’t write a jalapeño poppers recipe without adding a fresh twist. These jalapeño poppers are…

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Healthy Pumpkin Muffins

These easy pumpkin muffins are moist, tender, and warmly spiced—the perfect fall treat! Make a batch, and it'll disappear before you know it.

These pumpkin muffins are perfect for fall! They’re soft, super moist, and deliciously spiced—cinnamon, allspice, and more fill them with seasonal flavor. But best of all, they’re so easy to make. You can whip them up in less than an hour with a couple of mixing bowls and a whisk. No mixer required here! I love that these pumpkin muffins taste sweet, but not too sweet, so that they can pass for breakfast or a healthy snack. Enjoy one (or two) in the morning with a cup of coffee, and then grab another for an afternoon pick-me-up. If you have any…

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Pumpkin Pie Spice

If you like fall baking, you'll love having this homemade pumpkin pie spice in your kitchen. It adds cozy autumn flavor to muffins, pies, and more!

It’s pumpkin spice season! Though I’ll never be the kind of person who runs out to get a pumpkin spice latte on the first day of fall, I do enjoy a thick slice of pumpkin bread or a puffy pumpkin muffin at this time of year. When I make these cozy fall treats, I always use homemade pumpkin pie spice instead of buying a spice mix in a jar. Why? Well, just like when I make my own Everything Bagel Seasoning, I can control the ratios of each component. I like my homemade pumpkin pie spice to be heavy on…

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Sweet Potato Salad

This roasted sweet potato salad recipe is a perfect fall lunch or side dish! Feta cheese, avocado, and a bright tahini dressing fill it with flavor.

I hope you’re all excited, because this sweet potato salad recipe is the first of many fall salads that I have coming your way this season! I love salad all year long (Like, who can say no to a tomato salad in the summer?), but fall salads have a special place in my heart. We move away from juicy summer bounty towards sweeter, starchier veggies like sweet potatoes and squash. And after a few months of craving leafless salads filled with tomatoes and corn, I want nothing more than a bowl of fall greens like spinach, arugula, or kale. Together,…

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A food blog with fresh, zesty recipes.
Photograph of Jeanine Donofrio and Jack Mathews in their kitchen

Hello, we're Jeanine and Jack.

We love to eat, travel, cook, and eat some more! We create & photograph vegetarian recipes from our home in Chicago, while our shiba pups eat the kale stems that fall on the kitchen floor.