Articles By: Tracy Bermeo
Summer Options!
Summer is officially here. The pool is open, I’m done packing lunch, and my kids are done counting down the final days of the school year. As much as I look forward to summer (we drove by the pool in February just to see it) even the pool becomes a little redundant. There’s only so [...]
Crock It! Summer Spaghetti Sauce
My kids requested spaghetti and meatballs for dinner. Feeling the need for comfort food, I was happy to oblige. However, the fact that my outdoor thermometer read 95 degrees (in the shade!) had me second guessing the request. The thought of having the stove going for hours made me cringe. So I experimented. I went [...]
Crock It! Creamed Corn
I had 7 ears of corn. I knew they were only going to last so long in my refrigerator and I knew they wouldn’t all be cooked immediately, so I decided that my Crock Pot would be a good place to experiment with all that corn. I found several online recipes for Creamed Corn, or [...]
Crock It! Potatoes Parmesan
As a nice Irish girl, I’m naturally attracted to potatoes. I’d even say I haven’t met a potato I didn’t like. So when I came across this recipe claiming to make the potatoes the star of the meal- I just had to try it. Let me say, I was not disappointed. The flavor is great [...]
Crock It! BBQ Pulled Pork
I have a friend who has two slow cookers and isn’t shy about making TWO pots of BBQ Pulled Pork at once: It’s that good! I love a pulled pork sandwich and when I realized how easy it is to make in a slow cooker, I actually understood why one would want to make two [...]
Crock It! Baked Beans
I have a bean pot. Most people my age don’t have one of those, but I do. I grew up with my mother making baked beans in the oven every Labor day for a big multi-family barbecue. So, naturally I was intrigued: Could a slow cooker produce the same results as my oven and a [...]
Verona Family Supports Clean Oceans
Jack and Michele Bernardino, of Verona, attended a fundraiser for Clean Ocean Action in Sea Bright, N.J. with their boys this past weekend. Clean Ocean Action is a nonprofit organization whose goal is to improve the water quality off the coasts of New Jersey and New York. Michele works for The Children’s House, a Montessori [...]
Crock It! Pepper Pork Chops
I bought pork chops with the intention of broiling them like I always do. However, as life has it, there was a busy day coming up and if I didn’t use my Crock Pot, dinner was going to be macaroni and cheese or whatever else I could pull together in a pinch. The last time [...]
Crock It! Simple Pot Roast
This is one of my favorite recipes! It was originally printed in the March & April 2002 Cooks Illustrated magazine, and then reappeared in the Best Slow and Easy Recipes from America’s Test Kitchen. While there are pot roast recipes in the book that are made specifically for the slow cooker, this is my favorite [...]
Not Kindergarten Ready? Here’s An Option
As I mentioned in a story last week, the final Verona public school kindergarten workshops were held this past Saturday. Over the next two weeks, the kindergarten screening process will begin and classes for the 2010-2011 school year will be set. For many of us, this is an exciting time just for the break in [...]