DES MOINES – Kassie Mather wasn’t anxious at the finals of the 2013 Hy-Vee Cake Designer Challenge Wednesday. The same couldn’t be said of her family. Standing near Mather’s work table, watching as she transformed cupcakes, sheet cakes and sugar cookies into popcorn, hot dogs and a rotating carousel, they whispered amongst themselves about her [...]

  Eastern Iowa doughnut lovers had recent cause to celebrate when Dunkin’ Donuts announced plans to open stores in Cedar Rapids and Coralville. Did you know, though, that the company owes its signature menu item — the doughnut — to the son of Jewish immigrants? The concept for mass-produced doughnuts, too, can be traced to [...]

  We’ve all heard it before: Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. And if there’s a country that does breakfast right, it’s Ireland. The traditional Irish breakfast — sausage, eggs and potatoes served with Irish soda bread or brown bread — was customarily made to fortify individuals for a busy and active [...]

“Did you do the vinaigrette?” Shedrie Smith asks one of her teammates, as an adult woman reminds the ladies that they have four minutes left. Smith then bangs a bottle of the dressing on a table, in complete contrast to the quick but delicate way she dispenses the liquid onto beds of leafy greens. It’s [...]

CEDAR RAPIDS – Cake was Kassie Mather’s focus at Tuesday’s Cedar Rapids Regional Hy-Vee Cake Designer Challenge, but she couldn’t leave her helpful smile behind. “People stop to watch and I want to ask them if I can help with anything,” Mather, a cake decorator from the Edgewood Road Hy-Vee, said with a laugh. The [...]

DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) — The smell of bacon was in the air Saturday as thousands converged on Iowa’s capital city for an increasingly popular festival celebrating all things connected with the meat. Some people wore Viking hats and others walked around with makeshift snouts for the Blue Ribbon Bacon Festival. The annual event featured [...]

  Quick – what’s the No. 1 snack served at Super Bowl parties? Chips and dip? Pizza? Chili? The answer is chicken wings. Chicken wings burst on the scene in the 1980s, at a time when consumers were shifting their chicken loyalties from the whole bird to boneless-skinless breast meat. This left the wings cheep-cheep [...]

  CEDAR RAPIDS — At 10 years old, Emma Cavanagh isn’t old enough to vote in Tuesday’s election, but she and 15 other budding chefs learned Oct. 28 that you are never too young to eat, and cook, healthy meals. Cavanagh was one of the young cooks who participated in the first Young Chef’s Academy [...]

It’s Bulk Foods Week! A lot of Eastern Iowa grocery stores are participating, so click here to find one near you and read this press release about the benefits of buying in bulk! National Bulk Foods Week press release: Portland, Ore. – Imagine if there were an aisle in the grocery store where many everyday [...]