I fly quite a bit. Not like businessman-who-travels-for-work-every-week flies a lot, but west-coaster-moved-east-coast-and-now-has-to-hit-every-state-in-pacific-time-every-few-months flies a lot. I zoom here and there and judge your family of five’s ability to get through TSA at least once a month.

It is because of this flying habit that I’ve created some fairly strict rules for myself regarding the airport, AKA the wild west of modern civilization. Truly, why there are seemingly no laws in place at major airports worldwide is beyond me. Is this why airports are the best places? Yes, of course. You can have a beer or a coffee at any hour, a sentence which would be deemed problematic in most other settings. And there always seems to be a bird flying around? Gross.

Momentary pause for this John Mulaney bit that I think of any time someone mentions a bird in an airport.

Airports, for better or for worse, are environments of sweet reunion, deep depression, immense confusion, and random sprinting that includes begging kind strangers to let you cut the line, the same line that is the only real structure present at Frankfurt International. (Even the best of us are bad travelers sometimes.) But I digress.

Food, to the great shock of no one, plays a large part in my airport rules, right after always going through pre-check even if your travel companion doesn’t have it and avoiding checking a bag at all costs (otherwise you may end up in a pickle in Frankfurt…again). Since most of my flights are 4+ hours—the burden of living on the opposite coastline as where I grew up and attended college—I have to prepare accordingly. Below are some ways I optimize the entirety of my flying experience:

If a flight is more than 4.5 hours, the pre-flight ritual is a gin martini with a twist at the airport bar. Ideally, accompanied by chicken wings.
If you aren’t eating chicken wings at the airport, eat right before you leave your house. You can also pack a killer steak sandwich (recipe below) to take with you and make all your fellow passengers jealous.
Thou shalt always have an emergency protein bar in your personal item (in addition to a spare pair of underwear and socks).
Fully. Charged. Noise-cancelling. Headphones! (I live in my Bose headphones, yes they’re worth the money.)
Having a fully charged portable phone charger is also on the list, just in case your flight doesn’t have a USB outlet OR if that outlet doesn’t work. I’m generally in the back of the bus where they don’t care about electronic needs, so this has saved me on a variety of occasions.
Pack an empty water bottle (preferably a Hydroflask) to fill up post-security. I usually have an electrolyte pack or two with me as well, so I’ll add one for the flight.
Have a homemade snack and sweet treat available for flights over 3 hours.
Redeye flights are more doable than you think, you just need compression socks, a really comfortable sweatshirt, and a window seat.

To say I have flying down to a science is generous (see multiple mentions of a near-catastrophe in Frankfurt), but I’ve gotten very comfortable with my system. And even though I travel a lot, I don’t just want to get to my destination—I want to feel good upon my arrival. Which is why I’m carting around compression socks, electrolytes, and homemade snacks. Something, like a very scary descent into Portland International Airport recently, is bound to come up, so I like to be in control of…well, at least what’s for dinner.

Here’s what I made this week: Steak sandwiches, a simple salmon plate with smashed potatoes and dilly yogurt, hot honey ricotta w/ cucumbers, the best chocolate chip cookies, a ground turkey veggie skillet, the US Open’s signature honeydeuce, and a grapefruit olive oil cake.

Hyperfixation Steak Sammie

If you’d really like to wow your gate agent and fellow passengers, wrap this bad boy up in aluminum foil and enjoy it before getting on the plane. YES, before the flight is recommended as it has a potential messy factor and consuming foods with many smells (even the best ones, like this) is NOT proper airport etiquette.

For this steak sandwich I toasted a ciabatta role from Trader Joe’s, rubbing a garlic clove on both sides once toasted. Then I assembled like so: Fresh, low-moisture mozzarella, flank steak, roasted red pepper, fresh basil, and arugula that was dressed with balsamic glaze. I’ve been dreaming about this sandwich ever since I made it—to say it’s my new hyperfixation meal is an understatement.

Steak can be intimidating, but it really doesn’t have to be. To do, you must begin! There’s my Yoda-adjacent encouragement for you today. I keep it simple and prepare steak as follows:

Marinate flank steak in a little olive oil, coconut aminos, Worcestershire sauce, freshly grated garlic, flaky salt, and freshly cracked black pepper.
Let this come to room temperature as it marinates—about 30 minutes.
Using a cast iron skillet on medium heat, sear the first side of your steak. Flip after 4 minutes for the other side. Check the internal temperature of your steak using a meat thermometer and wait until the steak is about 3 degrees under the doneness (here’s a helpful chart!) you’d like it to be at. It will finish cooking off the heat.
Once done, pull the steak off the heat and let it set for 10 minutes before cutting against the grain.

In other hyperfixation news, I’ve had this song on repeat. Alex Warren really just scratches that itch, and adding Luke Combs to the track is just icing on the cake. Spotify Wrapped, watch out.

Simple salmon w/ smashed potatoes & dilly yogurt

I know, I know—more salmon. ‘She can’t get enough!” OK, sue me? When you’re insufferably confident in a piece of seafood’s ability to make your day better, you’re likely to add it to the ole rotation on a regular basis, which is exactly how I feel about this omega-3 rich fish.

I did a simple sear (with salt, pepper, garlic salt, and onion powder) on my salmon in the cast iron. I served it with a kale salad that I made by massaging kale leaves with flaky salt, lime juice, some olive oil, and topping it with parmesan cheese. But the star of the show is the smashed potatoes.

Making smashed potatoes is simple: Parboil your baby potatoes (or, if you’re a Trader Joe’s shopper, your “teeny tiny potatoes”), move them to the air fryer, smash them with a mallet, and let them crisp up before serving. The result? Most surface areas for crunch compared to normal air fryer roast potatoes. I love them.

I serve my smashed potatoes with dilly yogurt sauce. It’s my version of ranch that I always keep in the fridge. Simply combine whole fat Greek yogurt, lime juice, flaky salt, pepper, garlic powder, onion powder, and a LOT of finely chopped fresh dill. It will stay good through the yogurt’s expiration date.

Hot honey ricotta w/ cucumbers

A few weeks ago, my house hosted a last minute girls’ night. And by girls’ night, what I really mean is three women gathering together to figure out the absolute circus act that was their lives for the 24 hours prior. This required snacks, but I hadn’t gone to the grocery store in a week. Enter: My go-to snack, cucumbers with hot honey ricotta. I usually have a tub of ricotta, and at least one cucumber floating around my fridge at any given time, and this night was no different.

Many of you asked for this “recipe” when it was posted on Instagram, and I’m going to show my hand here and tell you—it’s really not a recipe, more so just some light mixing and chopping. If anything, this puts on your hosting hat, not your chef whites. Spoon some ricotta in a bowl and add flaky salt, fresh cracked black pepper, and a generous pour of Mike’s Hot Honey. Mix mix mix, taste, adjust, mix again. Slice up cucumbers to your desired dipping size and enjoy!

While this is my go-to snack, it’s not my go-to airplane snack. At 40,000 feet, I’m swapping out ricotta for homemade hummus, which will last without refrigeration on long flights.

The best chocolate chip cookies

Before I thought I was going to die attempting to land at PDX last month, I was unwrapping the last remaining “best ever” chocolate chip cookies I’d made earlier in the week. This recipe belongs to Eric King, and yes, it really is the best ever. The only tweak I make is adding one extra egg. Everything else, I’m following to a T, including Eric’s “bang the pan” method which may seem a bit extra but is truly worth the small lift. If these were my last meal, I wouldn’t be angry.

Thankfully, they weren’t my last meal! Phew! So, what happened in Portland?

The 6.5 hour flight from JFK to Portland was smooth, up until it came time to land in my gorgeous home state. Me, over there in 32A, had gawked out the window at Mount Hood’s golden hour glow, eaten my snacks, finished my book, and was wrapping up Miss Congeniality 2 when things took a turn for worse.

We were about 45 seconds from touching down at PDX when our aircraft dramatically changed course. As in, we went from nearly on the ground to nose-to-the-clouds. This resulted in very particular tension amongst my fellow passengers. The pilot didn’t say a word for a couple of minutes, and we rocket shipped up up up and away.

My first, very rational thought was “oh no, obviously the plane has been hijacked.” Why else wouldn’t our normally chatty captain be filling us in on what was going on? And, how quickly can I, in 32A, jump over the two old ladies sitting next to me in order to save the day?

Eldest daughter, of course it would be my responsibility to rescue everyone.

After a small eternity (3 minutes) our pilot came over the speaker with a “sorry about that everyone, we’ll explain in a minute). Tensions were still high. Our plane is still ascending at an angle similar to a Six Flags roller coaster.

Another 2 minutes later and we get a “just had a little traffic on the ground, we’re heading back to PDX now” update through the speaker as our plane plateaued. We all began to breathe again. Did the jet bridge break when we tried to get off this God-forsaken vessel? Yes. But at that point, everyone in the cabin was so happy to be on flat ground we were very patient with the crew they sent to resolve the issue that was de-boarding.

No, our plane was not hijacked. What a relief! Instead, our captain was working to avoid a last minute collision, which is the circumstance we found ourselves in and the reason we needed to jet out of there on such short notice. That is also the reason, I have since learned, that the air space above airports is always empty. Planes fly in or out, but not up. That is so aircrafts like mine can make last minute adjustments that get them out of a potentially tragic situation quickly.

Allow me to take this time and pledge my allegiances to train travel.

Garlic butter turkey veggie skillet

I haven’t shared this on the ole blog yet, but Instagram followers know that I’ve been offering a weekly meal prep service in Brooklyn. The menu is released on Wednesdays, orders are accepted through Friday, meals can be picked up on Monday. This differs from the personal, custom private chef service (which is of course still available, but less accessible due to price point). Anyway, this week, one of the offerings was a garlic butter turkey veggie skillet.

I kept this pretty simple: turkey sautéed in a cast iron with freshly grated garlic, a tab of butter, salt, pepper, onion powder, and a pinch of cayenne. I removed the turkey, then sautéed chopped zucchini and red and orange bell peppers with the same season (sans the butter). Once the veggies were done, I added back in the turkey and mix mix mix!

I served this with air fryer sweet potatoes. The client? Very happy.

The Honeydeuce

I went to the U.S. Open last week—how fancy, I know. To say I’m hooked on tennis is an understatement. After four hours in Arthur Ashe Stadium I learned 1) how scoring works and 2) how much money people are willing to spend on posh sports food. A chicken sandwich (no fries!) was $20 and had me glancing across the parking lot to Citi Field, yearning for a Tuesday $5 hot dog.

The U.S. Open’s signature drink, the honeydeuce, is the annual “talk of the town” each August, but at $23 I couldn’t muster up the strength to get one. But, they did look refreshing enough for me to make one at home. Can confirm—light, delicious, easy to DIY! It’s also only cost you about $2.50 to make one at home compared to the $23 you’ll spend out in Flushing.

If I could find a way to smuggle one of these on a flight, then we’d be in business. Unfortunately, buying lemonade at an airport nears $23 on its own…so we’ll keep this beverage on the home front.

Grapefruit olive oil cake

I am consistently honored to be asked to make friends’ birthday cakes. One of my best gal pals texted me requesting “THE grapefruit olive oil cake” for her garden party birthday and I said “yes OF COURSE.” Said grapefruit olive oil cake comes from Molly Baz’s Cook This Book. I make this cake in a cheesecake pan and trade in the pistachio topping for a salty homemade whipped cream (heavy whipping cream, flaky salt, some refined sugar) and lemon slices.

One of my Instagram connections recently transported a wedding cake via checked bag, and I think this is my next airplane goal. I’d really level up my “food I brought with me” game if I could say I’ve done that! And, when (when!!) I accomplish this, I have to imagine it’ll be with the grapefruit olive oil cake. She’s sturdy! She can handle a quick freeze, plastic wrap, and some sweatshirt cushions to make it to her destination. As long as I’m not going through Frankfurt, I have to imagine I could pull this off without a hitch.