Dana DeVolk

Dana DeVolk founded This Silly Girl’s Kitchen in 2012 and built it over twelve years into the comfort food home it still is today. Hundreds of the recipes on this site are hers.

Dana DeVolk, founder of This Silly Girl's Kitchen
Dana DeVolk, who started This Silly Girl’s Kitchen in 2012.

Who Dana is

Dana is a culinary-trained chef, recipe developer and food photographer. She started the site in August 2012 under its original name, This Silly Girl’s Life, and grew it into a kitchen that thousands of home cooks came back to week after week. Her approach shaped everything here: good food should not be complicated, and a recipe should work the first time you make it.

She is also the author of the cookbook The Cozy Table, published by Penguin Random House.

Dana’s recipes on this site

Every recipe Dana and her team developed between 2012 and 2025 is still here. Posts she wrote carry her name in the byline, and recipe cards show who first developed the dish and when it was last tested or updated. Some of the most-loved recipes on the site are hers, including Rice Pudding with Cooked Rice, Sweet and Sour Sauce and Chick-fil-A Mac and Cheese.

The site today

In January 2026, Jason Decker and his family took over This Silly Girl’s Kitchen. Dana is no longer involved in running the site. Jason and his daughters cook her recipes again, update them, and add new ones of their own, building on the foundation she laid. You can read the whole story on the About page.

Find Dana

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Recipes by Dana

See every post bylined Dana DeVolk.