11/23/08: Nut Roll!!!

So here are pics of the crazy amount of nut roll I made for the bake sale. Ok so it wasn't that many really but considering I started at 11pm at night it was a lot :) Anywho it was fun and messy, yay!

Some exploded, some were nice and pretty, all made a mess, and all were wrapped!

11/26/07: After the Turkey

We had a loverly thanksgiving here, hope you did too! And then the following day the sis had another birthday. So I made her a colorful cake using the jello meringues I mentioned before. Turns out that the jello was too strong for my tastes, plain old meringues are yummier, but they did make for fun decoration on the cake.

01/10/07: Happy Birthday Mom!

It is my mother's birthday today and the day that usually ends our holiday season :) So we had a yummy crab dinner and I made her a pumpkin cake roll with cream cheese filling. I thought it was pretty yummy and it came from the Splenda cookbook I got for christmas. Some pretty tasty desserts in there from the looks of it, although this is only the first recipe I have tried I have decided I love the book.

10/24/06: Bakin' Again

Dunno why but when it gets colder out I wanna bake. So I made an apple pie last week. It came out ok, a little on the tart side and not enough cinnamon. But even so, warmed up it was very yummy I think.

And this week I decided on something more fun. Gingerbread cookies. I had a pumpkin cookie recipe too but decided just to make pumpkin shapes instead. Now I feel all appropriately fall-ish just in time for my trip to hot hot hot Indonesia tomorrow. Just checked the weather and it looks like it will be a sultry 95 degrees the whole time. Woo hoo! It always seems a little too hot at first but then I just love it. Anywho the plan is to bring some cookies there to give them a taste of fall too. Very excited!!

In knitting news I will still be going to Rhinebeck, just not looking like I will be wearing that new sweater, it is still sleeveless. We shall see how the final packing goes tonight maybe there will be time to put it all together, I mean the clothes are all washed and clean so it is possible. Yeah baking got in the way of that plan, oops!

P.S. I wrote this before I left for my trip, but I am now here on vacation! yay! Never got arround to uploading the photos but perhaps i will do that at some point we shall see. Didn't finish the sweater and barely got to say hello to people at Rhinebeck, it was kind of a whirlwind but fun anyways. Ok off to relax some more!

07/05/06: Blueberry Waffles Please

We had a nice big American breakfast to celebrate the fourth, amoung other activities. Four days of parties was lots of fun! Since we saw fireworks the night before we just played with sparklers to close out the weekend.



Check out the pretty rainbow we saw the day before, which is very rare here. Of course it was much more brilliant in person.

06/29/06: Finishing up Some Tasks

I am very behind in finishing some post wedding tasks. So this past weekend I finally went out and used up the gift certificates at Williams Sonoma. Now that was fun! I got some funky baking tools for me and a nice indoor grill for the hubby.



These oatmeal raisin cookies were made for a belated Fathers Day to my Dad. They are his favorite kind of cookie making them allowed me to use my new cookie sheets, joy! Best part is these sheets don't warp like the old ones, nice! I also got to use the Martha Stewart Baking book my Mom gave me. She has you add coconut to the cookies, which I have never done before, but I think it really made these come out yummier than usual.

I also got the cute little prep bowls, I think I love them.

Next I got a funky batter dispenser that is really meant for pancake batter but I thought I would try it with cupcake batter. It was a messy start but it made filling the trays go a lot faster I must say! It will be great to use next time I make waffles, I always get batter all over the place with a ladle so this should help.

Again I used the Martha book for the cupcakes. It was the one bowl chocolate cupcake recipe. Everything was smelling very good at this point. I on the other hand was becoming a bit of a clumsy oaf. I was making a mess, but hey that is part of the fun right?

Then I used this funky little frosting pump. I made some cream filling and smooshed it inside the cupcakes. I decided baking hostess style was the best way to get to use more of the gadgets.



Next up was making chocolate ganache. Found a recipe on the WS website for their chocolate macaroons. It was awful yummy, dipped some cupcakes while it was still warm and then used the frosting piper again after I chilled the ganache for a thicker consistency to top off some of the other cupcakes. Aren't the mini ones cute?



I cheated on the very last part and used this frosting in a can thing for the white. I could have washed out the piper and put in the white frosting I made but just didn't want to clean it out at that point. I thought about going to pastry school for a few minutes before I started putting the frosting on but after seeing my decorating skills I think I need to practice at home more first :) Messy looking but they taste good and I sure had fun with the gadgets. Oh and they came out amazingly chocolatey.

03/29/06: Cookies Within Cookies

I got a fun cookie book, bigfatcookies by Elinor Klivans, a couple weeks ago and finally gave a recipe a try. I have to say that I bought the book because of the fun layout and I also got its partner cupcake book for that same reason. But, as it turns out the recipies look great too, and so far I have made the Cookie in a Cookie recipe and loved it! First you make your chocolate chip cookies the normal way, then let them cool and crumble it into the rest of the cookie batter and back the final cookie.

Check out the batter before adding the bits of already baked cookie and after.



Here is the first round of baking, all smooth and pretty.



Then here is the final cookie all textured and twice as yummy!



I think these are the best chocolate chip cookies I have ever made. Next time I am thinking of adding macadamia nuts! I love this book and can't wait to try more of the cookies in it.