I have been very impatient for spring this year. It’s been exceptionally cold in Chicago and everything has just been talking for-ev-er to come up. So when I saw the first bursts of yellow dotting the yards of the lazy I got super excited! I could almost hear Oprah announcing her next guest. Please welcome, Spriiiiinnnnnggg! Continue reading “Dandelion Lemon Bars”
Glazing your gingerbread cookies is a deceptively simple way to create delicate and impressive patterns on your gingerbread cookies. The textured dough, once baked, gets brushed with a simple powdered sugar glaze and allowed to dry and crystallize.
Continue reading “Glazed Gingerbread Cookies”
I wasted about a week making a string of disastrous sheet cakes. A vanilla rhubarb cake that was tough and spongey with weeping, semi-curdled frosting. An earl grey-lemon one that was simultaneously bitter and bland. The last bright idea I had was a lemon-thyme cake with a goat cheese frosting. But I just couldn’t face another failure so I skipped it. But I had already bought the goat cheese. So I gave it a hard think and in the spirit of Reckless Experimentation decided to make a Chocolate Brownie with a Chocolate Goat Cheese Frosting and Candied Walnuts. Continue reading “Chocolate Brownie with Chocolate Goat Cheese Frosting and Candied Walnuts”
I love homemade peanut butter cookies with the little fork marks on top. And those puffy ones with the hershey kiss plopped in the center. Those are the best honestly. But when I bake I’m always looking for ways to make classic flavors and recipes conform to my rather strict visual standards. I like things to have a consistent, clean shape and tidy edges. I especially like to make things one level fancier than is necessary. These yummy peanut butter sandwich cookies do just that. Continue reading “Peanut Butter and Chocolate Sandwich Cookies”
Over the next month I will be on a mission to post every cookie that’s ever been a standard in my Christmas cookie boxes. I try each year to send a box of cookies to our relatives that we won’t be seeing during the season. It’s a special tradition for me because deep down, way way deep down, I’m sort of a softy. And nothing says Merry Christmas From Your Secretly Sentimental (emphasis on mental) Relative like a box of cookies. Continue reading “Eggnog Snickerdoodles”
I have drop-cookie issues. I know they’re tasty and easy and much beloved. But I really can’t handle the uncertainty inherent in a cookie that just gets plopped onto a cookie sheet with a spoon. I need cookies to be precisely scooped or rolled or cut out, not “dropped”. Making chocolate chip cookies leaves me deeply unsatisfied. I’ve been thinking about a cookie with dried fruit and nuts but all my internet research led straight to drop cookies. So I got to work cooking up some delicious fruit-nut cookies that could be rolled out and cut into precise circles. No blobs allowed!
This frosting is the best baking idea I’ve had in like a year. I’m sort of over pumpkin honestly so when I got a hankering for a cozy fall cake, I didn’t really know where to turn. I’m not an apple gal and carrot cake is made of vegetables. And nuts. And raisins. Come on. Continue reading “Pumpkin Cake With Molasses Cream Cheese Frosting”
I used to work for a wedding photographer back in the day, before digital photography was a thing. He was very eccentric, had a lot of odd habits and some very strong opinions. He once leapt from a moving train that had gone express mid-route to avoid being late to class. He woke up the next day in the hospital with a nasty head injury then ran a marathon 3 days later. To save time while eating he would mash entire slices of bread into dense balls he called “cowboy bread” which he washed down with as much milk as he could safely drink in one sitting. He was unapologetically hostile towards new trends in photography, such as color film. He was fond of saying, “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.” I thought he was a curmudgeon and a bit daft at the time but it turns out that’s exactly how I feel when it comes to the almighty PUMPKIN SPICE. Continue reading “Soft Chai Snickerdoodles”
I know I said that the Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies were my baby. But now I have a new baby and it’s these Chewy Molasses Cookies. At first I was worried that I wouldn’t love the Mexican Hot Chocolate Cookies as much once I posted these, but it turns out there’s enough love in my heart for both. My heart grew, as did my waistline. Continue reading “Chewy Molasses Cookies”
