I adore a simple, crunchy, lightly sweet slice and bake butter cookie. They are lovely rolled in colored sugar, chopped nuts or coconut. For a quick Valentine’s Day treat, I rolled my cookie dough log in homemade colored sugar and shaped it into a heart when it was partially chilled. Once it was completely firm, I just sliced it, revealing darling heart cookies with a red sugar edge. Super simple and a gorgeous little gift! Recipe after the jump. Continue reading
Tag Archives: dessert
Last Minute Valentine: Slice and Bake Butter Cookies
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Valentine’s Day Cupcake Sandwiches
Last year, I couldn’t think of what to bake for Jeff for Valentine’s Day when I ran across an adorable heart-shaped Whoopie pie/muffin top pan in Michael’s and inspiration struck. He loves red velvet cupcakes so I decided to make him a sort of whoopie-pie-cupcake-sandwich hybrid. The result was gorgeous, super tasty and a less messy version of a cupcake to boot! I used the Magnolia Bakery recipe exactly, so no need to reprint, but be sure to check the cakes often because they don’t take long when they are in a shallow pan.
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Delicate Milk and Rice Flour Pudding
Longing for something simple and creamy, we ordered “rice pudding” for dessert from our favorite Mediterranean restaurant one evening. What we got was anything but simple and I immediately became obsessed. After lots of recipe research, my best guess is that it is actually called Malabi, an Israeli milk and rice flour pudding. The texture is smooth, creamy and soft. It holds its shape easily like a flan, but the rice flour and rose-water gives it a light, delicately floral flavor. The restaurant drizzled their version with a rose water syrup and sprinkles it with coconut and pistachios, but the flavors and toppings vary from recipe to recipe. Once I found my favorite version of the pudding itself, I made it a few times to perfect my version. It is extremely quick and simple to make…and our toddler adores it, so it’s a great recipe to introduce new and exotic flavors to a child who might be a little skeptical. Continue reading
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Time for Pumpkin Pie!
Thanksgiving is just a few weeks away! Here’s a photo of my pumpkin pie from last year. I always use the rolled Pillsbury pie crusts for cutting out decorations because they are evenly rolled and hold up nicely to intricate cutting, but I like a thicker, homemade crust for the base of the pie. Click through for the recipe! Continue reading
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(Three) Rustic Wedding Cakes
The largest cake was a yellow cake with salted caramel buttercream. It had two tiers and an adorable owl topper.
When your little brother and his fiancée ask you and your dad to make their wedding cake, you say “of course”, but when they ask if you can make THREE, you choke a little, then smile and still say “of course”. They insisted that they wanted something simple and rustic, but when you have to make cake for 150 people in a rented home kitchen, things will always get a little interesting. We had made three cakes for our wedding as well with only a few hitches, but we rented an industrial refrigerator for them and bought vanilla buttercream instead of making it ourselves (a huge time and money saver!). These two crazy kooks wanted flavored buttercreams and one carrot cake, so everything was made from scratch in many, many batches. Continue reading
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It’s My Birthday…Time for Lemon Velvet!
Time for my 2nd annual Lemon Velvet recipe post! This has been my birthday dessert ever since I was able to express my opinion. So…for a really long time. It is trashy, easy, and quite possibly one of the most delicious things you will ever eat. I’ve tried a fancier version of this with real whipped cream and homemade lemon pudding but it honestly couldn’t hold a candle to my mom’s original recipe.
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DIY Truffles
Truffles are the easiest candy to make at home, they are basically composed of only two ingredients and you can flavor them in a million different ways…which makes them the best Christmas gift EVER!
I carved a large stamp for the truffle boxes (click the image for the video tutorial), stamped one in red on white paper, scanned it and printed a bunch on sticker paper. They still look hand stamped but they are all perfect and low maintenance.
Since truffles are mostly just heavy cream and chocolate, you can either pre-infuse the cream with flavors by using a steeping method (whole ingredients left in hot cream for 30 minutes and then strained out) or you can add flavorings or liqueurs to the melted mix.
The basic ratio for the simplest truffle is 1 cup of heavy cream to 1 pound of chocolate (a mix of bittersweet and semisweet). The basic method is this: heat the cream to boiling, remove it from the heat for 30 seconds and then pour it over the chopped chocolate and whisk until smooth. Add a tablespoon of dark brewed coffee and a little vanilla to heighten the chocolate flavor. Let sit at room temperature until firm, scoop and form into balls and roll in cocoa powder or powdered sugar.
SUCCESS! Left to Right: Holiday Spice, Peanut Butter and Pretzel.
I decided to make 3 “truffles” this year as my Christmas gift using the steeping method…although one is really just a classic peanut butter ball! After successfully making a delicious Cinnamon Toast Ice Cream this summer by steeping the cream with buttered cinnamon toast croutons, I thought, “why not try this same technique with pretzels?” The resulting “Pretzel Truffle” is subtle, but delicious, while the other “Holiday Spice Truffle” is punchy and perfect with every one of my favorite flavors this season. How you can make your own truffles and my recipes from this year after the jump! Continue reading
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Grandma’s Peach Pie
My grandmother was “famous” for three desserts; strawberry rhubarb pie, peach pie and rice pudding. I’m not sure she ever made anything other than these three things, but boy, oh boy were they fantastic! Peaches are delicious and cheap right now, so get to the store and bake this perfect pie this weekend. Continue reading
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