Vive le Macaron

This morning, I got to spend a few hours perfecting my pastry chef skills with my very talented friend Andrea at Sur la Table. Our task: macarons. We were quickly corrected that American macaroons are the coconut desserts, where the French macarons are the shelled sandwich creme cookie. There's your lesson of the day.

Our creations included strawberry with Champagne (eh, sparkling wine, we saw the bottle) buttercream, bacon with maple buttercream, and mint with dark chocolate ganache. While I don't see myself making these very often--they are pretty labor intensive and apparently not for the amateur baker-I could see a batch for a special occasion as definitely doable.

A very fitting way to spend Bastille Day :) Vive le France!

A Domestic Kind of Saturday

The past few weekends have been pretty busy with commitments and to-do lists, so this was the first weekend I could indulge in one of my favorite hobbies-trying new recipes. Saturday, this meant baking.

Both recipes are from Smitten Kitchen: S'mores Pie and Chocolate Hazelnut Biscotti.

Chocolate Hazelnut Biscotti
Besides hazelnuts being pretty unavailable at each store I went to, this recipe was ridiculously easy.

Sliced, before heading back into the oven for the second baking.

Sunday morning biscotti!

S'mores Pie
Another pretty simple recipe, with the downsides being the time standing with the three steps. I opted to make everything, though you could easily make shortcuts and buy a graham cracker crust or buy Marshmallow Fluff in lieu of making your own.

The marshmallow making portion was the most difficult. In the recipe, it says the approximate time for whipping the gelatin and corn syrup is 5 minutes. I'm pretty sure Big Red just paid for himself being on for about 25 minutes.



I can't say the mixture tripled in size either. While it was mixing at high speed, I put some mini marshmallows I had on hand atop the pie, and then spread my own marshmallow mixture above them.

With cooling, baking, and chilling time, this recipe took close to 3 hours-and I took shortcuts. I did not let the pie cool coming out of the oven before putting the marshmallows on (another lesson in reading directions thoroughly-though it was a happy coincidence since I put the mini marshmallows on top of that layer, so they melted a bit.) The pie is supposed to chill for 3 hours after adding the topping and we went to a movie for 2. Who can really wait that long anyhow. After it comes out, the final step is broiling the pie so the top browns-truly making it a S'more Pie.

Mmm, the inside.

Slice of the pie. Scott even enjoyed. He likes pie, but does not like s'mores. It was a dicey decision to attempt this pie for this household.

Capping off my day of baking, we feasted on lime halibut with mango salsa (not pictured-sometimes you forget about your early prep still in the fridge), twice baked potatoes, and stuffed mushrooms.


After seeing Bridesmaids (I'll give it a B), we came home to enjoy the remaining wine and of course, the s'more pie, in the backyard over a roaring fire naturally, and a little poetry courtesy of Walt Whitman.

It was a great Saturday.

Happy Mother's Day!

Last night, my girlfriends and I held a mother's day dinner in honor of our moms. I think it's safe to say this might become a tradition-a great time was had by all.

Motif: Shabby-chic farm style dinner with vintage embroidered linens. (Thanks Cristal!)

You can see we attached pictures with our moms to the lattice in the background.

Backyards are always better with lights! This is proof I manned the BBQ.
Lessons with Scott paid off.

Kiss the cook!

Shannon-a great grill master herself. And maker of the best ever bacon-wrapped dates.

MEAT.

The moms-before they toasted us! Clever ladies, beat us the daughters to the punch.

End of the night group shot, though Katie, Paula, and Shannon had left.

I'm often interested in the menus for parties-here's the breakdown:

Appetizers:

• Caprese salad
• Blue cheese-stuffed olives
• Artichoke and bean crostini
• Bacon wrapped dates

Entree

• Filet mignon (with Scott's secret marinade)
• Chicken with tequila lime marinade
• Twice-baked potatoes
• Cesar salad

Dessert

• Nutella cupcakes
• Coffee cupcakes

And several bottles of wine-of course.

This was a super fun evening. We've all been friends from as early as elementary school and were all on dance team together during various years in high school and the friendships have remained. Cheers to moms-both biological, stand ins, in-laws, and soon-t0-be as well!

It's Amore!

I miss the days of picking out the perfect valentine for the crush in the class, hoping its message wasn't too obvious or too friendly, and cutting out the bonus cards on the back of the box for the teacher or the girl you didn't really want to give the card too because the ones on the back were hard to cut out!

So this year I decided to bring a little old school to the office with some valentine's and peppermint patties. Enjoy.

Mix powdered sugar, condensed milk, peppermint extract, and food coloring in blender. Shape into balls.

Press down with fingers or use bottom of drinking glass to flatten.

Melt chocolate chips in double boiler or use melting chocolate and melt in double boiler or microwave.

While chocolate melts, consider dipping into your own v-day dinner dessert, cakeballs from Patty's Cakes.
Dip patties into chocolate, let harden.
Artfully, or not so artfully, decorate with contrasting melting chocolate.

Just like the aforementioned valentine selection, choose the right valentine for the right person, especially in the office. And the right sweet treat-like Oreo's for the vegan friend.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Erin Go Bragh Beer Cupcakes

Yes, you read that correctly. Beer and cupcakes. Guinness and chocolate. Might take over the notable pairings of cheese and wine, peanut butter and chocolate, peanut butter and jelly, Nutella and everything else...you get the point.

Chocolate Stout Cupcakes-recipe found here.

The recipe calls for a bottle of Guinness and includes cream cheese frosting. Bliss. Kerri tells me there is a recipe that even has Bailey's in the frosting. You can bet that will be next.

I have no idea what took me so long to do this. Enjoy your corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, Smithwick's, Guinness, or beverage of choice on this fine day, avoid a pinch, and a Happy St. Patrick's Day to all of my Irish and "Irish" friends today. Erin Go Bragh!

Vegan Cupcake Week Wrap Up

Our cupcake week had its finale contributions this week, and I think we are all sad to see it go. There might just be a vegan cookie week around the corner we liked doing it so much. Now onto the 'cakes.

Leah's Simple Vanilla & Agave Nectar with Not-Too-Sweet Blueberry Mousse Topping




My very own Hazelnut Cupcakes w/Mocha Hazelnut Mousse Filling
(Recipe can be found here, should you not want to buy Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.)




Christopher's Maple Cupcakes w/Maple Frosting & Sugared Walnuts

Our office has the usual issues. Stolen cupcakes and other food.

These were pretty tasty even IF they did have nuts. I think I'd replace mine with chocolate chips or bananas.

Vegan Cupcake Week: Day 3

Pumpkin is really a flavor and ingredient that should be used all year, and not only brought out October and November. Case in point:

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes with Cinnamon Icing



The baking mistress, Kiera, with her delight.

These remind me of those large, thick pumpkin and chocolate chip cookies you can buy in the grocery store. However, they really are more like cakey discs, so the fact that these would be considered healthy AND are in cupcake form WITH icing. Perfection.

Vegan Cupcake Week: Day 2

This Vegan Cupcake Week is so muy delicioso! I am going to gain five pounds by tomorrow I just know it, though I guess that what Jillian is for at the end of the day.

Today's recipe is Mexican Hot Chocolate Cupcakes with Chocolate Ganache Frosting. Yes, be jealous. Thank you Andrea for executing utter perfection.

So pretty right?

The baker and her goodies...not quite a baker's dozen. The cupcake tree is flawed.

Up on Friday: Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cupcakes w/Cinnamon Icing...yep, I can't wait. Pumpkin should really make more appearances year round!

Vegan Cupcake Week: Day 1

My office suitemates are pretty cool. We do potlucks for every holiday and allow each other to sample our baked goods and latest kitchen endeavors

One officemate in particular, Virginia, is the resident vegan. She doesn't always have the opportunity to enjoy our famous potlucks, and that is pretty much a massive bummer. Last week she brought in the book Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World, and we oohed and ahhed over the delicious looking confections. Thus, she decided we would have a Club 444 Vegan Cupcake Week. Today, she brought us these bad boys:

Crimson Velveteen Cupcake with Vegan Cream Cheese Frosting

The amazingly delicious cupcake, commonly known as red velvet.

Um, can we say these rivaled their mainstream counterparts? Good lawd, these were tasty!

The artist, @gigihead, and her masterful creation

Up next: Andrea's Mexican Hot Chocolate Cupcakes w/Rich Chocolate Genache Frosting

Cupcake Pops

After finally joining the harem of women that swear by the fabulous gal that is the Pioneer Woman, I can say I am officially a fan. She is amazing!

While stumbling around her blog, I found the directions for these awesome cupcake pops:

(source)

You can find the official recipe here.

After reading the recipe and seeing how simple it looked, I figured this would be perfect to bake for my sister's birthday cake and share with a few work friends also celebrating this week. I made two batches, the first on Sunday for my sister, and then I reserved the other half of the batch for Monday night. This was the first time I had worked with melting chocolate, and the first round pretty much had the shape, but lacked the definition. Not to mention I did not let the "cup" part dip deep enough.

The second batch I made changed two things, according to the recipe. I had forgotten to put the balls in the freezer to chill, which probably would have helped with shape retention, and I found that rolling them into ovals opposed to balls before using the cookie cutter worked well. I lacked to take pictures of the second batch but can say with confidence they likely improved at least from a 4 to a 5 on the baking cuteness scale. In terms of taste, these things are DELICIOUS. Go bake and make them now! They are moist and wonderful since the icing is mixed with the baked cake.

Thank you Bakerella, you might be my new dessert hero.

Oh, Nutella

Nutella has to be one of life's most delicious pleasures. Hands down, it would be one of the three items, along with Chapstick and probably Purell, that I would take with me on a desert island. (Let's face it-moisture on the lips would be essential, I could clean myself and possibly disinfect bites, and finally, who wouldn't be game for Nutella on palm leaves-genius!)

I have made several desserts with this tasty spread, and for the foodies out there, you may know that Giada DeLaurentiis is the primary writer of most recipes that include Nutella.

So for your Friday night reading pleasure, I give you HazelNutella Kisses (well, that is what I cleverly dubbed them at our wedding. If you search the FoodNetwork website, type in Chocolate Hazelnut Smooches.)

• 1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup Nutella, [or a lot more if you are like me]
• 1/2 cup butter, softened (1 stick)
• 1/2 cup sugar
  
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 egg
  
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup orange sprinkles, or orange sugar [I have yet to do this, it's always the fancy crystal sugar for me]
  
• 1 (9-ounce) package of Hershey's Kisses

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In another medium bowl, place the chocolate hazelnut spread, butter, and both sugars. Using a hand mixer, cream the ingredients together, about 3 minutes. Add the egg and vanilla and blend until incorporated. Stir in the dry ingredients, just until incorporated.

Shape the cookie dough into walnut-sized balls. Rolls the balls in the sugar, pressing to adhere. Place the cookies on a heavy cookie sheet about 4 inches apart.

Bake for 8 minutes. Remove the cookies from the oven. Quickly place a chocolate kiss in the middle of each cookie. Return the cookies to the oven and bake for another three minutes. Cool the cookies on a wire rack.

Heaven. You'll want to live on my desert island too. Just bring your own Chapstick or gloss.