My chocoholism strikes again.
(Help.)
Read all about it: Homemade Chocolate Syrup
dessert
Culinary Cousins: Fluffy Homemade Marshmallows
I’m in full holiday mode. There’s a permanent layer of sugar coating my kitchen counters and coursing through my veins.
Read all about it: Fluffy Homemade Marshmallows
Culinary Cousins: Dutch Apple Pie
Fall means apples. Thanksgiving means pie. I was a little down for the count this year, but that didn’t prevent me from baking up a bevy of desserts.
Very little stands between me and my kitchen. Especially when sugar, butter and flour are involved.
Read all about it: Dutch Apple Pie
Culinary Cousins: Lemon Cheesecake
A couple of weekends ago, we celebrated my aunt Taffy’s birthday. Since I’m known as the baker of the family, I attempted a decadent, Southern Living-inspired lemon cheesecake.
Read all about it:
Homemade Lemon Curd 
Candied Lemons
Catching up on Culinary Cousins.
I’ve been cooking and baking and eating — even growing — and posting over at Culinary Cousins, I just haven’t had a spare second to tell you about it. So let’s play a little catch up:
I can’t explain how, but I grew some romaine lettuce.
Read all about it: Tuesday Refreshment…
Continue reading
Culinary Cousins: Apricot and Pistachio Biscotti
Oliver and I recently lost a dear friend. And we expressed our condolences in the best way I know how — with baked goods.
Read all about it: Apricot and Pistachio Biscotti
Culinary Cousins: Banana Pudding Poke Cake
I’ve started baking over at Culinary Cousins. It’s a gateway. I may never stop.
Read all about it: Banana Pudding Poke Cake
Cooking Spree: Mini Oreo cheesecakes
Every morning I get an email from Foodimentary that informs me of the national food of the day and regales me with key moments in food history. By pure coincidence, today is National Oreo Day — the very day I planned to tell you about my latest cooking spree using, what else, Oreos.
Only I cheated.
The real Oreos weird me out a bit. What is in that creamy vanilla center, exactly? Besides harsh chemicals and toxic substances. I mean, probably.
But let me not get ahead of myself. To the beginning.
I hate to waste food. I’ve likely told you about this before. It just pains me to leave a box or pint or bunch or basket of anything unused, or worse, to throw it away. A few months ago, I was at Trader Joe’s, and I spied a box of the elusive Joe-Joe’s. That’s the TJ answer to Oreos. To me, they were only a figment — the top item everyone raves about, but the most impossible one to find. At my stores, they’re almost always sold out. So, in the interest of belonging and being part of the in crowd, I bought a box. I liked them — the cookie is chocolate-y and the creamy center is ultra vanilla-y. They’re very good — but I just couldn’t finish a whole box.
What to do. What to do. Continue reading
Cooking Spree: Homemade Applesauce
It’s a question that paralyzes me every time. That summons the angel to one shoulder and the devil to the other.
“Would you like chips, bread or an apple with that?”
I try to behave when I eat at Panera Bread, and choose that apple to accompany my meal instead of more bread (delicious!) or potato chips (decadent!). But, instead of keeping the doctor away, I just collect a lot of tiny apples that I never eat.
Then last week I came home with a bag of apples someone brought my family from a nearby orchard. So I stared at those, alongside my Panera stash, perplexed. What do you do with such abundance?
I could have made a tart or a pie, but I was trying to eat decently healthy. Continue reading
South & Sundry 