SnickerDoodles
When I was growing up I made snickerdoodles all the time, as we always seemed to have the ingredients on hand to make them. Nowadays I make the dough and keep it in my freezer. Baking a dozen or less when we feel the need to eat something sweet. I do the same thing with my peanut butter cookie dough, and chocolate chip. Why bake it all? Unless you plan on eating them all right away, really no reason to bake them all up. I feel that homemade cookies taste best the day there were baked, and it’s nice to have a little cookie goldmine stash in the freezer waiting for rainy day.
Pro tip: the holidays are coming whether you like it or not, and you are gonna have to make cookies at some point. Why not make some killer homemade cookies now, freeze them and bake them when you need them. Novel idea.. I know.
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Chocolate Chip Blondie’s
I made this recipe for a Father’s Day hike. They came in really handy and transported really well. Everyone seemed to enjoy them. I used this recipe and left the nuts out because I was feeding children with nut allergies in their family.
These are a nice alternative to chocolate chip cookies if you are pressed for time. When I was thinking of what I could contribute to the hike I thought of cookies. My chocolate chip cookies are so nice, but my oven is so quorkie I can only cook one sheet pan at a time. So one batch of cookies means the oven will be on for at-least an hour. I try not to use the oven in the summer time because it really heats our place up and I don’t like heat. So then brownies came into mind, but I thought that would be too rich for a hike. So after doing some searching I thought this would be a nice combo. Kids love anything with chocolate chips, and the youngest one ate two!
Full RecipeBanana Mousse
This recipe was inspired by me not wanting to waste ingredients and the hot weather. Normally when my bananas get over ripe I stick them in the freezer and save them for banana bread. With this heat I did not see myself baking any time soon. After looking through my pantry I decided to make a Banana Mousse using gelatin and the thickening agent.
I looked online and found this recipe from One Perfect Bite and decided that I could loosely follow it with ingredients from my pantry and refrigerator. Mind you I had to swap somethings in to make it work, but trust me it worked!
I highly recommend you serve this with dark chocolate shavings. It reminds me so much of a monkey-tails, and who does not like monkey-tails! (I have the cutest picture of me eating a monkey-tail at the Ren Faire. When I find I shall post it).
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Chocolate Pavlovas with Chocolate Mascarpone Mousse (Daring Bakers Challenge, Jun 2010)
The June 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Dawn of Doable and Delicious. Dawn challenged the Daring Bakers’ to make Chocolate Pavlovas and Chocolate Mascarpone Mousse. The challenge recipe is based on a recipe from the book Chocolate Epiphany by Francois Payard.
I’m a little late posting my challenge this month. I had my Meringue done on time and I was pleased with how easy making meringue can be. The second part of this challenge was to make Mascarpone cheese, I have made that before in past challenges so that was easy for me. And lastly to make the Mousse was really simple and really tasty.
Full RecipePiece Montée – Croquembouche (Daring Bakers Challenge May, 2010)
The May 2010 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Cat of Little Miss Cupcake. Cat challenged everyone to make a piece montée, or croquembouche, based on recipes from Peter Kump’s Baking School in Manhattan and Nick Malgieri.
After making Pâte à choux for the first time I feel pretty impressed with myself. Learning how to work with the dough and cook the flour prior to adding the eggs is truly the hard part of making Pâte à choux. If you don’t cook the dough long enough in the sauce pan you will end up with round jelly dounut looking Pâte à choux rather then big puffy clouds that are begging to be filled with tasty delights.
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