guess what I made?

These

Sliced

Reamed with my new toy from the Moravian Cookshop. A whole pound of these babies.




and baked to perfection

for the hubster for tmrw after the Iron Pigs game. Our neighbor gave us 2 tickets for a late morning game so he's taking the boy who LOVES baseball, while I wait for the window repairman to come.

The recipe for the body of the pie is from Emeril's (the same one I always use) but this time I topped it with meringue from the Joy of Cooking cookbook.

THe mans' birthday is Saturday, so I'm trying to surprise him a little each day this week. Yesterday I brought home the cutest t-shirt from the zoo... 4 beetles crossing a pedestrian crosswalk.. and it says in the correct font The Beetles. Today was a few dark chocolate truffles from the Moravian cookshop. Champagne, cappucino, coffee, raspberry, amaretto, and some pyramid looking one. Sunday was a Phillies towel that you take to the game. Monday was a lost day, I'm afraid. but I have lots more planned for him.

Just a bird's eye shot of what I made during the 2011 Tour de Fleece. There's lots of yarn there... and a few rolags to spin yet. It will be finished before school starts.

pie, anyone?

I wanted to make something special for DH for father's day. So I thought oooo a key lime pie. He'd love that. So I did... those little limes are such a pain to squeeze... there must be some kitchen tool that does the job... so the entire bag later plus the juice from squeezing 1.5 regular limes and voila:

A slight diversion of Emeril's key lime pie. His topping calls for sour cream with a pinch of sugar mixed in.. which I'm sure would be fab but I had 6 egg whites to use up from making tiramisu last week, so merengue topping won out. If you read the comments on the recipe page.... it really is VERY good. DH was in heaven. Next time I try the sour cream topping... and I'll find something to squeeze those little limes before then too ;-)

smells of Christmas

the Christmas tree... yes it really makes the house smell great!

baking cookies..it's that time of year.



We've been trying to do a batch a night. I started over the weekend with shortbread cookies that you put in a mold, then unmold and bake. DS2 managed to consume most of those and the rest of the family finished them off. So I have no pictures of the finished product. Only this picture of us preparing them.

I do have some other pictures of goodies we've made though.



These are a house favorite and super easy for all the kids to help with.

Pretzel kisses

• Preheat oven to 200° F.
  
• On cookie sheet place small pretzels.
  
• Unwrap Hershey kisses.
• Place kiss on top of pretzel
  
• Put cookie sheet with kissed top pretzels in oven
  
• Bake until chocolate is soft to touch
  
• Remove from oven
  
• Push m&m candy into top of Hershey kiss
  
• Let cool
  
• Enjoy!

And another variation. Rolo pretzels.

• Preheat oven to 200°F.
  
• Place pretzels on cookie sheet.
  
• Unwrap rolo and place on top of pretzel.
  
• Bake in oven until chocolate on Rolo is soft.
  
• Remove from oven.
  
• Press a pecan on top of the rolo squishing the rolo a bit.
  
• YUMMO!

This time we used the square ones that I usually use as gingerbread house windows.



Spritz cookies I believe there is a learning curve to using a cookie press. And the dough has to be at the right temp. With a couple more batches ours could be perfect. But they taste great none the less.



DH's favorite — shortbread pinwheels. When I was little I called these Squirrel cookies. The tough thing about this cookie for me is keeping the chocolate and vanilla layers to stick once they're baked..... if anyone has a secret, please let me in on it.


My grammy made the best cookies in the world. One of my fondest memories of Christmas preparations was making cookies with her. She was stingy doling them out before the holiday too. Probably because they were really used as gifts. Her signature cookie, Wheaties cookies, was not a favorite of mine, but my brothers loved them. We all fought over her Mexican Wedding Cakes though (a.k.a. Russian Tea cakes, snowballs) and I'll make some here this year.


My other favorite Christmas memory I'll share with you later on the day it should happen!


See you tomorrow, with pictures of some knitting!

snow = baking

DD finished her gingerbreadhouse this morning. Since it had snowed here, we decided to make it snow on her house as well. The snow is strawberry cotton candy... yum! The snowmen, gingerbread people and trees are JustBorn peeps in different shapes. Just Born factory is actually in our town, so we had to use them!

We also made a double batch of peanut butter cookies from the Emeril's cookbook There's a Chef in my Soup. They are very peanut buttery...

I made a spinach quiche as well for lunch and tried to sneak in a few rows of knitting while listening to Brenda Dayne's pocast Cast On. It's my FAVORITE podcast. Love you Brenda!

I was thinking last night that maybe we'd have no school tmrw or a delay, but I'm doubting it more and more.... guess I'll be singing Christmas music all day after all!