Valentine's Day Cookies!!

So even though I'm a tad bit late for a Valentine's Day post, I really wanted to show you guys a few pictures of the sugar cookies that I managed to get before these guys disappeared!

How fun are these?? Not gonna lie, they took me for FOREVER to make. I've never been a big fan of the sugar cookie making/decorating. It takes an hour or so to chill the dough, then you have to dirty the counter to roll them out, and then I always loose a few during the transfer from cookie-cutting to pan (although my average is steadily increasing). And thats just to get a cookie! Then you have to either decorate with sprinkles (which always fall off for me) or wait until they cool and then frost (and normally have to make a couple of different colors to make them look cute). I'm exhausted just typing it.

However, I have recently decided that I wanted to get better at this sugar cookie decorating thing, because they look so dang cute! So, I made my mother-in-laws sugar cookie dough (delicious) and cut out a bunch of heart cookies. I do have to say that using the Silpat to roll out the dough really helped these babies to not stick to the floured surface (yay!). While they cooled, I made royal icing and colored it PINK! I then piped a really thin line of icing to outline the heart. (I sucked at this. Like really sucked.) Then, I added a little bit of water to the icing and filled in the outline (although some turned into bleeding hearts since they leaked outside the icing lines. I was never great at coloring inside the lines anyways....). They didn't look great at this point - the lines weren't really straight and kind of lumpy and the icing filling wasn't quite even, so I decided to hide their flaws with SPRINKLES - and it really worked!! I loved the pink on pink icing/sprinkle combo. I also made some red icing and put the same pink sprinkles on them - the colors didn't turn out in the picture, but I loved the contrast and it was probably my favorite color combo.

I didn't think that these were awful for my first attempt. And I actually had a fun time doing it, until I got to the dirty dishes part. I'm pretty sure they tasted good since they were gone by just the next day on our way down to the beach - we even had to make an emergency trip to a cooking store to buy more cookie cutters so that we'd have some cookies to eat ON Valentine's Day!

I hope that everyone had a great valentine's day (better late than never)!!! Thanks for stopping by!!!

Super Bowl!

I had been looking forward to throwing the second annual Woodruff Superbowl Party for a long time - it was the light at the end of the tunnel of a long month of studying. I decided to serve Indianapolis vs. New Orleans food - complete with jambalya vs. buffalo chicken mac n' cheese. (I never did find out who won the food bowl - they were both all gone by the end of the night!!!)

I also OBVIOUSLY had to do themed desserts as well, and they were OBVIOUSLY all bite sized. I started off with two kinds of cupcakes - a white cake with blue buttercream frosting and a chocolate cake with yellow cream cheese icing. I'm a sucker for chocolate cake and anything with cream cheese, so you can guess which was my favorite. Plus I got to try out my beginning staged piping skills, which actually turned out better than expected after a momentary panic of not finding the right tip (and the only one I've ever used).

See? Not so bad.

The next thing I made, and my absolute FAVORITE were these mini peanut butter pies with graham cracker crust. I had my first slice of peanut butter pie at a holiday party my parents had when I was little, and have been obsessed ever since. Since I can't make an entire pie because I would eat it myself (in probably 10 minutes), I had been brainstorming how to make these guys mini-sized. I ended up individually forming the crusts into mini-muffin tins, but upon inverting the pan to get them out, I lost a bunch of the ends of the crust. I made the next batch in paper cups, scooped the filling into them with an ice cream scooper, and stuck them in the freezer. The next morning, the paper peeled right off no problem and left most of the crust. I topped these guys with chocolate ganache and managed to get a few onto the plate instead of in my belly :)

Since I had a lot of leftover ganache from the mini PB-pies, I had to whip up something to put underneath it (of course). I found a quick brownie recipe from Hershey's that ended up being great, but not as fudgy as I like. BUT the ganache MADE the brownies and I'm not sure that I'll be able to make another brownie without the rich topping. darn.

Doesn't that look scrumptious??

Hope you all had a great superbowl (if you weren't over here enjoying the above treats) and GO HEELS, who happen to be playing dook right now. (I get too nervous to actually watch the entire game without having something to distract me) Stayed tuned for some Valentine's day sugar cookies!

I Passed!!!

I'm officially a PhD candidate!!! I'm not sure, but it might have something to do with the awesome breakfast that I provided my committee!

They had their choice of lemon poppyseed bread (with a lemon glaze), blueberry muffins, apple cinnamon muffins, and chocolate-chocolate chip muffins!! Yummmmm.

and yay!

Chouquettes, or a really yummy cross between a puff pastry and a chocolate chip cookie

In keeping with the French theme, I made these Choquettes before Thanksgiving. Even though I didn't make them during that week, it was a "warm up" to get ready for all of the baking that I did that week. These were super good - very light and fluffy with just a little bit of chocolate. It was a little odd that the dough was made in a saucepan, but they still turned out fine! However, they didn't keep very well, the sugar made them soggy, so they are definitely a "day of" bake. But I still managed to eat a few before that happened.

I actually got this recipe from David Lebovitz's book "Living the Sweet Life in Paris" but I also found them here on his blog! Bon appetit!

A French Thanksgiving

Every year since before I can remember, we always have a theme day on the Friday after Thanksgiving, mainly so we can keep eating such great food. This year, our theme was "France," so we jumped on the Julia Child bandwagon and made some great beef bourguignon (unfortunately, no pictures). All together, we had a 7-course dinner - starting off with some raclette, which consists of a 2 part grill in which you melt some raclette cheese underneath the top grill, which has peppers and ham simmering on top. When everything is done, you pour the raclette on top and enjoy!

Next up, we had a green salad with cheese and bacon (blurry pictures only - perhaps too much wine already?)

No "French" dinner is complete without escargots... which we all had to try. Here they are getting all buttered up before going in the oven. You actually can buy the shells separately, and then get escargot and put them in these shells. Pretty ingenious. AND they were great. But it could have been all the butter (and Marty's special sauce...).

I'm blanking on some of the other courses (except who could forget the amazing cheese course - with about 5 types of Brie). But here are some croissants ready to go in the oven. I made these from scratch - they are really fun to do and about 100x better (read - fluffier, butterier, crispier, yummier) than the roll-up Pillsbury kind.

And for dessert, I made chocolate mousse and an almond-pear tart. The mousse was ok - the tart was phenomenal. I will definitely be making it again - and you can either make your own crust (which I did) or buy the ready-made.

The recipe can be found on David Lebovitz's blog here. It was awesome! I substituted Grand Marnier for the liquor because that is what we had - and it was still great!

Brioche

Even though I'm about two holidays late, I did want write about the Brioche I made for Thanksgiving!! This year, the theme was all about French cooking (more on that later), and for breakfast one morning, we decided to make brioche french toast.

I had tested this recipe out at home once before, and ended up burning the entire thing due to oven mishaps and an overly long walk with the puppy. I didn't have much better luck at the beach for Thanksgiving, because one of our ovens was down and the other one wasn't set at the correct temperature. (It was 50 degrees hotter than what it was reading) Luckily, we got an oven thermometer, and I saved all three loafs from a burning death. They ended up being a big hit! (And, if you make French Toast out of it, it doesn't really matter what it looks like! They all look the same covered in egg batter, and taste delicious!)

But it did end up really nice and fluffy - and very buttery - which I would hope so considering how much butter went into each loaf!

In fact, we had made enough brioche, that it even made it to Thanksgiving dinner table. Doesn't it look pretty on there? (I also made that amazing pile of mashed potatoes. My absolute favorite.)

The recipe is pretty involved, and takes two days. And your mixer gets a great work out, but its completely worth it!!

Brioche Dough (from Dessert University by Roland Mesnier)

1.5 tsps salt

5 tbs sugar

6tbs warm water

3 c all-purpose flour

1 1/3 envelopes active dry yeast

5 large eggs

2 sticks (1 c) unsalted butter, softened

1. Combine salt, sugar, 2tbs warm water in electric mixer. Stir together with dough hook, add flour and combine

2. Combine 4 tbs warm water with yeast, dissolve until foamy

3. Add 4 eggs to mixer on medium speed, one at a time. Mix for 5-7 minutes until dough is smooth and firm

4. Add remaining egg slowly, followed by the yeast mixture. Turn mixer down to low speed and mix for 15 minutes or until dough is silky and elastic and detaches from the side of the bowl

5. Add butter, 4 tbs at a time, with mixer still on low. Make sure the butter is incorporated before adding the next. Make sure your butter is softened for this step or it will take for forever! Overall, this should take about 5 minutes.

6. Dough should be glossy and elastic. Cover it with a towel and let stand in ~75 spot until its doubled in size (1.5 hrs). (I sometimes put my oven on warm for a few minutes, turn it off, and put the dough in there - just watch it and take it out when its doubled in size!)

7. Deflate dough by flipping it in bowl several times. Cover and place in fridge overnight, no longer than 24 hours

8. Butter a loaf pan (I used a standard large loaf pan)

9. Divide dough into 6 even pieces, roll into egg shapes. Place dough eggs in pan, 2 across, 3 deep. They will be touching

10. Drape pan with plastic wrap and let rise until its doubled in size, about 1.5 hrs

11. Preheat oven to 450. Brush loaf with beaten egg (Note - I don't do this.). Snip middle of loaf with scissors, making a half inch deep cut in order to let the bread rise.

12. Bake for 10 minutes at 450, then reduce the oven temp to 375 and bake for 50-60 minutes more until the loaf is golden and fully risen.

13. Unmold and cool on wire rack.

(Since its unlucky to end on 13)

14. Slice, eat, and enjoy!!!!!!!

Pumpkin Cheesecake

Because we've been eating Joyce's famous pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving since before I was born, I haven't had a chance to make this Pumpkin Cheesecake recipe that I found last year. (Who can justify eating pumpkiny desserts any other time but Thanksgiving?) Luckily, we decided to have a pre-Thanksgiving meal with our friends, so I got to try it out!!!

I have to say, this cheesecake is fabulous. So creamy without being overwhelmingly pumpkin-y. I almost didn't add the marshmellow topping, but it made it look so pretty and also tasted great!! One thing that I might change is to go back to the good old graham cracker crust instead of this gingersnap crust. Just not a fan of gingersnaps.

You can find the recipe (and some better pictures) here.