I'm baaaaack!

Hey y'all - Sorry about the 2 month hiatus. For those of you that didn't know, I was involved with planning The DOUGHMAN that took place last Saturday. It was on Man vs. Food last year (I had my 2 seconds of fame) and its basically a relay quadrathon where you have to eat a meal (think pork BBQ or a pizza) and then run, bike or jump into a flimsy inner tube and paddle across the pool. It was a lot of fun this year, but took up A LOT of my time. So, in addition to school, DOUGHMAN, and starting to coach summer swim league again, and throw in a trip to Italy, there wasn't much time to bake/blog.

So, let's start summer off in style - with a Fruit Pizza! I absolutely love this dessert and make it all the time in the summer. Its super simple and easy to take to a cookout, and its got fruit on it, so its gotta be healthy, right?

I always use strawberries and blueberries no matter what (they are my favorite), and here i've used kiwi and bananas, but you can change it up with whatever fruit you have! I've used mandarin oranges or peaches - this can really work with everything!

The icing is cream cheese "frosting" - my favorite by far. For the cookie crust, if you are really in a time pinch, you can use it with the pillsbury roll out sugar cookie dough and it tastes great. I recently made it with my own sugar cookie dough, and I liked it a lot better -I think the Pillsbury dough is too sugary.

There is an optional apricot glaze that you can put on top. Ever since the glaze leaked on my friends pants on our way to a cookout, I've left it off. I don't think it adds anything to the pizza, but it also doesn't ruin it!

The tart usually lasts a couple of days, but it can go soggy - so make sure you eat it up in a timely manner (shouldn't be problem). You can also use any shape of pan (square, rectangle, star, heart), so go crazy!!!

Fruit Pizza

Sugar Cookie Dough

1 8oz package Cream Cheese

1/3 cup sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla

assorted cut fruits (strawberries, kiwi, banana, blueberries, raspberries, peaches - anything!)

Optional Glaze:

2 tbsp apricot preserves

2 tbsp water

1. Spread out cookie dough on a flat pizza sheet (or any other sized sheet) until covered (use your hands!!!). Bake at 350 for about 15 minutes until just turning brown. Let cool.

2. Mix together softened cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla. Spread onto cooled sugar cookie - I like to spread mine right to the edge!

3. Arrange the cut fruit in any pattern that you like.

4. (Optional) - Mix together the apricot preserves and water, spread evenly over tart.

5. EAT!

Bran Muffins

In keeping with the health kick, I complemented my homemade granola making with some bran muffins. I had seen these on another blog a while ago, and filed them in the back of my mind to make them. The only problem was that they require wheat bran - and who has that on hand???

I finally remembered to pick some up on one of my rare Whole Foods Trips (I tend to overspend there so I limit my shopping trips - everything looks so GOOD!!). The recipe calls for toasting the bran - I ended up burning my first batch, so luckily I had another full two cups! Make sure you stir the bran every once in a while - burnt bran doesn't smell very nice.

I wonder who took that bite? These were gone in about two days. But they are good for you, right??? If you are feeling healthy, or just want to try a not so sweet, but still delicious muffin, give these a try!

(Please note the barbie-themed muffin liners. What a great find.)

Recipe by Nancy Silverton

2 cup (125g) wheat bran
1 cup, plus 1/2 cup (190g total) dark raisins
1 cup, plus 1/2 (370ml total) cup water
1/2 cup (120g) buttermilk or plain low- or non-fat yogurt
a few swipes of fresh orange zest (unsprayed)
1/2 cup (105g) packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup (125ml) vegetable oil
1 large egg
1 large egg white
1/2 cup (65g) flour
1/4 cup (35g) whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350F. Toast the wheat bran on a baking sheet for 6-8 minutes & STIR every once in a while (DO NOT SKIP THIS STEP UNLESS YOU WANT YOUR KITCHEN SMELLING OF BURNT WHEAT BRAN. not a good idea). Heat 1 cup raisins with 1/2 cup water - simmer for ten minutes until water is gone and puree raisins in blender or food processor. Mix together the toasted bran, yogurt or buttermilk, and 1 cup water. Then mix in the raising puree, orange zest and brown sugar. Stir in the oil, egg and egg white. Sift, or just throw in the flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt - stir until combined. Mix in remaining raisins. Spoon batter into muffin tins - almost to the top! Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until set.

Homemade Granola

About a week ago, I had a granola craving, and instead of going out to the store to buy some, I decided to make my own. After a quick search online, I found a simple recipe with most of the ingredients that I already had in my kitchen. I made only half a recipe - and it was fantastic!! I didn't end up having some of the ingredients (walnut oil & flaxseed meal), so I wanted to try it again to see if it would make a difference.

The second time, I used the walnut oil that the recipe calls for, which was surprisingly not very expensive at the store. I actually liked it better the first time when I just used canola oil - maybe it wasn't quite as rich. Also, I couldn't really tell a difference with the added flaxseed in there. Either way, it works with almost any combination of ingredients that you want to throw in (walnuts, almonds, raisins, etc) and goes great with yogurt for a breakfast! Enjoy!

Recipe (adapted from bonappetit)

• 4 tablespoons walnut oil (I used canola), divided
• 3/4 cup (packed) dark brown sugar
• 1/4 cup egg whites
• 1/2 teaspoon (scant) coarse kosher salt
• 3 cups organic old-fashioned oats
• 1 cup walnut halves, broken in half
• 1/2 cup flaxseed meal*
• 1 cup pitted dates, coarsely chopped or torn into pieces
• 1/4 cup honey

Preheat oven to 350. Brush parchment with 2 tbs oil. In a bowl, whish 2 tbs oil with egg whites, sugar, and salt. Add oats, nuts, and flaxseed, toss well. Spread mixture on baking sheet, bake 10 minutes. Stir, bake 10 more minutes. Add dried fruit, drizzle honey over, bake for 10 more minutes. Let cool and enjoy!

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I made some festive shamrock sugar cookies for St. Patty's Day, and then iced them in green royal icing!

Here they are "in progress" before I flooded them with more icing.

After some taste testing, we decided that the fully iced ones are actually better - I just loved the look of the outlined ones though (and I ran out of icing so they didn't really have a choice). Everyone loved them, including Miss B (who also shares her dad's ability scarf down incredible numbers of sugar cookies).

Happy St. Patrick's Day!!!

THE ultimate oatmeal cookie???

After 24 long years of baking, I might be finished testing oatmeal cookies. How do I know this? Patrick, who does not like oatmeal cookies AT ALL, and who will never ever ever eat one under no circumstances whenever I make a batch, first, tried one (gasp) and second, said "These are pretty good for oatmeal cookies" (jaw dropping).

I made these to bring to an all day lab meeting, figuring that oatmeal can be eaten in the morning (it qualifies as breakfast, right?) or in the afternoon (it is in cookie form after all). With no raisins, which I found out was a plus, I made two kinds: walnut chocolate chip and white chocolate - craisin. I was impartial to the walnut chocolate chip, and I noticed that those went faster.

It was also nice to have people eat these cookies instead of the desserts that the Washington Duke Inn gave us (must be something they put in those Dook cookies). I will definitely be making these again and might be done looking for THE oatmeal recipe (until the next one comes my way).

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!