Basic French Macarons

Following the recipe at Yum Sugar, I made my first batch of Macarons!  Their short list of ingredients - ground almonds, powdered sugar, egg whites and granulated sugar - make them seem deceptively easy, however the process is lengthy and the handling needs to be careful.  I did my research online, temperature, over and under mixing, imprecise measurements, impatience can all lead to disaster.  Thus, I began with low expectations and a basic, straight forward vanilla French macaron recipe.

Yum Sugar's recipe leads you through the process step by step, from sieving the ground almonds and sugar and beating the whites to the unique processes of 'punching down the batter to a molten lava consistency' and striking the cookie topped, parchment lined sheets against the counter top to form the airy 'pied' or feet on the bottom of each cookie.

The author also suggests flavour alternatives such as red velvet and colour variations using gel colouring and at which point in the process to add each.  This being my first time, and the process being notoriously difficult, I left well enough alone - vanilla it is.  I followed the recipe meticulously, the only suggestion not followed, was the 3 day aged at room temperature eggs - I was satisfied my week old carton of refrigerated eggs was old enough and used 3 at room temperature.

I encourage anyone who has been hesitating over making these yourself to give these a try - follow the recipe to the letter and you'll be pleased with the results!

Rosemary Garlic Salted Amish Dinner Rolls

I wanted to make rolls to serve with a roast chicken dinner and was having trouble finding a recipe that didn't have milk as an ingredient (I was out!)

This recipe, described as an Amish bread recipe worked with what I had at home. I topped the rolls with rosemary butter before baking and brushed the tops with garlic butter before serving.

This recipe yields 2 loaves of bread or about 16-20 rolls depending how large you make them!

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

This recipe is so easy -- you can even make it in the food processor if you have one!  Serve as-is or ice with cream cheese frosting if you wish.

Good Eats Soft Pretzels

This is a recipe for pretzels I first saw on Good Eats it may seem labour intensive...I mean, a fifteen minute drive to the mall yields a hot fresh pretzel as well..but hey, it's raining...and where's the fun in that!?

Historically, pretzels were immersed in a bath of water and lye and there are several recipes on line tha still call for a lye bath in the process of pretzel making.  Here, the lye bath is replaced a safer and easier baking soda boil and this step cannot be skipped.  The boiling process is what gives pretzels their distinctive chewy texture and crust.

Also, the Good Eats recipe linked calls for pretzel salt.  I could not find any where I live, and have to admit, did not look very hard, I used coarse salt in its place with excellent results on the fresh pretzels.

The pretzels are best hot and fresh as the salt has a tendency to dissolve in storage in a container (perhaps the pretzel salt doesn't do this!)- but if you are not salting them, you may have better luck with storing them.  These also freeze well and reheat in the oven or microwave for a hot, fresh pretzel whenever the craving hits.

Cinnamon Sugar Butter Cookies

I wanted to make cookies and had an image in my mind of what I wanted to make....a buttery sugar cookie, rolled in cinnamon sugar before baking. I found this recipe..but didn't have the required amount of brown sugar called for.

A few substitutions and we have these...

Chicken Pot Pie

This is my favourite pie crust/pastry recipe. I use this pie crust recipe for sweet and savoury pies as well as individual chicken pocket pies!

Start this recipe by making the pastry as it needs to chill for a while. The pastry can even be made the night before and allowed to chill over night.

This pie crust is made easier by a food processor, if you don't have one it can be done by hand too with the aid of a fork or pastry cutter.

Filled with an easy chicken stew this makes a warm, comforting winter - or anytime - meal!

Black Bottom Cupcakes

It's Shaun's birthday and that means he gets to take cupcakes to work! Now, light fluffy cake and pouffy icing doesn't a manly cupcake make; and Shaun would insist it's bad enough to carry a cupcake carrier to work with him without there being frou-frou cupcakes inside....a serious insult to his manhood I'm sure.

So here we are...the manliest cupcakes in the world. Even their name screams of manliness...the Black Bottom Cupcake...sounds sinister doesn't it?

What we have is dark Devils food cake, no icing on these cupcakes...(real men don't eat icing)...and a little dollop..oh, excuse me...a robust blob(!) of cream cheese filling (cream cheese is ok apparently being the stuff many a chip-dip is made from). Just don't tell him there are mini chocolate chips mixed in...if he asks I'll tell him it's poison. Manly Poison.

Saltine Toffee Bar

Don't knock it till you try it! I stumbled upon this unusual treat (what do you call this, a cookie? A square?...) on The Parsley Thief and it seemed similar to something an Aunt of mine used to make with graham crackers so I had to give it a try.

The salty crackers and sweet toffee make a great combination...feel free to top it with nuts, a drizzle of white chocolate or whatever tickles your fancy!

Pumpkin Spice Pancakes

A great way to use up leftover pumpkin puree this recipe is as easy as mixing the dry ingredients and adding the wet!  Try topping hot pancakes with a scoop of vanilla ice cream for a truly decadent breakfast!

Challah Rolls

Challah is a traditional Jewish holiday bread.  It is my understanding long braided loaves are baked for the Sabbath and are eaten then and throughout the year, round loaves of the same bread are baked for the New Year.  I used the same recipe used for these loaves and made rolls instead, however, if you wish, form your dough into a beautiful braided loaf!

Mini Doughnut Cinnamon Sugar Muffins

There is nothing quite as delicious as a mini doughnut.  Hot, moist cake doughnut deep fried to greasy perfection doused with sugar and cinnamon.  This recipe attempts to at least somewhat replicate that in the form of a muffin.  Moist sweet cake, basted with melted butter then rolled in the familiar mixture of cinnamon and sugar.  Makes 12 large muffins but would work equally well in a mini muffin tin for charming mini - mini doughnut muffins.