Category: sweets

The semester is finally over, and I have spent this first week of summer break being very happily lazy. There are a ton of projects I want to work on this summer, including a redesign of this here blog, but right now I am thoroughly enjoying not having anything to do. And what have I been doing with all this free time? Besides re-reading Harry Potter for the seventy-second time, and sleeping in, and taking really long walks in the lovely May weather, I have been, of course, cooking.

Last summer my housemate, Miss Amelia Bedelia, bought me a lovely creme brulee set, which, much to her chagrin, sat unused in the pantry all year long. With Amelia getting ready to leave us for the summer I realized the only fitting and proper thing to do was to break out the torch and make some creme brulee. I also recently received, from the ever-generous folks at Blake Makes and Amano Chocolates, several bars of incredibly rich, perfectly bittersweet dark chocolate. Amelia loves chocolate, Amelia loves creme brulee, so clearly, chocolate creme brulee was the answer.

Continue reading Chocolate Creme Brulee

I received raucous cheers and applause for these babies. I am not kidding, there were whoops and shouts and there was some profuse praise, I think brought on by the sugar high these things induce. They are rich and almost unbearably sweet, the chocolate sugar overdose avoided only by the bits of salt scattered across the top. And they were an overwhelming hit with everyone who tasted them, even the mostly vegan woman who happily ate them despite the fact that they are loaded with butter and sweetened condensed milk.

When I first read the recipe in Bon Appetit, I thought they sounded lovely but were probably more trouble than they were worth. The recipe has three parts: the crust, the caramel, and the chocolate topping. It involved a candy thermometer. It involved cooking and then chilling and then cooking and chilling some more. But I wanted to do something impressive for the last-day-of-class party we had in cataloging, so I thought I’d give it a go, and as it turns out they are not nearly so difficult as they sound.

Continue reading Chocolate-Caramel Slice

My cataloging class is on Friday, and the professor assigns each student a date to bring a snack for the class. This Friday was my snack day, and you can bet your sweet tuchas that I wasn’t about to go to Shaw’s and buy a box of Keeblers. When I have an opportunity to bake for people, I jump on it. And after a week of relatively disastrous cooking experiences, I turned to Dorie Greenspan for guidance. I knew she wouldn’t steer me wrong, and she didn’t. Even though I took some (minor) detours from her recipe, these cookies were still pretty amazing, and my classmates devoured them. And they were pretty darned astonished that I made them myself, too. Baking apparently impresses people. I’ll have to keep that in mind.

Continue reading Dorie’s Midnight Crackles

I saw these on Slashfood awhile ago and I knew I had to have them. My housemates thoroughly agreed. So once I finished all the projects and classes and found myself in vacation, I went straight to Trader Joe’s, bought myself a box of Peppermint Jo-Jo’s (so much better than an Oreo will ever be) and baked up a plate of these insanely delicious brownies.

I didn’t follow the Baking Bites recipe exactly. Or at all. Instead, I found a basic brownie recipe in Dorie Greenspan’s book and stirred in the crushed up peppermint cookies at the end. And wow, oh wow. They were the very picture of decadence. The creamy peppermint filling melted into the brownie, and the cookies got crispy and extra baked tasting, and all in all, this was a brownie experience well worth repeating. In fact, I only got one brownie before they disappeared, which is both testament to their deliciousness and a requirement for me to make them again. Soon.

Continue reading Peppermint Cookies and Cream Brownies = Crazy Good

I keep reading that peach ice cream is the quintessential summer ice cream, the Fourth of July All-American ice cream, the ice cream that screams homemade on Grandma’s porch to people all over this country. And here I was, a midwestern/Californian/east-coast girl who had never had peach ice cream in her life. How could this be? How did this happen? Were my parents remiss?

It could have something to do with my childhood disinterest in fruit, and my continued love for all things chocolate when it comes to ice cream. But I determined last week that it was time to rectify the situation. I saw a huge container of delicious smelling ripe peaches at the market and I knew it was time to see what all the fuss is about. I decided to experiment a little, though. Instead of straight up peach ice cream, I wanted to make something that would taste more like peach pie, with vanilla ice cream. And you know, I succeeded.

Continue reading Summertime Peach Pie Ice Cream

The ice cream maker has not been silently resting, just because my writing skills have taken a break. Oh no, I’ve been playing and testing and taking full advantage of my fun new toy to help cool off during the unpleasant days of this New England summer. Our freezer is packed with frozen treats and I just want to keep making more. It’s so much fun. I get a ridiculous, child-like kick out of watching the liquid custards and purees slowly freeze and turn into dessert in front of my very eyes. And I get an even bigger kick out of realizing that I can bring all of my ice cream fantasy flavors to life. It’s like having my very own Ben & Jerry’s factory in the kitchen.

Not like I’ve been that creative yet. I’m definitely one of those types who likes to learn the basics before jumping into the crazy shit. And after my disastrous watermelon sorbet attempts, I felt even more strongly that I had some technique perfecting to do. Thankfully, my next sorbet turned out perfectly.

Continue reading Perfect Strawberry Sorbet plus something sweet and salty

This summer promises to be extra spectacular. Why? Because my kind and generous parents sent me the greatest summertime diversion ever as a birthday gift: an ice cream maker. A red, shiny, beautiful ice cream maker. And because they are so brilliant, they also sent a copy of David Lebovitz’s The Perfect Scoop, the book that is showing its lovely cover all over the internets these days. My excitement for ice cream is boundless. I want to make new and different varieties every single day, but if Crystal and I went through that much ice cream, well, let’s just say neither of us can afford a whole new wardrobe. As it is, I’ve only had the thing for a week and I’ve already made two batches.

Continue reading The most glorious summer of all…

One summer about six or seven years ago, my friend Charlie and I went out to pick blackberries by the DeLaveaga disc golf course in Santa Cruz. We fought through brambles and stinging bugs and filled a couple buckets with blackberries, enough to try to bake a pie. What we didn’t do, though, is figure out how to make pie crust, and our kitchen experimentation ended up a disaster. We decided to settle for a sugary blackberry sauce to pour over ice cream, and we were perfectly satisfied. But pieless.

About four years ago, my good friend PJ Burks came to visit in Boston, and we went apple picking. It was a glorious fall afternoon, and we filled bags and bags with the most delicious apples I’ve ever tasted. We came home with all of our apples and decided to make a pie, but remembering my previous crust difficulties, we bought a premade crust. Our apple pie was beautiful and we were very proud, but my heart remained rankled by the fact that I had to yet to really, truly, and honestly bake a pie.

Last week I bought an enormous bag of beautiful cherries, and I decided this was it. This was the time to bake a pie, a real pie, from scratch, with a lattice-top crust and everything. And when the weather finally cooled down enough, on Friday, I did it. I baked my first cherry pie.

Continue reading My First Cherry Pie

Last Friday, I had a crappy, crappy day. One of those “I woke up this grouchy” days. Despite gorgeous spring weather (we’re actually getting spring this year in Boston!) and working only a half day and the fact that it was Friday, I just felt like booty all day. And Crystal, who didn’t start out the day pissed, sure ended it that way when she was stuck in traffic for an hour and a half on the way home from work. What did we need to rectify this crapaliciousness? Sparkling wine and dessert.

Crystal picked up a lovely Cava on the way home, and I pondered and pondered what to make. Something light, because it was hot out. Something that would work with fizzy wine. Something that wouldn’t make us feel like heifers after a week of too much beer. What to do, what to do? Well, once again, it was Giada to the rescue. Continue reading Chocolate, Stawberries, and Sparkling Wine and the Whole Day is Better