Like just about everybody I know in the Northeast, I go apple picking in the fall. This year, the wife and I took a crazy trip up north to Applewood Orchards in Warwick, NY (to be detailed in a later post). We exited with half a bushel of apples, a pumpkin and smiles on our faces.
Unfortunately, our mood quickly turned sour when we wasted our first four apples on this recipe for the “Best Apple Crisp Ever.” Oh, hyperbole, why am I such a sucker for thee?
Categories: Baking · Dessert · Problems
Tagged: brown sugar, apple crisp, Applewood Orchards
Categories: Baking · Dessert
Tagged: lemon, lemon squares, zest, powdered sugar, easy recipe, sweets week
Simple. Delicious. Irresistible. Thy name is icebox cake.
Man, I love this thing. I could eat the whole log in one sitting… if I hadn’t already inhaled half of the cookies and whipped cream while making it.
And while I probably should have put more cream between the cookies instead of in my belly, there’s no wrong way to make this dessert. However, if you have an addictive personality, I suggest steering clear of the following recipe.
Did I mention how ridiculously easy this is?
Ingredients
Directions
In a large bowl, whip cream until it begins to stiffen. Add sugar and vanilla, and whip until soft peaks form.
Take a wafer and place dollop of cream on one side. Add another layer of wafer and cream, until sandwich will stand on its side in a caterpillar pattern (same as the wafers in the box). Keep building until all but two wafers are used. Cover the log with a thin layer of cream.
Cover and place in the refrigerator (icebox) for at least one hour. Cover and reserve extra cream in refrigerator. When ready to serve, add thick layer of cream around the log and crumble reserved wafers on top.
To serve, slice in diagonal rows about one inch apart.
Categories: Baking · Dessert · Recipes
Tagged: chocolate wafers, easy dessert, icebox cake, no-bake, refrigerator, whipped cream
Normally, waking up to a batch of freshly baked chocolate chip cookies is no less than a miracle. As in:
But in this case, there’s something more peculiar at work. Something which, although just as awe-inspiring, doesn’t give you the same warm and fuzzy feeling that a genuine miracle engenders. I speak, of course, of the emergency overnight shift of a veterinary intern program.
Let me explain.
Categories: Baking
Tagged: cookies, emergency overnight, mini chocolate chips
Although everything was beautiful, the highlight of a recent wedding I attended was the endless amount of cookies. I can count at least 12 varieties in this picture alone, but there had to be more than 20 kinds continuously replenished at the dessert table all night.
It was truly a legendary feat by the mother and aunt of the bride, who must have been baking cookies for nearly a month. The only problem: sickness induced by washing down too many of these treats with open-bar alcohol. Ughhhhhhh.
A couple of my favorites were:
The Mouse
The Hamburger
Categories: Baking · Curiosities · Dessert · Events · Travel
Tagged: wedding cookies, mouse cookie, hamburger cookie
Back in the day, my Aunt Dolly made THE BEST Toll House cookies. They were somehow both chewy and crumbly at the same time and just sweet enough to be completely addictive.
Until now, I’ve had little luck in replicating her success, even as the same recipe she used calls out tauntingly from every package of Toll House morsels I buy. And I buy quite a few.
Although I can’t be sure which of the following factors was responsible for my recent breakthrough, it probably had a lot to do with a certain extra presence in the kitchen:
The result: some damn fine cookies. Maybe not as good at my aunt’s, but as close as I’m ever going to get.
Ahem… close as we’re ever going to get.
Categories: Baking
Tagged: chocolate chip cookies, toll house morsels
No, I’ve never heard of a klatch before either.
But when I looked it up last week after receiving an invitation to the above office event, I immediately dug the idea. After all, who doesn’t love an informal gathering, as for conversation?
For my cookie contribution, I used a recipe from a Mrs. Field’s cookbook that I’ve had forever (I think I stole it from my mom). Although I’ve tried a couple of the book’s other concoctions - with varying degrees of success - I’d never attempted the classic Blue-Ribbon Chocolate Chip Cookies.
Unlike the delectable, store-baked Mrs. Fields, these didn’t turn out so great. They had a good, chewy consistency (I finally got the butter part right!), but the taste was a bit off. I think there was too much brown sugar.
Other klatch batches included:
Needless to say, the afternoon sugar rush had me working at not-quite-full mental capacity. And I’ll tell you what: the employee handbook doesn’t quite cover this dilemma.
Categories: Baking · Recipes
Tagged: chocolate chip cookies, Christmas, holidays, klatch, mrs. fields, sugar rush, work
When someone doesn’t cook very well (or just doesn’t like to), they will still admit to being an expert at one or all of the following three things:
The implication, obviously, is that these three things are so easy to make, even people whose stove has never been turned on (”Where’s the defrost button?”) can put them together. So, I find it quite hilarious that I cannot for the life of me make a good batch of brownies.
I start off with the best of intentions and the exact ingredients called for on the box. I put the pan in the oven at the right temperature, for the right amount of time, and then… mush: it doesn’t cook through. If you watched the first season of Survivor, I’m like that professional chef that couldn’t make rice. Except, I’m not a professional chef, and I doubt I’ll ever need to survive by making brownies.
The whole problem may have something to do with my addition of massive quantities of chocolate chips to the batter, even when chips are already present. It’s part of the “there’s never enough chocolate” school of baking, taught to me by my mom.
So, while it may not always produce the best brownies, at least there’s more chocolate. And couldn’t we all use more chocolate in our lives?
Categories: Baking · Problems
Tagged: , brownies, chocolate chips
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