Blueberry Zucchini Bread
During the car ride home from my parent's house yesterday, I listed all the recipes I need to post on this here website to Casey and he had no recollection of me making Blueberry Zucchini Bread! When I described it as "that tasty/moist/lemony bread studded with juicy blueberries...you know the one you ate a LOT of?" the memory of eating the bread finally came back. Apparently he was just thrown off by the word zucchini because he had no idea there was zucchini in that bread! Cooper had no clue too. I'm guilty of vegetable hiding.
Blueberries & Zucchini! They're both in season right now, so why not combine the two and make a scrumptious bread? This recipe makes TWO loaves. If you're scared that you'll eat BOTH loaves (which is easy to do and I don't blame you), wrap one up and give it to your neighbor/friend/coworker and earn brownie points. If you're feeling greedy, wrap up the second loaf and stash it in your freezer. Blueberry zucchini bread will be a great start to your week, next week!
Continue reading→
Homemade Soft Pretzels
If you decide to make these AH-mazing homemade soft pretzels, make sure someone else is home to help you eat them. I had to wait FIVE excruciating hours for Casey to get home and I SWEAR I almost locked myself out of the house TWICE so I wouldn't eat more. When Casey finally arrived, I had a pretzel filled dinner waiting for him. For an appetizer, he started off with a plain pretzel dipped in hot mustard. His entree was a cheesy jalapeno pretzel with a few dashes of Tapatio. For dessert, he devoured a crispy cinnamon sugar pretzel. That's right. Three courses of doughy goodness for my husband. That's how we roll.
You should make these pretzels this weekend if you can! The active time is a snap and the inactive/proofing time can be spent cleaning up your kitchen or doing crunches while watching trashy TV. The bottom line: these pretzels are LEGIT and people will be impressed! I kinda feel like opening up my own soft pretzel stand outside our house featuring Honey Rosemary Lemonade. Wouldn't that be awesome? I'm totally dreaming.
p.s.- Cross off another item from my 31 comes before 32 list. #15. Make my own soft pretzels!
Continue reading→
Farm Stand Buttermilk Doughnuts
.
I recently made Crispy Fried Chicken as well as French Fries. If I'm doing all this frying, I might as well make some doughnuts, right? Do you say donuts or doughnuts? I usually type donuts because it's faster. Whatever you say, there's no mistake that they are hands down one of my most favorite foods. I ate six donuts in less than 15 minutes when I was pregnant. True story.
My birthday is coming up, which means I'm rushing to knock stuff off my 31 comes before 32 list. AHHH!! I still have a cleanse to do! And a fondue party in the summer?! WHAT?! Last weekend I knocked off #2. Make donuts from scratch! I had Cooper help me measure out the dry ingredients early in the morning and almost had a heart attack when he dropped the large bowl of flour on the kitchen floor. Yikes.
Five important lessons were learned while making these AH-mazing buttermilk doughnuts:
1. Do not make doughnuts unless you are FULLY caffeinated.
2. If you want a huge mess in your kitchen, ask your almost 3 year old to help you.
3. Hot doughnuts are outrageously good! And with a yeast free buttermilk dough, they're a snap to make!
4. If you are making these for a family of 3, make sure you have friends/neighbors to give some to! Too many doughnuts in your kitchen spells TROUBLE.
5. It may take trying 6 doughnuts to help you figure out if you prefer the cinnamon sugar ones to the vanilla glazed. Don't be alarmed.
Now friends, it's Wednesday. You have a few days to reduce your caloric intake to prepare for this weekend's Buttermilk Doughnut EXTRAVAGANZA! DO IT.
Continue reading→
Profiteroles with Chocolate Sauce
Here's a weird fact about me! I always pay close attention to what my friends/family order when we're at a restaurant. It's only because I'm nosy, weird, and I desperately want to learn their taste buds. I also like figure out what they'll order when they pick up a menu. I take a guess in my head, and when I'm right, I feel awesome. My brother and husband always order duck or some other MEAT. Carbs always seal the deal for their entrees. My dad orders fish or chicken and makes them sub greens for carbs (he's that guy!). He also never orders dessert BUT that doesn't stop him from eating mine. My mom will start with a beet salad, and for her entree she picks the lamb or something pork related. She always makes room for dessert when she sees profiteroles on a dessert menu. ALWAYS. This type of information comes in handy.
So, when it came to Mother's Day last month (YES I'm SOO BEHIND!), I knew exactly what to make my mom for the special day. Profiteroles! I learned how to make them at my Sur La Table class a few months back and Mother's Day & my 31 comes before 32 list put me to the test. #8 Make cream puffs for my mom. (She LOVES profiteroles!)= COMPLETED.
They were SCRUMPTIOUS and well received! A little bit of effort but totally worth it! My mom is worth it. As it turns out, Pate a Choux is pretty fun to make and the dough is kind of addictive if you're into eating dough like I am. If you want to give someone a nice gift, make them something they'd order in a restaurant. Surprise them! I almost always go for the bread pudding, anything with bananas or homemade donuts. My birthday is in August. I'm just planning ahead here.
Continue reading→
Triple Berry Galette
There isn't a better way, in my opinion, to welcome someone home after a week away on business than with a huge slab of triple berry pie. Casey has been gone for the past week which means I've been eating salads, playing single parent, organizing my closet, catching up on girly/trashy shows, wearing face masks, hogging the couch, plucking my eyebrows in random parts of the house and really wishing I had a reason to bake something. I woke up yesterday morning with the intention of making a pie and that's what I did. I made this one. My husband was coming home and he deserved a pie for his hard work.
A trip to the store for some fresh berries while drooling over this crostata from Lottie & Doof, and a text with my best baker friend about the difference between a galette & crostata helped me make this ridiculously easy pie. It's free form. It's gorgeous. It's rustic. It's charming and the crust is earth shattering! Like...I can't BELIEVE I made this crust-CRUST. The berries are juicy, dark & delicious. They're the epitome of summer.
I must confess that I hogged this galette like I hogged our couch this past week. Even though I gave half of it to the neighbors, I cut a small slice for myself EVERY TIME I walked past the kitchen. I purposely avoided the kitchen for 4 hours before Casey came home or else there would have seriously been none left. Pie so delicious... you must give half of it away and then hide it. Good thing I've been binging on salads....
Walnut Shortbread
Did I mention that it's overcast here? It's June. According to twitter, the last time it rained in San Francisco during June was in the 1930s. Crazy. My neighbor kid called it June-uary. How funny is that? She also let me try on 12 of her Silly Bandz yesterday. But that's besides the point. I'm just irritated that I can't get started with the outdoor cocktail-ing yet. Instead, I spent yesterday indoors baking and cleaning up my garage...dreaming about cold beer with lime & shrimp tacos.
To taste a bit of summer, I decided to open a jar of the Early Peach Marmalade from Blue Chair Fruit yesterday afternoon but we had no bread in the house. Instead of smearing it on warm buttered toast, I decided to make this walnut shortbread because, why not? The little Martha Stewart recipe card has been sitting on my kitchen counter for months now and I had all of the ingredients...serendipity!
So...Walnut Shortbread. What's not to like? Buttery, crispy, slightly nutty (wishing for a few nutty chunks!) but very delicate and perfect for preserves. Fantastic snack or breakfast for an overcast day with hot tea. Amazing with peach marmalade. AH-MAZING. If the weather would cooperate, I'd pack a few squares & some jam for makeshift picnic in the park or maybe layer some in an fluffy apricot parfait? But today I plan on crushing some up and adding it to my Greek yogurt with honey and fresh raspberries. That's just how I roll. Summer, I'll see you soon.
Coconut Waffles with Maple Cream
Dear Joy,
I could send you a text but I'm much better at typing on a keyboard. You might already know this from my never-ending typos. I have big thumbs. We both have big hands. I'm telling the world this. It's true. Anyways HELLO! I took your advice. I didn't tell Casey that your Toasted Coconut Waffles were Gluten Free! He had no idea! He devoured one and then he proceeded to climb back into bed to sleep it off. You apparently invented amazing waffles that require slumber! Way to go! Honestly, I think he just wanted to dodge cleaning up my mess in the kitchen...and it worked. I'll have to try that when he makes me something to eat...which will be never. Wait. He does make rice... in the rice maker. I'm gonna collapse on our bed like one of those fainting goats when he makes his next batch. Watch me.
Coconut flour. You're right. It's pretty awesome. I mean...I know how much we looooove our coconut oil, but FLOUR?!! I think I might have tried a few tablespoons of it on its own. It's sweet, savory and not boring like regular flour. I'm thinking it could be a good substitute for the whole wheat flour in the Coconut Shrimp I made. Do you think that would work? Have you used it for that application yet? It was cool to see how it expanded in the batter. I was worried for 2.5 seconds and then BAM the batter was all pudding like. You know your stuff. I bet you have made many many MANY gluten-free people jump for JOY with this recipe. Do you get sick of that pun?
I was going to make my own apricot compote for the waffles, but I couldn't find my dried apricots! I think I used them all up in that late night batch of Apricot Pistachio Granola last week. I stood in front of my pantry for 10 minutes willing a bag of apricots to appear. It didn't work. Have you ever willed food to appear? Did it work? So I didn't have any apricots BUT I did have a banana and some dark chocolate. I sprinkled those both on top. YIKES. It was like dessert for breakfast! It required a glass of water but that didn't stop me from cleaning my plate.
Anyways, I like you & your taste buds. I also like that I can text you at 7:50am on a Sunday morning with a picture of my steaming waffle maker because I know you're already awake. Thanks for being a person who doesn't like to waste a Sunday morning.
Your bud,
Tracy
Strawberry Clafouti
My mom made a cherry clafouti for company when I was a little, and I've been smitten with the word *clafouti* ever since. Clafouti. CLAH- FOO-TEE. It's a fun word to say. Go ahead, try it. See what I mean? I wish I could tell you that I was an immediate fan of clafouti, but unfortunately I can't. When I was a kid, I wasn't keen on anything that tasted like egg. There was an incident at a Mexican restaurant involving FLAN that totally scarred me. Flan is not the dessert you want to eat on your 9th birthday while you're wearing an obligatory sombrero, trust me. So when I tried a hunk of clafouti expecting it to be like cake, I was truly disappointed! Through the maturing process I have learned the beauty of an eggy custard-like cake batter. Isn't growing up fun?
Those gorgeous strawberries I brought back from Driscoll's found a home in this simple Strawberry Clafouti recipe! The batter required a quick whirl in the blender, much like the Chocolate Dutch Baby I recently made and the strawberries get all roasted and gooey delicious like those dreamy Roasted Strawberries I posted. There's also no shortage of buttered crispy edges. I love crispy edges! And can we just take a moment for that beautiful spongy middle mixed with a crazy amount of sweet roasted strawberries? I've never made anything like it. Sprinkle powdered sugar on a hunk and you can call it breakfast. Or position a scoop of vanilla bean gelato on top and you can call it dessert! Clafouti. Keep saying it. CLA-FOU-TI!
Continue reading→
