Ginger snaps

Hey all! Here's a quick post on some cookies I've been making for YEARS. They're ginger cookies, similar to the consistency of Starbucks: gooey centers (but not too gooey) and crispy outsides (but not too crispy!) and are very adaptable with some common baking-sense to be crispier or gooey-er. They can be small or large ( though bigger ones should have their balls pre-squished, rounded mounds, people!).... Without further adieu....

Gingersnaps
1) cream 3/4 cup shortening, 1 cup packed brown sugar, 1/4 cup molasses, and 1 egg until fluffy.

2) sift together 2 1/4 cups flour, 2 teaspoons soda, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon ground ginger, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves.

3) mix in sifted mixture to molasses mixture until incorporated

4) form into small (1 in diameter) balls, roll in granulated sugar, and place on greased baking sheet.

5) bake at 375 degrees for 12 minutes, until only slightly soft on top (or firm if you enjoy crispy ones!)

Happy baking!!

Simplified Sandwiches

So recently we've been all about sandwiches. Roasted, toasted, raw or with slaw, sandwiches it is. Partially because they're easy to eat (no rice or noodles required!) and partially because they're super-filling for my needy-nursing toddler who gets boob-clingy when hungry. So here's a little list of our favorite swamiches lately:

Peanut-butter and Jelly (claaaassic)
Cream cheese & cucumber
Cream cheese & apple w/honey drizzle
Cream cheese, sprouts, spinach & apple
Peanut butter, banana, & honey
And Myra's all time favorite: peanut butter chocolate chip. (She came up with it)

Have fun sandwiching, I know we will!!

Homemade Chicken Soup

When the weather turns cold as it has been these past days (off and on, hooray SF Bay Area), I like to heat things up with comfort foods. One of my favorites is homemade chicken soup, with fresh veggies and herbs. I like to make a vat of it, and keep it around for a few days. You might want to reduce my recipe by half if you're solo, or if you're not too keen on slurping on tasty chicken & veggies for more than one meal (but come on, it's great stuff, so go ahead and get your biggest pot out!) I really hope it gets cloudy again soon, so that I can make up a batch of this for my family! Pairings: Goes great with biscuits, Pillsbury Grands are my favorite because you're busy making the soup, and they only take 10 minutes on average with no brains attached. Any of your favorite French or Italian bakery breads are delicious as well!

Crafting & Gifting for the Holidays

Hello all, it has been so long!!
Anyways, I have decided that since the economy is down like J-Sean and I am broke as a joke, I will craft all of my gifts for the holidays!! (With the exception of a lovely Pyrex bowl set I got on black Friday for my best friend, but you know, BFFs are always exceptions!!)

So my standard gift package includes:
White Chocolate Cranberry Fudge
Thumbprint Cookies (With Boysenberry or Orange Preserves in the thumb)
Something cute I have stitched up recently!!!
And umm.... Love?? Oh yes! A personalized Holiday note.

I really like Target dollar isle for anything wrapping-wise, as well as little stocking stuffers. the drawback is that my daughter is always with me, so I can't sneak things by her. I trust her short term memory more than anything, at this point.

I've actually gotten lazier and lazier. I was going to hand make recipe books, and then I thought I would buy them and hand write them, and now I'm just typing my recipes and mass-printing them, and pasting them in the books instead. So much easier! I hope my friends forgive me. Recipe books (for those of you who like to try and review new recipes) are nice hand made gifts, since your recipient will know you tested it first, and you can add your own pointers and advice, or variations. And leave room for their own! Then, its usefulness is two-fold!

Happy holidays to everyone out there, and good luck for the New Year!

The Best Pumpkin Pancakes

 So recently I stumbled upon some AMAZING pancakes. And I mean, UH-MAZE-ING. They're great solo, with butter, or with the whole sha-bang (butter, syrup, powdered sugar, anything really!). They're from Food Wishes, a blog which AllRecipes linked to recently in their featured seasonal recipes. I've taken the liberty of reproducing the recipe below with only two seasoning changes I made (I'm a bit of an addict on flavor, so the changes will be off to the edge, don't worry. If you like a more subtle flavor, go with the original). If you'd like more instruction on mixing methods, follow the link above to Food Wishes, there is a lovely video showing you exactly how to mix flour, milk, eggs, etc. But really, they're just pancakes. Hard to mess up! (especially with this flavor)

Pumpkin From Scratch (Part 1)

So I recently went bananas, (err, pumpkins?) over making my own pumpkin puree, since Safeway doesn't seem to be carrying canned pumpkin recently (Trader Joe's does, but the lines are SO LONG!!).
I went to town with my chef knife to open it up initially, because (as I discovered) it can be really difficult to cut a pumpkin in half!! Cleavers work well too, my favorite was the high-swung chop to break this bad boy up!

Ever had a hard time trying to clean out the goop without breaking too much of the sides? Ice cream scoops work really well, because they give you a better angle than a regular spoon, and they have a deeper bowl so you don't have to empty them as often.

The goop separated, I microwaved sections of the sides in a glass dish with a cover to cook them. It took about 15-25 minutes, depending on the size of the piece. When cooked, it should be pretty mushy & peel away from the skin easily. My favorite tools for this process are a fork and spoon: The fork spears a section in place skin-side-down, and you use the spoon to gently scrape away at the pumpkin meat.

After you've got all your pumpkin meat cooked, you can throw it in a blender or Cuisinart to finish pureeing it. Cuisinart is easier, blender takes time to blend, then smash down, then blend some more... not fun!! After it's all blended you can either cook with it, bake with it, eat it straight (My daughter loves it with cinnamon & a pinch of sugar) or freeze it for cooking later! I recommend freezing in 1 or 2 cup amounts in freezer bags, so it's easy to thaw just what you need.

Happy Halloween!

Lemonade & Variations

What could be better for the tail-end of summer than a cool glass of lemonade, or maybe a lemonade twist? My favorite drink for hot weather is the Rose Lemonade, which I devised after visiting a restaurant in Ashland, OR (that sadly is no more!). Alternatives are included in my recipes to give your last summer event a perfect drink compliment. So what's your favorite style?