Happy HOL-i-days!

I confess - I have been a very bad blogger as of late. Somehow, you start with a blog, then you taper off. I had a million and one pictures I wanted to upload and show you all over the last few months, but I have lapsed in keeping on top of this.

Several little things have been a hindrance, preventing me from blogging. Yes, excuses, excuses...I know. But Biscuit and I have been in the process of applying to graduate school. We have been doing a great deal of wedding planning, and of course, we have been getting ready for the holidays. Here is an update from the last few months.

October:
To start off this fantastic month, we celebrated Mommy Foosela's birthday. One of my gifts was a cake I saw Paula Deen make. It had a lot of butter in it, so it must be delicious, right? Well, butter, yes... delicious? Well, that was debatable. Here are some pictures from that disaster.
The cake was quite easy to bake - all three layers of it. The drippy caramel goo was also quite tasty and stayed (pretty much) in place between the layers.



The frosting is where things got tricky. If you happen to think that the frosting has a consistency a bit like concrete, well, you are correct. It was very difficult to spread. It was more a matter of spackaling it to the cake. But it worked ... and it sure looked better after it was decorated.



We all ate it - demolished it, actually. One of the best parts of the entire cake was the caramel center that developed. So tasty!



The other "thing" that came from this recipe was my creation of maple walnut fudge. Yeah, by any stretch, it is not really fudge. In fact, it is just the recipe for this frosting, but when you add some walnuts to it and pour it into a well-greased 9x9 glass dish and chill it, it becomes a most wonderful rich and luscious fudge. So good!

November:
November brought us Thanksgiving, a true food festivus. Both my family and Biscuit's Mom made fabulous meals that satisfied many people. My addition to the special day were baked goods, of course. I made scrumptious pumpkin whoopie pies with cream cheese frosting, maple snickerdoodles, and a German Chocolate Pecan Pie. So tasty. Pictures of these creations will follow soon.

December:
This is the month of decadence. The first weekend of December is the kickoff to the holiday season. My family throws their annual Christmas tree party. Amazing food is in abundance. This year was even more special because we topped off the evening with a trip to Worcester to see Neil Diamond in concert. We had Grammy and Biscuit's parents in tow. It made for a great night.

December also saw one of the worst ice storms to hit our area ever. Biscuit and I have been out of school for over a week now and have had time to master our ping pong skills and create delicious Christmas treats. We have made lace cookies, chocolate chip cookies, caramel shortbread, and even SUGAR PLUMS! Have you ever sampled the bliss of a sugar plum? Well, these things are magic... the stuff that dreams are made of!

I will update again soon with all the pictures from the gingerbread festivus that will occur tomorrow. Until then, seasons greetings and EATINGS!

More Good Stuff on the Way!

Celebrate Fall




Even though it is nasty and rainy out today, I love to think of all the goodness of fall - farm produce fresh from the harvest, chilly nights and high school football games, the change of humid air into cool, breathable air, warm one-pot dinners made in a dutch over, and those first fallen leaves. I wanted to put up some pictures I took at the apple orchard last week to remind me that even though today is dreary, there is a lot of fall still on its way!

I just found out that a student friend of mine is celebrating a birthday tomorrow. That, of course, means that the good ol' Kitchenaid will have some work to do this weekend. I found out that this young lady is quite a chocolate fan and enjoys brownies and cupcakes. Maybe I will have to whip out my cupcake decorating kit, or do some fanciful variation on traditional brownies. Biscuit is going to hate me - all of a sudden fall hits and I am back to backing unhealthy treats. I did, however, download a recipe for carrot and date cookies. I will let you know if I try those.






I got pretty excited thinking that the holidays were coming up, too! Fall means Thanksgiving and lots of pies and crisps of all kinds (my favorite is my German Chocolate Pecan Pie), but it also means Christmas is just around the corner. December holidays call for more hearty treats like my rugelach (a Jewish pastry with a cream cheese dough) and my pistachio-cranberry biscotti dipped in white chocolate. I am thinking about just giving out cookies for the holidays this year instead of actual gifts. I am pretty sure they might be appreciated more than mere travel mugs or scented lotions.


All these pumpkins will soon be delicious pies! YUM!


Biscuit and I are off to hit the gym. It is too wet outside to run; but we have to expend calories somehow if we are going to be eating so many baked goods! I think for supper we might try stuffed acorn squash. I have a recipe that calls for sliced apples, sausage, sage, bread crumbs, and eggs, all delectably tucked amidst the flesh of acorn squash. If we venture in that direction for dinner tonight I will be sure to capture it digitally and put it up here. Happy weekend, everyone!

Apple Pies - 1.1

Great fall afternoons are made for two things - a long run in the woods and some good ol' fashioned baking (after a shower, of course!). And, today, I did both. To start off, this Thursday was such a great day. I was informed that Neil Diamond, my favorite singer EVER, was coming back to Massachusetts this fall. Promptly, I e-mailed an invite to my grandma to join Biscuit and I at this concert. With encouragement from her friend, Mike ("Go, Mary, GO!"), Grammoo informed me that she would come along to the show! That made my day!


Another positive was my run in the woods and Biscuit's decision to order sushi for dinner. I was excited to eat, but I had a busy night still ahead of me. Magically, my three dozen maple snickerdoodles disappeared, and it was requested that I make some more. Indeed, I also made a pie for a Debate Watching Party that I am attending tomorrow.

Having a little extra dough, I made a mini-pie, or what Biscuit called .1 pie. When the two pies were next to each other, he referred to the package deal as Pie 1.1. HA! Well, here is Mama Pie along with Baby (.1) Pie.

As I uploaded this picture, Biscuit exclaimed "Wow, that pie looks so small. It looks like it is being led around by the big pie." I could not agree more, Biscuit My Love! Well, he did not seem to mind the size of the pie as he was munching on it, as seen below...

It looks like a busy weekend on tap, with Biscuit playing in a tennis match, and the aforementioned Presidential Debate Party we are attending. I may have a chance to bake, and if I do, you will be the first to know. A big SHOUT OUT to all of my friends at Widener Library. Too bad I can't send you chocolate to eat over the internet. Love you, Grammoo! Happy baking!

It's a Very Baketress Wednesday

I blogged, then I went to check on my cornbread. To my distinct surprise, I pulled this baby out and my goodness! did it ever look good! You could smell the honey baked warm into the bread. So good. It formed a nice crisp brown layer on the top. Here are the final results:

Mmm, Mmm Cornbread Look at that crisp top!

This was my first homemade cornbread. I have been a big fan of cornbread and corn muffins since I was little, but I have always used a blue box to make it. This summer, Biscuit started to make these delicious savory little corn cakes, and since then, we always keep corn meal in the house.I figured that since we were having chili for supper, that I had to make a great accompaniment. This cornbread will be the perfect compliment.

My other creation did not fair as well. I decided to make Kerri's Nutty Shortbread Cookies. Now, her recipe called for pecans, and she recommended using parchment paper when baking these cookies. I made my first four cookies on a straight baking sheet. These four came out perfect; crisp on the outside, nutty, crunchy flavor. So tasty.

The next batch did not come out well. I took the recipe's advice and opted for the parchment paper. I was disappointed with the results. In fact, most of them broke after they had cooled. I am not sure if, somehow, using the parchment changed the way the cookie baked, but I have to say, I have several decapitated moose cookies on my hands!

These moose lived.

Now, I should probably explain the reason that you will see so many moose cookies on my blog. Moose are by far my favorite animals. Up until this April, I had never, ever seen a moose in person. I was worried that I had forever cursed myself into never seeing a moose because I had once eaten a moose burger. Well, my bad luck streak broke four days before Biscuit proposed to me. My Mom said that I had to be in love before I saw a moose. The April moose was a lovely female, but the July moose was unbelievable. Biscuit and I were living in VT for the summer and I spotted this glorious creature at 6:30am one morning:

MOOSE!

Anyway, I will tell anyone who will listen to me about my love for moose. My students all know that I love moose. For an end of school gift, a student once gave me a sugar cookie recipe and a moose cookie cutter. Well, believe me, anytime I make a dough cookie that requires a cookie cutter, I use the moose. Alas, these are the chocolate-dipped moose cookies.

For some variation, I also chocolate-dipped a heart cookie, too.

Not as pretty as Kerri's...

but at least it's intact.

I still have a lot of apples hanging around. I may peruse some recipes online and see what else I can do to these apples. I will keep you posted on any creations!

Crispy Little Devils

MAPLE SNICKERDOODLES!

After a stressful start to the week, I was able to indulge in a relaxing afternoon of baking today. Being a teacher, occasionally I am observed for different reasons. I had one of these observations on Tuesday morning. This means that I spent the last week making sure that everything would flow perfectly in the classroom. The long and short of it is - well, I couldn't bake.

Then, Tuesday afternoon, I coached my very first cross country meet. My students were incredible and actually scored a big victory against two local towns. After a long day yesterday, all I wanted to do was go to bed and watch House.

Today, however, was the perfect baking day. I got home from cross country practice and perused the web for new creations. I found the most divine recipe for these little gems from heaven - maple snickerdoodles. HO-LY COW are these things good. Just as with most snickerdoodles, these have a lovely butter and sugar base with a lot of cinnamon. This fabulous twist included three tablespoons of real deal maple syrup. The recipe called for rolling the dough in maple sugar. Not having any in my cupboard (and knowing well how expensive such a purchase would be) I opted to create a mixture of cinnamon, sugar, brown sugar, and the slightest bit of maple syrup. Not enough syrup to make it wet, just enough to slightly moisten the sugar.

After ten minutes, these little badboys came out, chewy in the center, crispy and lovely on top. Biscuit may have a new favorite cookie. He is off taking a nap right now, but I am certain he's going to enjoy these treats.

I am also in the process of making a delicious honey cornbread recipe to go with the chili I procured from my parents' house last night. I also have the dough chilling in the fridge right now to make Kerri Annie's shortbread cookies, as featured on the Threadbare Bakery Blog. Not having pecans in the house, I decided to try this recipe with cashews. I did opt to keep the wheat flour versus white flour. Interestingly enough, this recipe also calls for brown sugar instead of white. I am so SURE this will be delicious, too. I have a big bag of chocolate ready and waiting for these cashew cookies to be dipped in.


In the meanwhile, above is a snickerdoodle snapshot I took after they cooled. Here below is an image of my cornbread that I am begining to fear may very well spill over into the oven as a result of being full to the brim. Eeek! Wish me luck!

Open for Business!

HA HA! Now that I have got Blogger figured out, I can upload some of my more recent creations. Also, on a completely different note, I do want to mention to you bakers out there another blog that may be of interest to you. This blog is produced by my very own sister, Kerri. She gave me the idea for opening up my own cyber blog-kery. Her blog is called The Threadbare Bakery and can be found at http://threadbarebakery.blogspot.com/. Her baketress status is awe-inspiring. She tries some really creative stuff. Be sure to check out her Glutinous Coconut Balls of Glory (or whatever else she has titled them)!

Back to the Overdue Book Bakery. I have mentioned in the past that some of my summer creations have included:

Magic Bars (also called Seven Layer Bars) - these are Biscuit's FAVORITE!
Caramel Shortbread Squares - you can never go wrong with caramel
Caramel Pecan Sticky Buns - the absolute easiest yeast dough recipe out there!

German Chocolate Cake

White Chocolate Raspberry Frosted Lemon-Raspberry Layer Cake

Scones of all varieties

Bread Pudding

and CUPCAKES!

Here are some fan favorites:

Above are the most recent blueberry scones.

Here is my new peanut butter white chocolate bread pudding.

A cup full of warm bread pudding on an early fall evening.

I will continue to upload more pictures of my delicious baked goods as they are produced. For now, enjoy the mouth-watering temptations featured above. Feel free to drop me a note if you are interested in any recipes!

Baketress Bliss

My fiance and I just celebrated the anniversary of our first date by picking apples. Our first date was actually a twelve-hour long afternoon that included apple picking, strolling, laughing, grocery shopping, and a thwarted attempt to watch a football game that never came on. We made the best of the afternoon sharing teacher stories and celebrating the glory of the apples we picked. Now, a year later, we ventured into another new territory together - turning those anniversary apples into a delicious pie!

Using my Mom's (actually my great-grandmother's) crust recipe, I attempted my very first apple pie last night. The fact that it is half-gone by the next day is indicative of our success. Mike (A.K.A. "Biscuit") was an expert at slicing the Macoun apples we picked into perfect-sized pieces. I worked with a dough that was comprised of:

2.5 cups flour

1 cup Crisco

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup of milk

1 tablespoon vinegar

I mixed all of the dry ingredients together first, then cut in the Crisco with a pastry cutter (a life-saver - much better than using the two butter knife method of years past!). The next step was to combine the milk and vinegar together and THEN add that to the dry mixture. This produces enough for both a top and bottom crust. My Mom reminded me of the importance of pricking the crust, both bottom and sides, before adding the apples.

The apples were sliced (we used about 10 medium sized Macouns - a lot, but it made for a nice, lumpy, full pie!) and placed in a large mixing bowl. Before they could discolor, we added 1 cup of sugar, some cinnamon, some nutmeg, a tablespoon of flour, and a 1/2 teaspoon of salt. When it came to the cinnamon and nutmeg I do not measure. Some recipes suggest using 1 teaspoon of each - I probably use at least a tablespoon (3 teaspoons for those making the conversion) of cinnamon, and a bit less of nutmeg. That appley-goodness mixture goes straight into the pie pan. Before adding the top crust, Biscuit and I sliced up a few pieces of butter and strategically placed it atop the apples to make for a gooey-ier center. We covered the pie, crimped the edges, put three venting slices in the top. I coated the crust with a light butter-wash and threw it in the oven.

The pie baked for 10 minutes at 425 degrees. After ten minutes, we lowered the temp. to 350 and baked for another 40 minutes. The results were divine! Biscuit went out, back to the supermarket, convinced that a pie of this magnitude should not be enjoyed without vanilla ice cream. Upon his return, we could not wait for the pie to cool before we cut in. The crust was PERFECT! Oddly enough, I am not much of a crust person when it comes to pies, but this was really outstanding. Biscuit said that everything; the crust, the apples, the soupy-ish filling; were just perfection. I was glad that we were able to make this together.

Trial and Error

In baking, just like in life, some things come out incredible; other times you fall flat on your face. However, tonight I had a couple successes in the kitchen. I made some pretty delicious blueberry scones and a white chocolate peanut butter bread pudding.

The bread pudding was inspired by a dining experience I had at my sister's rehearsal dinner. I sampled a delicious buttscotch bread pudding. Tonight, in the mood to bake, I scoured my cupboards and came across a bag of unopened white chocolate chips. This was a find! Naturally, I keep several baking essentials on hand at all times - pumpkin, corn syrup, sweetened condensed milk, BUTTAH, and nuts of all varieties; but a bag of morsels does not last long. I remember why I purchased them. I had set out to make white chocolate raspberry cupcakes, but opted for a lighter, fluffier lemon-raspberry cupcake recipe instead. The white chips had been in hiding and it was time for them to make an appearance in my oven.

Chocolate (white or milk, it doesn't matter!) always goes with peanut butter. I sliced up some light wheat toast, popped it in some corningware with the white chocolate chips, and soaked the bread bits with a mixture of cinnamon, brown sugar, and a little milk. Voila! 50 minutes at 375 degrees ... and DELICIOUS! I will be sure to put up some shots in the near future! For now, you can feast your eyes on some of my summer baking projects.

Here is a green moose that looks like a rhino. The other fun detail is the decapitated moose on the top right. His head was scrumptious.

This moose baking cookie session was unbelievably fun. The best part was even before Biscuit and I started baking - we were in the supermarket buying frosting and I kept getting frustrated saying I couldn't find any brown frosting --- um, yea, all of the chocolate frostings ARE brown. I was a little tired that day.

Summer cakes

The German Chocolate Pecan Cake was Biscuit's birthday treat; the other was for our summer landlord, Len. The cake was a lemon layer cake with a center of raspberry preserves in the center. The cake was frosted with a basic white frosting and accented with fresh raspberries stuffed with white chocolate chips and mint.

Food, Glorious Food

Welcome to The Overdue Book Bakery. This page is dedicated to my personal dream of becoming a baketress. I spend my free time concocting curious creations in the kitchen I share with my fiance. I bake, he eats. It is a perfect pairing. In expressing my dreams about becoming a baketress, a former student of mine suggested that I open a restaurant in our town's old library. She said I could name it The Overdue Book. Until the day comes that I can actually have my own little bake shop around the corner, this will have to be my bakery for now. Please enjoy the tasty treats!