Bakery Days

October 2010 . Sugar Cookies

One more gratuitous cookie shot. Get the recipe here.

October 2010 . Snowflake Sugar Cookie

It took less than an hour, but he knew me instantly and said with a laugh, “You should bake more; it makes you happy.”

I pondered this a bit, shrugged my shoulders and said, “Okay.” He’s right. Baking makes me happy. I craved creativity, something that’s been lacking in my baked goods lately. I had no idea what I would do. Normally when I have a baker’s road-block, I turn to my tried and true  chocolate chip cookies for a quick sugar fix. Not this time–no, I thought a bit more about this, and decided to let my thoughts drift. My brain flittered around tarts, puddings and pies before it settled on a snowflake. Sure, it’s October, but who says I can’t have snowflakes and shamrocks in the fall? Tonight would be a year of sugar cookies.

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June 2010 . Pimentos de Padrón

One of my favorite stalls at the farmers’ market is East Palo Alto’s Happy Quail Farms. They have the best looking, best tasting peppers that my eyes and mouth have ever feasted on. During the winter months, they take a break from the farmers’ market circuit (at least at the Ferry Building, which makes me a bit sad), but they come back every summer with beautiful bright peppers. Normally, I buy a few sweet bell peppers to stuff, sauté or add to a salad, but last week I asked about these little pimientos de padrón and learned quite a bit! » Read the rest of this entry «

June 2010 . Zucchini

This weekend at the farmer’s market, I spied with my two little eyes, zucchini. With spring fruits here and the summer season just around the corner, I’ve got tons of sweets lined up to bake. Tarts and muffins and frozen treats galore! Today’s recipe is another experience in one-handed cookery—the thumb is still temporarily out of order, and like all things that life brings, I use them to make sweets.

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April 2010 . Onion & Leek

This week, I discovered that I went a little overboard with getting too early of a head start on boxes. Not to worry, it’s easy to unpack a camera cable and repack.

I am an avid subscriber of many many many food blogs. This is also true of email subscriptions. I’m constantly inundated with recipes, hot trends, and news around the globe (yet, I still thirst for more). Last week, while going through my inbox, I was delighted to find the recipe of the day was for a savory onion and leek tart. After reading the recipe, I decided that this would compliment my roast chicken perfectly. So off to the farmer’s market I went to gather my ingredients… » Read the rest of this entry «