sweet november: dessert

Today's word is dessert. Dessert. I have to admit that while I probably have the largest sweet-tooth on the planet. I am not really a dessert girl...unless it's for breakfast, think scones, coffee cake, pie. At least, when I think of the word dessert, I tend to imagine some sort of baked alaska or creme brulee (good golly do I LOVE creme brulee) when the reality is, at home, when the mister reaches for the ice cream some time after dinner, I am usually pouring a bowl of Marshmallow Mateys instead. See? Breakfast...ish.

 

As it stands, I have not been to the grocery store in a while and I have not had a decent bowl of cereal in a few weeks (I'm trying to kick my cereal habit). I was thinking of baking pumpkin donuts for today or making an icebox cake (I've had an idea for an ice box cake since last year that I have yet to do) but I was feeling utterly defeated by an early morning asthma attack and we had no whipped cream. What we did have was a box of brownie mix and some peanut butter chips.

But brownies on their own are hardly worthy of a dessert crown so I baked 'em up in a pie pan and then popped the rest of the batter into two small ramekins and a pilfered pyrex storage container. I like my brownies a little less gooey than is the norm so I usually make 'em a little longer. The pie pan baked up in about 28 minutes but the ramekins took longer (about 40) as they were deep dish. I know this because I dipped a spoon in for a photograph and eked when I saw the goo!

So next time you want to serve a fancy dessert why not make it brownies? A wedge of brownie dusted with powdered sugar or a dollop of barely sweetened whipped cream would pack a punch as would individual deep dish servings served up in pretty white ramekins. I got mine from Target.

****Hello November and thanks for joining us! It's officially a photo-a-day challenge (with words if you like but not necessary, I just tend toward wordiness). Click here to see the photo list and here to see Tara's photos.  Hopefully you'll be inspired to play along with us, and at the end of the month we'll have weeks worth of fun photos to share with each other! Think of it as a guided way to get all NaBloPoMo  on yer blog.  Leave a comment and share your sweet november photos.****

bake dillydilly: s'mores scones

A few weeks ago, we kicked off the end of summer vacation for the nephew a-go-go with a campfire on the beach. Campfires in a-go-go land usually mean s'mores and well, I got a hankering the day after that and the day after that and then the day after that. While summer has finally hit our happy town, the mornings are still socked in, cool and grey...perfect for some morning baking.

With visions of marshmallows, graham crackers and chocolate still in my head and a hankering for a good scone and some coffee, I came up with this recipe. Knowing that my tastes in scones might not be your average taste in scones, I put out a call for some testers and the results were dandy. Three of us baked up these scones using less sugar, more mix ins, no top wash, milk chips, semi-sweet chips, and even a round with almond milk. The verdict is these are tasty and customizable. So if ya like, grab up some grahams, a rolling pin and a few other staples and get to baking. Soon enough you will have a tasty treat with echoes of our favorite campfire treat.

The key to a dilly of a scone is to keep your ingredients as chilled as possible. I like to pop a bowl into the fridge both to keep my batter cold and to remind me that I want to bake. This recipe uses one stick of butter (about 1/2 cup), which can be frozen and grated into your flour or cut up into smaller bits. I usually cut mine up then put it back into the fridge to ensure its chilliness.

 

 

To start, place your graham crackers into a bag and give them a squish or two with a rolling pin or jar or can. Make sure to crunch them up nice and good. This is something your kiddos will really get  kick out of.

 

 

Next, add your dry ingredients (including graham cracker crumbs but not the mix-ins) to your chilled bowl and break your butter into the whole shebang either by using your fingers or a pastry cutter. Sometimes I am known to use two forks to mix it all up.

 

Once it is all crumbly, toss in your mix ins and add about 1 cup of liquid. Don't go dumping the whole cup into your bowl, add a little at a time until your dough is sticky but not runny. This is also a good time to set your oven to 400F in case you haven't yet. At this time, I also make sure to have a cookie sheet ready. I use a sheet of parchment paper atop mine.

 

Turn your dough out onto a floured surface and push, shape or roll out to a decent sized blob for cutting. I used a square biscuit cutter but you can use your hands to dollop out scones like Ezerd did or mound it on top of your cookie sheet if you like, like ms. a did (they even have the pictures to prove it). Depending on your method, you should get at east eight scones out of this dealio. I got ten.

 

Brush with milk or egg and add your sanding sugar, brown sugar or sprinkles. I used an awesome coffee, chocolate, sugar grinder I picked up at Trader Joe's. Bake for 12-15 minutes depending on your oven and preference for browning.

 

Let cool a smidge before enjoying and don't forget to use that parchment paper. The ooze from the marshmallows can be quite troublesome to clean up. Allow to cool completely before storing and store them in a loosely wrapped container or in a bowl covered with a dishtowel. This will keep the tops nice and crisp while the insides remain slightly moist. These scones are not very sweet save for the chocolate and marshmallowy bits. I made the recipe as printed up there. ms. a did a batch with semi-sweet chips and thinks they were quite tasty but the milk chocolate lends itself to the intention of the s'mores. My gal, ezerd added a bit more chips and squish but forgot to give her scones a wash. She said they still cooked up really nice and were super tasty even using almond milk.

 

Enjoy with a cup of coffee served up your favorite way. I had a few marshmallows and chips left over and couldn't let them go to waste. Here ya go! An ode to summer and campfire treats, these scones can be tweaked most any way you like. Have a go at it and let me know what you think!

fortunes where we find them

 I woke up from a nap in the mood for chocolate and sweet. I seem to have a grip on my allergies at the moment but not nearly as strong a grip as I would like. The past few days has had me a bit on the groggy side which usually means that some pesky pollen has snuck in. In comes the grog, out goes the sniffer. It's a good thing I have learned to roll with it. I might not roll silently but I roll all the same.

The grogginess combined with the summer heat that has finally hit our little town had me down for the count. The early-afternoon light sneaking in through the blinds along with the soft-soft thrifted duvet I just picked up from my favorite thrift had me snoozing along with the hum of the sewing machine as mister stitched up a pair of ukulele straps.

I woke up just as mister came in to tell me he was heading out for a project. I slippy-slipped my way to the tiny kicthen with one thing in mind. Chocolate! In all honesty, I have kind of been neglectful when it comes to chocolate. I think that with the sniffer gone, my sweet tooth finds its happiness in cakey bits and such. This day however, I wanted chocolate!

After digging around the collection of bars in the drawer (I pick up fancy bars for baking) I grabbed what was a left of a New Tree Lavender Milk chocolate bar and popped it atop a square of graham cracker. After a waltz or two in the microwave and a nice covering of mini marshmallows I had myself a s'more.

After documenting its pretty, I brought that square of sticky goodness to my mouth and caught the most delectable whiff of lavender. It was a perfect moment. I could smell the chocolate, the lavender and the vanilla in the marshmallows. How sweet it is when the sniffer works!

Slow like molasses

I woke up before 7am and promptly made a pot of coffee. I'm not much of a coffee drinker but for some reason a hot pot on a dreary day makes everything seem a little brighter. Tea I love but tea makes me want to bake and have friends come over to craft, talk and watch old movies. I have a long long list of things to do for this week and yest all I feel like doing is stand at the kitchen window and spy on all the birds haging out in the garden. Mr. A-go-go rigged up bird bath and so far we haven't had any takers. I can't wait until they find it. I am such a bird watcing dork. Speaking of birds we saw some pretty nifty birds in Joshua tree. We saw red tailed hawks, giant ravens, a couple of cactus wrens(they hopped right up to us, the little sneakers) and some scott's orioles in all their yellow funkiness. Yesterday we saw an interesting wren like birdie with yellow on it's underside and we also have a visiting hummingbird that has a lot of rust on it's back. See? Bird dorks.

I recently took part in Jenny Holiday's Vintage Kitchen Swap. I had a much harder time than I imagined finding vintage and/or retro goodies for my partner, Jennifer. Sigh. You just can find fun vintage in Los Angeles anymore. I did score some adorable salt & pepper shakers out in Ventura and manged to wrestle up some more goodies. I'm lucky that my mamos was a collector and that granyn never threw anything away so I was able to round it all out. Up above is a picture of some lanterns I sent along. The pretty paper flower lantern on the right was granny's. I had two of them and thought to send one along as it is so so so pretty, methinks. I also made up some retro marble magnets and a batch of chocolate lavender shortbread. You can see more of the items I sent here if ya like and I'll post all the awesomeness I received soon.

Today I will clean a little, update the shop a little, laze a bout a bit and craft away. I will also work on my paper and some scholarship essays. I will. I promise!

Oh, if you are in Los Angels or the San Fernando Valley and in need of a cupcake or two, check out Unforgettable Cakes! They are super duper yummy and the staff is oh so friendly. They serve sandwiches also. My gal the witch-lady and I spent a good two hours there partaking of sweets and coffee. You can read what I yelped about here. Happy Day!