This past weekend we hosted an Easter Brunch for all of our Ottawa friends. But, not only was our brunch to celebrate Easter, it was also to celebrate our friend Laurel’s birthday.
I wasn’t quite sure what type of birthday dessert to prepare for her, so I enlisted Jeff’s help in determining the perfect dessert to serve. I gave many options, cake, *pie even an ice cream cake, but Jeff came back with cake and told me that her favourite flavours were lemon and vanilla. How incredible is that! A lemon and vanilla birthday cake, I knew that could be arranged!
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blogging, cake mix, cooking, food, homemade, lemons, photos, pot luck, recipe, Valentine's Day
Last week I received my regular issue of What’s Cooking magazine from Kraft. I love this little mail-out. The recipes are usually quick and easy, and it is always fun to look at glossy food pictures to find inspiration.
This issue was no exception. I found a few recipes that I wanted to try, especially this cookie recipe. When I opened up the magazine to this recipe, I knew that I would be baking this weekend. I consider myself lucky that my colleagues enjoy Monday mornings when I bring my baking in to share 🙂
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blogging, chocolate, cookie, food, homemade, party, peanut butter, recipe, weekend
Well, I finally am sharing with you my ultimate chocolate chip cookie recipe. This is my tried and true recipe that I have been using for years. It is the perfect combination of chocolate, pecans and, of course, rolled oats. Cookie perfection! 🙂
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blogging, chocolate, cookie, family, homemade, nuts, party, photos, recipe, weekend
I have been pretty good with my food consumption lately. I have been trying to stick to a mostly Paleo diet, however, the urge to bake struck me like a ton of bricks. I could no longer ignore the desire inside of me to whip up a batch of muffins. There were two ways that this could have ended up, I could have looked for a healthy muffin, loaded with fruit and whole grains, but instead, I opted to make a decadent treat full of peanut butter and chocolaty goodness.
I went to the internet and typed in chocolate peanut butter muffin. The first one that appeared was the one that I decided to make. I was definitely on a mission. I wanted to bake, I wanted it to be chocolate and peanut butter and I wanted it now! 🙂
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Tags: blogging, chocolate, cooking, food, homemade, peanut butter, pot luck, weekend
Today is my birthday and because lemon is likely one of my most favourite flavours (beside bacon!) I thought I would share with you this super easy and delicious recipe for lemon cookies! 🙂
It is really hard for me to believe that today I am turning 40! When I was a child, I used to think that forty was so old! But as I turned the page on a new decade this morning, I don’t think forty is old at all! I feel that I am in such a good place right now that I am embracing forty with open arms! I have a husband who loves me, a fabulous family and the greatest group of friends! I love my life, and wouldn’t change a single thing about it!
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blog, cake mix, cookie, family, food, lemon, pot luck, recipe
For all the recipes that I have tried and all the time I spend in the kitchen, it is surprising, even to myself, that I have never made a batch of apple sauce. I KNOW! It is likely the simplest thing ever to make, yet I have never tried to make it myself. Maybe because I can buy an entire jar of it at the grocery store for only a few dollars? Anyway, this weekend I set myself a goal to make a batch of apple sauce!
The ingredient list is quite simple, apples, cinnamon and lemon. Yep, that is it! I found some recipes that called for sugar to be added, but when I buy apple sauce at the grocery store, I always pick up the unsweetened variety, so I opted to not add any extra sugar. It didn’t really need it, as apples are quite sweet on their own.
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Tags: apples, blog, cooking, food, homemade, Paleo, recipe
With Valentines Day happening this week, I thought I would share with you a spicy brownie recipe. Nothing says Happy Valentines Day like chocolate, especially when it is complimented with a hint of heat.
The pairing of chocolate and spice isn’t new. In fact, one of my favourite desserts that I have experienced here in Ottawa is Chili Chocolate Ice Cream from the Smoque Shack in the Byward Market. It is so confusing for your taste buds to have to cooling sensation of chocolate ice cream, but then the heat from the cayenne pepper hits you and your instinct is to eat more of that cooling ice cream, but that is where the heat is. It is such a delicious and vicious cycle 🙂
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blog, chocolate, food, homemade, party, recipe, spicy, Valentine's Day
The weekend of our move is finally here! I have been talking about it for so long that you may have thought that it had already happened.
When I was starting to pack up our pantry, I noticed that the carton of molasses was almost empty. To me it seemed like it wasn’t worth packing away in a box, but it was the perfect opportunity to look for a recipe to use the molasses I had left.
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blog, breakfast, chocolate, food, homemade, party, pot luck, recipe
Well, here is another post dedicated to the art of baking. I am very aware that my last bunch of posts have been about baking, but with Christmas around the corner (only 22 more sleeps!) baking seems to be what is in my heart and mind to do.
When the desire to bake strikes you, there is no sense in fighting it, you might as well give in and start pulling out flour and sugar from your pantry.
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blog, breakfast, cooking, dates, family, food, homemade, party, pot luck, recipe, weekend
This blog post could easily be only four words: “These cookies are amazing!” 🙂
Having only access to two cookbooks is really giving me a chance to scour through them to find new and interesting recipes. This experience has really opened up my eyes to the fact that I likely don’t give my current cookbook collection a chance, I look through and if I am not immediately impressed by a photo or a concept, I flip the page. But with only two books available to me (since the rest have been packed), I have to actually read the recipes to determine if the flavour combinations are something that I want to try. I can’t remember the last time that a month’s worth of my baking has all come from the same cookbook.
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Tags: bake sale, baking, blog, chocolate, cookie, cooking, family, homemade, party, pot luck, recipe, weekend
Ruby Reduction 