Summer bundt

It's hot. Obviously, since it's July in Memphis. It will be hot until October. Or possibly later judging from the recent NOAA report. I'm doing my best to stay indoors. One of the few perks of summer is the widespread availability of produce. Berries, squash, tomatoes, etc. Oh and watermelon, I have been eating the heck out of watermelon lately. I've been pinning a lot of summer-inspired recipes, there's a recipe for peach-ginger handpies I hope to make this weekend. Last weekend I made the Triple Berry Summer Buttermilk Bundt Cake that Deb at Smitten Kitchen posted a few weeks ago, the recipe is adapted from Rustic Fruit Desserts (which I own and has lots of great recipes, including a delicious jam cake).

It's a berry-filled bundt cake with lemon zest and a sweet, thick lemon glaze. It's completely worth turning your oven on for. I sent half home with my nephew and I think he, his brother, and his parents liked it. Doug and I liked it a lot too, we managed to polish it off within a few days with nary a crumb left.

Brown Butter Blueberry Muffins

After finally getting our kitchen back in working order I got back to baking. I missed it so much, you don't realize how much you much using your whisks and cake pans. One of the first things I baked were these muffins from the Joy the Baker cookbook. I can't say enough good things about this book, it's been out for awhile now but I still love thumbing through it and picking out something to make.

 Besides the blueberries, the browned butter is the other major flavor going on. Browned butter makes almost anything better. The first time I made it I burned it, it was blackened butter - not as good. However, when you don't burn it it's awesome and makes everything taste better.

They're super easy to make and especially right now when blueberries are in season (you can use frozen too).

S'mores Brownies & a new cookbook

I love new cookbooks, I mean not all cookbooks but most of them. I especially love the ones with lots of sweets in them. The new cookbook from Joy the Baker fit that bill perfectly. It's a pretty book to look at and the recipes inside are clever and imaginative and so delicious looking. I can't wait to make everything in it. 

For the inaugural recipe, I picked S'mores Brownies and I am so glad I did. It's something akin to your basic cake-y brownie recipe with crushed graham crackers in the batter and topped with giant marshmallows. I did slice my marshmallows in two to make them fit better and mine were a little darker than the photo in the book but they were so good. This was one of Doug's favorite new recipes, he a lot of them. Do yourself a favor and invest in this book, there are recipes for Strawberry Cookie Dough Ice Cream, a Peanut Butter & Jelly Shake, Avocado Fries, Peanut Butter & Bacon Cookies and so many other treats.

A crafty project

I pinned this project from Amanda at Wit & Whistle ages ago. I finally got around to completing it a few weeks ago. It's a super easy project and completely clever. The complete instructions are here. I did pretty much everything that she did, same mugs/pens. I used my sketch book for inspiration, as well as just trying something that I thought would look nice. Some of the designs I came up with aren't perfect, lines are a little messy or too thick/thin but I think it adds to the character. When I was first testing the pens out I kept a moist paper towel besides me and if I messed up I immediately wiped off and dried the mistake and it was gone. I bought two pens, one in Anthracite (black) and one in Pewter (grayish silver). The black pen turned out better than the gray one (for me at least). To me the black pen gave more of a drawn-on look. 

Thanks to Amanda for this crafty little project!

Miscellaneous stuff I like right now

My Kindle. We bought it right before our huge roadtrip. I actually didn't use it very much until we got back (I'd rather knit than read it turns out). However, when we got back I started using it more often. I'm still not 100% sold on it for all my reading needs but I enjoy the convenience of it. As of today I have read since late-June: Under the Banner of Heaven by Jon Krakauer (good but bizarre story), Bossypants by Tina Fey (loved.it.), The Help by Kathryn Stockett (hated it), Then Came You by Jennifer Weiner (liked it okay) and I'm in the middle of Cleopatra: A Life by Stacy Schiff and yesterday, thanks to a friend's recommendation, I downloaded two John Green books, Looking for Alaska and Paper Towns. Since I go through books so quickly I like that I can have a new book almost instantly. It is hard getting used to not having an actual book to look through though.

This yarn (Madelinetosh Merino Light in Mineral)

I have cast-on-itis, I'm going to use it to make this sweater but I'm not letting myself cast on until I finish the other half-dozen items I have on the needles. The color makes me extremely happy.

Salads, my current favorite salad is baby greens, toasted almonds, dried cranberries, goat cheese, turkey and balsamic vinaigrette. I can't say it's super healthy but it tastes good.

Mad Men, we are so behind on this. I know everyone has talked about how great this is forever but we're just now getting around to watching it. We just finished the first season and both of us love it. I told Doug it's like candy, not only is the storyline completely addictive, the set design/wardrobe is so fun to look at.

The most recent Bon Iver (Justin Vernon) record. Beautiful and eerie. 

He's also doing this with James Blake:

Rebekka Seale's Dear Friend, blog. She lives in Nashville, takes very lovely pictures and is also a very talented artist.

I'm obsessed with these chairs. I would love a set for the dining room, maybe with a long wooden table.

Nutella love & the first pumpkin baked good of the season

Usually this is how I like to eat Nutella. Although it's really good on graham crackers too.

 

Over the weekend I made Nutella shortbread cookies with a recipe from Serious Eats/Cakespy. These cookies are a little more labor intenstive because you shape two flat pieces, fill them and seal the sides, so a little more work than your normal scoop and bake cookies.

They are super buttery/crumbly but very, very good.

 Saturday morning, before I made shortbread, I made pumpkin doughnut muffins (recipe from Martha). Last week in Memphis it was so nice weather-wise. The mornings and evenings were cool and even the day time was nice. Today and tomorrow temps are creeping back into the 90's but hopefully we'll cool down again soon. The cooler temperature put the desire for pumpkin baked goods in my belly so I made these muffins. They were easy and buttery and gave me the first hint of fall. 

They were also really good with this.

Middle-of-the-week chocolate cake

Some times Wednesdays just call for chocolate cake. I was itching to bake something last night, but nothing too involved since it was a weeknight. When I was home at lunch I thumbed through my growing collection of cookbooks and found this recipe for a simple chocolate loaf cake from At Home with Magnolia. I like this cookbook but most of the desserts in it require hours of letting it 'set' before eating. Luckily, this loaf cake did not, it was more of a throw together, bake, let cool for half-an-hour and then devour. I used natural cocoa powder and made the adjustment suggested by Deb at Smitten Kitchen. The loaf cake turned out perfectly and didn't 'rise and fall'.

Doug and I had our still-slightly-warm slices with vanilla Haagen-Dazs, very good.

Hug the ones you love

(I meant to post this Friday but got sidetracked)

Life is all too brief. Earlier this week I was reading Gluten Free Girl and saw this post about a dear friend of hers who very unexpectedly lost her husband (the story is can also be found on CNN's Eatocracy too). It resonated with me because Doug lost his father from an sudden heart attack when his father was just 42, Doug was 12.

She asked those to help her heal by making her late husband's favorite pie and share it with those you love and hug them, because as she says and as we all know too well, tomorrow is not guaranteed.

So here's my Creamy Peanut Butter Pie, eaten with the one I love.  

Chickens & cold pie

I have been badgering Doug for backyard chickens for EVER. This is a man who almost never tells me no but he used his veto power over chickens. I wanted backyard chickens for a number of reasons, one being that I'm a country girl at heart, having spent good portions of my childhood at my grandparents and great-grandparents homes in the county. After much begging and pleading and thanks in large part to my uncle, I wore Doug down and he finally agreed to two Buff Orphingtons. My uncle got the chicks while we were driving out west back in June and they've been living at his house ever since. We went to visit them back in July and they were in that awkward not a chick anymore but not yet a full fledged hen stage. Anyway, before the chickens can come live in our backyard we have to get their 'house' situated. Doug had considered building a coop from scratch but with the heat and the lack of A/C in his wood shop he decided to buy one that was pre-made online. It came in pieces on Friday in two very large boxes and Saturday in our living room he put it together. It looks pretty darn good I think and Doug says its very well made. We still have to build the chicken run that the chickens will hang out in during the day while we're at work but Doug's drawn up plans and hopefully the run will be completed in the next few weeks so the chickens can come to our house before the end of the month.

While Doug was slaving away in the living room, I was two rooms away making Key Lime Pie in the kitchen. Rebecca at Ezra Pound Cake is such a bad influence, she tweets about the delicious things she's made, which promptly makes me want to make whatever it is she's made. Which is how I ended up making Key Lime Pie Saturday afternoon. The main appeal of making the pie was that I knew it would be a cold pie and that sounded delicious since Memphis in August is something akin to Hades. Rebecca's recipe is on her blog here. It was quick and simple and very good. I skipped the whipped cream though because I wanted a pie that was more tart than sweet.

Stay tuned for future chicken updates.

Chocolate hearts Peanut Butter

I think I've talked about this before so forgive me if I'm being repetitive...You know sometimes you see a picture of something and it looks so good that you have to MAKEITRIGHTNOW? That happened to me with this Chocolate-Peanut Butter Pie, via Ezra Pound Cake. I saw the picture and then starting calculating how long it would take to create and then get in my belly. It's not made with very many 'whole foods', but it's got an Oreo cookie crust and that's good enough for me.

Despite looking intricate, it actually didn't take very long to make, it took longer for it to chill than anything. I spent that time circling the refrigerator, willing it to get colder. Now that it's 100 degrees (at least here in Memphis) you can make this without heating up your entire house.

Second, on this love fest of chocolate and peanut butter, are these Cocoa Brownies with Salted Peanut Butter Frosting from Not Without Salt. My photographs aren't anything near as nice as hers but the brownies were exceptional. This is the kind of frosting you want to just eat out of the bowl.

Strawberry Jam Attempt #1

Making jam is scary! Seriously, I thought there might be an explosion/burns/spills on either me or one of the cats running around underfoot. Luckily no one got hurt!

My strawberry jam making adventure at the downtown farmer's market, where I got berries from Jones Orchard. It seems like it took forever to clean and hull them but once that was done I started working on the jam part. I started out using this recipe from Food in Jars as a guideline. Instead of macerating overnight with a vanilla bean, I used a generous scoop of vanilla bean paste. Making the jam wasn't not the hard part, I did let it cook a little longer than I should have giving it a slightly more 'caramelized' flavor.

The scary part came once it was time to can the jars. I used my Ball canning set, which comes with a rack to set the jars in, but I also added a dish towel underneath because everything was rattling so loud I worried something would break. The jars boiling was the scary part, it made so much noise that I was sure the whole thing would explode. After the allotted time I turned off the heat and pulling the jars out with the tongs. The lids started popping right away so I knew I had gotten a good seal. My problem arose later that day when the jars had cooled and I realized the jam was more like a sauce. I assume I didn't use enough Sure-Jell to make it jammy enough. So I Google-d and found instructions for re-making jam. I used this site and re-made it using more Sure-Jell and this time it turned out just right, the perfect jam consistency.

It took time and patience and frustration but I finally made jam! I plan on making more in the next week or so before the heat takes all the strawberries away. The jam was particularly good on homemade sweet cream biscuits.

V-Day Treat

I don't really have strong feelings about Valentine's Day one way or another. I probably cared more when I was in middle school/high school and wished I had a boyfriend to send me flowers. These days though it's kind of off my radar. I did get a little card/print for us, my friend Lynsey alerted it to me on Etsy. It's hanging in our living room now.

Now to the treat part - I committed a cardinal 'sin' - I used boxed cake and pre-made frosting! If that's not bad enough I used it to make cake balls (or if you're more refined cake 'truffles'! Shameful, but I so do not care. Y'all they are good. I'm almost positive there is nothing 'natural' in them but you what? that's okay. Sometimes you just want junky things. I used the recipe from How Sweet It Is (she has some fabulous pictures and more obscenely good-looking treat recipes). I bought Duncan Hines Strawberry Deluxe cake mix and cream cheese frosting and used Ghirardelli milk chocolate chips for the chocolate coating.

The hot pink sugar is from Bake It Pretty. The best part about these is that the cake is pink, very fun. They are really, really rich and sweet and I say that knowing I have a high tolerance for sugar.

I did have a hard time dipping them into the chocolate, not all of the cake part got covered. So there you have it, one of the few times I have used boxed cake mix and I don't feel bad about it. 

Mini Pies

I love finding new blogs. Last week I found The Spotted Fox, it's a super cute blog with recipes, craft project and general adorableness. The authors are two girls from Nashville, which endures them to me even more. After spending the better part of an afternoon combing through all of their posts, I found this idea for making mini-pies with Nutella and banana.

It's just cutting out discs from pie dough

Filling them a slice of banana, a dollop of Nutella and a sprinkling of cinnamon, covering them with another disc of pie dough and ending with a little egg wash. 

They were so good, of course anything with Nuetlla is delicious. I think they'd be perfect with almost any other pie filling.