TWD/BWJ: Pecan Sticky Buns

Fifty-*something* years old and I've made my first brioche dough. Well technically, my trusty middle-aged Katie (KA mixer) made the brioche while I stood by with sweet words of encouragement. Another two-day recipe, but all's well that ends well. Half of the dough was transformed into not-so-sticky buns (but I'm not complaining - sticky is overrated). The other half of the dough waits patiently in the freezer for a day when our bodies need an infusion of butter. OK, "need" may be too extreme a word.

And now that I think about it, this probably wasn't the best day to go for that blood draw. I thought it was just a check of my vitamin D level.  Last time I was at the endocrinologist's office, she prescribed the mega-dose-once-a-week variety cuz I'm not so good at remembering to take vitamins. And then I forgot to take it the first couple of weeks.  Duh. Anyway, long story short, when I arrived for the blood test, they had a list of several other things to check.  Here I expected a finger prick (well, a girl can dream) and ended up donating 4 tubes full, about an hour after consuming a fresh-from-the-oven sticky bun. So when  they call to alert me of cholesterol and triglyceride problems, I'll have to fess up. Enough about me.  Let's get on with the pictures. The recipe can be found here or here, and other blog links are here.

Guess what I discovered?  See that "lock" lever?  Would have
been so helpful to know about that during the making of
the white loaves...

Never mashed butter with a
scraper before.
It was fun. 

♪♫... Rolling, rolling, rolling up some
sticky buns...♫♪
(think "Proud Mary" - sorry!)

There they are hanging out between the blackberries and the broccoli.
Thought they'd feel healthier that way.  Oh, and did you notice on
the shelf above?  Uh-huh.  Rhubarb.  You know I'm going back
for a second round of that Hungarian Shortbread...

Ready for the oven.  See that potholder in the back?
It says "The Queen does not cook" and it's
burnt from when I accidentally dropped it on
an element in the oven, LOL!

Close Enough. Yum!

This shoe reminded me a little of that butter-smashing...  Actually, there's a story here.  I saw it under the edge of this dumpster by the library.  A few weeks later it was still there, miraculously enough - with it's mate!  Can't find that picture right now, but it'll show up one of these days. Then I'll have to make that second batch of sticky buns.

TWD/BWJ: Hungarian Shortbread

Oh my, I'm so very late posting this, but it's been quite a week.

I took a five-day Carol Taylor workshop at the National Quilt Museum in Paducah, Kentucky. And yes, I went home on Tuesday evening (after sewing from 8:30 a.m. to 8 p.m.) and baked! Thank goodness I was staying at my sister's house and had access to an oven.

Couldn't find rhubarb in Paducah. Believe me, we tried. So I ended up with a jar of raspberry preserves as the filling. Shared the finished product with the other quilters on Wednesday and suddenly became very popular. The executive director of the museum even came in and declared that he was in love with me, LOL!  So there you have it, a success! The recipe can be found here or here.  And other blog links here.

Love the exposed brick walls in my sister's kitchen.

Wonder who first thought "Hmmm, maybe I should freeze that dough and grate it...?"

Baked the bottom layer for 15 minutes before adding the filling and second layer.

Didn't add the powdered sugar til the next morning.

Oh my goodness, they were LUSCIOUS!

First a picture to give you a little taste of what I spent the week working on playing with. Not finished, not even sure this will be the final arrangement but it'll give you an idea.  

And, I have to say that I saw several shoes in the road on this trip but wasn't fast enough with the camera to get one picture. So I'll show you a picture of one of my favorite shoes from another Paducah trip. I especially love this shoe because a teenage boy spotted it and even showed me where to find it.  He'll be graduating from high school this year. Thanks Philip!

TWD/BWJ: Lemon Loaf Cake

A comedy of errors right from the start.  First, I accidentally made this 2 weeks ago before I realized that Pizza Rustica was the "Easter" recipe.  Surely you can understand my confusion.  Anyway, it was a good thing I made it then.  I needed a non-messy dessert to go with dinner for a sick friend's family.

[PLUG HERE:  if you haven't discovered Meal Train, it's absolutely wonderful!]  

The first cake was really quite dry so the second one (which I sent with the dinner) got a good dose of lemon glaze. Which brings us to attempt #3, finally at the right time on the Tuesdays With Dorie schedule.  The recipe can be found here or here, and links to the other bakers are here.  Let's get started.

I've had a Swan's Down cake pan in my kitchen for at least 20 years. Couldn't resist letting it sit in on the proceedings since I was actually using Swan's Down Cake Flour. 

Notice those organic labels on the lemons?  Thought it was well worth the extra 20 cents apiece to not worry about pesticides.  Especially since we're using the skin.

Naked lemons!  I pretty much love any excuse to use the microplane. Oh, I did juice one of those lemons and added it to the batter. Also mixed the juice of another with powdered sugar to make a thin-ish glaze.

WARNING! It's time to avert your eyes if you can't deal with gross things...

The batter was coming along nicely and it was time to add the cream.  Earlier, I left the carton out on the counter (along with the eggs) to come to room temperature while I went to the grocery for lemons.  At some point you'd think I would've noticed the imprinted date...

 

Yuck-o!!!  Solid and Black!

Definitely NOT left-over from the previous two Lemon Loaf Cakes!

Off to the grocery again.  Don't know if it hurts to leave cake batter partially mixed, but I didn't have a choice. Half an hour later, the cake finally made it into the oven and I set the timer for 45 minutes. Much time passed and I finally decided to check on the timer. Uhhhhh. Not timing.  As my daughter would say, "epic fail." I probably set it for 4 minutes, 50 seconds and didn't hear it go off 40 minutes early.  But amazingly enough, the cake was not burnt.  Heck it wasn't even done. So I baked it longer. No idea how much total time, but the toothpick was the decider. When it finally came out clean, I poked lots of holes in the cake with the toothpick and poured on the glaze.  

You can see that some of the glaze pooled up around the bottom of the cake. After a few minutes the extra had soaked in and I popped it out of the pan to finish cooling.

This is the shoe I saw this week.  A loafer would've been nice, LOL!  But instead I got a running shoe.  Well, yesterday WAS the Boston marathon...

Liebster and The Compliment Box

Out of the blue, something unbelievably sweet happened.

Marilyn, of cook bake learn grow picked me to receive a Liebster blog award!

The Liebster is a way of recognizing small blogs.  The rules are to:

1. Link back to the person who gave it to you and thank them
2. Post the award to your blog
3. Present the award to 5 other bloggers with less than 200 followers that you appreciate and value
4. Leave a comment on those 5 blogs letting them know they've received the award.

I'm totally new to this blogging thing and it feels funny to know that anybody at all is even out there. So now I have a confession to make. I have a secret. The secret is that NOBODY in my life knows about the blog.  Not my husband or my kids or any of my real-world friends.  I wanted to get my feet wet without worrying about what they thought. Too intimidating. And then a stranger reached out and was kind to me.

It reminded me of the compliment box. In my daughter's Montessori 3rd grade class, the children could write compliments and put them in the box. The teacher would read them to the class during circle time.  I have one of those little slips of paper on my refrigerator door.

These girls are now freshmen in college.  Different colleges.  They went to different high schools too, but they've kept in touch all this time and they're still as close as friends can be.  In fact, I took them to Harry Potter World just a few weeks ago. They have grown into thoughtful, kind, happy young women and it was a pleasure to be with them.  Makes you wonder about that compliment box.

So, THANK YOU Marilyn!  And in honor of this auspicious occasion, a very special shoe.  I seriously could not believe it when I saw this one!

Now for my 5 picks:

1. Clare, the Dordogne Quilter- an English quiltmaker living in France with a wonderful liberated style of design

2. Cher, of The Not So Exciting Adventures of a Dabbler... - makes me laugh and writes the thoughts I have but can't put into words

3. Emese, from A Bear's Pastry Workshop - creates some of the most beautiful cookies I've ever seen

4. Helen, HelenNoBlog, a quilter from Long Island who always has something gorgeous and interesting to share

5. Mina, of Kinda Quilty - I can't believe how much this woman gets done!  Constantly challenging herself. And her color sense is amazing. Plus, she's got a cool dog.  

TWD/BWJ: Pizza Rustica

Here's the "done" picture right up front.
Can't figure out how to arrange the pics,
so it's a spoiler!

When is a pizza not a pizza?
When it's "Pizza Rustica" of course!


 When I saw what we were making this week, I envisioned some sort of free-form crust with Margherita-like toppings, but this is what I call quiche. After a little research (my default position on anything odd), it has become apparent that Pizza Rustica is a totally traditional and beloved Italian dish.  Seriously, the things I'm learning from this project!  So, on with the cooking. The recipe can be found here or here, and links to other bloggers in the group are here.  Oh, and I loved it!  I read that some people thought it was "bland" or that the crust was too sweet, but for me it was perfect.  Maybe there's something wrong with my tastebuds...

Easy processor dough

The filling.  Hate to admit it, but up til now
I've been a prosciutto virgin.

Rolling along.  That dough scraper has changed my life.

Ready for the oven.  Tossed the scraps with a little
cinnamon and sugar.
Love me a cook's treat!

OK, so I dropped
a little cheese...

Since it's Holy Week, I thought a flip-flop spotted in the church parking lot would be appropriate for this week's shoe

You can always tell it's spring in Atlanta when you start
to see flip-flops.  That's my friend Merle who saw it first!

TWD/BWJ: Irish Soda Bread

They took pity on us after the Rugelach-that-went-on-forever.  Today's recipe for Irish Soda Bread was quick and easy.  I think I spent more time going outside for a sprig of rosemary than it took to make the entire thing.  Tasty too.  Might have to try this with a variety of add-ins.  This time, I divided the dough in half.  One was plain (cuz I want to do the recipe as written at least once) and the other had some queso and rosemary added. The recipe can be found here or here. And other blog links are here.

easy peasy ingredients

ready for the oven

done

What sane person lets freshly-baked bread cool?

This week's shoe. It's GREEN! Perfect for March.

TWD/BWJ: Rugelach

First thing I've ever baked that tasted like it might have come from a bakery.  Really.  I know their secret now.  LOTS of butter and cream cheese.  In fact, everything about this recipe seemed excessive. Even had to run to the store at the last minute for more cinnamon. But it was fun. And this week Baby Boy is home on spring break.  So let's get on with pictures.  If you want the recipe, you can get it here or here.  Other blogs about it are listed here.  (Note: I'm in a hurry and can't to figure out how to put these pics where I want them...)

Nobody said it was low fat! And shortly
after this, the King of the Castle began a
conversation with me just as I was adding
the flour.  Still not sure if I used
2 1/2 or 3 cups.

It's a 30 year old food processor and only works on "pulse"
but I've got the cutest measuring spoons in town!

Left his jacket on til I mentioned the sleeve
dragging thru a pile of flour. The things
you learn when you cook...

I heard a funny noise and realized that
someone had discovered the can of
spray cream in the fridge!

We decided to make one batch following the recipe.

Happened to have dates, figs, and raisins
in the pantry, pluse there were apricots
left over from making the filling

This was the point where I read that they were supposed
to chill for 4 hours!  Uh-oh.

Decided to go with chocolate for the second batch.
And a different shape.

Told BB he could add whatever he wanted
to the last one.  He emerged from the pantry with
a bag of mini-marshmallows.  

This recipe goes on forever!
Now it's time to dip.

Pretty close!  And I must say, they're delicious!

Oh - and it's not every day you see a sweet shoe like this in the road!