Brownie Sacher Torte

Brownie Sacher Torte

Sometimes time can be the best healer.

A year ago, I tried making the famous Sacher torte for my mother’s birthday. It’s a dense chocolate cake with apricot filling that hails from Vienna. I did tons of research and worked much harder than usual to get the cake just right.

Epic fail, everyone. The glaze was clumpy and the cake was just way too dry. It was so not worth all that time and effort. Luckily, time passed and I decided I wanted to try again, but this time I did it on my terms. That means the cake became a brownie and the glaze was a much simpler version of the process that did me in a year ago.

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Salted Caramel Pecan Pastry Ring

Salted Caramel Pecan Pastry Ring

Breakfast is such a huge motivator in my life. I don’t let myself eat until after my workout. It’s good to have something to work toward!

Does that work for everyone? Nope. My friend is more of an evening exerciser. By that time, I am done and a half. Can barely move, except to lift the fork to my mouth to eat dessert. That’s my workout later in the day!

When you want a good breakfast treat that is homemade but easy, I recommend turning to refrigerated biscuits. Not to make biscuits with, silly. To make something far more fun. This salted caramel pecan pastry ring is delicious and perfect for the morning, not to mention pretty quick to put together. It takes the usual five minutes or so!

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Cinnamon Sugar Cookie Chips Coffee Cake

Cinnamon Sugar Cookie Chips Coffee Cake

Breakfast is calling. It’s wondering why cookie chips took so long to get into coffee cake.

Cinnamon is one of those dark horses. I forget about it for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. And then without warning, I eat a dessert with cinnamon, and wham! I can’t stop.

When I tried Hannah Max cinnamon sugar cookie chips for the first time to decide how to bake with them, I had to slap my own hand to stop it from reaching back into the bag. The cinnamon sugar flavor is more addictive than I expected. It’s always fun when life runs contrary to expectation in a good way!

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German Chocolate Cake

German Chocolate Cake

My dad just had a birthday, so I made his favorite: German chocolate cake. And like the dutiful daughter I am, I didn’t work crazy hard on it because my dad told me not to. My parents are always telling me to take it easier.

While I was baking this cake, I realized that I don’t talk about my dad much on this blog, which is odd. My parents are a huge part of my life. We live close to one another, so I see them almost daily. And my dad explains a lot about who I am.

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Cinnamon Crumb Bread

Cinnamon Crumb Bread

The other day, I posted an easy Mother’s Day recipe. This one is not quite that easy, but it’s still pretty doable. So if you know what a spatula is, dig in!

For some reason, people associate Mother’s Day with brunch. Okay, I know that it’s traditional to take mothers out for brunch on the big day, but why? Don’t we rate a fancy dinner?

Listen, I’m not trying to knock brunch. The food is delicious and decadent, and it’s totally fine to feature chocolate in your pancakes, or waffles, or French toast. How could I possibly object to that? But I really, really love going out for dinner. Dinner out means one night of not having to cook for greedy little mouths.

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Black And White Birthday Cake

Black and White Birthday Cake

My youngest baby turned three the other day. And suddenly, time is just going at warp speed and I’m not sure if I can handle that.

You see, I’m one of those women who tries to beat everything. If someone tells me I’ll need to recover from something for 2 weeks, I love to prove them wrong and be up and running at the end of the first week. If someone looks at a piece of cake and says that it’s too rich to eat all at once, you can bet that my piece of cake is long gone. And though I know I’m aging and that time speeds up irrevocably, I keep fighting it. I know it’s futile, but it can’t be helped.

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Passover Crumb Cake

Passover Crumb Cake

If you read my blog with any regularity, you know I’m a crumb fiend. I love piling crumbs on everything, like this. Or this. Or this.

There’s no exception to that rule on Passover. In fact, while some people call it the holiday of matza, I call it the holiday of crumbs. If you’re wondering why, think about what matza does. It crumbles everywhere. On floors. In hair. Between tiles. Atop light fixtures.

And there I am, broom and dustpan at the ready, to clean it all up. Which is actually a huge step for me, because I am not good at keeping the house clean, much as I try.

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Browned Butter Half-Pound Cake

Browned Butter Half-Pound Cake

Here it is, beautiful readers! My last installment in this week’s browned butter series. I hope you’ve enjoyed this week as much as I have!

Today’s offering is inspired by Kenny, a.k.a. my non sugar-craving half, who thinks all desserts are too rich. I love pound cake, but he has two bites and puts it aside. So I decided to halve the butter, brown it, and see what happens. Verdict? Success!

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Easy Pistachio Cake

Easy Pistachio Cake

I know tomorrow is Pi Day, thus pies are being posted right and left. But kids, I couldn’t wait to share this one. I’ll share a pie next week sometime. We cool?

Do you remember the red pistachios? Do they still exist?

I loved those things. They got red dye all over my hands, but I always thought they tasted better than the regular kind. My grandparents always kept them around for me. And then one day, they disappeared. I haven’t seen a red pistachio since.

Things have a habit of disappearing, unfortunately. There’s a great poem by Elizabeth Bishop called “One Art” where she talks about what she calls “the art of losing.” It’s a great poem, and my English teacher self highly recommends it to you. But I sometimes get creeped out by how much I’ve lost without even realizing it until after the fact.

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