Ice Cream Shop Blondies

Ice Cream Shop Blondies

Back when I was a suffering grad school student, I had one saving grace. Right at the edge of my campus there was an independent ice cream store adorably named Cone E. Island. I got into the habit of stopping there before my grueling night classes and getting something creamy and sugary.

Their signature treat wasn’t ice cream, though. It was a giant blondie called a Fantasy Bar. While it came in many flavors, the original was the best. I could always count on that bar to deliver with its giant chunks of caramel, chocolate and white chocolate.

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Skinny Oreo Cheesecake

Skinny Oreo Cheesecake

Okay, I admit it. I’m going heavy on the Oreos this week. After eating all the cookies and cream bark, my cravings just intensified. But I wanted to be somewhat healthy, so here we go!

Cheesecake is exciting. I used to go to the Cheesecake Factory and inhale giant slices of peanut butter cookie dough cheesecake. It was really awesome until they stopped making it. Oh yeah, and until they posted their nutrition information. All of a sudden, I was horrified.

Okay, I know cheesecake is not a health food. Duh. So now and then, of course I’ll indulge. But I have to have cheesecake more often than “now and then,” so that’s why I decided to make this cheesecake.

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Cookies And Cream Bark

Cookies and Cream Bark

About a year ago, I embarked upon a kindness project. It’s not much, but I decided to bake something for each co-worker’s birthday. You see, every time someone did me a random act of kindness, I’d just feel so grateful. And kind of guilty, too, because I wasn’t doing enough back. So the birthday baking is my way of showing appreciation for the people I work with, but it’s also my way of making them feel special.

Anyway, this past week, I messed up. An intern’s birthday somehow slipped through my fingers. I promised to make it up to him and he told me that the easiest way to make him happy was to incorporate Oreos into whatever I was baking.

I’ve noticed something about Oreos: they have the same fanatic fan base that my beloved peanut butter cups do. And like any loyal fan, Oreo devotees accept no generic substitutes. It has to be Oreo or bust. I understand completely. I accept no peanut butter cup that’s not a Reese’s.

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Plum Tart

Plum Tart

When I was a kid, I used to read books from a bygone era where the characters eat lots of plum desserts: plum pudding, plum pie, plum cake, plum tart. I always wondered what that would taste like. Could it really be as good as it sounded?

Turns out, it is! This cake is dessert gone retro, the kind of treat people used to eat in the dark days before peanut butter cups existed. But there’s a lot to be said for the sweet, buttery crumbs that contrast so beautifully with the plums.

While I went ahead and called this a tart, that was really for lack of a better word. It’s very dense and kind of like a cross between a giant sugar cookie and a yellow cake. The hybrid works, but I still have no good word for it. And there’s a gentle sprinkling of cinnamon sugar on the top that is reminiscent of a Snickerdoodle. So you could call it a cookie cake if you like. Either way, it tastes happy!

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Peanut Butter Cup Cookie Cupcakes

Peanut Butter Cup Cookie Cupcakes

When I was a young and inexperienced baker trying to make up recipes, I didn’t have much success. I mean, I was 15. The process of creaming butter with sugar was a completely terrifying prospect. And whipping egg whites until stiff peaks form? I still remember doing it by hand one day. It worked, but I was traumatized.

Now, many years and one Kitchen Aid mixer later, I am much wiser. But I still remember fondly the recipes that were not epic fails when I was just starting out. And one in particular that I kept making time and time again were these cookie cupcakes. Because they worked. And because they were actually delicious.

These are peanut buttery without being too sweet or over-the-top intense. They remind me of classic peanut butter cookies: same flavor, same happy nostalgic feel, same need for the glass of milk. But there’s more in each serving, more to bite into. The middle is nice and soft while the edges are chewy. And best of all, they have that Reese’s cup in the middle.

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Mocha Bread

Mocha Bread

I’ve heard that climbing Mount Everest is pretty hard. For most people, anyway.

We all have our version of that, the near-impossible summit that we can’t reach, no matter how hard we try. For years, that was my grandmother’s mocha bread.

When I was little, I didn’t like apple pie. Chalk it up to youthful foolishness. So when my grandmother made the pie, she’d also make this bread. And I loved it. It was so special that I’d eat it slowly, sliver by sliver, to make it last. Usually, I gobble up my dessert. But this was too special

And when I grew up, I tried to make it. Over and over again I followed the recipe, calling my grandmother each time I failed. It was too light in color, or too heavy in weight. What was I doing wrong? It got to the point where I suspected her of recipe sabotage.

Finally, about a year ago, and shortly after my grandmother’s death, I got the mocha bread right. I’m still not sure exactly what I did to make it correctly other than acquire more knowledge and skill, but I feel like the torch has been passed. She was a phenomenal baker who used scant resources in harder times to make amazing food. Later in life, she still had the knack for producing recipes that nobody else seemed to have.

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