Everyday Oatmeal Cookies

I've switched from always having a loaf of banana bread around to always having oatmeal cookies around. They bake more quickly, have whole grains (kind of), and besides, I use all my bananas in smoothies these days.

This recipe is really flexible, you can substitute in whatever dried fruit, nuts, and spices you have on hand. My favorite combo is cranberries, walnuts and coconut, and my second is cherries, apricots, and prunes. The only version that we couldn't finish was white chocolate chip, raisin and ginger, I don't know what I was thinking, but they were still good enough to be polished off in the break room at work in less than a day.

These are great with tea or soy milk, and make really good ice cream sandwiches with vanilla ice cream too.

Everyday Oatmeal Cookies

makes about 2 dozen

1 stick butter, room temperature

3/4 cup light or dark brown sugar

1 egg, room temperature

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/3 cup all purpose flour

1/3 cup whole wheat flour (or you can use all white flour)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp freshly grated nutmeg (you can add whatever other spices you like too)

1 1/2 cups rolled oats (not instant, they come out gummy)

1 1/2 cups dried fruit (I like 3/4 cup coconut, 3/4 cup craisins)

1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 375 and grease 2 baking sheets. Using an electric mixer, cream together butter and sugar, then beat in egg and vanilla: these are your wet ingredients. Sift together flour, salt, nutmeg and baking soda: these are the dry ingredients.

In 2 batches, add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Do not overmix. With a large spatula, gently mix in oats, fruits and whatever other add-ins you're using.

Drop tablespoon sized hunks onto your baking sheets, leaving about 2 inches in between. If you want flatter, crisper cookies, smoosh hunks into thinner rounds with a fork.

Bake 8-10 minutes until golden brown on top. They will still be soft to the touch, and may seem underdone, if you like chewy cookies, take them out anyway and when they cool they will be perfect.

Strawberries are Here!

Well not here exactly, because apparently the spring in Arizona is too short for strawberries, but California is pretty close by, and they churn out some yummy berries. I've been eating at least a pint a day, it just doesn't make sense not to when they're $1/pint. I've thought about making a strawberry tart or cake, but that's just too much work when they're so good plain. Buttermilk scones, biscuits, shortbreads, whatever you want to call them are pretty easy though, and make delicious strawberry shortcakes, or are great plain with butter and jam for breakfast.

Buttermilk Biscuits

makes 6

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2-3 Tbsp sugar (depending on your tastes)

5 Tbsp cold butter, cut into bits

1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 450. Sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and sugar. With your fingers, combine butter with dry ingredients until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add buttermilk and stir until a soft sticky dough forms. Drop dough into 6 mounds on ungreased baking sheet. Bake until golden, about 12-15 minutes.

My Sexy Bundt!

After a long day of shopping for nursery bedding, my resolve was weakened and I gave in and bought this totally unecessary bundt pan from Williams Sonoma:

Then I came home and baked this amazing banana cake and felt like a domestic goddess:

And I was trying to be a kitchen minimalist, doh.

Classic Banana Bundt Cake

adapted from Dorie Greenspan, Baking From My Home to Yours

3 cups flour

2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

2 sticks butter, softened

2 cups sugar

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 eggs

4 very ripe bananas

1 cup sour cream or plain yogurt

Preheat oven to 350. Generously butter and flour your bundt pan (or other 12 cup capacity pan).

Whisk together flour, baking soda and salt.

Cream together sugar and butter with hand mixer or paddle attachment of stand mixer. Beat in vanilla and the eggs, 1 egg at a time. Add in the bananas, half the dry ingredient mixture, then the sour cream/yogurt, and finally the other half of the dry ingredients mixture.

Bake for 65-75 minutes. Let cool for ten minutes before unmolding to prevent breakage.

New problem: now I "need" a totally unecessary cake stand to show off my Gehry-esque creations!

I'm thinking of naming my next kid Sorbet

I have been on a sorbet tear lately. It all started when I visited the coolest ice cream shop ever, Sweet Republic. If you are ever in N. Scottsdale/Phoenix/Arizona/the greater southwest USA, you need to stop by.


The nice lady at the counter let me sample almost all of their flavors. I was feeling guilty until she compared herself to a crack dealer, and said that is how they hook lifelong customers. Smart. I tried Lychee Tarragon, Basil Lime, Coconut, Salted Caramel, Canteloupe, Watermelon, Gorgonzola, Mango Lassi, and more that I can't remember.


Then I went home and whipped out the ice cream maker! Since I have to share with the rest of the fam, I've limited my experimental herbal flavors, but now that they're hooked, I'm going to start sneaking in some fun stuff. My basic recipe is: mix a bunch of fruit and simple syrup, puree in blender if necessary, and freeze in ice cream maker. So far I've done Mango Lime, Strawberry Peach, and my fave, Toasted Coconut . I'm toying with Cucumber Mint, Canteloupe Yogurt, and something involving Chambord or Frangelico. There's still 3 more months of summer to go, we'll see what I come up with... Incidentally, if you don't own an ice cream maker, I highly recommend getting one. They are usually easy to find at yard sales:)


Toasted Coconut Sorbet

1 14 oz can coconut milk
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup water
2 Tbsp rum
1/4 cup shredded coconut

Make a simple syrup by boiling together sugar and water. Remove from heat and whisk in coconut milk and rum. Let cool in fridge. Meanwhile, toast coconut in a dry pan, or under the broiler. If you still have some time, do a couple shots of rum.

When coco mixture is cool, freeze in an ice cream maker, adding in shredded coconut in the last 5 minutes of mixing. In my KA attachment, it takes 20 minutes on STIR (1), then I add in the shreds and keep mixing for another 5 minutes. You are then supposed to put it in the freezer for a couple hours but I can never wait that long, so mine comes out soft, as pictured. Boo, patience.

CEiMB: Double Chocolate Pudding

This week's Craving Ellie pick was Double Chocolate Pudding Pie, chosen by Tessa from Handle the Heat, another cool Arizona food blogger (we gotta do something all summer, right?).

I decided to borrow Sara's idea of making the pudding without the pie, because my house does NOT need a 9 inch chocolate pie lying around. Plus, this gave me the chance to experiment with fun pudding containers for the pictures. After much fiddling around, I decided on these cool steel martini glasses. I was having so much fun that I lost track of time and my hubby stumbled into the kitchen around midnight to find me in a very intense pudding photo shoot. I don't know if he was fully conscious, but he mumbled something about the dang bloggetyblogblog and turned around and went back to sleep. I did notice this morning that one of the glasses chilling in the fridge is now empty. Breakfast pudding? I like it!

I didn't have milk in the house so I used soy, and couldn't tell the difference. Hey, I almost made a vegan dessert! If you ever need an easy, make-ahead, vegan dinner party dessert (and who doesn't), this would be great. I topped mine with dark chocolate shavings and shredded coconut, or almond slivers would've been really good too. I have not kid tested this yet, but I'm sure it will be a hit. And it really was ridiculously easy, so easy I am now asking myself why I don't make pudding more often.

Double Chocolate Pudding
adapted from The Food You Crave, by Ellie Krieger


2 tsp (1 packet) unflavored gelatin
3 Tbsp boiling water
1/3 cup sugar
3 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder
2 Tbsp cornstarch
pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups vanilla soymilk
3 Tbsp semisweet chocolate chips
1 tsp vanilla extract

Mix together boiling water and gelatin to combine. In a small sauce pan, add sugar, cocoa powder, cornstarch, and salt, then slowly whisk in soymilk. Bring to a boil, constantly whisking all the time, and then add chocolate chips. Remove from heat and keep whisking until smooth. Whisking is a strange word after you use it 9 times. Now whisk in the gelatin mixture and put in the fridge to set for a couple hours. Garnish with whatever fun bits of stuff you can find, I used coconut and shaved chocolate.

1 of the 47 pudding pics now on my hard drive

(in hindsight, they are way 80's and I don't like them)

Movin' to the country, gon' eat me a lotta peaches...

It's May 10th. In Arizona, that means peach season is halfway over. Insane, believe me, I know. However, as I have chosen to live here, I should be able to adapt to the seasons, so yesterday I woke up at 7:00 and BEFORE EVEN ONE CUP of coffee I was in an orchard elbowing mean Korean ladies out of my way, jockeying for dappled red Earligrande beauties. Lucky for me, I am taller than the average bear, because while I thought I loved peaches and would do anything to get some juicy, ripe supermarket-impossible goodness, the crowd at 7:30 was out for blood.

I came home with 9 pounds of peaches, promptly ate 7 in two hours, and figured it was time for some baking. I wanted to keep it simple and not get in the way of my amazing ingredients, so I opted for that minimalist American classic, peach cobbler. Paired with some homemade vanilla ice cream, it made a delicious Mother's Day dessert.

Peach Cobbler

6 perfect peaches, peeled and sliced into thin wedges

1/4 cup brown sugar

sprinkle cinammon

sprinkle nutmeg

1 tsp lemon juice

1 tbsp cornstarch

Combine in a 8X8" baking dish and bake at 425 for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, prepare the topping:

1 cup flour

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup white sugar

3/4 stick butter

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 buttermilk

Combine all ingredients and cut butter into the dry ingredients using 2 knives, or a mini food processor (the quantities fit perfectly). When peaches are done, carefully spatula topping onto the fruit and bake another 20-25 minutes, or until golden brown. Serve hot, with vanilla ice cream, or whipped cream.

Eat your heart out, Pinkberry!

I love my neighbors. Today, on the way to the mailbox, I was offered 3 giant grocery bags full of Ruby Red grapefruits. I accepted, of course, and now I'm figuring out how to burn through all of them before we go on vacation next weekend.

A little googling and I found something intriguing on epicurious: Lemon-Buttermilk Sorbet. I made some substitutions based on my fridge contents and the aforementioned Rubies and the sorbet/froyo/whatever you want to call it came out amazingly delicious. It was floral, tangy, creamy, but still light enough on the tongue so as to be refreshing. Too bad citrus season doesn't overlap the summer months, but I suppose that's where my freezer comes in handy.

Grapefruit Buttermilk Sorbet
adapted from Bon Appetit, June 2001

2/3 cup sugar (add a little more if you don't like things tangy)

2 cups buttermilk

1 cup plain greek style yogurt

1/2 cup grapefruit juice

2 Tbsp lemon juice

1 Tbsp grapefruit zest

Combine everything and whisk until sugar is dissolved. Chill for a couple hours in the fridge and then add to your ice cream maker to churn. Makes about 1 quart.

P.S. If you don't have an ice cream maker, put it on your thrift store/TJ Maxx sale rack list. They are pretty cheap and definitely worth the storage space.

Blondie v. Brownie

The last blondie I had was at a bake sale circa 1990, and it wasn't very good. Not so with this batch, which I made according to my new prophet, Dorie Greenspan. These are so good, they are going in the monthly rotation for sure. I may even like them better than brownies. I'll get back to you on that one. They are moist, and full of vanilla, butterscotch, chocolate and coconut flavors, with a hint of salt to put them over the edge into gluttonhood. Here's a link to the recipe online, I followed it almost exactly, except I subbed almonds for the walnuts, so I won't bother retyping it.