Best Oatmeal Cookies Ever!

I rarely say something is the best, because the nature of my personality is to always keep my options open…pending further investigation.  However, these cookies are different.
These cookies are all an oatmeal cookie ought to be:   crisp, butterscotch-y, with the perfect amount of chew due to the oatmeal…but not to much, and browned [...]

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Rhubarb Crumb Cake

I recently joined Tasty Kitchen, which is a new venture of Pioneer Woman, one of the blogs I read because my sister thought I might like it.  (Do I ever, she is a hoot and a kick in the pants combined!)
Today I posted my first two recipes:  Rhubarb Buckle, which I have already posted here, [...]

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Struesel Topped Muffins

Originally published in Sunset Magazine years ago…I give you…Le Streusel Muffins
The Muffin Part
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 mashed, ripe, banana
2 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/3 cup sour cream
1 1/2 cups flour
Mix together, blending in flour last until just turned in.
Scoop ( I use the ice cream style [...]

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Truffle Brownies

The Food Network had this contest, the first of many, to find the next Big Cooking Star, Steve & Dan were the Winners!  They won their own Cooking Show, for about five whole minutes.
For which I am grateful, because I was able to bag this great brownie recipe off of them.
So, to Steve & Dan, [...]

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Striped Hot Pads

Making of few of these to go be bundled with some other goodies for a DIY Holiday Gift Box or Basket.
For those of you who like DIY ideas read on, for those of you highly likely to receive one of these, skip this. and pretend you never saw it either:)
First, the knitting and felting [...]

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Rhubarb Buckle

MMMMM, mmmmm, Good!
Everyone needs a good Fruit Buckle recipe like this one! Use just about any fruit you want, they all turn out yummy!
Jeff and I can vouch for Buckle recipe, between us we have made:
Huckleberry (aka hucklebuckle)
Blackberry
Blueberry
Mixed Berries (frozen in bag from Trader Joe’s)
Raspberries
Rhubarb
Peach
can’t remember if we’ve tried apple…hmmm.
SO, anyways, make [...]

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Not Just for Christmas Cookies

I thought I would try a-new-to-me Christmas cookie recipe I received last year from Dad and his “new” wife Patty.  While at the craft shop I picked up Orange gel concentrated food coloring and thought I would give it a whack.
Lately Orange has appealed to me in ways it never has before.  Its [...]

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First Breads

I tried both recommended ways of slashing the loaves, one is just slashed across three times and the other is slashed twice in each direction like tic tac toe.
Both worked out just fine, but I personally prefer the simple elegance of the three slashes.

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First Breads

These are the first loaves I made, fresh out of the oven.

They turned out beautifully and were indeed as easy as promised.   (Never mind that my counter top looks like the flour train recently blew by:))
They are beautiful, yummy and easy…or did I just say that?

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Five Minute Artisan Bread

Here it is folks, I finally gave in, succumbed, surrendered, to the wonder that is called, “Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day: The discovery that revolutionizes home baking” by Jeff Hertzberg and Zoe Francois.
I think it is all the Major Knitters fault…I read her blog every day and she posted about this [...]

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