AJ Quigley, a regular on King Arthur’s Baking Circle community, emailed us this recipe with the following message –

“I ran across one of my favorite sugar cookie recipes years ago in one of those ‘company’ fundraiser cookbooks, and have used it quite often since then. I checked KAF’s recipes and there’s not one like it, so I thought I’d share. It makes a tender-crisp, melt-in-your-mouth cookie.”

Well, I’d been looking for the “perfect” sugar cookie recipe for a long time. Since about 1967, to be exact, the last time I tasted a sugar cookie from the Colonial Bakery in Glastonbury, Connecticut…

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Isn’t this just the nicest looking yellow cake?

Close/fine texture, yet still moist; high-rising, not crumbly… and the crown of chocolate doesn’t hurt, either!

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Although summer doesn’t officially begin until June 21, I’ve always considered Memorial Day the real kickoff to the season.

Having put away the fleece (at last) and resurrected the outdoor furniture from its winter hideaway in the cellar, I’m ready to kick back on the deck, throw some burgers on the grill, and soak up some rays.

More than ready, after the challenging season we’ve just experienced here in northern New England. Record-breaking snowfall this winter was followed by a “spring” that offered very little in the way of sunshine, LOTS in the way of rain.

Read: dirt roads turned into mud baths, and spring flowers going from colorful to drooping and rusty brown within the space of a day or so.

So far, we’ve had 3 days of sunshine this month. We’re more than due for some good weather this Memorial Day weekend – are you listening, Mother Nature?

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Blame it all on Bingo. No, not Bingo the game but Bingo the dog. You know Bingo, right?

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Love at first bite.

SUCH an overworked expression, but still… when you’re talking cheesecake, the tiniest bite is capable of sending you into paroxysms of ardor. The richness of the cream cheese! The delightful interplay of tangy and sweet; the barely crunchy crust cradling its ultra-smooth filling…

Be still, my heart!

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Do you remember the first time you made a marble cake? I do. I remember thinking it was the coolest thing in the world to blob the chocolate batter into the vanilla batter like the 5 pips on a die. Two at the top, two at the bottom and one right in the center, symmetry at its best. Then taking a butter knife and swirling the batters together, it was magical. Of course, being young I just had to…

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Ah, Easter! Another holiday, another occasion to make pizzelle.

I didn’t grow up Italian; I never heard of, saw, or tasted a pizzelle till after I’d married my Italian husband, and began visiting Boston’s North End – close by the Haymarket, where Rick’s family sold vegetables from their farm.

Since we lived in Maine, the trip to the North End was pretty much confined to holidays: Thanksgiving, Christmas, and Easter. We’d make the rounds, from the meat market, with its hanging skinned rabbits; to the bread bakery, where we’d pick up light-as-air loaves showered with sesame seeds; to Trio’s, where you could get every kind of fresh pasta imaginable. (more…)

Crème brûlée… cake?

Isn’t crème brûlée that rich, inch-thick slab of vanilla cream covered with a crackly-crisp, caramelized sugar crust?

Yes.

So how does cake enter into this?

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Inside out. Mirror image.

However you look at it, this fudge-filled vanilla cookie is a 180° twist on America’s favorite store-bought cookie, the Oreo.

A line extension, so to speak, of our original Oreo clone: the Faux-Reo. And its evil (calorically speaking) twin, the Faux Joe-Joe. As well as a bald-faced copy of the “Uh-Oh! Oreo,” one of Nabisco’s variations on their oh-so-popular original theme. (more…)

You know, Starbucks really does have some good ideas.

And I’m not above stealing them.

Not that I visit the World’s Favorite Bistro often; there’s not a Starbucks within 100 miles of me.

But when I travel, I find myself slipping into the first Starbucks I see – you know, just to check things out.

Also, since I recently learned a cup of plain coffee at Starbucks is cheaper than a cup at Dunkin’ Donuts – ’tis true! – I’ll treat myself to some Starbucks buzz: both literally, and figuratively. (more…)