The Adventures of a Frustrated Baker

Hey there everyone!  I know I disappeared for a bit, but we were relocating!  I now have my own kitchen back, none of my kitchen stuff yet, but lets just get right into the baking!  Christmas is coming and my kitchen is running pretty much 24/7 this time of year.  No time to waste! This recipe is actually from one of those free recipe cards you see just about everywhere this time of year.  I was walking down the seasonal baking display at our grocery store and saw these delicious mint chocolate chips that I loved last year.  They were buy one get one free so I just couldn't resist!  Plus they had recipes right there!  They were calling my name...I couldn't leave them there unbaked on the shelf. This recipe is super duper simple!  Took maybe 30 minutes and 25 minutes of those were the bars baking in the oven.  They taste and look great!  Hint, hint guys!  Awesome idea for Christmas goodies for bake sales or gifts!...

When my daughter and I were shopping for her new school clothes a few weeks ago, we stopped at the mall food court to recharge in between stores and grab some lunch.  We went to a little cafe/sandwich shop there that had these amazing little triple chocolate cookie chippers that my little one and I have both been craving ever since. Of Course, she wanted me to just go back and buy more, I however decided to try to recreate the recipe at home...you know so that we could have them over and over instead of just when I have time to go to the mall.  It's a baking version of the whole teach a man to fish, he'll eat for life philosophy... kind of deep for a cookie craving, huh?! Anyway, we mostly just went with the recipe of the back of a bag of Nestle white chocolate chips...the results were pretty close and we ate them all in about 24 hours!  (All 8 of us...not just my daughter and I!) Wihisk or sift together your dry ingredients. Cream together butter a...

This idea kind of stemmed from two things, one my craving for delicious pancakes and my family's love of all things bacon.  With as popular as the bacon/chocolate combo is these days I felt I needed to finally hitch myself to that particular bandwagon.  Before you totally reject this recipe, you know cause seriously bacon and chocolate is weird in pancakes, I must tell you I slaved over this one.  I sort of wrote it myself...well I used an old hand written pancake recipe scribbled into one of my notepads and tweaked it until it tasted just right...and now that I have guilted you all into reading further...I think you should all try it too! Now, I doubt it is truly a nutritious breakfast, but it was a special treat and we all enjoyed it very much.  The trick is, sigh...don't judge me, the trick is to put actual bacon grease in the pancakes in order to provide more bacon-y flavor.  You should all try it at least once.  They are delicious a...

Our garden, as previously mentioned, seems to think that we only need and want ginormous zucchinis and so has been mass producing crazy sized versions of this vegetable.  After doing a couple of pasta dishes, I realized that my zucchini arsenal of recipes was tapped and I turned to baked goods in order to use up some of our years long supply.  I have never tried zucchini in baked good form.  I know, I know, crazy!  But I just have never gotten around to it I guess.  For my first zucchini baked goodie, I chose cupcakes of course, and, while I myself did not really enjoy them (I guess I don't like zucchini baked goods...) my family and friends seemed to like these cupcakes and so I will share them with you too! One of our ginormous zucchinis.  Yup, that is a Morton salt container back there... Shred your zucchini using a cheese grater or food processor in order to get about 2 cups... Gather up all of your ingredients. Whisk or si...

Originally this recipe was going to be joined with my post for the sliders, but with all the pictures I had of those and then all the ones I had for this recipe, I felt that they could each stand on their own.  So the day that I made the sliders I searched all of the whopping two grocery stores we have here in town for slider buns only to be disappointed.  I so badly wanted to use my Williams Sonoma slider press...then it occurred to me, why not make my own buns?  I had seen a recipe on another blog recently that featured hamburger buns...why not give it a try and just make them extra small for sliders?  With that decided, we headed home and  I got to work! I made these on a marathon cooking day...I was making sliders, grilling up one of the monster zucchinis from our garden, making these slider buns and zucchini cupcakes! Yeah, it was a busy day in the kitchen here.  Anyway, the great thing about making breads is that you h...