Cute As A Button Cupcakes: An Improvisation

There's a few lessons I've learned recently about baking after you've had a baby:

1. It doesn't happen as much.

2. When it does, you really really really want it to turn out right.

3. It's easy to lose count while measuring multiple cups as you are trying to multi-task with a baby.

I've had these button molds for months now and I imagined making these cupcakes with a white frosting background. So, how did we end up with pink and green?

My mother's helper came to help me make these cupcakes. I mixed the cupcakes while she made most of the buttons. And even though this has happened to me before, I used organic powdered sugar...which turns out to be brown instead of white. Seriously, brown and not pretty brown. Argh. We had made blue, yellow and white buttons which did not look good with the brownish frosting. So, we improvised.

and made light green...

hot pink...

and bright green. Reminded me of Super Mario Brothers mushrooms from a distance!

And my two resolutions going forward: regular powdered sugar for white frosting and picking more tried and true recipes. I've debated sharing a big brownie fail story that happened over last Christmas. It was a ton of work- from a blog- and of course- to share with all of my family. Disastrous. Should I share it?

Have you had a baking experience where you successfully improvised?

Jeni's Ice Cream: Two Summer Splurges

Well, it's ice cream weather and I had to write a post about two summer splurges that I indulged in- one this summer and one last summer from Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream.

Mini- Splurge 2011- You may remember that we wrote a post a few years ago about my very favorite ice cream shop ever, Jeni's Splendid Ice Cream in Columbus, Ohio. I've tried quite a few - and for me, this is hands-down the very best ice cream I have ever had- even better than Bi-Rite and Humphry Slocombe. The carefully crafted flavor combinations, the use of seasonal ingredients and that fact that Jeni artfully creates surprising and delightful flavors without crossing the line into bizarre flavor, are what sets it apart from the rest. So, you can imagine my enthusiasm when her cookbook was released. It has recipes for my favorite flavors and ones that I can't wait to try. I ordered it immediately!

Big Splurge 2010- Ever since we went to Jeni's several years ago, I vowed to have her ice cream again, even if I had to ship it. And last summer, when I was very very pregnant and it was very very hot, I did just that. I shipped five flavors that I wanted to try or had tried before and held an ice cream tasting party with our neighbors. It was fantastic. So, what did I choose?

• Cherry Lambic Sorbet- one of my very favorites

• Gravel Road- mmm a salty caramel ice cream with almonds

• Sweet Corn and Black Raspberries- unusual but lovely with a discernible sweet corn flavor

• Goat Cheese with Roasted Red Cherries- unbelievable! Also a huge favorite of mine.

• The Buckeye State- classic peanut butter and chocolate

By far the cherry lambic and the goat cheese with red cherries were the best of the bunch but you can't really go wrong. Now the only question is, will I be able to make any of her recipes as well as she does or do I have to wait until we are pregnant again to ship out some flavors?

So, you might be wondering, why we haven't posted in a while. Well, we had a baby and I went back to work. But we are still doing all sorts of foodspiration: I'm making baby food, Justin attended a bbq class and bought an amazing smoker and I made 5 dozen cinnamon rolls with my grandma that I have to tell you about. It's all coming and hopefully at a more regular, albeit it less frequent pace. Hope you will keep checking in with us!

Campfire Cooking

This week we went to stay at a cabin by the lake in Minnesota of course had to have a few treats over the campfire. As you can see in the photo, we have three campfire favorites going on: s'mores, toasted fruit pies made with two slices of bread and pie filling in a pie iron, and Jiffy Pop, which is not intended to be popped over the fire but a few folks had well practiced techniques. Mmm, it was all delicious!

Do you have any campfire favorites?

Guess What We Made with This?

Check out this vintage grinder that my grandma owns. We spend the weekend with her and learned a thing or two about home cooking. This vintage Dazey grinder has three interchangeable blades and a suction cup to anchor it to a surface. It reminded me of our juice-o-mat and after using it, I kind of want one of these too. My grandma made a special breakfast food for us- any guesses what it was?


Hint: This was the blade we used. I'm embarrassed to say I've never made this food from scratch.

You're right! Hashbrowns! That is just something that we always eat in a restaurant and this was my first time making them from scratch.

And they were crispy on the outside! Thanks, Gram!

Cincinnati Eats Part 2: Graeter's Ice Cream

I haven't spent enough time in Ohio to know if this should be surprising, but the Buckeye State has a large share of delicious ice cream. In our past travels we stumbled across Jeni's in Columbus and raved about their creative flavors in this blog post. Where the people of Cincinnati are split on the virtues of their chili, everyone is behind their hometown ice cream favorite: Graeter's. As I was leaving for my trip a business associate who had previously lived in Cincinnati said, "get anything with chips!" (as in chocolate chips!).

Where Jeni's greatest strength may be in their edgy signature and seasonal formulations, Graeter's may be in their "french pot" process. In this process the small spinning pot receives the ice cream mix that freezes against the sidewall as it slowly scraped away. For ice cream with "chips" the chocolate is drizzled in at the end and the operator manually breaks it into pieces before each pint or gallon container is hand-packed. While this may all seem quaint and appropriate for a super-premium ice cream, for this Food Scientist it is amazing to think about this happening on the industrial scale with each 20 minute batch only yielding two gallons of finished product. Graeter's (a company with $35MM in revenue) not only sells out of their 47 stores, but also through retail grocery through Kroger, Meijer, and Giant Eagle stores.

Our Cincinnati hosts picked up five flavors to try . . . my favorite was the Black Raspberry Chip. My coworker was right about the chips, they are astounding in their individuality . . . one that wound up in my bowl must have been a half ounce of pure chocolatey goodness. The Black Raspberry was not to be under-shadowed with a bright tartness that helped cut the creaminess from the high level of butterfat.

Can we agree to love both Jeni's and Graeter's?

Cincinnati Eats Part 1: Cincinnati Chili

On a recent trip to Cincinnati I asked one native about it as a food town and she framed her answer with the idea that "Cincinnati doesn't know if it is in the North, South, East or West" (the local airport is in Kentucky) so their cuisine pulls a little from all these directions. It seems that the residents are equally conflicted about a local staple -- Cincinnati Chili. You hate it or love it . . . if you love it then you likely have an opinion about if it is served better at Skyline or Gold Star.

Urged on by some and warned by others we ventured out to the local Skyline. If you are from anywhere else then this dish will likely bend your definition of chili. The meat is simmered in a spice blend containing cinnamon, chocolate, cumin, allspice (among other things) and served in a watery sauce over a pile of spaghetti and topped with a huge mound of shredded cheddar cheese. If you stop there you've got what is called the "three-way." Adding onions will get you a "four-way" and the addition of beans is a chili "five-way." Nixing the onions, but adding the beans is a "four-way bean" -- got it?


My overall impression of our lunch time meal was of flavorful, seated fast food. You can't effectively eat the dish in your car, but since they key components hot and ready there is little lag time from order to assembly to your table. I had a small order of the chili five-way and chased it down with a coney dog and a diet Dr. Pepper. It's hard to tell but there is a chili dog under that giant pile of cheese, making me wonder if these foods were really vehicles for shredded cheese consumption? This thought was further fueled by the same shredded cheddar appearing in the hotel breakfast buffet near the egg station.

Have you tried Cincinnati chili? What did you think?

Signs of Spring!

Thank goodness- spring is coming and with it, lots of deliciousness. We couldn't resist buying the first cherries of the season at our farmer's market. We also bought fava beans, asparagus, lettuce with edible flowers and farm fresh eggs.

What are you eating in season?

Shaker Citrus Pie

Ok, I need another cookbook like a hole in the head, but I had to buy Martha Stewart's new Pie and Tart book. And since I recently tasted a Shaker lemon pie from Natalie at Bike Basket Pies, I really wanted to make one. Three cheers for Martha for putting the exact recipe from the book online here.

What makes this pie unusual is that it uses whole lemons and oranges- including the peel! They are thinly sliced and macerated with sugar overnight. This recipe only had a bottom crust with the gorgeous open top.The first time I made this I used a knife which made the slices too thick. The second time I used a mandoline but it kind of shredded my slices or made them so paper thin that they broke when tossed with sugar. This was fine for the interior but I wanted the intact ones for the top so I went back to the knife for those slices. Sadly, I wasted a few lemons and oranges figuring this out!

And the result was a beautiful pie with a custardy center that had terrific citrus flavor and unusual texture.