The Joy of Baking

Redalert.  Does anyone here read Joy the Baker?  Even if I hated food or if her recipes were nasty, I would still be loyal to Joy.  She is hilarious.  My longest friend Anna introduced me to her.  And by introduced, I mean sent me a link to Joy's blog.  I don't know Joy in real life, and Joy doesn't know me. But I do know Anna, we've been friends since second grade.

I have made her Blueberry Blackberry Pie several times now, and I won't go into detail except to say that the secret to any fruit pie, which I have discovered thanks to Joy, is the graham cracker crumbs at the bottom of the crust.  They soak up all the juice and it just perfect.  PLUS my graham crackers always go stale so this is the perfect way to use them.  I just put them in the food processor and let it go until they are very fine, and then stash them in the freezer.

This pie was full of fresh blueberries, blackberries, AND raspberries.  I made it because Ben was working and that's what I do.

This is also the reason why my oven gets smokey sometimes.  

I made this particular pie for March supper club.  It was good, but I had to use frozen berries.  I could tell a difference.

She just came out with a cookbook.  I am anxious to get my hands on one.  Anyways, try one of her recipes, any one!  I promise you will not be sorry.

Any other JtB fans?!

I AM Coming Back For You!

Don't worry, Julia Child's Duck with Orange Sauce.  I haven't forgotten you.  It's not that you weren't indescribably delicious the first time I made you.  It's not that I wasn't mortified when our dinner guests asked for seconds and we had run out of you.  It's just that, I can't handle three paged recipes right now.  I'm sure you can understand.  Please just know, Julia Child's Duck with Orange Sauce.  I'm coming back for you!

Don't worry, archive of family recipes.  It has been a few weeks, and you haven't seen the light of day. I wanted to be the one to tell you that I am bringing a boxed cake to Sunday lunch tomorrow.  Give me just another month or so, I promise we will be reunited as one.  It will be okay, I'm coming back for you!

Don't worry, Back in the Day Bakery Cookbook.  We haven't even gotten to know each other.  I'm not one to buy up cookbooks and leave them on the counter, all closed up, without butter spats and caked-on flour.  There will come a day, and the day is coming soon, when I will attempt the Mexican Hot Chocolate cookies, and the homemade butter mints, that are described within your binding.  I am coming back for you!

Don't worry, Raspberry White Cake recipe from the March Martha Stewart Living magazine.  Despite how things may seem, you have not been relegated solely as bathroom reading material.  I have you in the back of my mind, I am saving up enough brain power and stamina to create you for Easter.  But if babygirl comes beforehand, you and I will meet eventually.  Raspberry White Cake recipe from the March Martha Stewart Living magazine, it is just a matter of time until I come back for you!

Cashing in the Christmas Money

Does anybody else hang on to their Christmas money until this time of year?  I find that saving it will give me something exciting to look forward to during these lagging months of the new year.  On one of my walks in effort to prevent pregnancy cankles, I ran across a large sign in a window.  A blown-up cover of a cookbook, which had me at hello.


(You'll have to forgive the photo quality, I only took the picture so I'd remember the date of the signing...)

My sister and I trudged downtown on Saturday during the monsoon, hoping to be able to chitty chat with Cheryl and Giffith Day.  There weren't a ton of people there, but the Day's were NOT trying to be social.  So we snacked on the Mexican Hot Chocolate & Lavender Shortbread cookies and left it at that.

Squint, you can see Griffith in the window!  Cheryl and Giffith looked exactly as they appeared on the cover of their book, which is so so awesome.  I think they are probably just really genuine people, who were maybe tired of telling their story 75 times?  Or maybe the rain had gotten them down in the dumps.


Side Note: If you live in or ever visit Charleston, the Heirloom Book Company on lower King is a must for any cookbook lover.  Just put your hands in your pockets and don't touch anything--it is all so beautiful!  They had a complete box set of Julia Child's "The Way to Cook" on VHS.  It was $120something dollars.  It did not come home with me.  Plus, we don't have a VCR.


All of this to say, my sister and I were glad to have gotten out on a Saturday afternoon, and I am over-the-moon about reading every word of this beautiful new book.  I need people to volunteer to eat the things I will be baking.  First up will be their Buttermilk Chess Pie--my in-laws promised me I wouldn't be sorry.  "We haven't had one since we lived in Dallas!"


Merry Christmas in March!