30 Days and 30 Nights – Day 12

The LAST thing I wanted to do tonight was bake.  Do you ever have those days?  Not necessarily baking, of course, but anything?  I had such a great day – went to the dentist (only great because it is over with), fixed my car, ran errands, took a 7 mile bike ride, ate dinner out, and walked the dogs for a mile.  So, as the clock ticked past 10:00pm, the baking I had neglected all day still lay looming ahead of me.  Ugh.  Okay, I know, who really has a ticking clock anymore? 

I also just threw out two chocolate bombs, a slice (big) of the banana split cake, and made my husband eat the last of the 7 layer Italian cookies.  Good grief!  This is the first time I have had to throw anything out.  It is a good thing I am so close with so many of my neighbors, or I would feel like I was wasting too much good food!

But still, a challenge is a challenge.  So onward goes my 30D30B!  I must admit, I did my best to keep it simple tonight.  For me, first this meant it would be a cookie night.  Alas, I am so tired of the basic hum drum cookie recipe.  I am already plotting to steal Aunt F’s cookie recipe for jelly filled shortbreads because this is my hubb’s other favorite treat.  Unfortunately, I think that plan might have to involve black masks, flashlights, lock picking, tying people up to wooden chairs, and gagging them for several hours.  We’ll see how it unfolds.

So I went to my fail safe: Google.  Which brought me to another fail safe: Martha Stewart.  Oh Martha, how I love thee.  Let me count the ways….one pound, two pounds, three pounds more!

MarthStewart.com had a scrumptious looking recipe for Chocolate-Glazed Pumpkin Cookies.  I know it isn’t close to Thanksgiving, in fact the absolute opposite time of year for this type of hearty cookie, but it. looked. good!  Mmmm.  I also happened to have all of the ingredients on hand, so that helped a lot.  AND I happen to love anything pumpkin!  It obviously had everything going for it, the recipe that is.

I geared up at 10 o’clock to start baking a recipe that said it would take one and a half hours from start to finish.  Not too shabby since I slept in until 11:00 this morning!  First thing to note is I did NOT get the 3 1/2 dozen cookies the recipe claims to produce.  I never do though, so this is no surprise.  Am I the only person on this planet who likes HUGE cookies?  I didn’t even manage two dozen out of the recipe – 22 to be exact.  I used my trusty Pampered Chef Large Scoop which is a 3 tbsp scoop.  The recipe called for spooning the dough onto the cookie sheet as a “heaping tablespoon.”  Mine were way better.  I just know it! :)

Naturally, I had to split a cookie with my hubby, let’s call him Big D from now on, as soon as they came out of the oven…sans chocolate.  The cakey cookie was pretty good on its own.  Nothing to jump up and down about or anything though.  It had a fantastic pumpkin after taste though, so it would be very easy to sit down and eat the whole batch.  They were also an amazing consistency.  Very light and fluffy, and as I already said, cakey.  Exactly how I like my cookies.  I do not like to crunch into a cookie.  I shiver at the thought!

Waiting for the cookies to cool so I could glaze them was tough.  But don’t worry, I made it happen and it was WORTH IT!  The chocolate topping totally made the cookie and was a wonderful thought by whomever created it!  I have now eaten more of these than any of the other 11 goods I have baked in this challenge.  Time to pass them on to the neighbors!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 11

I have done it!  I have officially made my husband the happiest man ever!  Supposedly.  And with only a few minor changes he has requested.  I KNOW!  He is so difficult! :)  I also think I would have made my Italian MIL proud today too.

I spent about 9.5 hours working on my labor of love today.  Of course, there were breaks in between, but 9.5 from start to finish.  All the blood, sweat and tears went into my first time cooking 7 Layer Italian Cookies.  Apparently, if you are Italian and/or from New York, you know what these are.  I had never heard of them before.  My husband has sung their praises since we first started dating.  As is already known, we spent the last weekend in NY and NJ visiting friends and family.  Hubs made the point to search out an italian cookie so I could taste it for the first time. 

First of all, the name bothers the heck out of me.  They are not cookies.  They are a cake.  Certainly no normal cake, but still, cake.  It is a cake made with almond paste and a lot of eggs and butter.  You bake the cake in three layers and between them, layer apricot preserves.  Then put a layer of chocolate on the top and bottom.  If only it were really that easy (okay, it really wasn’t THAT hard)!

I do, though, only recommend making these yourself if you 1) LOVE them and everything else almond flavored in this world 2) Have an Italian husband who LOVES them. 

I searched through the recipes online and found a fantastic one with step by step directions at epicurious.com, so I am not going to put too many details here.  However, I want to include a few things and pictures of what I encountered on the way.

After following the directions of how to mix the cake, the recipe calls for you to spread each of the portions out on a piece of buttered wax paper in a 9 x 13 pan.  First – I forgot to butter the wax paper literally EVERY time and had to redo it.  What a waste of wax paper!  Then, I definitely used the wrong spatula to spread the batter.  The one pictured is the correct style to use!   Then, this picture here was taken before I put the pan in the oven.  Well, I was having a serious moment and forgot to take the spatula out of the pan before putting it in the oven.  It baked exactly like you see in the picture!  Woops!!!  I was able to salvage it though. Since it was a metal spatula, it didn’t do too much harm!

Next, the recipe calls for you to layer the cake with the apricot preserves.  That was my husband’s first problem…I didn’t heat and strain the preserves and he said the cookie tasted more like apricot than it should.  Sorry babe!  I promise not to cut corners next time!  After layering, you are supposed to wrap the combined cake in plastic wrap and put it in the frige for at least 8 hours.  To keep the layers even it is recommended that you weight the cake.  I put a 9 x 13 pan on top of the wrapped cake and placed a bunch of cans in it to weigh the cake down.  It worked perfectly.  The cake came out nice and compact and even.

  This is what the cake looked like after it was set and I trimmed the edges, right before adding the chocolate.  This brings me to Hubb’s second problem.  He was not happy with the use of bittersweet chocolate and thinks it should be milk chocolate.  I think he’s wrong.  I am fairly sure the one I tried up North was made with bittersweet.  I’ll try milk chocolate next time to make him happy though!

Last, but not least, the final product!  The cakes were very yummy, very almond and apricot tasting, and very 7 layer Italian Cookie!  Good luck if you take this on and I hope you enjoy it as much as I did!

30 Days and 30 Nights – Day 10

My neighbor, S, used the best words to describe tonight’s delectable…silky and smooth.  I managed to come up with my creation tonight all on my own!  The taste sensations you get while eating it are phenomenal!  My husband didn’t necessarily agree.  Don’t get me wrong, he liked it.  It just was not one of his top items that I have cooked in the last ten days (I’m still trying to find something to top the chocolate bombs from the other day).  It’s a shame, actually, because I was inspired by a creation of his own.  Often times when we go to the ice cream shop my hubbs gets some sort of mixture involving chocolate, strawberries and bananas.  I thought, what could be yummier than a cake with those ingredients?

I decided for my first attempt to make a chocolate cake with strawberry frosting and banana filling.  I kept it simple and used a chocolate mix for the cake.  Triple chocolate to be exact.  For the strawberry frosting I mixed four cups of confectioners sugar with 1/2 cup butter, softened.  I then mixed in 2 cups of frozen strawberries.  I did all of this in my food processor, so it cut the berries up nicely.  I did the same with the banana filling, but cut the recipe in half – two bananas, 1/4 cup butter, and 2 cups powdered sugar.

I cooked the cake in two 8 inch rounds.  After they cooled, I spread the banana filling between the cakes and covered the entire cake with the strawberry icing.  Then, I placed slices of bananas all over the top of the cake.

Okay, so now for the first thing I would change.  MORE BANANAS!  Next time, I will put another layer of sliced bananas between the two cakes as well.  I like bananas, but I don’t love bananas.  This cake, however, is awesome based on the combination of chocolate and bananas.  Wow! 

Now, there were also some problems I need to iron out.  Since the strawberry icing was made with frozen strawberries, it had a decent spreadable consistency.  HOWEVER, almost as soon as it was on the cake, it started slowly drooping off like the skin on a bull dog!  There was nothing I could do to stop it from falling off the cake.  I tried refrigerating it, and even froze the banana filling…that was REALLY liquid-y (used a fresh banana).  So, I suppose I need to try and make it more of a buttercream consistency with the shortening?  Yep, that’s a question.  Any recommendations?

For once though, I really didn’t care how it looked because it was SOOOOOOOOOOOO good!  Definitely a recipe worth messing around with!  Strawberry cake with chocolate frosting and banana filling?  Banana cake with chocolate filling and strawberry icing?  I want to go make another one right now just thinking about it!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 9

I just finished my weekend of traveling back and forth to New York for a wedding, staying in New Jersey with my MIL and a stop along the way in Annapolis, MD.  It was a terrific weekend with fun crammed everywhere we turned!  We had tons of relaxation, parties, and, you guessed…baking.  I am so proud of myself for having completed my baking each day I was gone.  Now, if I could only manage to fit a 5 mile run in with that as well, my vacations would be complete!  We started on the road this afternoon and the very first thing I did, before the car was even unpacked, at 8:49 tonight was decide what I was going to bake this evening. 

The cake du jour?  This would make my sister happy…Carrot cake.  A delicious recipe I found on allrecipes.com, as usual.  It was very highly rated and saved by a million people, so I thought surely this was the recipe to go with.  I was right!  It is a very simple recipe to make – dump and mix.  Although, I must say I am horrible when it comes to mixing things in the proper order.  The only time I pay attention to mixing things appropriately is when you are supposed to cream sugar with butter or something of the sort.  The most work went in to shredding the carrots.  Luckily though, my husband gave me a new food processor when I graduated with my masters degree!  It adds a bit more to clean up time, but makes shredding things like carrots an absolute breeze! 

I was surprised at exactly how many carrots I would need for the recipe.  The recipe called for 3 cups of shredded carrots.  I don’t know if I barely made it over two.  I used an entire small package of carrots – maybe 8 or 9 – and it still wasn’t enough. 

The cake was fantastic.  It seems like it would even be a great batter recipe to add something else to instead of carrots, like mango or something.  Maybe next time….!

I feel like I have taken it easy the last couple of days because I have had no problems with cooking these fun recipes.  Maybe I need to try something a little more difficult tomorrow.  Hmmmm……

Blueberry Cobbler

I interrupt “30 Days & 30 Bites” to bring you … blueberries, and MORE baking! I’m the “mom”! Today we went blueberry picking for the second time this season at our favorite blueberry farm: A & N Blueberry Farm .

Blueberries from our favorite farm!

Right now I’ve got about 8 pounds of blueberries drying on my kitchen island. Yep, that’s right, I break the rules and wash my blueberries before freezing any that won’t be used in the next few days. I first went blueberry picking about 30 years ago. I brought home so many that we had to go out and buy a freezer (they are not nearly as expensive per pound if you have thought out your storage options in advance!). That first time I followed ”the rule” and bagged them up unwashed and put them in the freezer to be enjoyed during the cold winter months (well, we were living in Florida then too, so at least they were cooler winter months).  I was distressed to discover that it was not always convenient to have to wash them before using in a recipe. The following year we picked right after a rainstorm and the berries were all wet anyway. My solution:  I wash the berries as soon as I get home and then dry them on a double layer of beach towels (we’re back in Florida so there are plenty of those around!) under a ceiling fan. When the berries are completely dry I bag them up, 1 cup to each small freezer bag, with four 1-cup bags in a large freezer bag … makes it easy to pull out the right amount for muffins, pancakes or a pie…or a cobbler! 

So, what are we going to do with 15 pounds (7 pounds picked during the first trip of the season) of blueberries?? Bake! My new favorite cobbler recipe, adapted from a Rachel Ray recipe. 

 Blueberry Cobbler

 Ingredients:

4 cups of blueberries, fresh or frozen

1/3 cup, plus 4 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 ½ cups, plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 ½ teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

1 ½ sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

2/3 cup milk (I used 2%)

½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional – my favorite blueberry pie recipe has cinnamon in it, so I decided to add to this recipe … perfect!)

 Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375°. Lightly grease an 8-by-8-by-2-inch square baking dish

Mix the blueberries with 1/3 cup of the sugar and 2 tablespoons of the flour. Spoon into the baking dish.In a large bowl, whisk together the remaining flour and 3 tablespoons of sugar with the baking powder, ½ teaspoon of the cinnamon and the salt. Cut the butter into the flour mixture until it resembles coarse meal.

Add the milk and vanilla and stir to form a wet, sticky dough. Drop rounded teaspoons of the dough over the top of the blueberry mixture to cover. Sprinkle the remaining 1 tablespoon of sugar and ½ teaspoon of cinnamon on top of the cobbler and place on the middle rack of the preheated oven. Bake for 45 minutes, or until the top is golden-brown and the fruit filling is bubbling up through the crust. In my “hot” oven, this only took about 35 minutes.

Let the cobbler cool for at least 20 minutes. Serve warm (with ice cream!) or at room temperature.

Tags: Baking, Blueberries, Debbie

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 8

Oh my!  Maple leaves!  This has started out as another great day.  Why? Because breakfast was a warm, maple-y, almond cake of goodness!  I need to start by saying I would never have made this recipe without the encouragement of my MIL.  You know how you buy those cute baking pans that are the size of cupcakes, but in different shapes?  Things like mini bundt pans, sandcastles, or in our case, maple leaves?  They usually come with a recipe on the packaging, right?  Well, me being the brilliant baker I think I am, I always throw them out.  Surely I will find a better recipe than this standard issue, with the box, creation.  Go figure, I have been proven wrong.  Don’t tell my husband I said that.

The recipe with the pan is titled Almond Butter leaves and we thought it would be worth a try. My MIL had all the ingredients (almost) and it sounded like it might be good.  I should also tell you that I don’t like almonds.  I don’t like nuts in anything I bake.  My mom spent YEARS leaving the nuts out of her banana nut bread for me.  My tastes are obviously changing though, because these really were great almost just the way they were written.

So before I give you the recipe, I’ll tell you what I did different.  The one ingredient we didn’t have was vanilla.  Yep, trusty vanilla.  Oops!  We used the last of it on the PUD cake last night.  At first we thought we would put more almond extract in, but then found a container of maple extract and thought, why not?!  So we substituted the maple for the almond.  Holy maple, I am so glad we did that!  Next time, and this is definitely something I will make again, I might even take out the almond extract too and sub it all with maple.  Uh, YUM!

Also, the recipe called for 1/4 cup finely chopped almonds to be mixed into the recipe. Since we wouldn’t be icing these things, I decided to REALLY thinly chop them and I placed them in the bottom of the pan.  That way it would have a nicer presentation when we flipped them out.  They looked super cute and I would highly recommend it if you are using a decorative pan. Of course, if you are using cupcake tins/cups this won’t really matter since the bottoms won’t be seen.  Just dump the almonds in with the recipe.

Why did I love this recipe?  First of all, I wanted to eat all six of the cakes myself and not share them with anyone.  Good sign.  That leads me into the second reason.  The recipe only made enough mix to fill the pan – a six maple leaf pan (or if you want, six cupcakes).  Again, since I have been baking EVERY day, the smaller the recipe for me right now, the better.  It was perfect for three of us to eat for breakfast and not eat too many.  If my kids were here, though, I would have had to make them twice.  This of course leads me to my “third of all.”  I think my children would love this recipe.  I can’t say that about too many things, especially for my son.  He doesn’t eat much of anything, let alone sweet things.  He is certainly not reaping any benefits of 30D30B!

If you want to add something extra to it, it lends itself to being drenched with maple syrup.  The cakes taste like amazing pancakes with all of those flavors.  Awesome!

Almond Butter Leaves (I am writing this with all of the changes I made; adjust as needed)

• 1/4 c. butter, softened
• 1/4 c. granulated sugar
• 1/4 c. confectioners sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/4 tsp. maple flavor/extract
• 1/4 tsp. almond extract
• 3/4 c. flour
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• pinch of salt
• 1/4 c. milk
• 1/4 c. slivered almonds, really finely chopped

Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Generously grease six individual mini cake pans or cupcakes.  Sprinkle chopped almonds in bottom of each pan to cover the entire bottom.  In large bowl, combine all ingredients.  Blend on low speed 1 minute, scraping bowl often.  Beat on medium speed 2 minutes.  Pour batter into prepared pan.  Bake 20 – 22 minutes until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Cool in pan 5 minutes; turn out onto cooling rack and cool completely.  Makes 6 leaves or mini cakes.

Now I had better run upstairs and see if there are any left!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 7

I was so good tonight!  Despite spending an entire day on the road, I still baked for my 30D30B challenge.  Now that is dedication!  Hubby and I hit the road at 6:30 am to drive through Annapolis and visit with his host family from his days at the Naval Academy.  After almost ten years they are all still in touch and we always have a great time hanging out.  We ate a nice lunch on campus and then we finished the drive to New Jersey to stay with my wonderful mother-in-law.  Really, how many of you can say you have a wonderful mother-in-law and not be lying through your teeth!?  As soon as we walked in the door, she had our glasses filled with wine, take-out Chinese food on the way, and recipes out for us to bake together in support of my little bloggy blog.  Awesome.

Actually, today was the first time we have shared the kitchen with each other.  Lord knows, I am no chef!  So, I stay out of the way of the masterful Italian women in my extended family while they are making their “only mom’s will ever taste this good” lasagna.

Tonight, though, my MIL was as excited as I was to work (though you can’t really call it that) together in the kitchen.  She brought out one of her great recipes – Pineapple Upside Down Cake.  I think it was the least stressful and most fun I’ve had trying something new in these last six days.  Never having made PUD Cake, I didn’t know what to expect.  I had to eat two pieces to confirm that it was a delicious cake.  It is such a specialized cake, I think I will probably reserve it for Hawaiian luaus, beach and pool parties.  It is one of those kinds of cakes that you need to be in the mood for to not go just grab a chocolate cake mix box.

A great thing about her recipe is it is a nice size cake.  It is smaller and calls for an 8 inch square pan (of course round would work fine too), so you aren’t making this enormous cake that you feel guilty for eating the entire thing in one night…something I have been trying very hard NOT to do all week!

It needs little more introduction than this, so grab your MIL and a glass of wine – I know some of you might actually need the latter to deal with the former – and enjoy some cake!

PUD Cake

• 1/4 c. butter or margarine (I RARELY replace butter with margarine)
• 1/3 c. firmly packed brown sugar
• 4 – 5 pineapple slices, drained
• 4 – 5 maraschino cherries
• 1 1/4 c. all purpose flour
• 3/4 c. sugar
• 2 t. baking powder
• 1/2 c. milk
• 1/2 t. salt
• 1/4 c. shortening
• 1 egg
• 1 t. vanilla

Directions

1. Melt margarine in an 8” square pan in the oven
2. Sprinkle crumbled brown sugar over melted margarine
3. Arrange pineapple rings over the brown sugar mixture
4. Place a maraschino cherry in the center of each pineapple ring
5. In a large bowl, sift flour with sugar, baking powder and salt
6. Add shortening and milk, beat 1 – 1.5 minutes at low speed
7. Add egg and vanilla, beat 1.5 minutes more
8. Pour batter over fruit, bake at 350 for 40 – 45 minutes

Allow to cool for 5 minutes.  Loosen sides with spatula and invert onto plate.  Let stand for one minute before removing from pan.

I am going to throw my excuse out there right now, but I may not get to bake EVERY day this weekend since we are seeing friends, going to a wedding, and driving home, but I promise I will make up for it later!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 6

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Marissa!  Happy birthday to ME!!!

What better way to spend your birthday than BAKING?!  Go figure though, it wasn’t a cake for me.  This weekend one of my sweet little neighbors is turning five.  Though her mother is also a fantastic baker, she, for some reason, requested I make her daughter’s cake!  Little M requested a princess cake so this is what I came up with.  I searched online for a while looking for inspiration but didn’t find too many things.  I did, however find the idea to use the ice cream cones as spires, so that was a big bonus. 

To assemble my cake I used two cake mix boxes (chocolate) and with those I filled a 9×13 pan, an 8 inch round pan, a 6 inch round pan and 6 cupcake holes.  I stacked them, naturally, large to small and then used the cupcakes to support my ice cream cone spires.  I used some inexpensive $1 bag spiced gum drops from Walmart for the edging and then also added some piped stars in purple for another accent.  The cupcake part was hubby’s idea.  He’s so clever.  He even volunteered and did a little icing this evening to help me out since I was decorating, cleaning, mowing the lawn, etc.  Gotta love him!

I put the all important crumb layer on the entire cake and let it set in the fridge before frosting, but for some reason it didn’t do all that great of a job keeping the crumbs away.  Also, since my crumb layer was white I definitely had some issues with it come through the pink.  It’s not a perfect cake, but hopefully little M won’t care about the imperfections and she will be so happy to have a castle.

I made my husband use our Blockbuster free movie coupon to get Julie and Julia.  I thought it was appropriate given our new endeavor here.  He told me I better never talk to him the way Julie spoke to her husband when she got frustrated!  He said that would be the end of 30D30B.  Guess I better watch my manners!!! :)

So here we go.  Happy birthday M!!!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 5

Do not read this post if you do not like chocolate!  I mean it.  Really.  Stop.  Right now.  Today’s baking wonderfulness is chocolate based, chocolate filled, and chocolate covered.  And it is rich.  I love this chocolate cake.  It works well as a bundt cake, pan cake, cupcake, everything.  You name it and this cake is fantastic.  Put a few layers together and smother it with chocolate icing.  Or, do what I did and pour some wonderful ganache over it.

Unfortunatley, it didn’t turn out quite as I was hoping.  I was trying to go for a petit four look, but I certainly need some practice with that method.  After trying to smooth the ganache over all sides of a few of the cakes, I gave up and simply continued to glop it on top.  Other than that, it is a very simple cake to mix and bake and cover with something delicious.  I, of course, had to make it hard on myself.  Surprise. Surprise.

My husband fell in love with the cakes immediately and called them chocolate bombs, so I’ll stick with that!  Again, he ate 2 of the little cakes in a matter of minutes and had to force himself to stay away from the rest.  I am always able to judge how good my dishes are based on my husband’s instant reaction.  I know in the first two seconds whether it is going to be a “keeper” recipe or not.  Whether he tries to be nice and lie to me about it or not, it is easy to tell how he really feels!  He falls all over the dishes he loves before he can even swallow the first bite.  Mouth still stuffed full, chocolate at the corner of his lips “oh my God, Babe, this is amazing.  I would totally buy this.  I’m going to have ten more.  Oh.  Wow.  Babe, really, these are great.”  Otherwise, I kind of get a nice smile and a “it’s good babe.”

Today’s recipe was definitely the former.  That certainly makes me happy!  So here it is, the recipe for my chocolate bombs:

Chocolate Bombs

• 1 box of Devil’s food cake mix
• 1 5.9 oz box of chocolate pudding (the more chocolatey, the better!)
• 1 cup sour cream (I have decided almost every cake is better with sour cream)
• 1 cup vegetable (I use canola oil for everything though)
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup hot water
• 1 package (8 0z) dark chocolate chips

Mix all ingredients in a large bowl until blended.  Add chocolate chips last.  Pour into a greased pan of your choice.  Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for 50 – 55 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

My ganache topping:

• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 8 oz package semisweet chocolate chips
• 1 tbsp dark rum (I love this option!)

Place chocolate chips in a medium bowl.  Bring heavy cream JUST to a boil in a small sauce pan over medium-high heat.  As SOON as the cream jumps to a boil, pour over the chocolate chips.  Whisk immediately until chocolate is melted.  Add rum.  I suggest sticking the bowl into the fridge until it has reached your desired consistency.  It will be very thin at first and get thicker the longer it cools.  I put mine in for 15 – 20 minutes.

Enjoy!

30 Days and 30 Bites – Day 4

I was SO proud of myself for completing my first three days of 30D30B.  I don’t think I have ever even managed to write in a journal for three consecutive days any time in my life.  Alas, at day four, life has already gotten in the way!  Instead of sitting at home and coming up with brilliant baking ideas, I spent 20 + hours at the hospital in labor and delievery.  A great friend of mine gave birth to her first son who’s daddy is deployed on a ship.  I was lucky enough to be chosen as coach to share this wonderful time with her and her parents.  So maybe I didn’t manage to create a masterful confection, but boy…things don’t come any sweeter than Baby R!  So though I had to skip a day of baking, I thought I would post something that I have been meaning to do for a while.

My brilliant mother, that’s right, you read right mom.  My brilliant mother is the craft czar when it comes to re-purposing things in life.  One such idea, I use to tease her about profusely and it involves a hairnet.  A plain plastic hairnet.  The traveling woman that she is, my mother stays in a lot of hotels.  While in these hotels she collects the specialty soaps and shampoos and other what nots (like hairnets) that hotels leave in the room for your convenience.  First off, always thinking of other people first, she saves up the soaps and shampoos and donates them to her local Ronald McDonald House.  They are always in need of things like toiletries and other personal care items for the moms, families and children that they help at their charity locations.

Of course, I digress and I should probably get to the key point of this post.  She uses the hairnets that she gets from the hotels as a sort of saran wrap.  Remember the Glad plastic bowl covers they sold for a little while?  It is the same idea.  But WAY cheaper.  The hairnets fit over all size bowls, even huge ones, and are fantastic when you are trying to cover awkward items that just won’t take saran wrap easily.

Unfortunately, I am not the traveling woman my mom is, so I have to buy my hairnets.  My dollar store sells them in packages of 15 (look in the sections with the wigs and curlers) for, you guessed it!  A dollar!  So here is a picture of my hairnetted cookie dough from last night’s cookies.  Just don’t wear them before you use them!

Tags: Baking, Cooking, Repurpose, Storage