last week I bought some molasses - I have been thinking about gingerbread.
for this morning I made a pan of gingerbread, a Jackson family recipe.
I don't think I realized that gingerbread could be anything but cutout cookies until Nathaniel and I got married.
as it turns out gingerbread is one of Nathaniel's favorites - loves it at breakfast, tea, dessert with a bit of whipped cream...

Everyone can use a good gingerbread recipe - especially with Christmas around the corner (Ahhh! Christmas is coming!).  Please, please, please make this recipe at some point in the next two months and especially eat it with freshly whipped cream and a cup of coffee.

mix together:
1 1/2 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ginger
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp nutmeg

in a different bowl mix together
1/2 cup of melted butter
1/2 cup of boiling water
1/2 cup of molasses
1 egg

mix all the ingredients together until smooth
pour into a 8-9 inch cake pan
bake at 325 F for 35 minutes

I ate a piece while skyping with Gab this morning - I restrained myself from exclaiming out loud just how delicious it was because I didn't want her to be sad not to have a piece of her own.
I definitely do not make this recipe enough.


I don't make it nearly often enough.
 

coconut banana bread

our yummy bread from last Friday morning.
Nathaniel called it Caribbean banana bread.
he loved it - Florence had a little nibble of my piece, she was wild about it. She would have eaten my entire piece if I had let her get her little hands on it.  Thanks for the suggestion Jamey!

(the picture is from the myrecipes.com)

when the days get really cold this winter I will whip up a batch of this bread and pretend we are far away in the Virgin Islands.
For those of you interested check out the recipe here.

At some point in the early summer, my sister-in-law, Gillian came over for dinner.
Because she is totally awesome she stayed around to help with the clean up. After poking around under the sink a bit she turned and asked me where I kept my rubber gloves for washing dishes.
I told her that I actually didn't own any - simply put she was baffled.
I have my reasons -

• those yellow gloves are always soooo huge! when I use them I feel like I am clunking around in them
• because they are huge, water always gets in them and they take forever to dry out - gross
• probably the biggest reason is that really, I can't be bothered with them - I don't want to take the time to pull out the rubber gloves and put them on when by the time I do all that I could have my dishes washed (in theory!)

Gillian listened to my reasons and simply said, 'I don't know, you might find that you like them...'

A couple weeks later, I am opening my birthday present from Gillian...she bought me a pair of rubber gloves.  Size x-small the package said, and they are purple not yellow. Gillian smiled - you never know...

Ah - well those gloves have sat under my counter unused since July. 
Last week I was washing up the blender and cut my finger on the blade (because I was lazy and didn't take the blender apart the way I should have done), a terrible inconvenience.  I remembered the gloves under my sink and decided they might just keep my fingers dry (remember - size x-small!?) and I could keep washing up without the risk of infection.

I think I have been converted.  These purple gloves have done everything Gillian said they would do and then some. So I don't know - come over some time and offer to do my dishes, I might even let you use my awesome purple gloves that are not clunky, keep your hands dry and if the sponge is smelly your hands don't get smelly too.

falling behind...

but still here.

This Friday the plan was to make the coconut lime banana bread recommended by Jamey.
However come Thursday my bananas were just not ripe enough - It has taken me long enough to learn that if I go ahead a make the bread before those bananas are ripe I am ALWAYS disappointed.
I decided to wait a week.
Ha! now you know what I have in store for next week - finally I am ahead again!
Anyway, I decided to take some of the coconut that I had for the banana bread and make some scones mom and I made while she was here.
chocolate - coconut - almond scones. This recipe is also thanks to Joy the Baker and you can take a look here.
Here's the thing, I have always been very anti-chocolate in my breakfast.  Never - ever would you catch me with chocolate chips in my pancakes, muffins, banana bread...you name it - it just never happened. And yet here I am make scones with chocolate chips...and would you believe I love them?  I don't think that I have been converted to chocolate chips in my pancakes, but I think I am beginning to understand a little bit.
Absolutely delicious.  and it makes more scones than my other recipe, which means that here we are on Sunday still enjoying them - grant it a little stale, but nothing a little warming up in the toaster and some butter can't cover up.

my Central New York baby

loves apples. 

as you can see, one apple is just not enough,

 

she will share as long as she gets to hold the apple 

- & it doesn't interrupt her own enjoyment of it

she can hardly stop gnawing away for a picture,

ah, but I guess she comes by 

it honestly!

After a wonderful and inspiring visit with mom this past week I came to last night with a resounding crash.  I was missing having someone to discuss baking ideas with and then the companionship that comes when you have someone working in the kitchen with you.
What in the world was I going to make for Friday morning - there I was searching through my cupboards remembering that it can't be anything that calls for too much baking powder because mom and I used so much last week I hardly had any left...and I was not about to go out and buy some.
I found a can of pumpkin puree. Perfect!
Pumpkin bread it would be. It will be a nice break from all the apples I have been feeding them.
The recipe comes from Martha Stewart - she makes it in loaf pans, I went with the bunt pan (prettier that way).
I am going to do the cheater way and I won't take the time to write it out.  Have a look at the recipe here.

A few thoughts...

• if you like pumpkin pie - you will love this. It is still cake like while somehow also being creamy and dense.  Though, perhaps the denseness of it has to with the fact that I may have slightly undercooked it?
• instead of the plain icing the recipe called for I made a cream cheese icing.  This I highly recommend, it is a bit more decadent/desserty but there is something so wonderful about cream cheese and pumpkin. 
• and on a personal preference - I wouldn't make this recipe again for myself. I tend to like my pumpkin bread to be bread and not so  much like pie. 

I apologize ahead of time - this is going to be a long post...and I am also sorry to say that it will have no pictures of my creations, I was a bit too groggy at 5.30 this morning to remember to grab the camera to take a picture of them just out of the oven.

So, this morning, the guys enjoyed giant cinnamon rolls for breakfast.
I have grown in my cinnamon roll making over the last few years - gathering tips from my sisters, and my mom.
I now have a couple different dough recipes to use depending on what is around in my kitchen, yesterday I made what I call the deluxe version, which involves milk and an egg.

Step 1:
1 package of dry active yeast (2 1/2 tsp)
1/2 cup of warm water
1/2 tsp sugar
dissolve yeast and sugar in the water and set aside,

Step 2:
1 cup scalded milk (cooled)
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp salt
pour the milk over the oil, sugar and salt. stir till combined & sugar is dissolved.  If needed continue to let cool.

Step 3:
1 egg wisked
in a large bowl, combine the yeast mixture, milk mixture and the egg.  gradually add -

5 cups of flour
stir till all the flour is mixed in,  turn the dough out onto a floured surface and place the bowl over the top. Let it rest for 10 min.
After resting, knead dough till smooth and springy (using more flour as necessary - I find it to be a rather sticky dough). return the dough to the bowl, cover and let rise for 1 1/2 - 2 hours.

Step 4:
Roll out the dough into a large rectangle - large but not too thin!
Melt 1 stick of butter -  and spread over rectangle, pour excess into baking pan.
* a sweet trick I learned from Naomi:  put the butter in the microwave & almost just barely start to melt it so most of it is still solid just very very soft. It makes less mess that way when spreading onto the dough, and when rolling them up*
Sprinkle generously with cinnamon and brown sugar
and if you like - it's always fun to add raisins/ cranberries (my favorite)/ toasted nuts...

Step 5:
Roll the dough loosely into a giant log (roll up the long end of the dough), with a knife slice the log into about 1 1/2 inch rolls and place them into a 8 1/2 x 11 pan.
Don't squeeze them together - I generally do a 2-1-2-1-2 with the rolls, this gives them room to grow and (I personally think) helps them cook through properly.
I generally have overflow and need to put 3 of the rolls into a pie dish (this will depend on how thick you make the rolls).

Step 6:
You can now do one of two things
- cover them with plastic wrap and put them in the refrigerator to bake later, I have stored them this way for up to two days no problem.  I take them out of the fridge 30 min - 1 hour before I want to bake them.
- bake them right away and of course, enjoy!

Bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes

and finally make an icing to go over the rolls out of confectioners sugar and milk - or I like to use half&half.