When we first moved into our own place {sans roommate(s)} -we had a great set of neighbours. They were an amazing, friendly couple from Nova Scotia, who -as an added bonus -brought us food on a regular basis.

To find nice people like that in the downtown core is pretty much impossible. So you can imagine how devastated I was when I found out that they were moving out only four months later. Little did I know then, it would get much worse.

At the beginning of the year our new neighbours moved in… with dog.

Now I should take a time out to say that I absolutely love dogs. I can’t make it through a day without thinking how much my life would be better if I had one. But I’m aware that my life can’t accommodate a dog. I live in an apartment downtown and that in itself means NO big animals.

I guess these neighbours find themselves exempt from this basic logic, because they have a HUGE dog which I have not seen, but have definitely heard on multiple occasions. This leads me to conclude that they neglect their dog. This thing barked all weekend. Unless the owners are deaf I think it’s safe to assume they were away for those two days.

During the weekend howl-fest going on one wall over, I made the best brownies of ever. I will forever call these “The Best Brownies of EVER” because that’s what they are. Some people like their brownies extra fudgey. I am not one of those people. A brownie purist knows that brownies are supposed to be somewhere between cake and fudge. I like mine 60% towards cake, and not too sweet. If your palette is anything like mine, I strongly suggest you make these. Trust. They are perfect. Even more so if you are living through trying times –auditory or otherwise.

The Best Brownies of EVER

Ingredients:
4 oz Unsweetened Chocolate Squares (4 Bakers Squares)
1/2 cup of Butter
1 and 1/2 cups of sugar
3 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
1 cup of flour

No mixer allowed. This is easily done with a bowl & spatula.

Method:
1. Preheat Oven to 350 F (180 C)
2. Melt chocolate squares and butter over medium heat
3. Stir until completely melted
4. Transfer melted chocolate mixture to a bowl. Add sugar and mix.
5. Add eggs and vanilla. Mix again until incorporated.
6. Add flour. Mix only until the flour disappears completely.
7. Transfer to a greased glass dish (I used 9 x 9 lined with parchment paper).
8. Bake for 30 minutes or until toothpick test comes clean.

Let cool and dig in. Invite some friends over to do the same.

My mom had a gathering at her house last weekend, and I offered to bake the desserts. My mom, who was born & raised in England, loves Victoria Sponge. The cake was named after Queen Victoria who was said to have some daily at tea. It is made like any other sponge cake, but has cream and jam sandwiched in between the two layers. Personally, I don’t understand the appeal. For one thing, the UK doesn’t have the best reputation in the culinary world. I didn’t like the smell of it while baking, and I’m not a fan of Devonshire cream. Although -to be perfectly honest -I didn’t even try it, and in its defense, everyone seemed to like it at the party.

Recipe:
8 ounces softened butter (I used margarine)
8 ounces superfine sugar
4 large eggs
8 ounces self-raising flour, sifted

Filling:
6 tbsp jam (I used blackberry by request)
300ml/10½ fl oz double cream (eg. Devonshire)

Icing sugar, for dusting
You’ll need two 15cm-17.5cm/6in-7in cake tins

1. Preheat the oven to 350F.
2. Grease 6in-7in cake tins and line the bottom of the two cake tins with a circle of parchment paper.
3. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar until pale and creamy. Beat well to get lots of air into the mixture (takes a few minutes).
4. Beat in the eggs one at a time. You can add a tablespoon of flour if the mixture curdles.
5. Fold in the flour using a large metal spoon. Do not over-mix.
6. Pour the mixture equally between the two cake tins and level off the top with a spatula.
7. Place in the oven and bake for 20 minutes, or until the cakes spring back when pressed gently with a finger and are slightly golden in colour.
8. Remove from the oven and take them out of the tins after about 5-10 minutes. Place them on a wire rack to cool completely.
9. Spread the sponge with the jam and the whipped cream (traditionally, the cream goes on the bottom of the top layer, and the jam goes on the top of the bottom layer). Carefully sandwich together.
10. Dust with icing sugar and serve.

I recognize that I have to stop posting pictures of various domestic/barnyard animals. And I’ll really try to limit it from here on out… But we went to the Royal Agricultural Winter Fair on Saturday and it’s so wonderful to be able to see a freshly-sheared (and somewhat frazzled) sheep.

Because it’s a slower season at work, I’ve had lots of time on my hands, and have been baking lots. I took the following recipe from the All Bran website, and replaced the bran with Kashi cereal. I really like these, and they’re great if you want a snack without preservatives. I substituted honey with Barley Malt Syrup/Extract and a bit of Maple Syrup.

HOMEMADE KASHI BARS

Ingredients
2 cups Cereal, 2/3 cup raisins, 1/2 cup chopped nuts, 1 tablespoon margarine or butter, 1/2 cup honey, 1/4 cup peanut butter, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

Directions
1. Stir together the cereal, raisins and nuts. Set aside.
2. In 3-quart saucepan, combine margarine, honey and peanut butter. Stir over medium heat until mixture is well blended. Remove from heat. Stir in vanilla, cinnamon and cereal mixture.
3. Press mixture into 9 x 9 x 2-inch pan coated with cooking spray.

Cut into 20 bars when cooled. Store covered, in refrigerator.

I also made carrot cake, because (admittedly) I ate the last 1/4 of the slice R. bought last week. Even though this took most of the evening, it was worth it.

CARROT CAKE

Ingredients
6 cups grated carrots, 1 cup brown sugar, 1 cup raisins, 4 eggs, 1 1/2 cups white sugar, 1 cup vegetable oil, 2 teaspoons vanilla extract, 1 cup unsweetened apple sauce, 3 cups all-purpose flour, 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda, 1 teaspoon salt, 4 teaspoons ground cinnamon, 1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions
1. In a medium bowl, combine grated carrots and brown sugar. Set aside for 60 minutes, then stir in raisins.
2. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
3. Grease and flour two 10 inch cake pans.
4. In a large bowl, beat eggs until light. Gradually beat in the white sugar, oil and vanilla. Stir in the apple sauce.
5. Combine the flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon, stir into the wet mixture until absorbed. Finally stir in the carrot mixture and the walnuts. Pour evenly into the prepared pans. Bake for 45 to 50 minutes in the preheated oven, until cake tests done with a toothpick.
6. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan. When completely cooled, frost with cream cheese frosting.

N.B. This makes a LOT of carrot cake. It could easily be halved. When grating the carrots, it is important to press/strain out juices intermittently (otherwise the cake consistency will be ruined). I saved the juices in order to colour some of the icing for the decorative carrots.

I made the frosting with cream cheese and icing sugar. It was pretty runny but light, which was nice because it didn’t overpower the carrot flavor. I didn’t really measure the ingredients out, but there a bazillion icing recipes online, so they’re easily found.

We just replaced the modded XBOX for a modded Apple TV, which is great because I can now flip through flickr pages (mine & friends) when I can’t find anything to watch on regular TV. I’m excited!

Is there anything better than Williams Sonoma? When I walk in, time and space come to an abrupt halt. Admittedly, I try to avoid it entirely, because I can easily spend hours in there. I am mesmerized by things like thousand dollar espresso machines and portable cupcake holders. I know that most of the products are ridiculously overpriced, and down the street, you can get an almost identical flat icing spatula for a third of the cost… but everything in there is just so beautiful.

I almost caved when I saw these decorative pie crust cutters, but I thought I could make my own leaves with a small knife. The result -although not very successful -is shown above. This was my pre-Thanksgiving test pie, and I’m thinking I might be ambitious and attempt a turkey instead of a leaf today.

I’m using this award-winning recipe that I found on The Canadian Baker, replacing margarine with the butter and this time, no spices (by request).

PIE

Filling:
8 apples about 3 lbs (1.5 kg)
3/4 cup granulated sugar (175 mL)
2 tbsp cornstarch (25 mL)
1 tsp cinnamon (5 mL)
pinch each ground nutmeg and salt
2 tbsp margarine, softened (25 mL)

Peel and core apples; cut into 1/4-inch thick slices and place in large bowl. In small bowl, toss together sugar, cornstarch, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt; add to apples and toss to coat.

Double-Crust Sour Cream Pastry (see below)
1 egg yolk
2 tbsp coarse sugar

Pastry:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (625 mL)
1/2 tsp salt (2 mL)
1 cup margarine, cubed (125 mL)
1/4 cup ice water (50 mL)
3 tbsp sour cream (50 mL)

In bowl, whisk flour with salt. Using pastry blender, cut in butter and lard until mixture resembles fine crumbs with a few larger pieces.

In small bowl, whisk water with sour cream; drizzle over dry ingredients, stirring briskly with fork until ragged dough forms. Divide in half; press into discs. Wrap each in plastic wrap; refrigerate until chilled, about 30 minutes. (Make Ahead: Refrigerate for up to 3 days.)

On lightly floured surface, roll out half of the pastry to generous 1/8-inch (3 mm) thickness; fit into 9-inch pie plate. Trim to leave 3/4-inch (2 cm) overhang; fold under and flute edge. Scrape filling into pie shell; dot with margarine.

Roll out remaining pastry. Whisk egg yolk with 1 tbsp water; brush over pastry rim. Fit pastry over filling; trim to leave 3/4-inch (2 cm) overhang. Fold overhang under bottom pastry rim; seal and flute edge. Brush egg mixture over pastry. Cut steam vents in top; sprinkle with coarse sugar.

Bake in bottom third of 450 F (230 C) oven for 10 minutes. Reduce heat to 350 F (180 C); bake for 65 minutes or until bottom is bubbling and thickened. Let cool on rack. (Make Ahead: Set aside for up to 24 hours.) Makes 8 servings.

Source: Canadian Living Magazine, October 2007.

The two seem to go together very well. It has been said that some of the best bakers are those with cold hands, especially when it comes to making dough. I am not a big fan of the winter. It doesn’t do much for me; I get cold easily and -other than skating every so often -I don’t take part in winter sports. From my perspective, the only redeeming quality to the cold front we’ve had recently, is that cooling baked goods is much quicker & easier. Perfect timing too, because I decided to bake some treats for my sister’s baby shower on Sunday.

The muffins above use spelt flour and bananas. They’re a creation by, believe it or not, Gwyneth Paltrow. Her new website (which has been panned by critics), delivered this cute little recipe to my inbox, and I figured I’d give it a shot.

Banana Nut Muffins
Ingredients:
3 medium ripe bananas
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/4 cup brown rice syrup
1 tbsp. vanilla extract.
1/2 cup barley flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 cup raisins
1/2 cup walnuts
2 tsp. fine sea salt
6 tbsp. canola or sunflower oil
1 cup whole spelt flour
1/2 cup white spelt flour
(Makes 1 dozen muffins)

1. Preheat oven to 350 F (180 C) and roast the walnuts for approx. 7 minutes, then finely chop.
2. Sift the flours and baking soda into a medium-sized bowl, add the salt.
3. Puree the bananas in a food processor and add the remaining liquid ingredients, mix well.
4. Make a well in the flour and pour in the wet mixture (scraping the processor bowl well) and fold together until the flour is moistened. Add the walnuts and raisins and fold just a few more times to incorporate. Don’t over mix.
5. Line muffin tin with papers or brush with oil. Distribute batter evenly among cups.
6. Bake approximately 25 minutes, or until a toothpick tests clean. Let cool.

I used a few substitutions, and omitted the walnuts entirely, but they still turned out great. The real surprise was that R loved them. They’re relatively healthy, and were gone in 2 days.

I made chocolate chip cookies too. A lot less healthy, but so delicious! I took the recipe from Big Fat Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie (but only used 1 cup of chocolate chips) and I used some techniques from the NYTimes recipe Quest for the Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookie. Notably, letting the dough rest in the fridge for a day before baking. Trust me, the wait is worth it.

These lemon squares are low fat, and pretty good. I think I messed up the crust though, because I used 1 cup milk + 1 tbsp lemon juice to “fake” the buttermilk. If I make it again, I would probably just use a different crust entirely. I took the recipe from Baking Bites

I also (finally) made my date squares. To be honest, I took this from a baking cookbook a long time ago, but I forget which one it was.

Oat Crust + Topping
1 1/4 all purpose flour
1 cup oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. salt

Date Filling
10 oz. pitted dates, chopped (I would use more, maybe 12-14 oz)
3/4 cup water
2 tbsp. brown sugar

1. Preheat oven to 375 F, grease or line a 9×9 inch pan.
2. Prepare crust and topping. In a large bowl, with hands, mix flour, oats, sugar, butter, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Transfer 2 cups of mixture to baking pan. Reserve the rest. Press mixture evenly onto bottom of pan to form a crust. Bake 10 minutes. Cool completely in pan on wire rack.
3. While crust is cooling, prepare filling. In saucepan, combine dates, water and brown sugar. Cook over medium heat stirring frequently until mixture thickens and all water is absorbed (6-8 minutes).
Spoon filling into bowl and refrigerate until cool, about 30 minutes.
4. When filling is cool, spread filling over crust. Top with reserved crumb mixture. Bake until topping is golden. 35-40 minutes. Let cool.
5. Cut 4 strips x 3 strips (Makes 12 bars).

These are crumbly but delicious. I’ll probably have to make more, because I’d like to keep a couple for us to eat this week.

Happy Friday everyone!

Last Friday, a friend gave me “The Power of Your Subconscious Mind” by Dr. Joseph Murphy. If you’ve read or heard of “The Secret”, Murphy’s book follows a very similar theory -that of the power of attraction and the power of thought. I know people make fun of this principle, and I have too at times. But in a lot of ways, I think there really is validity behind this philosophy. And as with anything else I immerse myself in, I keep finding supporting evidence to back up their case.

Late last night, I was doing the rounds on some baking blogs, and saw a link to this recipe for Sunny Jungle Bars. I’ve been wanting to bake something new for a while, but -at the same time -I was really hoping to make my favorite date squares. I figured this recipe was some sort of compromise. There were dates in it, after all. So I ran to the grocery store to pick up some -but not all the ingredients listed, and started up.

This recipe is pretty involved, but my mind was so focused on making date squares, that I was unconsciously following the process to make them instead of the Sunny Bars recipe. As a result, the bars didn’t turn out 100% as I had planned. Looking back, I probably should’ve just made date squares and be done with it.

Second example: This morning, I was reading the book on the subway, and decided to start thinking positive thoughts about getting a job/career. Later on, when I checked my voicemail, there was a hugely anticipated voice on the phone. And that’s all I’m going to say about that for now.

Lesson learned: Your thoughts have more power than you might think.