My mom's favorite thing to bake.

Hello, Happy Holidays, and Happy New Year!

Hope everyone is enjoying this special time of year, filled with twinkling lights, laughter, and that "ok sure, I'll have another" outlook to the appetizer/dinner/dessert tray. It's totally allowed. 

The main reason that these wonderful indulgences are much more justified at this time of year is this when everyone breaks out their special [fill in name of food here]. That recipe they only make one or very few times a year, that one you really really love. 

My mom's fudge falls into that category. 

Every year I watch for a varying amount of time while she makes it, always fleeing while the sugar dramatically boils (which she says is her absolute favorite part), always excitedly tasting the end result. I've never actually made it, but this year, I did take a few pictures of the process. 

And yes, I did stay in the room the whole time. 

Haven't I become so brave?

Happy eating!

It's beginning to feel a lot like winter.

Perhaps you heard about (or experienced) what happened in my area this past weekend. 

It snowed. A few inches - unremarkable to many; disappointing to children (and adults) wanting to build snowmen but finding the covering way too powdery to even make a good snowball; generally annoying to yours truly. 

I'm not really a fan of snow. Well, if it stays out of my way and does not affect the road quality, it doesn't really bother me.

Actually no, I still don't like it then either. 

But I will give snow this - freshly fallen, untrampled and unplowed, glittering in the light...it is pretty. 

I didn't spend this entire weekend being annoyed at cold crystalized water, however. I began assembling cookies for various holiday gatherings (began being the operative word here).

The first batch of cookies was the shortbread cookies first seen on Mothers Day. This time I kept everything but the raspberry jam, making a basic shortbread cookie with a special holiday touch of whimsical icing. 

Personally, my favorites were the happy faces, the swirls, and the squiggles. 

Hole in the middle of the bread egg (or, "Hey! Not dessert!")

My dad taught me about this recipe years ago, cutting holes in the middle of bread and adding an egg in the subsequent hole. And snacking on the leftover circle of bread.

A critical, crucial step.

I'm not kidding here. 

So in my house*, this is called Hole in the middle of the bread egg. Actually, I used to (up until about, oh, 3 months ago) call it "hole in the middle of the egg bread". It still sounds more pleasing to my ear, despite it not making much descriptive sense. 

Let's go!

Create a hole in the center of the bread using a cup. Obviously, the more brightly colored cup you use, the better your end result will be. Duh.

Eat the piece of bread. Do it. 

Add butter to a pan, and add the center-less bread. 

Is anyone else reminded of Death Becomes Her? Such an awesome movie. 

Add the egg, and salt and pepper if you wish (or any other egg accompaniment you desire).

Flip!

I have to admit, this was a bit of a nervewracking moment for me. Usually when flipping eggs, I have a fairly low success rate. With camera in hand, I felt even less prepared for the big moment. Surprisingly, it went pretty well. 

And, eat. 

*Other people know this dish by the name "Egg in a basket," "Birds nest," or a bunch of other names. I prefer to avoid the artistic terms for "bread" and "egg", and use the straightforward name for this straightforward dish. Up to you. 

Fall

Unsure of how much longer the crispy crunchy leaves will still be speckled amongst the grass, I decided to take this opportunity to take another close look. 

Good morning!

Originally uploaded by Kitchenphobe

I'm not really sure what to say about this sunrise...

It's not the most colorful one I've seen recently (always witnessed while the camera is far enough away that by the time I get to it, the sky has morphed into its daytime shades).

But its still pretty.

Good morning, December! Happy to see you!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone!!! 

(Well, for those of you outside of the U.S., Happy November 26th! Yay!) 

When one thinks of typical Thanksgiving desserts, the words "pumpkin," "apple," and "pie" come to mind. Which is all well and good, but I am planning on tossing a new player into the dessert table mix this year, with such keywords as "chocolate" and "cookie". 

I don't think the table will protest. 

And I'm hoping the people eating at it won't either.

Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies

The dry ingredients

That looks pretty creamy to me

Beginning to add the dry ingredients

After incorporating in all of the dry ingredients, I noticed that the batter was dry. Like, really dry. Like dry to the point that I thought that maybe possibly something could be awry, and it maybe probably was my fault.

The almost-forgotten eggs amongst the dry batter crags. 

A sigh of relief and little mental pat on the back for remembering that.

I substituted chocolate chips because I had them already. Yay convenience. 

Oh, guess what I bought?!

This should help. As a side note, the recipe called for ungreased cookie sheets, but I wasn't taking my chances. 

Before being baked

Kitchenphobe's holiday tip: It's usually a good idea to remove any finger-adorning jewelry before rolling cookies.

Side note: My ring tells time. (The inside is a sundial). How awesome is that?

Oven-cam. 

Post-baking

Hi there cookie

A pile of deliciousness.

Chomp.

With a texture akin to cake/a brownie, these cookies are wonderfully chocolatey and delightful. (A pause for irony—there is a Toll House commercial on right now). I believe that they will make a great addition to our Thanksgiving dessert spread. 

Hope everyone has a relaxing, safe, and delicious holiday! 

Salsa with Adam. The food, not the dance. But I'm sure we could learn the dance if we tried.

Adam: Hey, let's make salsa this weekend.

Me: Okay. 

Salsa is a fairly intuitive and easy process (which means I was fairly intimidated and attempting to deflect any questions asking my opinion on the product throughout). Adam did fine. Surprise, surprise.

So we combined tomatoes, and black beans, and onions, and jalapenos, and crushed pineapple, maybe some other stuff, a bunch of spices, and ended up with salsa. 

And by we, I mean he. I'm still slowly chopping the onion into irregularly-sized pieces.