Fruit Crostatas and Back to School

     Ok, so this title is slightly misleading. These pint-sized fruit crostatas actually happened several weeks ago, I just never got around to uploading them. Shocking, right? Me, being lazy?
     Never!  Oh, alright, maybe.  In any case, this recipe and (the next few to come) were made about 2-3 weeks ago in my final efforts to crank out new tasty treats before I became bogged down with homework, dancing (ps, I do ballroom dance. Whoo!) and, if time allows, a bit of a social life!

Almost (but not really) sick of desserts: Peach and Cherry Crisp

     The third (and final) dessert I was baking last Wednesday was a personal dish--not in the size, although I did make it much smaller, but more so in that I was headed home for about 4 days, but my kitchen had quite a few fresh fruits lying about.
     Now, whatever was I supposed to do with those?  Hmm...perhaps a delicious, healthy(er) fruit crisp!  Why yes, yes, that DOES sound delicious, doesn't it?

And so it was.

The Second Cake: Mini Lemon Poppyseed Cakes with a Lemon Syrup and a Lemon Glaze (Whew!)

Okay.

     So we've got half of my mom's birthday cake tale down, right? Right. Well, here's the second half.  The light, summery, more-feminine cake I was wanting to present.  This cake is, as the title implies, very lemon-y.  But frankly, I loved it.  Like, was-kinda-upset-I-didn't-make-more-of-it-and-left-it-with-my-mom loved it.  It's true, lemon-on-lemon-on-lemon (yes, it's a trio!) action does sound a bit blah, bland, and redundant.  Originally, in fact, I was going to do the lemon cake with the lemon syrup and make a delicious, refined lavender glaze, garnished with lavender, of course, of the sort that you only hear about in very dainty, deluxe bakeries and cafes.

     Well, unfortunately, lavender was NOWHERE to be found for this venture.  I mean NOWHERE. Other than the internet.  Which was not going to happen.  So here's the magical triple-lemon threat I came up with instead...and I must say, I was not disappointed at all. No sir-ee.

Not. One. Bit.

Birthday Showdown: Mini Chocolate Devil's Food Cake with Raspberry Buttercream Frosting

Okay, I admit it.

     I've been avoiding the heck out of updating this blog recently.  Why? Because I've got 4 recipes to load on here in addition to the one I'm about to hit you with.  For my mother's birthday last week I decided to make her cake. But I couldn't pick just one. So, I made two. (I was going to make a 3rd, but the whole point of that one was the frosting, which was an unforgivable failure...so that was out.)
     Both of the cakes turned out MARVELOUSLY, though I'm certainly glad I experimented with this chocolate one the first time around.  Or at least, I'm glad I experimented with the original frosting recipe that was with the cake recipe, because if there's one thing I've learned from these experiments, ladies and gentleman, it's that I have no idea what the heck Swiss Meringue Buttercream Frostings are supposed to be, but they don't like me...and me?  I'm not so sure I like them either.

     This chocolate cake, however, I grew to like very, very much.
(Note: Photos of finished cakes are from my practice session when I didn't get the frosting quite right, but I assure you, it still tasted FANTASTIC...that's why there wasn't time to snap photos when I perfected it on the second go!)

7 Layer Bars...deluxe style!

     So, once again I haven't posted that much this week.  However, unlike the last time this happened, this is NOT because I haven't been busy in the kitchen. Polar opposite, actually--I've been baking so much I'm about tired of it! (No, this could never really happen.)
     I've been going a little bit dessert crazy, you see.  On a whim last week I decided to make 7 layer bars for my boyfriend, who loves them dearly.  I made them, but was unsatisfied with the results--they were quite tasty, you see, but a little too sweet, a little too rich.  I chucked up the problem as being that I used a little too much sweetened condensed milk for the size of my batch, & didn't bake it long enough, so aforementioned milk didn't really dry up--it was still by and large present in a syrupy, sugary form.  So I decided to make a round two, with the correct recipe presented in the following post!

Finite Incan-childhood:A Harry Potter week (and some Almond-or peanut- Butter cookies!)

     Contrary to popular belief (and, perhaps, hope) I have not, in fact, fallen off of the face of the planet. Hooraaaaaay!  Last week I was unable to get creative in the kitchen for a small myriad of reasons.

1. I had a take home exam for my summer class that was due by Wednesday.  Yes, it was take home, but for that reason it was extra-long and had nitty-gritty specific questions that required a lot of fact-checking and time consumption.
2. As last week saw the release of the final installment to the Harry Potter film series, I spent any free time I had re-reading the books. \
3. This also meant that I was going to go home on Thursday for the midnight premiere/following weekend, and as such, I opted to NOT go grocery shopping for the last week and a half and simply use up all the food I had.  This resulted in a lack of things with which to cook.

     But, now all that's over, and since I DID actually manage to bake a *little* something while I was at home, here's a reward recipe for the long wait-Almond Butter Cookies!

Short & Sweet: Lime Buttercream Frosting

     Recently, my mom attended some sort of picnic/potluck get together.  She came home raving about these cupcakes that someone else had brought oh, to be the envy of a potluck-if I could only be so lucky someday! that were topped with this apparently to die for icing--a lime buttercream frosting (topping an apparently delicious strawberry cupcake).


     Well, she was not lying.  This icing is so creamy and INEXPLICABLY delicious.  Though there were only two of us home this 4th of July thanks to the travel plans of my dad & sister, we felt an absolute need to make an entire batch of cupcakes after the original chef was kind enough to email my mom the recipe...and I must say, I'm not sure how long they'll last.  Read on to find out how to make this super-simple but MAGICAL topping for your next sweet treat!

Getting seasonal-Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp!

     I am having far too much fun thinking about and playing with this blog.  What's that you say? "You've actually DONE something to it?"  Why yes, yes I have, as I slowly but surely bring back memories of html and webpage design from my childhood. (That's right, my Neopets had some fancy petpages back in the day. 200 points to you if you understand that reference, applause to your general lack of 90's & millennium-aged nerdiness if you do not.)
     In any case, this blog is hardly any good without new recipes, so I figured I should get busy and post some!  The problem I am facing currently, however, is that while I have been tinkering away in the kitchen of my condo this summer, having not planned to start a blog, I have ZERO pictures of all my efforts.  So, you're just going to have to make do with text-only posts and recipes for the moment, and when I get a chance to re-create all these treats I'll be sure to update with photos as soon as I can-particularly of this scrumptious summer treat I whipped up well, more like blundered and guessed through a couple of weeks ago for two friends who were kind enough to be test subjects for some of my cooking one night for dinner.  Recipe and, of course, a story after the jump!

You say over-ripe, I say opportunity!

So.
     You've come to that classic realization that you, despite your best intentions, cannot eat your bananas as fast as they are growing over-ripe.  Perhaps you bought too many, or, like me, you simply have no idea how they went from being slightly green-tinted (the best way to eat a banana, in my opinion!) to brown and splotchy in a matter of three days.  How very rude of them.

     In either case, this leaves you with two options-chuck them to the garbage (and inevitably feed the neighborhood raccoons, how kind of you!) or, in the name of all things delicious and money-saving, you can swear to create magic from this mayhem!  
     I went with option number two, though admittedly I botched it a bit and wouldn't call it the highest form of magic, shall we say,  but putting that all behind us, here's an unbelievably simple recipe for Banana Nut Bread to use up all those sad banana corpses lying around your kitchen!