Baking Splurge

When I went to the doctor and realized I'd gained 5 pounds I decided I should probably cut back on the sugar for awhile. I did relatively well for a few weeks, but then a strong desire to bake hit me and I had to indulge it.

So first indulgence:

I knew I wanted to make cookies. I bought chocolate chips at the grocery store because I needed to make cookies. Cookies are delicious. I knew I wanted to use oatmeal, nuts, and chocolate chips. So with a simple search on smitten kitchen I came up with this. Changes I made: I at least tripled the amount of cinnamon and doubled the amount of cloves and nutmeg. I am a firm believer that recipes never call for enough spices so I always increase the amount require. I used walnuts instead of pecans (because that's what I had). I think you could definitely decrease the sugar in this recipe a little bit. They were pretty sweet. I was doing this on my lunch break (once again) and completely forgot to take any pictures while baking. However, I promise you these are delicious. My fiance (calling him that makes me smile) said, "These are the most delicious cookies I've ever had!!" and proceeded to eat a dozen in one day.

Second indulgence::

I love the Farmer's Market and Madison just so happens to have an amazing one. The first few weeks of spring there was not a lot of fresh produce at the market, but something I saw over and over was rhubarb. So I decided I needed to experiment. I picked some up at the Tuesday night market (which is .1 miles from my apartment) and once again searched Smitten Kitchen for a recipe. There were a few options and I decided on this crumble. I made very few changes, only slightly increasing everything because I had closer to 3 cups of rhubarb. It was delicious, and disappeared VERY quickly.















~The Wisconsin Sister

P.S. The Florida Sister's carrot cupcakes were delicious. You should probably make some immediately.

carrot cupcakes.

Often times I like reasons to bake. I don't think I need a reason, but I feel better about baking something relatively unhealthy if there's a justifiable reason for eating it. Get it? So, when I learned that my sister would be coming home for a whirlwind trip I knew I needed to bake something. And it needed to be good. I'm a really, really big lover of Deb over at Smitten Kitchen. Like, really big. And when I saw these cupcakes I knew I needed to bake them. I cut the recipe in half because there's just no reason to have 24 cupcakes lying around taunting you.

12 is a much more manageable number.

Much more adult and grown up. And you know what else is grown up? Reducing the amount of sugar in the recipe, which is exactly what I did. Really, though. These taste totally fine by reducing the amount of sugar by 1/4 cup (in the actual cupcake, not the frosting).

And, you know what else? These are delicious without any frosting at all. And since they're made with canola oil we mine as well be calling them health food, right? Right.

However, if you are going to frost these cupcakes (and I highly recommend you do. Just set a few naked ones aside for breakfast.) I suggest adding more maple syrup if you really want to taste it. If you just want a little hint, then follow this recipe to a tee. But, if you're like me, and you were looking for a little more maple syrup kick, I'd go ahead and add a few more glugs.

Enjoy these fresh out of the oven or the day after, or the day after that, or even the day after that. Really. These taste delicious days after being made.

almond biscotti with a hint of orange.

There is nothing particularly intriguing about biscotti in my opinion. Generally, I think of it as having the consistency of a stale cookie and tasting like almond extract, a flavor I don't really enjoy. So, when I saw that Emily had made a batch of Deb's biscotti and she liked them, I figured I should try this recipe out asap. And I'm so glad I did. They were so delicious — buttery and crunchy, but the kind of crunch you imagine biscotti to have. I highly recommend making these. They aren't very hard to make and the results are so worth it. Oh, and I made these using freshly squeezed orange juice instead of the recommended liqueur. Still delicious.