theyeasticando

[theyeasticando]

Sachertorte, 12.29.2024

Our best friends were two of the people who tried and failed to see Taylor Swift in Vienna over the summer, and the resulting mishaps soured them on their Austria trip. So when we planned to spend New Year’s Eve together, I promised I’d make a sachertorte that would (hopefully) not be as dry and disappointing as their first.

A bold promise, baking a brand new recipe with limited ingredient access at altitude, but I think I pulled it off. Loved the glaze technique for a gelatin-free mirror effect too, just would do it over a cooling rack next time to avoid the weird skirt.

Via the Sacher Hotel: https://www.sacher.com/en/original-sacher-torte/recipe/

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I’m still here, 2024

My last actual update on Tumblr was for Ozz’s birthday in 2022. About two months later, my dad died, and I’ve spent a lot of the intervening time grieving, sorting out his estate with my brother, and working to improve my mental health. While baking has always been a go-to stress-reliever for me, a tactile hobby that can take my brain off of things, finding the time and energy has been somewhat challenging.

I haven’t stopped baking. Not by any means. I’ve just returned to many old standards and comfort bakes, and I’ve found it easier to remember to post on Instagram (same handle), where I’m a more regular user. At some point, the idea of having to sift through phones and hand drives to dig up photos for this archive became overwhelming, and then the (self-inflicted) shame of not having posted in 2+ years became its own hurdle.

So this post is here as a permission slip of sorts. It’s me acknowledging that I’ve made it through some difficult times, that I do not owe it to anyone to make this silly side project a complete archive of every bake ever to come out of my kitchen. It’s a new leaf, a clean slate, a pick-your-metaphor for the start of the next chapter. Things may look different moving forward, or move at a different pace, but that’s perfectly ok.

It’s just where I am.

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Three-tier chocolate chip cookie cake with ube buttercream, 08.07.2022

We’re slowly whittling down the brainstormed list of birthday cake ideas for Ozz’s birthdays, and this year was cookie cake’s time to shine. He briefly launched through a rabbit hole about ube white chocolate chip cookies for the base, but reconsidered for the ol’ Great American Cookie Co. standard, chocolate chip.

I wanted to keep a little of that ambition in the final cake though, so I contacted the expert about ube buttercream ideas, visited two Asian grocery stories looking for ube extract, bought a few options of powder and jam instead, and experimented a little with my base buttercream recipe for this fun result. 

Notably, the cookie recipe uses shortening instead of butter for a lighter cookie, giving the structure a little more of a chance of holding up against its own weight. All plates were licked clean.

Adapted from Sweet Girl Treats 

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Brownie ice cream sandwiches, 08.06.2022

I did a recent photo backup of my phone, and that means all my pictures from the last several months are now in disorganized chaos somewhere in Photos on an external drive. I’m sure I made some good stuff in that time, notably the zucchini butter pasta from Smitten Kitchen, but as data management is my Achilles heel, you’ll likely never see those here.

Instead, you can have two thirds of the baking extravaganza that took place this past weekend (the first third being everything bagel burger buns, which I’ve made before). 

First up was these homemade ice cream sandwiches, featuring brownies from Grandbaby Cakes (which did some weird things in the oven that I blame partially on my parchment paper but still turned out tasting great and didn’t get too hard in the freezer) and buttermilk ice cream from Smitten Kitchen (which put a decent chunk in the flat of eggs we picked up from the farmers’ market).

Sliced the 8x8 pan into eight little rectangles and wrapped them individually in wax paper for maximum nostalgia.

Via Smitten Kitchen and Grandbaby Cakes

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Asparagus, goat cheese, and lemon pasta, 05.10.22

Deb (of Smitten Kitchen fame) sends out a Monday newsletter with some of her picks for the week, and this precise pasta recipe made it into two of them within the last month—one that focused on weeknight pasta options, and one highlighting asparagus and rhubarb season. So I took that as a cue I should probably try this one soon...

Made its debut for Wife Cooks Wednesday this week, and both Ozz and I went back for seconds. He also reports it made a tasty lunch today as well. Safe to say this will be a repeat offender!

Via Smitten Kitchen

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Sausage rolls, 05.07.22

This year’s Graham Birthday Bake! Another savory British favorite, this time expedited considerably by the use of store-bought puff pastry. Because, as the contestants on GBBO always say, “who makes puff pastry by hand?!”

These turned out great, reheated beautifully, and were consumed as lunch, breakfast, midday snack, and roadtrip sustenance. We added a bit of thyme and sage to round out the flavors, and I wouldn’t change a thing.

Via the Spruce Eats

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Funfetti cinnamon rolls, 04.21.22

Ozz has been asking for these for a little while, and I finally threw a batch together, successfully using up five almost-gone sprinkles varieties in the process. You love to see it.

I love that this recipe has sprinkles somewhat laminated into the dough in addition to in the filling roll and on top. Downside is that the recipe page is 900 miles long, so screengrab what you need and get out.

Via Chelsweets

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Pork and onion empanadas, 03.23.22

I promise I baked things between August and March, but I have a hate-hate relationship with data storage, so those photos are somewhere on another hard drive and not on either my laptop or my phone anymore, so... I decided my choices are either chaos or an incomplete archive, because clearly having organized photo folders I can access in a reasonably manner is not an option.

Recipe via an old Make It Sweet class

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Piña colada cake, 08.29.21

The long-awaited part II of the birthday switcheroo. It’s been eight months, so uh, the details are hazy here.

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Lemon macarons, 08.07.2021

Maah got to visit for “her birthday” (it’s complicated), and she asked for something lemony as a birthday treat. She loves my macarons, so this seemed like a no-brainer. Next time, I’ll leave out the lemon extract in the shells; it doesn’t add much other than a slight artificial taste that you really don’t need when you make lemon curd from scratch for the filling.

Shells via the archives, curd via Taste of Home

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Quiche with Maah, 08.06.2021

I’ve been having a devil of a time with crust shrinkage during parbaking, so I mixed it up and tried a new recipe this time. It takes substantially more time (especially when you don’t read all the fine print before starting), but turned out great. Filling by Maah: 2 yolks, 2 eggs, 1.5c milk or cream, plus eyeballed fillings: Parmesan, spinach, and ham, in this case.

Via Serious Eats (read both links first)

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Michigan bakes, 07.2021

I got the chance to make some treats during our Michigan getaway this year: another batch of no-churn ice cream (quad berry, courtesy of the cake leftovers, and raspberry from Leigh’s hand pies), dog treats (peanut butter bones and some granola bars), and a dios torte for Dave’s birthday.

Ice cream via Grandbaby Cakes Dog treats via The Healthy Hound Cookbook Dios torte via the New England Journal of Hungarian Desserts

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Quad-berry bundt, 06.20.2021

An annual favorite, this time in the fancy pan.

Adapted from Smitten Kitchen

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Kolaches, 06.13.21

You can take the girl out of Texas, but you can’t take Texas out of the girl. This round featuring cream cheese, cherry jam, apple butter, and peach jam.

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Blondies, 05.23.21

Our vaccinated neighbors got together for a little potluck dinner one evening, and I couldn’t resist an excuse to make a batch of these.

Via Smitten Kitchen

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Leek, pancetta, and potato pasties, 05.08.2021

We got to spend Laura and Graham’s birthday weekend with them at a lake in NC, and my offer to each was whatever baked good they wanted. I forgot to photograph Laura’s brownies (my cocoa go-to), but Graham’s request was Cornish pasties for dinner one night. The dough was a ton of work throughout the day, but the end result was delicious and exceptionally filling.

Looking forward to getting to try the real ones with these friends some day.

Via The Great British Bake Off

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Breakfast royal icing class, 05.04.21

I’ve done a little royal icing before, on some cookie commissions around Christmastime, but I always kind of hated it and suspected I was doing something wrong. So when I found a maker on Instagram with royal icing classes, I signed up and hoped she’d help me crack the code.

It turns out you have to prep all the icings and cookies in advance (which makes sense, since that took me about six hours on Sunday, and the class was two hours after work on Tuesday). But she includes a handy workbook with some instructions and guidance for how to do things, and the two-hour demo was recorded so I can revisit and try this again sometime.

My icing wound up being too runny, in part due to humidity and in part due to having made it too far in advance, but it was still a better texture and flavor than what I’d used previously, and the designs were a fun and creative way to approach wet-on-wet flooding. Still need to work a little on my icing colors and textures, but the leftovers are now in the freezer for me to try again with once I work up the courage... and patience.

tl;dr Next time you see a bakery charging six bucks for one of these cookies, you will PAY it and you will LIKE it.

Via How to Cake It