TWD: Molasses Spice Cookies

When I was about nine years old I remember helping my mom clean the kitchen after dinner. I was clearing the table while she swept the floor. At this point, my brother was seven and my sister was three so you can imagine what kind of a mess ended up under the table. Once she had swept the debris into a little neat pile my mom gathered it up into the dustpan and said to me, "you know there are people in the world who will never even see the crumbs that fell off the table during a meal and there are many others who have to eat these crumbs". I don't know why that stuck with me the way it did but I have never forgotten what she said and I almost always think about it when I sweep my own kitchen. It helps me to pause and put things in perspective. Yes, we have to plan carefully so that we can pay all of our bills every month and it will be quite some time before we can purchase a second car but we always have plenty of food and even if for some reason we could not purchase food we have wonderful family who would never ever hesitate to help us in any way we asked. With Thanksgiving around the corner I can't help but be overwhelmingly thankful for how lucky I am for all of the blessings in my life.


I love Thanksgiving because it really does allow for us to remember everything we are thankful for and to celebrate it with all the people we love. Breaking bread is one of the most universal and yet special things a group of people can do together. The Thanksgiving meal is especially wonderful because so much time and love goes into preparing it. This week's Tuesdays With Dorie recipe was selected by Pamela of Cookies with Boys and it would be a fabulous addition to the dessert table for Thanksgiving Day! I don't know if I can easily explain how much I love these spicy, crunchy on the edges and chewy in the middle cookies. Well yes I can: I made a batch of these about a month ago and we ate every last one before I took one solitary picture. I made a half batch again last night so that I could snap a few shots and they have already disappeared again! They are so wonderful and so easy to make. Oh and they are really very pretty too thanks to the sparkly sugar crust. Make these, enjoy them, and be thankful!

TWD: Chocolate Caramel Chestnut Cake

My mom always said that the difference between guilt and shame is that guilt is an important tool in effecting positive change while shame halts positive growth. She has a PhD in psychology so we got to hear a ton of smart little tidbits like this as we grew up. I'll be honest with you, I didn't really understand or believe the guilt/shame thing until pretty recently. You see I'm one of those people who feels guilty about pretty much everything- I have to conciously force myself to not feel guilty all the time. It actually used to be much worse when I was little. I think I owe most of my early guilt to Catholic grammar school (thank God, yes really God, that my parents pulled me out in fourth grade and switched me into a far more relaxed and forgiving learning environment). When I was little I used to sit around wondering if I may have had an unkind thought about someone without really realizing it and if I'd better do some penance just in case. Yeah, that kind of guilt. Then when I got older I started feeling guilt about things like not being the smartest, the thinest, the most outgoing, etc. It wasn't a "I want to be the best" thing, seriously, it wasn't and it still isn't, it is seriously a guilt bordering on shame thing.

Anyway, I grew up and out of a lot of these feelings. So I never really saw how guilt could be a good thing- all it had ever done for me was hinder my ability to accept myself. But the other day a parenting moment changed all of that. I'll set the scene for you: I'm doing dishes in the kitchen with Eloise sitting patiently in her bouncy seat, Derrick is grading papers in the living room, and Helen is running back and forth evidentily trying to get either one of our attentions. Somehow Helen decided that the only way I would stop cleaning the kitchen and play with her was if she hit Eloise in the face with The Cat in the Hat. Poor Eloise was inconsolable- screaming at the top of her lungs and unable to catch her breath. In reality, she wasn't hurt badly, but she's only ever been coddled and Helen's violence took her by surprise. At that moment, all I wanted was for Helen to feel guilt- I wanted her to see what she had done and to never, ever do it again. She actually did feel bad- she looked frightened and sorry and asked me to give Eloise some medicine. Guilt. Who'd of thought?

Ok so now cake- an earlier version of myself would have felt horribly guilty, perhaps even ashamed about the way that I mauled the extremely simple chocolate glaze that covers this lucious cake. But guess what? I don't feel guilty at all because the rest of the cake came out perfectly! The ganache sandwiched between the two layers and coating the outside of the cake is made from hot caramel poured over semi sweet chocolate...ummm how have I never thought of doing this before? Divine. The cake has sweetened chestnut puree in the batter. This was my first experience with chestnuts (besides hearing Johnny Mathis sing about them roasting on an open fire). Let me just say this- I thought the chestnut flavor was perfect in this cake, but I tried incorperating the leftover, unsweetened puree into a pumpkin soup and it was a perfect disaster. I actually did feel guilty about the soup because boy did I waste a bunch of pumpkin and cream in creating that pot o garbage. Anyway, I skipped the syrup and the chopped chestnuts (too expensive) that Dorie called for and I don't think the cake suffered from it at all. This is a wonderful cake with thoughtful, complex flavors that would be perfect for any holiday party. The cake calls for over a pound of butter and two cups of cream so if you are proned to feeling guilty about rich desserts, you might want to skip this one...

This week's Tuesdays With Dorie recipe was chosen by Katya of Second Dinner recipe can be found on her blog and in Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan.

TWD: Cran-Apple Crisp

We were supposed to be hit by a hurricane or tropical storm last night, luckily, the storm changed its course and largely dissipated before it hit shore. The unusual thing about Hurricane Ida is that it came at the bitter, bitter end of hurricane season. Growing up in New Orleans, we learned to always hope for the best and to prepare for the worst when a storm heads our way and in lieu of recent storms (ahem Katrina) the city has been especially cautious when anything begins to brew in the Gulf. Because of all of this, Derrick's school closed yesterday just in case the winds got bad enough for driving to be dangerous. Of course, the teachers still had to go in to "prepare" their classrooms so I decided to pack the babies up and go into school with him. It was really fun for the four of us to spend a Monday together even if we were just unplugging computers and moving filing cabinets away from windows. It's so funny how starved I've become for even the most boring outings!

Because I stay home with the girls, our family of four lives off of Derrick's teacher salary (practically nothing...haha); thus, we share one car. When Derrick leaves at 7:15am we say goodbye to all forms of transportation other than the double stroller until between 5:30-8:00pm depending on the day. We take LOTS and LOTS of walks. Seriously though, the three of us are always ready to get out of the house even for the most mundane of activities.

Besides walks to the park and reading books, one of Helen's new favorite things to do during our days at home is help Mommy bake. Baking, for Helen, means one of two things A) sitting on the counter to watch while I mix, measure, and stir or B) gathering up as many cooking utensils as I will allow her to borrow and "baking" pretend cakes on the kitchen floor. The other day, as I peeled and chopped apples for this week's scrumptious Tuesdays With Dorie recipe, Cran-Apple Crisp, Helen was busily stirring her "cake" on the floor when I looked down and discovered that she had gathered up a bunch of pieces of apple peel that had fallen from my cutting board and had mixed them with a stray button, a penny, and a guitar pick in her bowl. To Helen, this is baking, this is what it looks like I'm doing when I bake- pulling out random bags of powders, mashing up sticks of goo, throwing in berries!


This week's recipe was chosen by Pam of Cookies with Boys - it is a mix of apples, fresh cranberries and a bit of sugar topped with a crumb mixture composed of butter, flour, oats, coconut, cinnamon, brown sugar, and ginger. The mix of tart and sweet is just magical! This is such a fantastic Fall dessert- I couldn't recommend it more! Not only is the crisp delicious, it is extraordinarily simple to make, especially if you have a little baking apprentice on the premises.

TWD: All in One Holiday Bundt

I'm very thankful for many things this Thanksgiving season: good health, a new addition to our family, a comfortable place to live, a loving family, and the fact that this month Tuesdays with Dorie is allowing it's members to post November recipes in any order they wish (as long as the post is on a Tuesday)!! I went to Sam's Club on Friday and stocked up on Fall baking supplies. I got a giant bag of crisp, sweet Gala apples, four pounds of butter, a sack of fresh cranberries, and a three pack of pumpkin puree. In retrospect I might have gone a bit overboard...but isn't that what Sam's is all about? So I just had to make this cake which was chosen by Britin of The Nitty Britty (recipe will appear on her blog later this month and can of course be found in Baking From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan). The All in One Holiday Bundt is just that: pumpkin, Fall spices, diced apple, fresh cranberries, and pecans all rolled into a super-moist, flavorful cake.



I will probably make this cake again later this week- it was just that good...and I have plenty of ingredients on hand.