Howdy, folks! I’m writing an extra post this month share some wonderful news!
Some of you may remember I changed my blog schedule this year to allow extra time to work on a “super secret project.” As of today, that project is secret no more. The time for the big reveal has come!!! Ready?
……*DRUMROLL*……
I have a confession to make: before this year, I’d never ready The Princess Bride. The years up til now were a distracted chorus of “I’ll get to it” and “It’s somewhere in my TBR.” I’ve seen the movie, so I guess I just didn’t feel a ton of urgency. It wasn’t until someone requested it as my blog’s next Book of the Month that I actually sat down to read it for the first time.
AND OH MY GOSH YOU GUYS IT IS THE GREATEST. Such a complete and utter joy. I can’t remember the last time I had so much pure fun while reading. It’s clever, heart-warming, and fiendishly funny. As soon as I finished it, I was more than ready to get in the kitchen, and I knew exactly what I was going to make: Miracle Max’s resurrection pills.
In the book, Miracle Max prepares a resurrection pill for the “sort of dead” Man in Black. Inigo is skeptical of its appearance, but Max’s wife Valerie assures him that it looks a lot better with a chocolate coating. This reminded me of chocolate truffles, but I knew I wouldn’t have time to make the filling from scratch. After all, I’ve got a 2-year-old, 6-month-old, and Mysterious Suuuper Seeecret Project (which I PROMISE I’ll announce soon–hopefully next week!) to worry about. To resolve the issue of time, I turned to my trusty Oreo truffle recipe. It’s quick, easy, and dependably delicious—just what the doctor ordered. Then I snuck in a Werther’s soft caramel center for the perfect surprise.
You don’t have to slave away for ages to make these addictive little morsels (but they’re so delicious that everyone will think you did). So whip up a batch—they’re even worth coming back from the dead for!
Happy 4th of July, folks!
I hope you’re all enjoying a relaxing day with family, friends, and good food. I definitely am! We’re off visiting my husband’s side of the family today, and we’ve got a weekend in Indiana planned with my family next week. In fact, a visit to my family in June gave me the idea for today’s post, which is dedicated to Felicity Merriman, the American Girl doll inspired by the American Revolution.
I first got my Felicity doll when I was just a little girl (six? maybe seven years old?). We did EVERYTHING together, so much so that I’m actually surprised she survived my childhood in one piece. But survive she did, and my mom kept her safe in storage for years until I had a house with room to store her. Last month, I finally got to take her home! As I went through her box of accessories, it got me reminiscing about all the good times we had. The funny thing is, I had been stressing about what book to feature on the blog in July, but when I realized that my scheduled posting day fell on Independence Day…well, a Felicity recipe was just too perfect to pass up!
For today’s recipe, we’re recreating teatime at Miss Manderly’s house from the book Felicity Learns a Lesson. In the story, Felicity must learn to balance her patriot sympathies with her new friendship to a loyalist named Elizabeth. At teatime, Felicity has to choose between drinking tea (which her family is boycotting) or refusing and thereby endangering her friendship with Elizabeth. Her quick solution is awfully clever, and I want to commemorate it today by recreating Miss Manderly’s tea table: an inviting spread of queen cakes, hard biscuits, and black tea.
I used an almond variation on my own sugar cookie recipe for the hard biscuits, but it was trickier to find a queen cake recipe. I wanted an authentic colonial recipe, but it also had to have instructions that would make sense in a modern kitchen. In my search, I stumbled across the blog The English Kitchen, which sounded promising. The recipe there was perfect: quick, easy, remarkably tasting…and not much altered from the colonial version! The only change I made was adding nutmeg, since some variations on queen cakes call for mace (which comes from the same plant), and bits of brown spice are clearly visible in the queen cake illustration in Felicity Learns a Lesson.
Then came time for the finishing touch: a custom tea blend! It’s been a long time since I’ve created one of my custom Adagio teas, so it was fun to stretch my tea-making muscles again. This red, white, and blue inspired blend is flavored with raspberries, blueberries, and almonds to make a rich tea with a distinct hit of juicy berries. I love it with a little sugar and milk.
So fire up some fireworks and put on the kettle. It’s time for a Patriot Tea Party! 😀
NOTE: This post is not sponsored by or affiliated with Mattel, Pleasant Company, or the American Girl brand.
This recipe wasn’t exactly reader-requested, mostly because the reader in question is still learning to talk: it’s the Little Mister! He loves the library. If he had his way, every book we checked out would probably be about trucks (little dude is OBSESSED). Still, I like to encourage him to widen his horizons, so at each visit one of the books we check out is always one I pick pout. This time, that book was “The Little Mouse, the Red Ripe Strawberry, and the Big Hungry Bear” by Don and Audrey Wood. It was a favorite of my childhood, and I hoped he might like it too.
Friends, he DEVOURED it. We read it 6 times that first day alone, and it’s been a daily request ever since then. I’m pretty sure we’re gonna have to buy our own copy. In the mean time, I thought it would be super fun to make a strawberry recipe the Little Mister and I could munch on while reading the book, so I jotted down a bunch of ideas.
Do you ever have an idea that excites you and you just can’t shake it? That’s how I felt when I wrote strawberry muffins on the list. I try to keep his snacks pretty healthy, and I liked the challenge of developing a sugar-free, low-fat muffin that didn’t compromise on flavor. Using the coffee muffins from my cookbook as a rough starting point, I set to work cutting the unhealthy components. I nixed the sugar, of course, and also cut half the butter, subbing in applesauce instead. I supplemented the strawberries’ natural sweetness with honey and added a mashed banana in lieu of an extra egg. In the end, we had a fluffy, naturally sweetened muffin that the Little Mister can’t get enough of. His daily battle cry has become “Mo cake!”. I’m more than happy to let him have some, and with these muffins’ healthy goodness, there’s plenty of room for a generous schmear of cinnamon honey butter! 😉
In The Chronicles of Prydain by Lloyd Alexander, Gurgi receives a magical wallet as a reward for his faithfulness to his companions. The little leather coin purse may look unassuming, but it provides its owner with unlimited food for as long as there is enchantment in the land of Prydain! Pretty darn awesome. I’ve had several readers request a recipe from the Prydain books, so I decided to make cookies inspired by Gurgi’s wallet. After all, a coin purse with the power of unlimited snacks is SO my thing. 😉
Let’s talk inspiration. Have you ever seen on Pinterest or Instagram those cookies with the hidden pocket inside filled with candy, sprinkles, sugary cereal, etc.? I’ve heard them called surprise cookies, pocket cookies, and confetti cookies, but whatever you call them, I think they look SO COOL. Since wallets are for holding things, now seemed like a great time to make my own surprise cookie recipe. So I got to work!
I used a chocolate version of the sugar cookie recipe from my cookbook, A Literary Tea Party. Chocolate cookies made the most sense, since a leather bag would be brown. But I also wanted detailed decorations inspired by medieval leather tooling, so I broke out my favorite royal icing recipe (developed by Julie M. Usher), which would allow me to make more delicate shapes than buttercream would. As for the filling, I went with Reese’s Pieces to get that unbeatable chocolate peanut butter combo.
I was more than pleased with the results. The wallets looked so darling with their tidy little icing swirls and yellow Reese’s piece clasps. I can’t tell you how fun it was to give them a little shake and hear the candy rattling around inside. Now hurry up and go make your own! 😀
P.S. If it’s your first time using royal icing, I recommend Julia Usher’s how-to Youtube video. She has a lot of good tips to make it easier.
P.P.S. I’m taking reader requests for blog recipes, so email me here if there’s a classic book you’d like to see featured on the blog!
Hi, guys! I’m finally back from my hiatus! I loved having a few months off to take care of the new baby, but I’m definitely ready to get cooking again. Full steam ahead! ^.^
Some of you may remember that I’m trying out a new format this year. I love doing full menus of recipes, but I don’t think I’ll be able to invest that much time in the blog this year. This is because, in addition to the new baby, I’ve got a Super Secret Writing Project in the works! 🙂 I can’t give more details quite yet, so all I can say is that it’s gonna take up quite a bit of free time. Rather than shut down the blog for a year, I decided to reduce my schedule to 1 post per month and take reader requests for recipes (you can send me your request here). Today is our first installment!
Today’s recipe is inspired by Gulliver’s Travels…although, if I’m being honest, it’s more like 3 recipes. I guess after being away so long, I was a little overeager to get back in the kitchen. 😉 But I promise there’s a practical reason for tripling up on recipes today: this post is a tribute to the Lilliputians, the tiny civilization Gulliver meets during the early part of his journey. He’s a giant in their world, so a few bite-size dainties to him are a whole feast to them!
This 3-course feast starts with Caprese salad bites made from hollowed out cherry tomatoes, bits of fresh mozzarella, snips of fresh basil, and a touch of honey vinaigrette dressing (the dressing recipe is a variation of one from Iowa Girl Eats). Next comes a mini beef wellington recipe I found on the Food Network. Finally, we have 3-tier mini cakes with vanilla pound cake, chocolate buttercream, and fresh berries.
Whether you’re a minute Lilliputian or a giant from a far off land, you’re sure to find these dishes satisfying.
Howdy, folks! I’m utterly delighted to introduce our household’s newest member: the Little Miss! We welcomed her to the world at 7:58 am on 1/3/19. She measured 21 inches and 7 lbs 11 oz, and we’re already smitten with her. Those of you who follow me on social media have probably seen me post about her a lot over the past month, but now I’m finally ready to sit down and share her birth story here on the blog!
Our last Charlie and the Chocolate Factory post! This is also the one I’ve been most nervous about. I’ve never made a chocolate bar before (much less one that has a filling). I had no idea how many times I’d need to make this recipe before I found something that worked. Still, I knew this wouldn’t be a true Willy Wonka menu without a chocolate bar, and Wonka’s Whipple-Scrumptious Fudgemallow Delight was the obvious choice, since it’s the chocolate bar Charlie eats when he finds his golden ticket.
Roald Dahl doesn’t give a clear description of the Whipple-Scrumptious in the story, so I had to use the name for clues. The word “fudgemallow” gave clear indicators of both marshmallow and a rich, indulgent chocolate, so I decided to do a dark chocolate bar filled with marshmallow fluff. After that though, I got a little stuck. “Whipple-scrumptious” could mean just about anything. I tossed around lots of ideas—rice crispies, flavored caramel, Cinnamon Toast Crunch, etc. But none of those seemed right for a Wonka bar. I wanted something with crunch to offset the softness of the marshmallow. I also wanted something whimsical and unexpected.
Then I remembered honeycomb candy. I’ve made it before as a Christmas present for family, and it’s pretty easy. It offers a delicate crunch without being too tough, and it would certainly be a pleasant surprise to anyone taking a bite. So I whipped up a quick batch and set to work!
Luckily, making candy bars turned out to be a lot easier than I thought. Everything worked perfectly on the first try! A pretty good end for 2018, I’d say. 🙂
Merry Almost Christmas, everybody! Today I’m putting the finishing touches on gifts and getting ready to hunker down for the last remaining weeks before we bring the Little Miss into the world. In the meantime, I’ve got some exciting life updates to share with you guys:
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As many of you may remember, my cookbook A Literary Tea Party was nominated in the 2018 Goodreads Choice Awards. The winners were announced at the beginning of the month, and I’m thrilled to say I placed 4th in my category! 😀 There was some tough competition—including cookbooks from Ina Garten, Bobby Flay, and Giada De Laurentiis—so getting 4th place was really exciting for me. I flailed about it on social media quite a bit, but this is the first chance I’ve had to announce it on the blog. Thank you SO much to everyone who voted! 🙂
Pssst! If you’re looking for a last minute Christmas gift, you can still get my book before Christmas if you order through Amazon!
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In my pregnancy announcement post, I mentioned plans to approach next year in 3 phases: hiatus, 2 posts per month, then back to full schedule by the end of the year. I recently had a big blog-related project come up that I need to start working on ASAP, so the plan has changed some. I can’t give full details about the project yet since it’s not officially official, but I should be able to shower you all with the awesome news by early spring. 🙂
As for 2019 blog plans, I’ll still be on postpartum hiatus for January-March. I scheduled some past posts to republish on Thursdays so it won’t be a total dead zone around here, but I don’t know how often I’ll reply to comments and such. After March, my plan is to do 1 post per month for the rest of the year. With 2 kids under 3 years at home, I’m gonna need the extra time for Operation Super Secret Project! 😉
There’s a silver lining, though: you guys get to pick what I make for the monthly posts! If there’s a food you’ve always wanted to see featured on the blog, shoot me an email through the Chat with the Chef page! It can be a specific literary recipe (like, say, the Queen’s tarts from Alice in Wonderland), or if you want to see a certain book featured but don’t care which food I pick, you can tell me about that too.
And you can start sending your requests now! I want to build up as many ideas as possible before March so I have the option to work ahead (and time to read the book, if it’s one I haven’t read). So if you’ve already got something in mind, send it my way! 😀
I LOVE chocolate caramels. I don’t mean caramels with chocolate on top (though those are good too). I’m talking about caramels that have had chocolate mixed into caramel itself as it heats, so you wind up with this dark brown, lusciously chocolaty confection. It’s a weakness of mine, so when I started brainstorming ideas for a Veruca Salt recipe for my Charlie and the Chocolate Factory menu, salted chocolate caramels stuck firmly in my brain.
However, my experience with making chewy caramels is limited…and by “limited,” I mean I’ve never actually done it. I accidentally made soft caramel while making honeycomb candy for the first time several years ago, but I don’t think even that counts, since I’ve never been able to replicate the result.
Rather than try to invent something on the fly, I found a recipe from Taste of Home that looked both simple and reliable. The only change I made was adding a little kosher salt to the top, and OH YOU GUYS IT WAS AMAZING. So chewy, rich, dark, and not-too-sweet. The salt turned out to be the perfect addition, adding just the right level of complexity.
I will DEFINITELY make these again. Soon. Maybe tomorrow. Do I have baking chocolate…I do! I could make these now!
Now is good.
NOTE: This recipe needs to set for at least 5 hours.