Cranberry Pecan Bread

Aside from turkey, on any given holiday table, my least favorite thing is very often the cranberry sauce. Perhaps I had one too many cloying canned versions as a kid, or the ones I had were simply too tart; for whatever reason, I usually pass the cranberry bowl to the next person swiftly. But then […]

Sicilian Cuccidati (Christmas Fruit & Nut Cookies)

As you might remember if you’ve been following this blog for a while, I have a deep affinity for Italy, and while it took me a while to come around to Italian desserts, they’ve really grown on me over the years. These are my favorite Italian holiday cookies, called Cuccidati (coo-chee-DAH-tee), as requested a few […]

Vanilla-Apple Cider Bundt Cake

Every October I’m torn between two existences: my desire to embrace the cooling season, the harvest foods, the upcoming Halloween witchiness, and the slowing down and coziness of the end of the year… But my work life is the complete opposite and pulls me in the other direction by necessity. As a school counselor, it […]

Basilicata: Crostata al Caprino (Italian Goat Cheese Tart)

If you’ve read this blog in the past, you may have a vague recollection that I was writing a series about Italian desserts at one point. As I’ve been less active in the past few years, I sort of trailed off, but it’s always been something I wanted to return to. The premise was that […]

Apple Cake with Sage Caramel

I…. wrote something? I did! I cannot believe how many months have utterly disappeared into the Covid abyss since my last blog post very early in 2021. I thought I would write so much during those quieter months at home when I had more time to bake, but somehow in the chaos of everything going […]

Spiced Persimmon Ginger Cake

Apparently I have suddenly become a persimmon person. This was not a thing that I expected, now or frankly ever. I had precisely zero encounters with persimmons until about a month ago, which I was perfectly okay with. They have never looked appetizing to me, and I’m sorry, what-now? I have to wait until they’re […]

Green Tea Rhubarb Pudding Cake

I think it’s safe to say that St. Patrick’s Day 2020 will go down in history as the saddest/strangest/quietest St. Patrick’s Day in modern times. No parades, no drunken bar crawls, and a sickly feeling that celebration is slightly inappropriate. I had a dinner party with friends planned, ingredients for creative desserts, and my general […]

Baked Sunday Mornings: Lemon-Almond Meringue Tarts

Finally– the cover shot. We are so close to the end of baking through BAKED: New Frontiers in Baking, and therefore the end of Baked Sunday Mornings. (So many tears!!) And finally we are making the iconic cover recipe: Lemon-Almond Meringue Tarts! I’ve never made this recipe, as I have a profound disdain for any almond […]

Baked Sunday Mornings: Lemon Lime Bars

Sometimes the simplest recipes feel like a triumph. Lemon curd is one of those basic baking things that I just do not have a good handle on; like, sometimes it comes out fine, and other times it more closely resembles lemon soup. So I always hold my breath when making fruit curd, because I just never […]

Baked Sunday Mornings: Lemon Drop Cake

The top of my cake hierarchy reads something like this: chocolate, vanilla (with or without rainbow sprinkles), red velvet, pistachio, coconut– with minor changes in the order depending on mood. Nowhere in this group of cakes is lemon. I’m generally fairly indifferent to lemon desserts; it’s rare that I would choose one over, say, a […]