White Chocolate & Peanut Butter Pie (GF)

It's now the week of Thanksgiving and I have hardly had any time to plan what I'm making for my family's thing and Matt's family's thing because school has just been completely life-absorbing and every day feels like my soul is being sucked out - dementor style - by my professors. So, in need of something both easy-to-make and calorically substantial enough to warm my numb heart, I made a peanut butter pie! Seriously, the words bring a smile to my face. Peanut. Butter. Pie.

In my opinion (I'm always right), the beauty of peanut butter pie comes from the balance of flavors and texture. It needs to be sweet and salty - silky smooth and crunchy - fluffy and rich - mess any of those up and you've just ruined my whole god damned day. And it was already ruined from the aforementioned soul-eating professors. I feel like I ...

Probably BakingBeauNovember 23, 2014pie, gluten freeComment

Apple Fritter Doughnut Holes with Caramel Glaze

My favorite doughnut is without a doubt the apple fritter. I feel like I should capitalize its name to give it full due respect but that would be silly. The apple fritters I grew up eating were weirdly crispy, but also gooey on the inside and bursting with heinously artificial apple flavoring, which tasted like canned apple pie filling was just dumped into the batter. I loved them...

Probably BakingBeauNovember 20, 2014goodie Comments

Black Forest Bacon Brownies

Ok, I know, putting bacon on anything and everything possible is so 2012. But look, I don't care, these are awesome.

These brownies have the perfect balance of salty and sweet, as well as a gooey fudgey texture that really just makes them irresistible, like actually irresistible, like I ate seven of these. :/

Anyway, pitting the cherries is a real bitch but its worth it. Canned cherries just won't cut it. They really won't. Do what I did and set up your laptop in your kitchen with Scandal or How To Get Away With Murder (shout out to Shonda!! Love u!) and just start cutting these...

Probably BakingBeauNovember 3, 2014bar Comments

Candied Citrus Peels

I'm all about easy ways to make food look way more elegant and refined than it really is. I mean, come on, it's half the work for twice the praise. Candied citrus peels do just that. People are always like "oooo, aaaaah" and what not but it's hella fricken easy and equally delicious.

Also, if you ever make a cake and don't have the energy to do a perfect job of frosting it, just throw some of these on there and cover up any imperfections. I ate too many of these today. Whatever...

BeauOctober 28, 2014snack Comment

Dark Chocolate + Stout Bread Pudding

Bread + Chocolate + Beer

I feel like that could be the title to my memoir. "Bread + Chocolate + Beer: the Tragic Story of a Young Life Gone Terribly Awry." But for realsies, this bread pudding is bomb. It's super gooey, and when eaten warm it suddenly becomes the most satisfyingly comforting comfort foods of all time...

Probably BakingBeauOctober 28, 2014goodie Comment

Sweet Potato + Pomegranate Cupcakes

Do y'all remember when pomegranates became a thing? Like there was definitely a year, I'm gonna make a stab and say it was 2007, when pomegranates arrived. Suddenly, everyone was walking around drinking those weirdly curvy bottles of "Pom" and saying things like "it's a super food" and "have you heard of this thing called 'twitter'?" Anyway, its been a while since then but I'm glad these little guys got their spot light cause otherwise these cupcakes would probably have been made with cranberries and no offense to cranberries but they really aren't that hip...

Probably BakingBeauOctober 20, 2014cake, gluten free Comment

Rosemary Focaccia with Pine Nuts and Sun-dried Tomatoes

I used this batch of focaccia to make a pizza!

Probably BakingBeauOctober 10, 2014bread, snackComment

Satsuma Soak Cake

Y’all. Satsumas are in season and they are delicious and if you don’t know what they are read this and also I’m sorry for you. The 411 is that they’re basically a small, easy-to-peel, super sweet, unnervingly juicy and addictive orange. I feel like everyone in south Louisiana (besides me because whatever) has a memory of sitting under a grandmother or aunt’s satsuma tree in some picturesque southern backyard picking satsumas straight off the tree and laughing with their play friends as the juice dribbled down their chins and into their laps. Or something like that.

Anyway, the above scene isn’t nearly as cute when I do it as a grown adult male so I’m over it and instead went to a supermarket (Whole Foods, because the farmers market is on Saturday morning and sometimes I do things on Friday night and can’t make it OK get off my case) and bought a 5 lb box for like $6, which it turns out is the perfect amount to make a bundt cake that needs to literally soak in the blood of these beauties. If you aren’t able to locate...

Probably BakingBeauOctober 6, 2014cake Comments

Bourbon Spice Layer Cake (gluten-free)

Probably BakingBeauOctober 2, 2014cake, gluten free, fallrecipe Comment