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Saturday, December 10, 2016

Candy Cane Cake

 Happy Holidays Everyone! I've been crazy busy with my new job and haven't had a lot of time to blog recently. With the holiday season upon us, I knew that I had to do some baking and bring you a few seasonal recipes.

Luckily, my department at my new job holds a holiday party each year! My department is so multi-national and multi-cultural, our holiday pot luck was a diverse array of curries, perogies and fried chicken. The entire office floor smelled amazing all day long! I decided to bring in a dessert that looked really fancy, but took no time at all to create.


The striped peppermint frosting hides three layers of rich chocolate cake and chocolate frosting. I went with a homemade chocolate cake recipe, but you can definitely save time and use a box mix. Just be prepared to use a lot of butter when you decorate this cake! There is a lot of buttercream on this bad boy. If you have the right tools, you can get this look in less than ten minutes. Just have a piping bag, turntable and bench scraper on hand and you can have a stripey cake too!


Sorry there is no inside view of this cake. I didn't want to cut it before I took it to the office because I wanted it to look pristine for the party. I also wanted to see how long it would take for someone to cut into it! 

Unfortunately I set the baking bar pretty high with my new coworkers. They are going to be expecting some pretty impressive treats in the future...


One Year Ago: Cherry Cordial Mallomars
Two Years Ago: Candy Cane Mallomars
Three Years Ago: Christmas Fudge
Four Years Ago: Acorn & Sausage Bake
Five Years Ago: Peppermint Mallomars
Six Years Ago: Banana Whoopie Pies


Saturday, November 5, 2016

Oreo Brownies

Are you ready for more recipes? I've been crazy busy over the past two months and haven't had a moment to make my own dinner, never mind making fun treats for WITK. What has I been doing? First, the boyfriend and I trained for and ran a half marathon! Second, I started a new job! 

The new job is along the same lines of what I was doing at my last company, but with much less international travel. I'll miss the monthly opportunities that I had to visit the far reaches of the planet, but I look forward to the new challenges associated with my new job!

One of the important things about my new job is that my office is so much larger. My previous company was only seven people in an office. Pretty small when you want to bake a cake and feed the leftovers to your coworkers. These days I have so many happy coworkers to feed, I can't wait to ply them with sugary sweets. How else do you make new friends at work?


I made these brownies a few months ago and fed them to myself. Luckily the recipe makes a smallish batch of brownie cookies and they store pretty well.  You can make a batch of these on Sunday and enjoy them all week long! 

With my new coworkers to feed, watch out for new recipes here in the kitchen! I'm ready for the holiday season and can't wait to get back to blogging.

One Year Ago: Brownie Donuts with peanut butter glaze
Two Years Ago: Loaded Potato Soup
Three Years Ago: Apple-Cranberry Crumble
Four Years Ago: Pumpkin cookies with Chocolate chunks & How to roast a sugar pumpkin
Five Years Ago: Honey-Roasted Peanut Butter Cookies
Six Years Ago: French Toast Cupcakes


Thursday, September 29, 2016

J@H - Homemade Cherry Cola

Sorry to have been so sporadic posting here recently, I have been crazy busy with lots of things happening in my non-internet life. Many changes have occurred over the past four weeks and I'm hoping they mean that I will have more time for cooking, blogging and life!

The big news? I quit my job,! Then I took off two and a half weeks before I started a new job! I'll miss the people at my old job, the international travel and the unique business model. What I won't miss? The 2 hour and 15 minute commute.  Each way.  

In addition to my new job, I also got myself a car! I haven't owned a car in almost six years. Since I lived in Connecticut, I got around on my own two feet or via public transportation. Trains, trams, buses, I've learned the tri-state area system pretty well over the past five years. Need to know how to get anywhere via NJ Transit? I can get you there. Now I just need to learn how to drive in New Jersey. Trust me, it's a whole different game from driving anywhere else!

With these changes, I've added so much more time to my life. I finally have the time to finish my Junk at Home Challenge! I decided to get going on it right away and try my hand at cherry cola.  


I've made a few recipes from the Homemade Soda cookbook by Andrew Schloss, but I've always shied away from making this recipe. It requires a lot of ingredients. Most of the ingredients are pretty common, but I had quite the grocery list and had to visit a specialty grocer to pick up dried bitter orange peel.


The recipe itself comes together very quickly. Once the cherry cola concentrate is finished, you just have to let it cool and you can be enjoying floats in no time! This cherry cola definitely tastes like cherry cola, but it doesn't taste like something that you would buy in the store. The flavors are much more complex and pair really well with vanilla ice cream!

Let's see if I can finish my 2015 challenge by the end of 2016!

One Year Ago: Pumpkin Mallomars
Two Year Ago: Rigatoni with Pepperoni, Mozzarella and Arugula
Three Years Ago: Peanut Butter Banana Bread
Four Years Ago: Sun-dried Tomato Ravioli with Basil Cream Sauce
Five Years Ago: Pumpkin Pie Mallomars
Six Years Ago: Chocolate Crisps

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