Ladies and Gentlemen, start your ovens year 2008

I am just about to begin my Christmas baking. The following is a list of items to be made. I will be posting only new receipes, anything already posted should be in the correct category for easy reference.

Bargain Basement Barb’s Chocolate Chip Cookie
Peanut Butter Bars (new)
Lauren’s Spice Cookies (new)
Donkey Ears
Chocolate Mint Hershey Kiss Cookies
Peppermint Bark
Lemon [...]

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Sterling Inn, Niagara Falls, Ontario

JT surprised me with a short weekend to Ontario’s wine country. We stayed at Sterling Inn (which I would recommend). The only draw-back would be that it is a bit out of the way with no view of the falls (we’ve stayed at most of the major towers and have had spectacular views of the [...]

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Toronto’s First Snow Fall

Why do people lose their minds during the very first snowfall? My god, we only got 4cm and there were over 400 accidents on city roads!
The plus side is that it is very pretty and starts to put us in the right mood for the season! Put on a fire and pull out that Barolo [...]

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Contemporary Chicken Cordon Bleu, Mushroom Sauce & Cauliflower and White Bean Mash

We’re had my best friend Kim (from university) and her husband Michael for dinner last night, and planning a meal for them is always a challenge. Kim is allergic to gluten, potatoes, and soy; Michael doesn’t eat anything with nuts or onions or anything that is very different! The dinner was a huge success and [...]

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Sweet Onion Confit

This is an adaptation from a recipe from Easy Entertaining with Michael Chiarello on Food Network US. It’s caramelized onions that are so delicious and sweet, I make huge batches and freeze portions! It is a great staple for dips, pizza bases etc.

Sweet Onion Confit

Ingredients:

6 large mayan onions (vidalia also work)
2 tbsp cup extra-virgin olive [...]

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Anna and Michael Olsen’s Walnut Bread

This recipe is out of Inn on the Twenty cookbook. I’d had this bread many times when we’ve eaten at the Inn on the Twenty in Jordan…it is absolutely delicious and worth the effort.

Makes 2 loaves
Ingredients:

9 oz chopped walnuts
1 3/4 oz blackstrap molasses
2 cups warm water (105°F)
1/3 oz dry active yeast
3 1/2 oz whole wheat [...]

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Greek inspired Stuffed Mushroom Caps

I had a brick of feta left over from the spanakopita exercise so I whipped up a delicious appetizer on Sunday for cocktail hour. Unfortunately, I didn’t photograph it – next time! I made up the recipe per cap, so it’s easy to extrapolate!
Ingredients:

2-3 mushroom caps per person (about 2″ in diameter works well [...]

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T-inspired Spanakopita

While at Paul and T’s during one cocktail hour, T served Spanakopita and they were wonderful! It inspired me to make some and freeze them – I used to always have these around but they are rather laborious so I haven’t made them in a while. They are worth it! This recipe originally came from [...]

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Bargain Basement Barb’s Ultimate Chocolate Chunk Cookies

These babies are best with the milk and dark chocolate chunks as below, but as we all know, pure chocolate chips will suffice in a pinch! It does seem like a lot of chocolate, but it’s well worth it. The beauty of these cookies is that they are thick, and riddled with chocolate all the [...]

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We survived another Doran weekend!

Thankfully, we survived with much celebration, laughter and camaraderie with our very best friends, the Dorans! JT and Paul played golf twice (the weather was amazing 20+ everyday!!!) and T and I shopped and shopped and shopped!
On Saturday, the boys piled into a van and drove to Soldiers Field in Chicago to watch a Bears [...]

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