Peach Hand Pies

Easy As Pie
This Sunday I will be hosting a half dozen nine and ten-year-olds for a baking workshop that I donated to our school fundraising auction, and I am actually looking forward to it.

One of my missions in life is to get kids cooking, and being creative in the kitchen. The good news is that these kids want to learn to make their own treats, so I am hoping for minimal batter on the ceiling. That being said, I’m hedging my bets…which means we’re going to make it easy this time around. There will be nothing involving hot sugar or hot oil. Just the thought turns my hair white!

The kids will make use of the gorgeous, seasonal fruit—we will make some mini fruit tarts and a lemon cake, as well as Peach Hand Pies (‘cause nothing is better than pie that travels). Of course, no baking class would be complete without chocolate, so we will be doing something with chocolate, though I haven’t found the perfect option yet…decisions, decisions. All of this in only four hours? No problem.

Although the fresh peaches that are available are just starting to get good, I am going to use frozen for the Peach Hand Pies to make life easier. Peeling and slicing peaches will take too long. The good thing is we just got some beautiful frozen peaches in from Oregon that will do the trick nicely.

Peach Hand Pies
Makes 6 6-inch circular pies Read more…

Grilled Cherry Milkshakes Recipe

Get ’em while they’re ripe.
These sweet, delicious signs of early summer have arrived in the market, and we can’t get enough of them. They’re only at their peak for about a month—so, don’t hold back!

We love eating them fresh Read more…

Texas Sheet Cake

You Say It’s Your Birthday…
Once again, it’s birthday week. My boys, my daughter and I all have birthdays. Of course we also have standards testing, baseball, choir, and student council campaigns. At some point I will have to scale the side of Mount Laundry, too. On top of all that, I am still required to come to work…if I expect a paycheck. I know. Crazy, right? So any birthday celebrations are most likely going to be quick and to the point.

My kids are pretty easy to please. As long as there is a donut cake in the morning, they’re good. Just in case you are wondering, a donut cake is a dozen (or so) donuts artfully arranged on a plate with candles sticking out of them. It’s a tradition. We have a donut sugar bomb breakfast while the kids open their gifts. Breakfast of champions.

I am a little more fickle. I don’t really have a favorite celebratory birthday dessert. I like birthday cake, but I also like birthday pie, and birthday pudding. Birthday crisp is pretty good…and don’t forget birthday waffles or pancakes!

This year, I want one of these beauties for a few reasons. First, making a Texas Sheet Cake is easy. Second, I have been harboring an insane craving. Third? Pecans, baby…

Now seems like as good a time as any to make one, though it’s pretty easy to come up with an excuse. You just need to make sure you have others to help you eat it—because a Texas Sheet Cake feeds a crowd.

Texas Sheet Cake
Yields on 18“ x 13” cake
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Sutter’s Fort Gingersnaps

Holdin’ Down The Fort

Sometimes you don’t realize how good you have it until you don’t. Yesterday my daughter and I participated in a program that 4th graders at her school get a chance to do every year. We were part of the Suttter’s Fort ELP program, which basically means we become the museum.

For almost 3 months, the kids have been studying the history of the fort and its occupants. Each child is given their own identity and is required to research that person’s history at the fort. The kids wear costumes the whole time and participate in activities that would have normally happened at the fort: like weaving, candle making, and cooking.

In order for the kids to do all this great stuff, a parent has to volunteer to help out and/or run one of the activities—and be in period costume as well. I chose to run the bakery. (I figured I’d stick with my strengths.) Baking bread in a beehive oven is no easy task. It’s an all-day affair, and I have had a new appreciation for my oven and my dishwasher, and let’s not forget the washing machine…

I can’t even imagine the amount of back-breaking work required just to survive as a settler at that time. If just baking the bread took all day, how long would it take to do everything else? And don’t get me started on laundry. I get why bathing and clothes washing only happened monthly. Yes. Monthly.

Our pioneers did know how to enjoy life, and all of the hard work made for some great get-togethers with music and neighbors. They danced, they laughed and they ate tasty treats like these gingersnap cookies we made in the oven yesterday after the bread was done.

Sutter’s Fort Gingersnaps
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