Hi, I'm Chef Mercedes. I'm a graduate of the French Culinary Institute/International Culinary Center's classic pastry arts program. Currently I do not work in the food industry so I use this blog to share my love of eating and passion for baking with the world. I hope you’ll enjoy what I have to share about baking and that I’ll inspire you to bake as well.
I made these a while ago, but I figure I've been posting a ton of scones so why not slip these in. These are simple raisin scones, with dried cranberries substituted for the raisins and some orange zest and extract in the dough. I love the combination of orange and cranberry, and the dried cranberries are especially good because they don't get mushy and overly sweet like raisins when they cook.
These are the delicious FCI cream scones with a healthy does of espresso powder and coffee extract added to the dough. I kicked them up even more with chocolate chips. Yum!
I got tickets to Richard III with Martin Freeman! The problem is, the normal tickets are expensive. So I waited on line (with a friend, thank goodness) from an absurdly early hour for reduced price advance tickets. Long wait short, we got great seats for about 1/4 of the price! I mention this because it (plus the day trip we'd taken the day before...whoops, bad planning) is the reason that I have terrible photos of my croissant bread pudding.
This is just a simple tart. I made a nice crust (not my best work but I was busy with exams), filled it with a nice whipped cream and mascarpone mixture, and topped it with fresh berries. Delicious, easy, fresh, and (with the strawberries and blueberries) very patriotic.
