Baked Brownies

I know I've made these before, and I'm sure I've posted about them (or variations thereof). But they never fail to be pretty much perfect in every way. In fact, these are probably my favorite basic brownie--I know I've said at before about other brownies and I may well say it about another recipe some day, but I think these are the best. They are fudgy and richly chocolatey. They are really easy to bake and the recipe makes a 9x13 inch pan---rather than a 9x9 pan---and more brownies is always better! I made these with a friend for our mothers and they were a hit! I actually spaced, we were chatting while baking, and added the eggs before the sugars. I was a bit worried it'd make the brownies cakier, but it didn't...just one more reason to like the recipe; it's resilient!

Plated Dessert for the Jewish Holidays

I made this dessert (honey milk chocolate semifreddo on apple almond cake with caramel apple sauce, milk chocolate almond bark, marzipan and nougatine) for the Yom Kippur break-fast meal this year. Yom Kippur was in mid-September, but I guess with all the excitement of starting school, I forgot to post this.

The beautiful thing about this dessert is it could be for almost any Jewish holiday! I had been away from home for Rosh Hashanna so I decided to use the traditional flavors from that holiday--apple and honey--as inspiration for my dessert. Since some of my cousins can't eat gluten- the whole dessert is gluten free and is therefore suitable for Passover (obviously if you keep Kosher there are other considerations besides leavened goods and flour, but in my household that's pretty much the extent of Passover.)

Thomas Keller's Chocolate Chip Cookies

Well I've officially started grad school classes. As a congratulatory gesture, my mom bought me a cookbook I've been wanting for a while: Thomas Keller's Bouchon Bakery Cookbook. It's a gorgeous cookbook! It's big an glossy and has tons of photos (of both the finished products and the process). The blurbs before the recipes seem to be both interesting and informative, and are all well written. The one problem is, most of the recipes are labor intensive or at least time consuming--it is a cookbook for a patisserie after all. Not that that is a problem in and of itself, but as I mentioned, I'm a grad student now; I don't have a ton of free time. So I couldn't make a sourdough loaf or lime and coconut eclairs. (I can't wait to try both another time).

Chocolate Cake with Pumpkin Spice Latte Filling

I start grad school this week. Yikes! I'm excited, don't get me wrong. But it's been a while since I've been a student and even longer since I've been in college. I know it's going to be a good experience and I'm going to learn a ton, but right now I just feel incredibly stressed.

Happily my friend Katy (who's getting a very science-y PhD) and her family invited me and my mom to their lovely house in St. Albans for lunch today. Her father is an excellent cook and a delicious meal with friends is the best distraction from the imminent doom--I mean exciting opportunity--of starting classes tomorrow.