December 2010
1 post
GUEST POST! Claudia's Brown Butter Buckles
OK, I have to admit, my initial attraction to this easy and scrumptious dessert was completely due to the name: “And now for dessert- a Buckle!” It sounds precious, like something Laura Inglass Wilder may have said at age six or so in Little House in the Big Woods. That was my favorite in the series, before life became hard and Mary went blind. Plus it allowed me to use my recently...
September 2010
1 post
SPOON LICKERS GOES CORPORATE
remember when peter fell in love with wendy and left neverland behind forever?
it’s like that.
i done grown up, y’all. and i have a company blackberry to prove it.
not gonna lie, i’m lovin’ the corporate life. but it comes at a price.
and there’s no way around it. this is a sorry, sorry state of affairs:
i am so totally adult i did not even have time to...
August 2010
2 posts
SPOONLESS IN THE CITY
i’m on a cleanse, y’all.
AND IT BLOWS.
i mean, just look at this ish:
what is it? TORTURE.
why? i don’t know why.
LAY OFF ME I’M STARVING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
a life without spoon licking is a life not worth living.
-alexandra
July 2010
3 posts
spoon lickers does shabbat: ALMOND BISCOTTI
vanity may have moved me to uncross my eyes when my nana warned they would “get stuck that way,” but the threat of spoiling my dinner was never (and never will be) enough to keep me from reaching for dessert first.
i mean, seriously - would you honestly put down a cookie to save room for a salad?
‘NUFF SAID.
with that in mind, i’m kicking off our belated shabbat...
RESURRECTION
we totally fucked up, you guys.
our kitchens are cacophonous with the clamoring of spoons, begging to be licked.
well, i’m diving in.
THE SILENCE ENDS NOW!
xx
alexandra
May 2010
1 post
1 tag
Dharma Cake.
It’s done.
April 2010
4 posts
WE HAVE A SUBMISSION!
This is very exciting. May I present to you Denise (real name Dennis) and his Wheaty Balls:
Dennis’ “Moroccan” Lamb Cous Cous
Sorry, Lickers, but I’m not much of a baker/confection artiste- I don’t have the precision or the sweet tooth to really warrant spending the time. Toffee, however, is a different story, but we’ll get to that some other day.
Anyhow,...
Watchspoon lickers dinner preview: dan and stefan tackle the delicate art of napkin oragami
Cornbread, from a skillet!
We got a cast iron skillet (for the frying of okra which I still can’t perfect like the Frozen and pre-battered kind they sell in Arkansas), and it’s time to make Mother’s cornbread.
Here you go, just mix all this shit together:
1 cup cornmeal (Mother says white)
1 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup...
GET 30: brown sugar cake with nutella buttercream
does this look like a happy customer or what?!
march is birthday month at spoon lickers, and this one was a biggie: my buddy stefan (pictured, morning after!) turned 30, and threw a big bash to celebrate.
in honor of the big 3-0, thought i’d try something new. fellow (and now new orleans bound!) spoon licker lauren inspired me to attempt one of the better treannovations (treat...
March 2010
3 posts
Chocolatehoneycakewithchocolatehoneyglaze,...
We made Chocolate Honey Cake* this weekend. I did not put those fucking obnoxious bees on it, nor was I clean in the glazing**. I prefer a “I just dumped this shit out” look. Eat it, Nigella.
*We did not have a springform cake pan on hand, so we split it between two 8inchers and baked it for really only 35 minutes.
**So sticky.
-C
BIRTHDAY PALOOZA CAKE!
for the past seven years, buddies nate and miguel have celebrated their birthdays with a huge blowout affectionately known as BIRTHDAY PALOOZA. every march, friends fly in from around the globe (even nate himself, from berlin!) for the festivities, which are nothing short of dionysian.
i’ve said it before, and i’ll say it again: every birthday must have cake!
my first thought was...
MONKEY BREAD
I will make this for every brunch I ever host or attend, from now until forever.
Whoa! That’s an intense photo. Well, this is an intense treat. You know the inner-most piece of a cinnamon roll, the doughiest, gooiest, highest-ratio of coating-to-bread-iest part? Pile 64 of those morsels into a bundt pan, and you’ve got Monkey Bread. And in this case, the sum is even greater...
February 2010
9 posts
spoon lickers does shabbat: salty vs cinnamon buns
apologies for the horrifyingly belated post. not to be conceited, but this one is worth the wait.
as jenny so beautifully (and punctually) recounted, a few of us spoon lickers gathered and feasted in jewish celebration last week. though there are now a few of us in new york, the founding fathers are all based in different cities, so we seized the opportunity of jenny’s visit to share the...
Red Velvet Cake for no reason
We made a red velvet cake just to make a red velvet cake (and then brag about it).
I don’t have the recipe, but it came from this book which is better than the Bible. What I can tell you is that it is a-okay to make the cake at Midnight, leave it on the counter after passing out in front of the TV from watching Fleetwood Mac: The Dance, and assemble it the next morning for breakfast.
-C
Fingerlick'd Pork ribs
While all those east coast folks were enjoying their Jew-food, I was over in the west making the most Southern, Gentile-iest heaping of meat I could think of for a large group of friends: Baby Back Ribs. Happy President’s Day!
The craving began when my mother sent me an article on how to cook ribs in the oven. GOODNESS, SO EASY.
I couldn’t take a picture fast enough.
So, I...
Shabbat Brunch by the Spoonlickers
I present to you Shabbat brunch by the Spoonlickers:
I believe that Alex and Brian have a more complete documentation of the process— I, however, only took a photo of the final glorious product.
The egg dish was a tribute to the “fresh ricotta and eggs” at Hot Chocolate in Chicago, which I believe to be quite possibly the best breakfast sandwich ever to grace the Earth. Ours...
Banana Cream Pie with Chocolate and Cinnamon
So… I’m way late with this. I made this pie last Sunday for our own Lu and Carmine’s Southern Fried Super Bowl Bonanza and I’m just finding the time now to post. Weak, I know. That said I am pretty proud of my maiden voyage into the wild world of spoon licking. The pie came out nicely. I got the recipe from The Art and Soul of Baking.
To begin, here’s me holding my...
Here We Go Maple Pear Upside-Down Cake
Hello new friends! I intended to (and promised Alexandra i would) try my hand at the Smitten Kitchen cinnamon buns last weekend. But then I looked at the recipe and realized that it is a project requiring probably more than four hours. Too long! Backup plan was a recipe by Mark Bittman, one of my favorite recipe sources. I think my goal as a cook is to land somewhere in between Deb’s...
a fistful of birthday cake: TRIPLE LEMON CAKE!
i absolutely LOVE birthdays, mine and everyone elses. you know that girl who makes you karaoke in chinatown till 4am on her day? THIS GIRL.
it should go without saying by now that i also love birthday CAKE. i am a firm believer that no birthday is complete without it, and that the best birthday cakes are home made.
last week was my boyfriend dan’s (our site designer and technical...
Dark Chocolate and Seville Orange Cake Death
I must apologize for this long gestating post. I was romantically detained, and I believe I have this cake to thank for that. I wasn’t sure where it would fit into the Spoonlickers world, but after seeing Jenny’s fruit-in-chocolate TART and having foreknowledge of what Alexandra has in store, I would like to throw this into the ring of BATTLE FRUIT treat.
This is one of the more...
January 2010
13 posts
Banana-caramel salted-chocolate-caramel peanut...
It’s a mouthful!
Shore and Shatula again bring you a crazy multi-step humdinger of a pie. And again, it’s a three hour affair, and that was with two sets of hands. But if you’re looking for something rich / sweet / bitter / fruity / CHOCOLATE-Y in your life, this is the recipe for you.
here is a link:
...
ryyyyyye bread
i know this is not an official group challenge, but i urge everyone to try making bread, if you don’t already do it semi-regularly!
i can’t speak for every spoonlicker out there, but cold weather makes me CRAVE homemade bread. the smell, the feel, the warmth… h-e-a-v-e-n. buuuuuuut, i tend to do my bread-baking in the fall, when i’m most excited about dropping temps. then...
Trannsylvania Trash Nüdeln: the blood-sucking,...
Earlier in the month, Jenny debuted her “Weeknight Garbage Pasta”. It was clever, resourceful - a veritable panacea of pantry panache. Inspired by her efforts, I set to work late one night. And while the results were mixed, it seemed a fitting spoonlickersTM introduction (hi there y’all, you can call me Paula Deen’s Mustache).
In this corner, we have whole wheat fusilli,...
Sunday Morning Just Got Better
Alex has been telling me about this project since its inception. I finally decided (as of last night) I would participate. Being competitive by nature, this is definitely entertaining for me. So here I come…beaters a’ blazin!
Breakfast time is always important for my man (Filthy) and me. Our schedules are so opposite that even though we live together, we really don’t see as much...
FINGER LICKIN' GOOEY: gooey butter cake!
oh my GOD. i am in heaven, and it is fucking GOOEY up here.
the second i saw charlie’s post i knew this treat was a must make. in fact, i got SO excited to make it, i neglected to follow several of the instructions in the process.
you know that pop quiz they give you in science class, the one with a paragraph of directions at the top that ends with “do not write anything on this...
DISCOVER BROWN BUTTER
after i frosted my elvis cupcakes i still had a ton of peanut butter buttercream, and no canvas on which to spread its deliciousness.
now ordinarily, i would just eat the whole tub with a spoon, or use it as a dip for my pretzel chips, but now that we have this blog i thought i’d challenge myself to actually BAKE a pairing for the leftover frosting. (well, most of it. let’s be...
So GOOEY
As per Liza’s suggestion, for a dinner party tonight I made a classic St. Louis Gooey Butter Cake.
Gotdamn, y’all, this is what dreams are made of. Imagine a cake with a layer of butter and sugar GOO floating on top. I can actually feel the fat sticking to my arterial walls. I’ve never felt so good.
I followed this recipe, to a near T, and got pretty decent results,...
TWO RANTS
OKAY. Gooey Butter Cake is cooling, but I have to clear my mind before I post them.
1. I have GOT to stop doing yeast dough recipes in the California “winter.” We don’t have heat, and it never gets warm enough for the dough to rise. SHIT.
2. My oven blows. It doesn’t get hot enough, or it gets too hot, or I don’t KNOW.
They’re still edible and will be...
HELLO, KITCHENAID! elvis cupcakes topped 3 ways
is there a better way to kick off the decade than christening a NEW KITCHENAID?!
nope.
excited as i was to open up this baby on christmas, i was even more jazzed to get her up and running!
deciding what to make first was no easy task. i mean the possibilities are ENDLESS, and treats decision making is not my forte - i want it all! after some deliberation i decided to start the decade, and...
Brown Butter Custard Pie with Cranberry Glaze
Natalie and I have had this pie bookmarked for months now. Technically, it is ever-so-slightly past its intended season— when Christina Tosi (Momofuku pastry chef) included both sweet potatoes and cranberry sauce in her recipe, she probably had certain occasions in mind. However, seeing as our Christmas tree is still up, it seemed like were still in acceptable range.
It should be noted...
Weeknight Garbage Pasta
There is nothing I love more than making dinner from kitchen staples— especially when the prospect of venturing out into the abyss of cold and snow is so utterly repellant that it’s tempting to open a can of garbanzo beans and call it a meal. But what I really love is the challenge. Forget the beans. Can I make a round, delicious meal from what I have in the house? Oh yeah. Watch...
HOLIDAY RECAP: failures in christmas baking
it is a new decade, and one of my resolutions is to look forward, not back, but before i do allow me to get all 2009 on you one last time.
christmas is hard, you guys. sure it’s magic when you’re a kid, but adult christmas is WORK. if finding out santa doesn’t exist is like learning the wizard of oz is just a tiny man behind a curtain, the discovery that christmas is laborious...
YULE LOG!
I did it!! I did it!! I made a yule log. And I’m REALLY proud of it.
I used this recipe from Martha Stewart. The only change I made was using almond meal instead of ground walnuts. (I don’t have a food processor— there’s no way I would have been able to get whole nuts fine enough.) This cake is HEAVENLY. It’s light as air, springy, and delicious. Aside from the...
December 2009
10 posts
Soaked & Baked Kentucker Toast
I made Alexandra’s Toast, but mine’s super DRUNK. It’s how I do it.
I did everything she did, pretty much. Except, I’m in Rogers, Arkansas and they don’t sell challah bread at our Walmart. In fact, next time I go in, I want to actually ask a bakery associate and see what kind of response I get. And this being ROGERS, Walmarts are all there are.
ANYWAY, I...
Maple-Bourbon-Pecan Piehole
This is Martha Stewert’s recipe, and I didn’t change a goddamn thing. That would have been criminal. But let me just say one thing (I hope my mother’s not reading this): it is incredibly frustrating to do anything, especially labor intensive baking when someone is micromanaging over your shoulder. Thank GOD said micro-manager doesn’t hang out in my kitchen…
...
soak n' bake: vanilla french toast
it is no secret i am a worshiper at the alter of smitten kitchen. i am a little single white female about its author, deb. i believe her to be my culinary soul mate, and imagine her house smells like a mixture of my two favorite things: bakery and baby. she is the kind of jewess i aspire to someday become.
suffice it to say i (and i am not alone here among us spoon lickers!) visit and steal...
Voskitas
i never really baked before I turned vegan almost four months ago. now that i have a long list of products i can’t consume, the thought of doing so is positively frightening. but i just couldn’t say no to grandpa sam’s roskitas. the one time i met him, grandpa sam was lovely. he even sang at the dinner table. so, i wanted to honor alexandra’s tribute (can you honor a...
mac and cheese
mac and cheese
i made this macaroni and cheese everyday at the cafe i used to work at. every single day. that’s how much people liked it. it wasn’t a recipe of my own creation, but i guess it kind of has become mine over time— all the tweaks, shortcuts, etc.
this was actually the first time i made it at home. the occasion was a holiday potluck. it was a really weird feeling to be making this in...
Drunk roskitas
I think I found my role in all this: do what the ladies do, but add some extra shit and pray. So in honor of Alexandra’s grandfather’s roskita recipe, I screw it up.
I pretty much did everything Alexandra did, with a few exceptions. Clearly my cookies are much fatter than hers and probably don’t even fit inside a coffee cup. I should have baked them longer, too, as mine...
roskitas: a sticky business
roskitas: not the most familiar of cookies. hell, even wikipedia’s never heard of ‘em. but they are real, people. and they are delicious.
more than that, they are a family tradition. so let’s get personal:
every morning after a slumber party at my grandparents’ i would descend (in my grandma’s floral nightgowns, as i still do) to the kitchen to find grandpa at...
Homemade Southern Bagels: WTF, Y'all?
The ladies will outshine me on this one. For starters, I’m not a Jew, thus my notion of what constitutes a good and/or classic bagel is somewhat unrefined. Also, coming from the South, I never even tasted a bagel until my time in the Great White North. So, again, I have no business telling you how to make a bagel.
With that in mind, I attempted to create a Southern flavored bagel...
Homemade Montreal Bagels: Possible
My first contribution to the Spoon Lickers hits close to home: Montreal-style bagels! I first heard tell of these mysterious entities in 2003 when my future husband moved to Montreal for a semester. I remember him mentioning them in a real life letter… calling them “fluffier” than a regular bagel and generally maintaining their greatness. It was most definitely the first...
What would I do without my kitchen staff?