Double Dark Chocolate Guinness Cookies! A late St. Patrick’s Day offering

Posted on March 21, 2013 by Not Crocker

St. Patrick’s Day is always fun and is a really easy holiday to bake for: a generous dash of Irish Cream, a splash of Guinness, a finger of Jameson’s and you should be set. Unfortunately this St. Patrick’s Day I ruined that batch of fudge and failed to make successful repair cookies. To combat this failure I had a delicious pint of Jameson-infused beer and went about my day. Not that I was dwelling on the loss of that fudge or anything (maybe a little) but I still wanted to make an awesome treat with an Irish kick. Looking back at my first post, the Guinness Chocolate Cupcakes, and remembering that I had told my trivia team that I would bring cookies, I thought, “I bet I could make Guinness chocolate cookies!” And off I went to bake my heart away.

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Blackberry Cream Cheese Muffins

Posted on March 10, 2013 by Not Crocker

There are a lot of magical little places up in the Yukon. I was fortunate to work at the incomparable Alpine Bakery, and have struggled to find bread of that quality in either Calgary or Vancouver. There are incredible cafés, restaurants, and shops that would stand out even in the largest cities, and we are always thankful to have these gems in our small town. One such gem is the Chocolate Claim. First, they sell some of my favourite earrings from Lara Melnik, but they also have two types of muffins every day that are sure to knock your socks off (they also used to have a cranberry bread pudding muffin that is as close to heaven as I’ve been, I am not sure they still make it). When I was working at the Yukon Transportation Museum I used to go out of my way a few days a week to get a coffee and muffin. One of my favourites was their Raspberry Chocolate Chip, it had the perfect balance of tart and sweet. My ultimate favourite which seemed to appear less often was the Blackberry Cream Cheese. Their muffins were massive and packed with berries. But the best part was on top there was a hunk of cream cheese, baked into the muffin and lightly crusted with sugar. That nugget of cheesey goodness POPPED with the flavour of the muffin.

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Salted Dark Chocolatey Cookies

Posted on February 24, 2013 by Not Crocker

One thing I love about Vancouver, particularly our location in the middle of downtown, is that you encounter such a variety of people all the time. Yesterday I popped into Marketplace IGA, I was standing in front of the dairy case, making world-ending decisions about whether I should or shouldn’t buy cottage cheese when a man with a walker insisted on moving me from my place to do the same. It was clear that his cottage cheese needs were more urgent so I wandered off to ponder other purchases. When I meandered back to the dairy case, mind made up, I was approached by an older lady. I quickly moved out of her way, assuming that she too couldn’t wait for cottage cheese, when she lightly grabbed my elbow. I turned around and she, in the sweetest, most elderly, heavily-French accented voice asked for my assistance. She guided me over to the yogurts and asked if I could help her. She was gazing hopefully up to the top shelf, and I realized, she can’t reach! This sweet, petite French woman really wanted the strawberry yogurt but she was about a foot short of laying her hands on it. I snagged her a tub and she enthusiastically thanked me. Day made. I got to be a friendly giant!
Then, as I wandered home from the store, enjoying the sunlight and mild weather that the few-blocks walk afforded me, I decided to take the alley behind our apartment instead of wandering up past the construction site and around the corner. This is regularly a busy alley, with a restaurant and bank on one end and a business and two apartment buildings making up the rest, so I’ve never felt worried about it. Well low and behold, in the middle of the day in a nice part of town(‘s alley… okay makes sense), I come across two flanneled gentlemen clearly exchanging drugs, money, and whatever else. Curses Vancouver, from sweet little French lady to nefarious flanneled gentlemen in the span of 20 minutes! Anyway, I nonchalantly cruised past them, glancing back only to check for cars while crossing the alley to my building. What can you do, not everyone is content to be outside in the sun, some people just need to flannel up and make mischief.

Please don’t take away from the story above that I am against flannel. I support flannel in the appropriate time and place, though really those gentlemen weren’t helping flannel’s cause.

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Almond Butter Cookies

Posted on February 23, 2013 by Not Crocker

The weather in Vancouver has been really wonderful. We had two gorgeous days on sunshine throughout the week and then yesterday started crummy with a straight 5-6 hours of rain but wrapped up on a blue-skied, sunny note. Today is another sunny one, so I am going to have to wander outside for some vitamin D and fresh air. I love being able to wander outside in the middle of February in just a sweater. No boots, hat, mitts, or scarf needed! I certainly don’t miss the snow and will be sad to leave Vancouver if ever needed. The snow that comes with practically every other city in Canada is not something I embraced. I’ve paid my snow dues, 18 years in the Yukon and 6 in Calgary! I deserve a little West Coast weather pampering, and have made sure to take full advantage.

All that said, I am looking at some Toronto positions that would be worth the move back into the big white. If they come around to be the real thing, I am going to have to mentally prepare for a winter unlike any I’ve experienced with snow AND humidity.

Anyway, I felt the other day like I needed to make something. I kind of neglected Not Crocker last week as I picked up a couple temp assignments that required me to bus it out to Richmond. By the time I got home I kind of flopped on the couch in a trance-like daze and Gen kindly made up some dinner for me. I did attempt a pork and rapini dish yesterday to very little success as the rapini over-powered the pork. I choked a bowl down and thankfully Gen finished up the rest. We all have our cooking failures!

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Jalapeño Almond Bread

Posted on February 16, 2013 by Not Crocker

First thing’s first. I just received my fourth wedding invitation for this year. I know I am coming to the age where everyone I know is getting married but I never expected to have four weddings for eight wonderful people just this year! I can’t believe it! The problem is that Genesis and I are under or straight-up unemployed. We have my cousin’s wedding in April, my childhood friend Helen’s in June in the Yukon, my dearest friend Katie’s wedding in Banff in July, and my high-school twin is getting married to her long-time amazing partner in August in Saskatoon. I wish I could attend them all, but that would require one of us to be on Air Canada’s payroll. Alas, we will figure it out, but I am fairly sure I am going to miss a few important events this year.

Anyway, on this beautiful sunny day I decided to make some hearty chili and a really tasty jalapeño almond bread that has all the characteristics of cornbread but with a bit more texture. The meal was super filling and I know it would satisfy even the most carby of carb lovers. I munched down a ton of the chili and happily munched on the almond bread between/with bites. I am going to experiment with a few different versions of this because it came out so beautifully. I suspect I could make a sweeter version of it that uses cream cheese and some cinnamon, maybe even a swirl of chocolate. Hmm weekend-testing ideas!

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