Friday Faves – The Little Kitchen
How’s everyone doing today? I heard that if you haven’t shipped your holiday gifts by now, they won’t make it by Christmas… I guess that means my family in the Midwest will be getting their gifts a little late. Sorry guys! Today’s Friday Favs feature is Julie from The Little Kitchen. Julie and I “met” on Twitter (I believe) and then we got to meet in person at TechMUNCH Boston this summer. She’s one of the reasons I drug myself out of bed after M&M’s wedding even though I was a bit hung over. I knew I wanted to meet her that day and she had come all the way from Florida, so I figured I could drag myself the one mile to get from my bed to TechMUNCH… You might recognize her name because she has been a busy little bee these past few weeks as one of the co-organizers of The Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap!
I love Jen. I don’t know if she knows this but I was reading and enjoying her blog before I started my own. Her blog, along with a couple of others, inspired me to start The Little Kitchen blog. I loved following her 30 by 30 list and now her 30 while 30 lists and keeping us updated on how she was doing. I wish I had thought of that! I love following her while she does the Avon breast cancer walks and I loved that she co-organized the Bakers Bake for Hope campaign. I was so excited when I got to meet Jen this past summer in Boston at TechMUNCH. She is so sweet online and even sweeter in person!
So it’s holiday baking season and we just finished up with the Great Food Blogger Cookie Swap and I’m still thinking about cookies. Do you use pinterest? I love it! You can create virtual boards and pin links, recipes, pictures, anything that has an image and a link associated with it. I like to use it as a way to collect recipes and projects I want to try.
I have a Cookies, Cookies, Cookies pinterest board and I just went through them and while I have quite a few I want to try, theare are five recipes I want to make ASAP.
Brown Butter, Brown Sugar Cookies from The Novice Chef
Brown butter makes everything better…I told Jessica after I tried the actual cookies that she made that I need to bake more with brown butter. Love these cookies and you must make it!
Pecan Pie Cookies from Bakers Royale
Love at first sight for me when I saw these cookies. Naomi is a cookie genius! Pecan pie in a cookie…I can’t wait to make these!
Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies from love veggies and yoga
Have you ever had a chocolate chip cookie with oatmeal before? If not you need to. I’m not talking about an oatmeal cookie with chocolate chips, I’m talking about a chocolate chip cookie that has oatmeal in it. It’s amazing and when I saw this cookie recipe from Averie that combines peanut butter, I’m making these soon.
Red Velvet Cheesecake Cookies from Two Peas and their Pod
Oh my heaven! I love red velvet cake, don’t you? This just looks absolutely amazing. There are no other words.
Cookies ‘n Creme Cookie Sandwiches from Gingerbread Bagels
I love, love cookies ‘n creme…this looks divine. Sandwich cookies are so fun and Lindsey makes it look so easy!
As for chocolate chip cookies, I think I have found the ultimate recipe.
Check out Jen’s cookies as well the roundups for the cookie swap! Thank you for having me, Jen!
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
I am of two minds on this post. On the one hand, my OCD really kicked in when I read that you had not followed Mark Bittman’s recipe but still decided to write about it. Seemed a bit sloppy for a nerd and an engineer. On the other hand, that is how Pasteur discovered Penicillin. Bittman is such a great cook, that I think he deserves better treatment; so I plan to do him the honor of making his recipe. I am not going to make the other two though!
Oops! Senior moment that – it was the Scottish scientist and Nobel laureate Alexander Fleming in 1928. Apparently, the Pasteur Institut ignored the work of a French physician, Ernest Duchesne, who in 1897 discovered the curative properties of the Penicillium Glaucum, a different mold than the one Fleming discovered, but in the same genus. Gotta love Wikipedia.
There are two tapioca recipes on the Minute Tapioca box. I always use the one for Fluffy Pudding, which calls for 2 cups milk and whipping the egg whites separately from the cooked milk with tapioca and egg yolk. I think you will find the pudding much improved over the basic recipe.
Also, the quality of the vanilla makes a huge difference in something like tapioca. Cooks Illustrated likes McCormick and I found this on amazon and at Sam’s Club in large bottles for very reasonable prices.
One other note: I find that CI has a sweet tooth: their recipes are sometimes too sweet for my taste, though they are a go-to source otherwise.
This is an interesting discussion. I tried the Kraft recipe today. I threw everything (except the vanilla) in the blender before putting it on the stove. I also added 1/2 tsp. salt and a bit more vanilla. I actually thought it was sweet enough already, though. However, I agree with your overall conclusion that it’s a bit boring. Well, at least it was easy. Anyway, next time I may a recipe using large tapioca. 🙂
Thanks for the comparison.