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Sweet Dinner Rolls & A Giveaway!
*note: this giveaway is now closed. Over the last several months, we’ve drastically reduced the amount of bread that we buy at the grocery store. Now that I’ve become comfortable making yeast breads, there just isn’t a reason to buy it anymore. Working with yeast used to intimidate me. I have very vivid memories of my Grandma making rolls for Sunday dinner – not only was her dough the smoothest, most supple* bread dough I’ve ever seen, but the rolls themselves were fantastically amazing. And…
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Chocolate Gingerbread Cupcakes with Brown Sugar Buttercream
Oh, heyyyy. Remember me? That chick who used to post new recipes three or four times a week? Yeah, I miss her, too. My days of impromptu, mid-day baking might be over, but with a little bit of planning I’ve been able to work around it and I think I have a workable baking schedule. This means our weekends are going to be excessively dessert-laden, but it’s all in the name of Lemon Sugar, right? So, these cupcakes have been on my baking list the…
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Orange-Yogurt Muffins with Marmalade Glaze & Brunch
Recently, I was chosen by Foodbuzz and Dannon to review and blog about a new product: Dannon Activia Harvest Picks Yogurt. I hosted a small, light brunch for my sisters and we really enjoyed ourselves, and the food! Since spring has made an early arrival this year, I put together a little table outside so we could soak in the fabulous weather. The great thing about yogurt is that it is extremely versatile. You can eat it alone, of course, or add a topping, use it as…
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Chocolate Cake with Vanilla Butter Cream
It was a year ago today that I first made this cake. Well, not this cake exactly – I can’t remember the exact flavor combination, but it was a big, heavy three-layer cake with fluffy frosting and glitter sprinkles everywhere.
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Homemade Pumpkin Spice Latte
There are a few things that I’m powerless against. I cannot say no to chips & salsa, guacamole, fried pickles, sweet potato fries and pumpkin spice lattes. Ooh – and nachos. It is nearly impossible for me to walk by a coffee house in the fall without ordering a pumpkin spice latte. It draws me in. They are definitely one of my favorite fall treats. I’ve seen the recipe for homemade pumpkin spice lattes all over the blogosphere and on Pinterest for years now, but…
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Erin’s favorite recipes from 2012
As we say goodbye to 2012, it’s fun to reflect on everything that happened during the year. My family had a wonderful year full of blessings. We celebrated my parent’s 35th wedding anniversary in May. We traveled to the beach with our extended family, filling up three beach houses. My oldest daughter completed Kindergarten and started 1st grade. We coached T-ball, we celebrated 1st birthdays for my niece and nephew, and found out my brother and sister are expecting again. We attended dance recitals, hosted…
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Reuben Sliders with Homemade Thousand Island
I’m pretty excited to share this recipe with you. It’s a good one. I love sandwiches, and I especially love warm, ooey-gooey slider sandwiches. And I really love a good Reuben. This is like, the nexus of the sandwich universe. Or something. My family isn’t doing our annual St. Patrick’s Day dinner until next week sometime, so I know that tomorrow (on the actual holiday) I will want something corn-beefy to tide me over until next week when we can celebrate. Since there is an…
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Homemade Vanilla Extract
If you’ve spent much time at all in the kitchen, you understand how essential good-quality vanilla is to the outcome of your desserts. The problem is, REALLY good vanilla is also REALLY expensive. Even the grocery-store options are relatively expensive, and they don’t even compare to the good stuff. To buy a bottle of top-quality vanilla, you’re going to spend nearly $20, and if you do a lot of baking, that’s quite an investment! So, as you can imagine, I was overjoyed to find this…
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Homemade Ricotta Cheese
My youngest brother is getting married in the spring. In preparation for the Groom’s family duties, my Mom, sisters and I are beginning the process of scoping out locations for their rehearsal dinner. Last night, while pouring over menus, venues and prices, I came across my favorite Italian restaurant, Lidia’s. I love that place. Everything is made from scratch with fresh ingredients – from their bread to their pasta to their marinara and ricotta cheese…and that’s exactly the reason their food tastes so much better.…
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Caramel Pecan Apple Pie
So, you really can’t go wrong with apple pie. Am I right? Even bad apple pie is usually pretty tasty. Or maybe I’ve never had bad apple pie? Aaannnd, now that I say that, I’m envisioning really bad apple pie, so I guess I could theoretically imagine an apple pie so bad that it might not be worth the calories. But this one? For Pete’s sake, it’s covered in a crumb topping. And then. THEN. That crumb topping? It’s topped with toasted pecans and caramel…
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Dark Chocolate Dipped Energy Bites
It happens occasionally, that I’m going about my day, maybe enjoying a little energy bite out of my refrigerator when I’m like, WAIT! Why haven’t I shared these with you guys yet? I guess I get tunnel vision sometimes, always dreaming up the latest and greatest dessert idea that I guess I just overlook my everyday favorites. This is totally an everyday favorite. I’ve been making these energy bites for a couple of years now. I’ve adapted the original recipe just a teensy-bit, but recently decided…
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Gnocchi with Roasted Red Pepper Cream Sauce
As I’ve mentioned in {previous posts}, I’m not a big seafood fan. But being desperate to not pass that on to my girls, my husband makes some kind of seafood for dinner at least once a week. I would really hate to deprive them of the health benefits of fish, so I don’t mind that they eat without me every once in a while. It’s usually on those nights that I get to whip up my own dishes that the rest of the family would…
