Happy Halloween!

This is our first Halloween in Chicago, and I must say, it has been a good one. Two quick gripes, and then I will move forward. One being, the lack of pumpkin beer available on Halloween. Apparently, the season starts in September and ends early October. What?! That is absurd. Who wouldn't want a nice pumpkin beer on Halloween, or around Thanksgiving for that matter. It is upsetting. Secondly, Halloween baking materials are basically nonexistent the week of Halloween. Unless you buy your Halloween goods before fall even begins, you are out of luck. This system seems illogical, but what can you do?

Moving on, we have visited a pumpkin patch, carved pumpkins, roasted seeds, attended Halloween parties, lost self-control with miniature candy and watched Blackbeard's Ghost. Halloween complete.

(headed to a UChicago Halloween party)

Tonight, I made some simple sugar cookies with a Halloween theme. I followed the recipe from The Craft of Baking. Sugar cookies can be hit or miss, but I enjoyed this recipe. The results were pretty good. There seemed to be a shortage of orange sprinkles this year, or I was too late in getting them (but in actuality right on time), so I made do with green and purple.

Simple Sugar Cookies recipe:
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 large egg
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 ounce unsweetened chocolate, melted (I used bittersweet chocolate because that is what I had, and it worked well)

Mix all ingredients and then split the dough in half and mix in the chocolate with the half in the mixer. Refrigerate for one hour. Bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

Pumpkin Patch 2010 In Review

Ian and I visited the All Seasons Apple Orchard and Pumpkin Patch in Woodstock, IL. The patch is about an hour and half away from Chicago, and it brought all the wonderful things you would expect from rural Illinois. We shared apple cider and apple doughnuts, picked our own pumpkins and walked through the corn maze. It was a perfect day.

Halloween Mini Cupcakes

Halloween is fast approaching, so in a last ditch effort I made some mini chocolate Halloween cupcakes. Mini cupcakes are fantastic, what's not to love about a perfect bite size piece of cake? They are, however, a delicate balance. With their compact size, it is all too easy to get a dry, chalky cupcake. It turned out to be the perfect night to make them. A thunder and lightning storm has rolled through bringing heavy rains. Just perfect. Ian broke out a bottle of wine from his private reserve to commence the evening. October remains the best month of the year. Tomorrow we are going to Woodstock, IL to pick out our pumpkins. Blog to follow.

Devil's Food Cake recipe (from the Art and Soul of Baking):

• ½ cup (2½ ounces) unsifted unsweetened
• Dutch-process cocoa powder
• ½ cup (4 ounces) plus 1 cup (8 ounces) water
• 1½ sticks (6 ounces) unsalted
• butter, softened (65° to 68°F)
• 1 cup (7 ounces) granulated sugar
• ¾ cup (6 ounces) firmly packed
• light brown sugar
• 3 large eggs, at room temperature
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 2 cups (7 ounces) sifted cake flour
• ¼ cup (1¼ ounces) unbleached
• all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon salt

Bake at 350 degrees for 12-15 minutes. Regular sized cupcakes bake for 15-20 minutes.

Apple Cheddar Scones

Last year someone mentioned they make an excellent apple pie with a cheddar cheese crust. Yuck I thought. I don't know why I rejected the idea because cheese, pie crust and apples are all delicious separately. Why not combine them? Smitten Kitchen did it again with her cheddar and apple scone recipe. I made them today, and at first I couldn't really taste the cheese, but after some time, and a lot more tastes it became more apparent. The savory flavor works so well with the sweet, crispy Honeycrisp apples. Scones seem to be all the rage these days, and now that Mark Bittman discussed them last weekend I hope the dry, overly sugary scones take a hike.

Boots!

Opening up a box to find a brand new pair of boots is a wonderful feeling. This last week, Ian and I have been purchasing our jackets and boots to prepare for our first Chicago winter. I went with a giant sleeping bag of a coat, and some Hunter boots with fleece inserts. Seen above is an incredibly technical test to make sure there are no leaks. Success!

Apple Crisp

Recently, someone told me that a great way to make your house smell delectable is to bake apples and cinnamon on low heat for an extended period of time. With those crates of beautiful, fragrant apples outside the grocery store this time of year, I couldn't resist purchasing some (overspending at the grocery store strikes again). Instead of baking apples alone, I made the first crisp of the season. The Sur La Table apple-cranberry crisp with oatmeal topping (sans cranberries). Nothing like combining apples, cinnamon and oats to form a perfect harmony. The house smells amazing. Hopefully I can lure a certain someone out of their room to come eat some. I don't know how those mini pumpkin lights haven't brought him out already.

Pico de Gallo

This has nothing to do with baking and everything to do with my eternal quest for good salsa. I have loved salsa for years, and for no good reason it has never occurred to me to just make it myself. Shocking. With a taco night last weekend, there was no better time to give it a whirl. I found the recipe from GOOPY herself. The GOOP newsletter is intolerable, but to my dismay I found myself making her pico de gallo recipe, with a twist. I added some mango and skipped the cilantro and added plenty of pepper. The result: fresh, simple and all sorts of fantastic. I could eat this stuff day and night.

Pumpkin Mini Muffins

With copious amounts of time on my side, I have been scouring food blogs and found a new goodie: girlversusdough. She makes some excellent baked goods, so I gave her pumpkin pecan muffins a go with some tweaks of my own. I halved the recipe, added more pumpkin and made mini muffins instead. I also added walnuts instead of pecans because pecans are sick. UPDATE: pumpkin is still delicious.

Oreos

The world has been a cruel, cruel place as of late, so what do you do? You make a cookie that brings back fond memories of your childhood. When things were simple and pure. I made some homemade oreos today from this recipe. Smitten Kitchen is one of my favorite blogs, and I have been meaning to make a recipe from the site for some time. This recipe did not disappoint, and was incredibly simple. Keeping in the theme of childhood simplicity. Make sure you have an ample supply of milk on hand.

October

October has arrived. Bring on the best time of year. I love October-fridge.

Promontory Point

Promontory Point, you are beautiful. How great it is that I can see you from my window.