Cookies Anyone?

I am in "new toy mode" as my husband calls it. Last night I was surprised when a FedEx man knocked on my door with a KitchenAid in tow. I have wanted a KitchenAid ever since I killed my mixer last December making Christmas cookies (it was an accident, I swear). I have refused to buy a new hand mixer because I was holding out for a KitchenAid. That ment no cookies, no cakes, no cheesecake, no frosting...no fun. So, when the lovely new gift from my mom arrived last night I was more than happy. Surprisingly, I didn't stay up all night playing with it. I found it a good spot on the counter and went to bed.

This morning I woke up, got everyone ready and off to school and nap before I played. I broke out the cookbook and made some delicious 100% whole-wheat cookies (I am a whole wheat freak). I started out with Ginger cookies for my husband.
Then I made chocolate chip for my oldest.Don't they look scrumptious? I made a plate of each and surprised my husband and his co-workers and I made a plate for the new neighbors upstairs. I love to bake and even more than baking, I love to give away the things I make.

I have to admit I didn't do it all myself. I had a little helper.

Food can be Pretty

Lately we have been experimenting with fancy foods. No, not expensive foods. Pretty foods. This all started a while back when I decided to stuff cooked rice into a measuring cup (mainly to measure it out for portion control) and serve it molded to the shape of the measuring cup (like they do in swanky restaurants). That (about 6 months ago) was the extent of our pretty foods until recently. Motivated by the abundance of nice restaurants in Portland my husband has begun to randomly make pretty foods. Here are some of our beautiful (and quite tasty) foods:

This is our "breakfast rice" as my 5-year old calls it. It is just basmati rice with butter (hidden under the blackberry), sprinkled with granulated sugar and cinnamon, and topped with a fresh blackberry. This is pretty much what started it all.















This is another rice dish that my husband and I made together for some friends. It is sweet rice (basmati rice with butter and sugar) topped with raspberry coulis (raspberry juice strained from fresh raspberries) and a golden raspberry.













And Finally, this is my husband's pizza margherita (the picture colors are a bit off). It was delicious. It was a very simple pizza with a handmade (by me) 100% whole wheat crust, tomato slices instead of tomato sauce, chunks of fresh mozzarella cheese, and fresh basil leaves. That is it. The basil was very aromatic and lended a nice flavor that really brought out the tomatoes (but not too much). So good and so pretty.

Happy Halloween!

Well, not quite yet but it was our church Halloween "Monster Mash" aka costume D-Day. I finished the turtle costume and it looks great. The snaps keep coming unsnapped so he crawls around quite immodestly. I made the body suit from a pattern and I used sew on snaps. Next time I think I will opt for snaps that are more heavy duty. The shell is a bit small but I really like how it turned out. I just zig-zagged around the edges of each piece (after finding out the hard way that you cannot quilt hexagons). To keep it on him, I sewed on elastic straps with plastic clasps.

The robot got done enough. I would still like to sew on a few more accessories. I sewed the whole thing out of many layers of fabric but I think it would have been much easier to just spray paint a few cardboard boxes. No pictures until it is complete.

In addition to all of the sewing I had to do, I also volunteered to bring two desserts and chili. I decided to make brownies because they don't require a mixer (I burnt out the motor on my mixer last Christmas in the middle of making cookies and I refuse to buy another one because I am holding out for a Kitchen-Aid). I thought a graveyard scene would be my best bet. I made shortbread cookies (again due to lack of mixer) for tombstones. I was too busy sewing to get it all put together so when my husband got home I put him on the graveyard shift. I think he did a great job, better than I would have done. He free-handed that skeleton with icing and made the heads from marshmallows and sprinkles (thank you Martha). They turned out great!