Hello Spring! S'mores Cookies

So once again I was gone and I had baking with drawl.  I was off to California for a week for work, where the best part was that I got to catch up with an old high school friend.  Well and we went whale watching and for once we actually saw a whale!  It really is beautiful out there and one of my very favorite places to go running.  

Well then I came home and back to work it was...well work in the office that is.  I thought cookies were definitely in order to take my break from work this week and to celebrate spring.  

Guest post #5: Strawberry Balsamic Tart

Sometimes it is all about the little things in life...one of them being able to cook/bake with one of your very best friends!  I am so excited for this 5th guest post.  Although Meghan says she has been having a time with baking cookies lately, she is an excellent baker and especially chef.  She inspires me to cook more for myself...to make single girl dinners and enjoy a glass of wine.

It was a very sad/happy time when she moved from DC to Birmingham last year, but no matter the distance we will always be friends.  We will continue running and pushing each other...having dance parties in the middle of the work day; although in different offices...finishing each other sentences...and discussing life over entire bottles (yes, not bottle) of wine.  This recipe is going to be amazing and easy so if you like strawberries and balsamic give it a try!

Apple Spice Cake with Cinnamon Cream Cheese Frosting

This is a cake that was one of three, that went along with two french pear tarts and dark chocolate almond toffee from the week of baking.  This is an apple cinnamon spice cake.  This cake is all about the apples...3 red...3 green...some were grated and others were chopped.  

I don't know what it is, but I have been on a serious apple kick.  An apple with almond butter is my new snack every morning at work.  Its my little break...my five minutes in the morning to take a breath... to stop thinking about what is on the computer screen in front of me for a hot minute, and maybe just day dream.  I have been day dreaming a bit too much lately it seems...oh well, sometimes its necessary.  Sometimes there is just too much real world, real job stuff going on...seriously though.

Clean your cupboard out cookies...Brown Buttered Chocolate Chunk, Butterscotch Chip, Pecan Cookies

What a great weekend...

...Meghan came in town Thursday

...We took a long weekend...aka Friday it felt like I was skipping school: went to go checkout the National Cathedral, and walked around Georgetown 

A couple of French Pear Tarts

So I burned myself for real.  I burned myself, and while I was doing it I dropped the tart. It was a tart disaster.  Half of it landed on the stove and the other half landed on the floor.  Lets just say that to begin with I could do nothing about the tart being half on the floor and have on the stove, because I now had the imprint of the tart pan on my arm.  It hurt, this is probably the worst baking burn I have had so far. And I was pissed...the whole purpose of baking said tart was to try it out, it was a test tart, for the other tarts that I would make later in the week and half of it was on the floor.  

A St. Patty's Day Treat: Irish Car Bomb"ish" Cake/Cupcakes

This is my life...

...sometimes its a bit sweet

...sometimes its a little boozey

...sometimes it both

...and other times I fall down the stairs with a cup of coffee in hand...thank goodness it wasn't still hot

...then there are the times when it is really still hot and I burn my arm on a tart pan...it hurt...a lot

But such is life.  It can get crazy out there but thats when the sweet and boozey can help.  Well that and good friends who come into town for a visit.  Or the friends that go for runs with you and don't stop even when they want to.  Or the friends who will listen to you complain about the same thing over and over again.