Pumpkin Biscotti

Happy Friday! I'm looking forward to a weekend of Paramount Theatre dates (2 in one weekend!), a massage (my second one ever - I'm using a groupon), and piles of grading. Okay, I'm not looking forward to the amount of grading, but grading in cold weather isn't all that bad.

I baked pumpkin biscotti the other night using this recipe. The recipe holds its own without drizzled chocolate, but everything is better with drizzled chocolate.

I know I haven't been a good blogger, but I assure you in my absence from blogging that I'm not doing lots of exciting things. I've been kept busy with my new job. Next semester should be smoother and I will be returning to posting lots more. I will try and start posting something every week though.

Enjoy the cooler weather this weekend!

Happy Friday!

Happy Friday! This really is a happy friday. This weekend is Austin City Limits music festival, which is possibly my favorite weekend of the whole year. I wasn't sure what was going to happen this weekend because my grandmother in Florida is in ICU, but our latest report today is that she's doing a lot better than she was.

 I get to see M83 for the third time this year -- all in Austin -- all outdoor shows! I'm going to live it up this weekend because I've been working non-stop since school started in August.



 (P.S. Yes, I know, I didn't make a new happy friday...I used one of my old ones. oops!)

BACK BY POPULAR DEMAND

...just kidding. But I've missed you, blog. I've been the busiest I've been in a few years. Not a whole lot is new (besides my new job) except for these things: I want McDonald's ice cream cones frequently now (ew? no, come on! and they're only around 50 cents), I cut off a lot of my hair, and um that's all I got.

YAY tomorrow is Friday. I need to get a lot done this weekend, but this is all I really feel like doing:

crazy cake request

Hi, blog. I haven't forgotten you. I'm super busy with the start of the semester.

 This past weekend we celebrated our friend Jared's birthday. Meg and I asked him what kind of cake he wanted and he responded, "well...something I've wanted for years is a chocolate chipotle blueberry cake...with cream cheese frosting." I responded with "cool, we'll do that" trying to mask the wtf thoughts going off in my head. Meg and I agreed to fulfill his wishes, compromising our baking reputation among our friends if necessary.

We used this recipe for chocolate chipotle cake that actually has a nutella cream cheese frosting. We cut back on half of the nutella in the frosting and replaced it with blueberry jam. In the middle layer, we added more blueberry jam (& some powdered sugar) to the frosting and used that as our filling.

Surprisingly, it turned out to be really good, although it's extremely rich. It's as close to a flourless cake without actually being one. I think one of our halves could have baked a couple minutes longer, only adding to the fudginess. Birthday boy was really happy with it.

The chipotle isn't noticable until you stop eating the cake and then you git a small kick. If you want to make a rich fudgy cake, this would be a hit (and you can skip the blueberry stuff).

Happy Birthday Daddy!

I'm posting this a little late in the day, but happy birthday dad! (Don't worry, I talked to him this morning too.) LOVE YOU!

and to everyone else...happy almost Friday!

Congratulatory Sausalito Cookies

Congrats Eric! This month has been really busy, including two different sets of parent visits, and Eric's graduation. Eric started college in Florida years ago and took a break for a few years to pursue music. He finished his degree here in Austin. I can't believe he's finally finished; every time his degree seemed to be in sight, an adviser would inform him about classes not transferring or there would be some really low level silly class he'd have to take.

He's had a fairly interesting experience being older than most students in his classes, usually coming through as an annoyance of their immaturity or lack of interest. He did get a lot of insight from me from the other side of the college classroom; he learned about all the pet peeves I have and how most professors get nervous still on the first day of class.

Bachelor of Economics! Woot! Instead of a cake, he requested I make Sausalito cookies (macadamia nuts & chocolate). I used this recipe and used dark, milk and white chocolate chunks. YUM.