This recipe brought back memories of baking with my Mom when I was growing up. She relied on her battered, red Betty Crocker cookbook. The binding was falling apart and the spine was stretched by all the clipped recipes that she stuffed in the front of the book. This was the late 70's-early 80's. Italian food was still considered "International". There wasn't a single Mexican recipe in the whole book. There was a recipe for something called "Sukiyaki". I'm not sure what that was, Mom never made it. She did make Waikiki Meatballs and kept them warm in a tan CrockPot during parties. We made the potato salad every summer for just about every family picnic or cookout or crab feed. We baked snicker doodles, chocolate chip cookies and sand tarts every Christmas. And she made the pineapple upside down cake (with canned pineapple, but no maraschino cherries. Mom didn't like them) and it was awesome. My brothers and I used to fight over who got the piece with the most pineapple.

I'm going to make this recipe the next time Mom comes to visit. I hope it brings back the same good memories for her. My Mom is the reason that I learned to cook. She was the first person that taught me that putting good food on the table for your family is an act of love. I got the message, Mom. I can't wait to have you and Dad over for dinner again soon.

This was an easy recipe. It took me a little over an hour—and that included stopping to take pictures. One big time saver for me—I used Pam Baking spray (the one with flour). It's way faster than buttering and flouring the pans. As an added bonus, the contours of the shell shape are a little cleaner. I have a set of old vintage tinned-steel pans that were a gift from my mother-in-law. She bought them back in the 60's when she was taking a French cooking class. They are beautiful!

The recipe seemed a little plain to me, so I added some Lemon Juice Powder. (I swear I don't work for King Arthur Flour.) One teaspoon of the powder added a little zing (so did the glaze I added...more on that later.)

First, we put the eggs, yolks and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer and whisk it lightly with the wire attachment. This was a little awkward, but simple enough.

Next, we whip the egg mixture until it is "airy, pale, and tripled in volume, like softly whipped cream." Don't forget to add the vanilla! The recipe said it would take 4 to 5 minutes. It took me more like 9 or 10.

That's okay, though. It gave me plenty of time to sift my lemon juice powder, cake flour, salt and 1 tablespoon of sugar (yes, I remembered to save it out). Don't skip this step. It's important to aerate the flour. This will allow you to mix it into the eggs without deflating them too much.

Then, you gently fold the flour mixture into your beautiful poufy eggs in three additions. Do you have to do it in three additions? Yes! If you dump it all in at once, you'll never get it incorporated without popping all those tiny bubbles you whipped into the batter.

The next step is to scoop a dollop of batter into the melted butter and mix it together. Here is one place where I think the recipe needs to be amended. This is a génoise batter. Every other génoise that I've made instructs you to keep the butter warm. They're VERY specific about this (pastry chefs can be intimidating.) The other génoise we made from this book didn't have you keep the butter warm, and mine didn't turn out. (There was a layer of gummy yuckiness stuck to the bottom of the pan.) Maybe it was something else, but I wasn't taking any chances. I melted the butter at the last minute and mixed it while it was still hot. Just a few turns of the spatula worked it in.

I poured this back in the main bowl and folded it all together. I sprayed my madeleine pans with Baking Pam (the one with flour). I used a cookie scoop to fills my molds. It was too much batter for my pastry bag, plus, I hate cleaning those things. It's important not to overfill these pans. Otherwise, they'll grow together into one, big, ugly mass on the top of your pan, instead of cute, dainty, girly, shell-shaped cakes. The pan below is actually a little bit overfilled.

Despite it all, they turned out okay. And didn't stick a bit. Yay, modern technology! (Okay, aerosol cans of oil and starch aren't that new, but it sure beats butter and a pastry brush.)

 Now, for the awful truth. They were a tad dry, even fresh out of the oven. The lemon flavor was nice, but subtle.

I was reminded that génoise is usually soaked with a flavored simple syrup and then iced or filled with something yummy. I didn't want to soak them with syrup. These are finger food and that would be too messy. But they needed something, so I made a lemon glaze. I used the glaze from the lemon-lime cupcakes recipe on KA Flour's website. (I know I seem like a KA fanatic.) It's super easy. Melt butter, sift powdered sugar, lemon juice powder on top, whisk in some water and you're done. Can you skip sifting? Sure, if you like lumps in your glaze.

I had to add extra water. The recipe said to aim for the consistency of molasses. I got pretty close. I dipped each cookie in the glaze and sprinkled them with a little yellow sanding sugar. You could use lemon zest, too. That would be prettier (and classier), but I wasn't afraid that my son would turn up his nose at zest. Don't dip all of them and then try to sprinkle the decoration on top. The glaze dries REALLY quickly. I actually had to whisk in a little water halfway through to keep it from getting too stiff.

So we had glazed lemon madeleines. And they were pretty good. For about 12 hours or so. Did I mention there were 24 of them? There was no way we could finish them in one day. The next morning they were decidedly stale and by that evening they were pretty much inedible.

I don't think I'd make these again, at least not as madeleines. But I'm excited by the possibilities for ladyfingers. Think tiramisu, and trifles, and charlottes! I hope we try this recipe again as a component in a more complex recipe.

What did you guys think of this? Will this become part of your repertoire?

This recipe is very well written. Trust the recipe! The authors went out of their way to explain what would happen. This dough goes from crumbly and yucky to smooth and silky in about 11 minutes. Not to get geeky, but it's pretty amazing. I guess the water from the potatoes takes some time to incorporate into the dough.

The rising times are really fast. This dough doesn't fool around. You shape the dough (which takes no time at all) and let it rise again for just 20 minutes. It bakes up golden brown and beautiful. And I made it to the ballpark in time to enjoy my free hot dog! We ate the first loaf with dinner that night, and the second loaf went in the freezer for later. This is my favorite bread recipe from Baking with Julia so far. This one's a keeper at my house. I can't wait to make sandwiches with it! What did you guys think?

We take cookies pretty seriously at our house. We have our favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe. My husband says it's perfect. (It's the Cooks Illustrated Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe with a dusting of kosher salt.) He didn't mind the coffee or the fruit (I used dried cranberries. I didn't have any apricots in the house.), but he objected to the ratio of cookie dough to chocolate. He likes more cookie and less chocolate. I really like chocolate, but I think he's right. These might've been better with less chocolate.

This time around I had a helper in the kitchen. My son isn't a big fan of cooking (yet), but he loves to crack eggs. He's a little messy, but he doesn't mind getting his hand dirty. (kind of like his Mom.) What did you guys think of these cookies? Did they make your favorites list?

The key to this recipe is planning and understanding that you can take a break at almost any time. Just stash the dough in freezer and come back to it later. The recipe can be divided into three phases: (1)mixing the dough, (2)incorporating the butter into the dough, and (3)shaping/proofing/baking the individual croissants. You can find the text of the recipe here. Thank you to Amanda at Girl + Food = Love. I encourage you to watch the video with Julia and Esther McManus. In her no-nonsense French way, Ms. McManus makes it clear that although this isn't easy, it is worth doing. Also, it takes practice to make the perfect pastry, so cut yourself some slack.

1. Mixing the dough was the easy part: dump all of the ingredients in a KA bowl and mix. (BTW, I substituted 1.5 Tablespoons of instant yeast for the fresh yeast. I also microwaved the milk just to take the chill off of it.) I used most of the reserved milk. My kitchen is very dry in the winter. Since my bowl was dirty anyway, I mixed the butter and the flour, too. Both the dough and the butter were wrapped in plastic and stashed in the fridge.

2. The next step required a rolling pin, flour and lots of patience. I also used my (ridiculously heavy) marble pastry slab. I envy those of you with shiny granite countertops. You roll out the dough, put the butter slab in it, and fold the dough over top. You roll that out and then make three turns. You have to refrigerate the dough between each turn, both because the dough must stay cold AND because it needs to relax. After too much rolling, the dough just snaps back. Again, I encourage you to watch the video. I thought the directions in the book were okay, but the video is so much better. After the third "wallet" fold, you wrap it up and refrigerate it again.

3. Finally, it's baking day! But wait, after you roll, cut, fill, shape and brush your croissants; then you have to wait for them to rise for three hours! So much for a morning treat, unless I want to get up at 5:00am on a Sunday morning. (Just for the record, no, I do not.) So we had them for dessert after lunch.

But finally, the payoff! They are the best croissants I've ever made, bar none. Don't be afraid to really brown these. The ones that I initially thought were too dark tasted much better than the blonder almond-filled ones. I only made half the batch. The other half of the finished dough is waiting for me in the freezer. I will definitely have to try the chocolate version. I might even order the little semisweet batons. King Arthur's website sells them. Aren't they cute? Ms. McManus put two batons in each pain au chocolat. But maybe three would work... Or four.

Look at those layers! According to what I've read, the steam from the water in the butter raises these things as much as the yeast. I guess all of that rolling and folding was worth it. What did you guys think? Did you have croissant success?

The recipe tells you to "choose a chocolate that you love", so I pulled out the big guns. I got a block of Sharffen-Berger 70% bittersweet. This chocolate is fruity with a big finish, so I was hoping it would really shine in the final cake.

A couple of notes about this recipe:

• I mixed the cake by hand and it gets really stiff after you beat some of the butter in. "Room-temperature" in my kitchen in February is around 66°F. I had to microwave the butter until it was just on the edge of melting to finish mixing it into the batter.

• The directions say to bake the cake for "exactly 30 minutes." After 23 minutes, the cake still looked raw and shiny. I was positive that it wouldn't be ready. I was wrong. It had the promised "thin, dry crust" after exactly 30 minutes.

• The part of the recipe that really worried me was "the flip". I was concerned that the plastic wrap would melt onto the hot pan. I was also worried that the warm cake would break apart and fall on the floor. Do you know the Julia Child-Potato Pancake story? (Read it here: the 2nd chapter.) Julia said, "When you flip anything, you just have to have the courage of your convictions." I must've had more courage than I thought, since it stayed in one piece. We miss you, Julia!

But enough about the process, the real question is: does this cake pay off? Is this cake the deep, dark, chocolate extravagance of my dreams? I'm happy to say, "yes, yes it is." As a matter of fact, I would recommend thin slices, since this cake is intense. I would also recommend not skipping the white chocolate cream. I know there are a lot of white chocolate haters out there (you know who you are!), but the warm, soft, rich cake really benefits from the cold, firm, bourbon-ey cream. If you're really not into white chocolate, you could probably get a similar effect with the ice cream of your choice. A drizzle of raspberry sauce might be nice, too.

Boca Negra
Makes 12 servings. A boca negra, or black mouth, is what you'll have after one bite of this intensely chocolaty cake—you'll also have a smile on your face. A chocolate craver's ideal, this cake calls for twelve ounces of bittersweet chocolate and you'll taste every ounce, so choose chocolate you love. The cake is meant to be served warm or at room temperature, when it is as moist, dense and dark as the chocolate you use to make it. Chilled, it has all the appeal of fudge. The white chocolate cream, which is made a day ahead, is one you can use with other desserts, and neither the cake nor the cream is a challenge for beginner bakers. In fact, if you make it in the food processor, it takes only five minutes.

The Cream
12 ounces white chocolate, finely chopped
1 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup Bourbon (or more to taste)

Prepare the cream at least one day in advance. Put the white chocolate in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the metal blade or a blender container. Heat the heavy cream until small bubbles form around the edge of the pan. Pour the cream over the chocolate and process until completely smooth. Add the bourbon, taste, and add up to a tablespoon more if you want. Turn into a container with a tight-fitting lid and chill overnight. (The cream can be kept in the refrigerator for a week or frozen for up to a month. If you've frozen the cream, thaw it overnight in the refrigerator.)

The Cake
12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 1/3 cups sugar, divided
1/2 cup bourbon
2 sticks (8 ounces) unsalted butter, cut into 10 pieces, at room temperature
5 large eggs, at room temperature
1 1/2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly butter a 9-inch round cake pan and line the bottom with parchment or wax paper; butter the paper. Put the cake pan in a shallow roasting pan and set aside until needed.

Put the chopped chocolate in a medium bowl and keep close at hand. In a 2-quart saucepan, mix 1 cup of the sugar and the bourbon and cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until the sugar dissolves and the mixture comes to a full boil. Immediately pour the hot syrup over the chocolate and stir with a rubber spatula until the chocolate is completely melted and the mixture is smooth. Piece by piece, stir the butter into the chocolate mixture. Make certain that each piece of butter is melted before you add another.

Put the eggs and the remaining 1/3 cup sugar in a medium bowl and whisk until the eggs thicken slightly. Beating with the whisk, add the eggs to the chocolate mixture and whisk until well blended. Gently whisk in the flour.

If you use the food processor: Put the chocolate in the work bowl. Bring all of the sugar and bourbon to a full boil and pour the syrup into the work bowl; process until the mixture is completely blended, about 12 seconds. With the machine running, add the butter in pieces, followed by the eggs, one at a time, and then the flour. Process an additional 15 seconds before turning the batter into the prepared pan.

Baking the cake: Pour and scrape the batter into the prepared pan, running your spatula over the top to smooth it. Pour enough hot water into the roasting pan to come about 1 inch up the sides of the cake pan. Bake the cake for exactly 30 minutes, at which point the top will have a thin, dry crust. Remove the cake pan from its water bath, wipe the pan dry, and cover the top of the cake with a sheet of plastic wrap. Invert the cake onto a flat plate, peel off the parchment and quickly but gently invert again onto a serving platter; remove the plastic.

Serve the cake warm or at room temperature with the chilled white chocolate cream.

Storing: Once cooled, the cake can be covered with plastic and kept at room temperature for 1 day or refrigerated for up to 3 days; bring to room temperature before serving. For longer storage, wrap the cake airtight and freeze it; it will keep for up to a month. Thaw overnight, still wrapped, in the refrigerator.

I made the Focaccia for our Super Bowl non-party (It was just the three of us. No blowouts on a Sunday. It's a school night.) We had buffalo chicken nuggets, peppers, celery and carrots with ranch dressing, homemade brioche pretzels with mustard dip, and rosemary focaccia. Ian went to bed when the power went out at the stadium. Thanks to the mysterious force that turned out the lights in New Orleans, I didn't miss any of the second half. Thank you, mysterious force!

Speaking of uncontrollable forces, it seems like this recipe blew out a few mixer motors. I made the dough on Saturday, so I was checking the Tuesdays with Dorie message board to see if anyone had tips on the recipe. I noticed quite a few posts about over-worked mixers. As someone who has broken and repaired her mixer 3 times, I have learned some lessons:

1. Wet dough is easier to mix. My KA mixer has a hard time with really stiff doughs. The first and second breaks were whole wheat bread and bagel dough. (The third time was a very stiff homemade fondant. It dried like cement. I don't want to talk about it.) Both doughs were pretty dry. Hold back the last half cup of flour and add it in only if necessary. It's easier on the mixer than mixing all the flour in and adding water.
2. Less dough is easier to mix. Some recipes just have to much dough for my mixer's 5 quart bowl. In that case, mix the dough until you have a shaggy mass; then remove about half the dough. Let the mixer work on one half of the dough while you hand knead the other. Then swap the dough balls. Just be sure to hand knead the two balls together, so that it's thoroughly mixed. Yes, this is a pain. But so is finding a Kitchen-Aid certified repair shop in your area. Trust me.
3. Shorter kneading time is easier on your mixer. Instead of mixing it all at once. Give your mixer, and your dough a break. This is called an autolyse. I didn't make this up. Really. Check it out at The Fresh Loaf. The wonderful bakers in this community are very generous with their knowledge and advice. You will be amazed at how different your dough will be after a 20 minute rest. And your KA will thank you. This technique works best with a wetter dough. So hold out that last half cup of flour.

I did just that when I mixed the focaccia and never added the flour back in. I'm used to working with a wetter dough. I really think it makes better bread. I encourage you to try it. It gets easier with practice.

I liked these focaccia, but it wasn't my absolute favorite. To be fair, I wasn't giving these my undivided attention. They got a cursory shaping and I forgot to spritz water in the oven during baking. I should probably try them again. I think my Kitchen Aid is up to it. What did you guys think? How did your mixers (or your arms) hold up?

It was delicious and beautiful. I served it with vanilla ice cream as a (nearly) midnight snack.

Thanks to our host this month: Laws of the Kitchen. You can visit the website to see the whole recipe. I followed the recipe exactly, except for the crust. Instead of using shortening for the dough, I used coconut oil. I think it turned out pretty good: flaky and relatively tender. I tried to use my stand mixer, but I had to switch to the food processor. Solid coconut oil is REALLY hard. I had to chip it out of the jar. I also used a little more water than the recipe called for.

I may make this again. The recipe really lets the apple flavor come through, but I'd like to try spicing the filling a little. I'd also like to try it with some different apples. We have access to some great heirloom varieties in the fall. What did you think of the apple tart?

I went photo crazy this week. Don't say I didn't warn you.

First, we make the sponge.

It starts out small...

Then gets larger!

It's a nice smooth dough, just a little sticky. Mine needed a little extra water. But it's really dry at our house. My poor cat has been static-shocked so many times, he's developed a twitch.

It goes into a container for the first rise (which is really the second rise, but they don't count the sponge.)

Meanwhile, let's make the onion confit. Why am I using pearl onions? I am not, dear readers. This is what passes for "yellow onions" at our grocery store. I don't know why they've been so small lately. After peeling, halving and slicing 16 onions, I'm thinking to myself, "this stuff better be amazing".

I melted the butter and put the onions in the pan, with a little salt and pepper and sugar.

After they soften, we add the wine, thyme sprig, vinegar and alcohol (Creme de Cassis is black currant liquor. I didn't have any, so I used homemade raspberry vodka.)

After an hour of cooking, it looks like this. Don't forget to fish out the thyme sprig! The onions taste slightly pickled, but sweet. I think this is going to be good!

Our pizza dough is doubled and ready to go.

I'm going to make both pizzas, since my son will not eat the onion confit (and my husband is willing to try, but doubtful). Their tastes are a little more traditional.

Their pizza will have tomato sauce, mozzarella cheese, onions, peppers, meatballs and pepperoni.

The onion confit pizza will have artichoke hearts, kalamata olives, sopressata and feta cheese, along with a little mozzarella to hold it all together.

I divided the dough and rolled out each half.

The dough is pretty relaxed, so it was easy to do. I even managed to get it more or less round. I always brush the dough with olive oil before I top it. It helps the edges brown.

This is what the onion confit pizza looked like before it went in the oven. I didn't quite use half of it, since I was afraid it would be too wet and weigh down the dough.

It took a full 14 minutes in the oven, but it came out beautiful.

If you don't own a stone or oven tiles, I urge you to get one. It makes a huge difference with pizza. I know they're a little expensive, but I've had the same stone for almost 20 years. It's lasted through countless moves and 2 cross-country trips. (It rides in the car with the Kitchen-Aid mixer and the plants.)

Here is half of the meatball-onion-pepperoni-red pepper pizza. I didn't get a chance to take a picture before they attacked it.

What did we think of the onion confit? I loved it as an ingredient (and so did my husband), but I admit we didn't think much of it on the pizza. The salty feta, olives and artichoke hearts kind of overpowered it. Someone on the Tuesdays with Dorie blog suggested trying the onion confit on baguette slices with goat cheese. I think that might be a better idea. Still, the pizza dough is a winner. It's easy and quick to make. The sponge really adds to the flavor.

What did you think of this week's pizza experiment?

January is for planning and dreaming. I've got more space to garden in this year. We finally put in a third bed. We borrowed my Dad's mini-rototiller and got it done the weekend before Thanksgiving. Notice how green the grass is. It's been a mild fall. Yay for global warming! I filled the bed with compost from our local landfill. 80 lbs of compost for $4.80! You can't beat that. Kudos to Frederick County for having such a great recycling program!

January is also for New Year's resolutions. I'm trying to learn from last year's mistakes (okay, these are mistakes I make every year.)

I plant WAY too much lettuce. It all matures at once, and we can't keep up with it. I swear the slugs ate more of it than we did. So... less lettuce. However, I am going to order some Little Gem lettuce seeds from the Territorial Seed Company. Aren't they sweet?

No more Tomato Envy. I'm going to plant some hybrid tomatoes this year. In the past, I've gone with all heirlooms and I've had very small yields. Heirlooms taste great, but they don't always produce a lot of fruit. Burpee has a Brandy Boy Hybrid that is supposed to be the best of both worlds: flavor and yield. Sounds good to me.

I'm going to buy/build the right supports. In the past, I've rigged supports for beans, cucumbers, and peas out of scrap wood and wire fencing. Unfortunately, it's really hard to harvest when you're trying to reach around splintery wood and sharp wire ends. No more! I've already got some really heavy-duty tomato towers that my Dad found. Maybe we can find something similar for peas, pole beans and cucumbers. Anything is better than splinters and tetanus shots, right?

What are your gardening resolutions? Are you going to try something new this year?