Monday, December 15, 2008

Rainy Day Baking



The rainy weather here in Windanseaville is just another excuse not to leave home, in my opinion. This is as close to winter as we get, and with a pot of chicken tortilla soup on the stove and the fire lit it's heaven on earth. A little knitting, a little baking, a good movie on tivo....even if I have to do a little work, the rest of the day is fantastic. Directly after reading this post by Bea this morning, I went to the kitchen and baked donut muffins. I even doubled the recipe so I could deliver some to a friend I had a meeting with and still have plenty for the girls.



Did I mention that Fiona is home for winter break? The tortilla soup (the Barefoot Contessa recipe with leftover roasted chicken shredded into it) was for her - I promised I wouldn't make it until she was home to eat it! The soup was last night's dinner, accompanied by a pumpkin tarte. The tarte was a hit, so you're seeing what's left over, i.e., not much. The filling is basically the recipe on the Libby's can except that I used eggnog from a carton in place of the evaporated milk, and I baked it in a tarte pan with a gingernap cookie crust. Topped with maple whipped cream (3 cups heavy cream, whip until soft peaks, add about 1/2 c maple syrup - not pancake syrup - whip until the consistency you prefer) it is all kinds of good things on one plate. It makes enough for a 10" tarte plus 4 little 4" tartelettes (cuz you know you've gotta taste it before you serve it to people!).



The muffins are pretty fab, too - I only dredged the tops in powdered sugar so they're not actually too sweet - good with a cup of coffee on a rainy afternoon.

3 comments:

At Home Mommy Knits said...

The soup and muffin recipes look great. We have another snow storm headed our way in a couple of days and I think I think I will be getting the ingredients today at the store to make them while we're stuck inside :)

Tracy Batchelder said...

It all looks delicious!

g-girl said...

you're making me hungry with all this yummy food!