Visions of Madeleines dancing in my head

A few months ago I was probing through the vast Internet just searching away when I came across a recipe for Madeleines. Since I did not have a traditional Madeleine pan I quickly dismissed the idea that these spectacular french tea cakes would be baking in my oven anytime soon. It just so happened that I have an antique dealer friend who also does estates sale and she asked my to accompany and help her with a sale today. Guess what I found! Come on just guess....... yep, a never used Madeleine pan. And that isn't all. I also found some decorating tips for frosting and I am the proud new owner of a new cookbook. (My husband groaned but it had a lot of pictures and since we all know that I am picture kinda girl I couldn't pass it up)


The entire day at the estate sale I could not wait to get home and try baking Madeleines. And that is exactly what I did. And they were so good. My mom had one and told me how they reminded her of my grandmother's tea cakes. I used the following recipe from Cooks and they turned out great. I would, however, recommend turning the heat down to 375 so they don't get over brown.


Madeleine Recipe


4 eggs


2 c. sugar


2 c. flour


1 1/2 c. clarified butter (or Promise Spread)


1 tbsp. vanilla


Confectioners' sugar
Stir eggs and sugar into top of double boiler until creamy and lukewarm. Remove from heat and beat until cool; add flour gradually, mixing well. Fold in butter and vanilla.
Use special shell-shaped Madeline molds that have been buttered and floured (or small 1 1/2 inch muffin pans). Fill molds 2/3 full; fill muffin tins less than 1/2 full. Bake in a 425 degree oven for ten minutes or until lightly browned. Dust cooled tea cakes with powdered sugar. Yield: 5 dozen.

My $2 Madeleine find.

Look at the buttery goodness. Yum


My cake decorating find. Where were these when I need them yesterday while making Dale's birthday cake?

My new cookbook. I am sure that I will be posting adventures from here soon.

A tribute to pie!

Things around here have been pretty uneventful (which I love), leaving me an ample amount of time to snoop around and see what other people out there are doing. I have really taken a liking to reading Farm Girl Fare and Finny Knits, both are highly entertaining and have some wonderful cooking ideas. Tonight, hubby and I decided to make the tomato pie that both Farm girl and Finny made and changed a few things to make it our own. It was delicious! The crust designed by Farm Girl was the most amazing crust I think I have ever had. I highly suggest her recipe that you can click on above.

I also decided that I really needed to make a dessert pie since we all know you can never have enough pie. I had really wanted a blueberry pie with the frozen berries we had picked but i am soooo hoarding them for no apparent reason than greediness. And since strawberries were not on sale I opted for the "on sale" peaches. Gotta be frugal and all.

I experimented with with my crust once again and did add the shortening as suggested by my mother but it just wasn't perfect. In fact I had a small meltdown while rolling the dough and hubby had to come to the rescue. I did lattice the top and it turned out better than I thought it would with the dough being all stupid and all. I don't think I have ever sworn that much in the kitchen before and I seriously thought I might cry. The only thing that should make me cry in the kitchen are the onions, damnit!

Peach Filling

8-10 peaches, peeled and sliced

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

3 tsp cinnamon

3 tbsp flour

Other than than me swearing at the crust there were no other problems and the pie turned out very tasty. I suggest serving it warm with vanilla ice cream. Yum.

Yum....

Today Dale brought home all kinds of goodies from the farmer's market. Fresh collard greens, okra, beets, and lemon basil. For dinner we feasted on fried okra, collard greens, cornbread, ham, and mashed potatoes. It was an amazing dinner and I had every intention of taking pictures of this fine feast but it was gone before I could get my camera.
For my collard greens and my fried okra I used recipes from Paula Deen. Her recipes never disappoint. I have included the links to these recipes below and I highly recommend them.
As most of you know I am still learning the ropes in the kitchen and today I actually felt I faired well. It was extremely rewarding to watch the fruits of my labor get gobbled up by my loved ones. So much so that I cant wait for dinner tomorrow.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/collard-greens-recipe/index.html
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/fried-okra-recipe/index.html
As Paula Deen would say, "Best Dishes Ya'll"

Preserving the taste of summer.

Summer is all about fresh and I wish it would last all year long. Although I cant make the weather maintain its sunny warmth all year, I can maintain a sense of summer at my table. Lately I have been freezing all of the left over herbs that did not get sold at the farmer's market. I wash them and place them into ice cube trays and freeze them. After my herbs are frozen into cubes, bag them into ziploc freezer bags. It is amazing. I used some frozen dill for fish the other day and it tasted like I had just plucked it from the garden.