V-Day Baking

Happy V-day. To celebrate my day I did a 4 mile walk/run to benefit Legal Services of Northern California. It was a lot of fun and supported a great cause. Most importantly, it did not rain so I did not have to fear catching pneumonia.

But I digress, that is not the point of this post. So, ON TO THE BAKING!

For V-day I wanted to make something I usually make special and a completely new recipe.

Red Velvet Bon-Bons
Is it cake? Is it candy? Is it the best of both worlds? YES! I saw a recipe for red velvet cake balls on Bakerella’s site well over a year ago. When it was warm, I did not want to tackle the recipe and worry about the chocolate not setting up in my warm apartment. Then as the weather got cold, I forgot that I wanted to make these. Then low-and-behold V-Day 2009 rolled around and I thought the red center to a classic V-day treat would be awesome.
Everyone loved these, so I will definitely be making them again in the future. I would like to tweak the recipe some, so stay tuned.
Deconstructed Chocolate chip Cookies
I make regular chocolate chip cookies all the time with great results. So to change it up I wanted to deconstruct the cookie, i.e.- make a chocolate chip cookie batter (yes, it is different than a sugar cookie batter) without the chocolate chips, then place the chocolate on the outside. The results are okay, but when making the dough I should have decreased the margarine in the batter. The cookies spread a lot while cooking and spread out thinner than I would have liked. Therefore, I made these smaller cookies, instead of the giant ones I had planned.
They still tasted fantastic and if I did not tell you right above that I wanted to do something different no one would have known the difference, but I believe in transparency. Maybe someone else can learn from my mistakes :-)

On a slightly me tooting my own horn moment. At the race I went to today there was a table set up selling homemade chocolate chip cookies. One of the girls at the table said they were the best she ever tasted. My friend and I politely declined and walked away. Then my friend turned to me and said, “she hasn’t tasted yours!” That made me smile. So, I just had to share that moment. I love to bake and I love that people love what I bake.

HAPPY VALENTINE’S DAY TO ONE AND ALL… SINGLE, COUPLED, TOGETHER, APART OR OTHERWISE!