Blueberry Buckle

Blueberry Buckle. I just love saying it. It calls images to mind of farm life and vintage aprons tied around waists, warm pans cooling on open kitchen window sills, and summer breezes. Of course, it's colder than ever here in the grey cottage. We are in the depths of winter here in New Hampshire - blueberries are a fond memory of summertime.

An Easy Little Coffeecake and Comment on 'The Yankee Way'

Hazelnut Coffee Ring

The house smells divine right now - like toasted nuts and chocolate and baking pastry! While this coffee ring cools just a bit, I'll tell you about this super easy four ingredient coffee break treat!

Apricot, Walnut, and Lavender Cake

Today was a day for baking a cake and there is one that I have been meaning to make for a good time. It comes from a Yotam Ottolenghi cookbook called Plenty More. I have been waiting for the fruit to come into our markets, though. They have finally arrived !

A Birthday Coffeecake ... and a Dream

A post about a pretty perfect birthday or breakfast coffeecake and a wonderful dream .....

Maple Apple Cake - Gluten Free and Great

I very rarely return to a recipe within a few weeks, even if I love the recipe. Those food bloggers who make a recipe to the letter the first time, and then return right a way to adapt it and perfect it before posting it are a different breed of cooks. I am a food diarist. What you see is what you get and if I adapt a recipe, I usually adapt it right out of the gate because I've read the recipe through and thought about it's ingredients or the cooking instructions, or the constraints of my pantry or the likes and dislikes of our house full of hungry folk, or, or, or ...

That being said, I want you to meet this Maple Apple Cake. This cake (above) started out as Rum Apple Cake, a recipe straight from The FOOD 52 Cookbook.

Triple Apple Cake

Look at this sticky, sweet/tart cake ! I was originally thinking that it should be served warm with a  big gob of vanilla ice cream along side, but ...

A Little Cake-y

 

... a pretty little patty pan of a pastry ... but, what's under that crust, you ask ? ....

New Year's Festive Apricot Streusel Crumble Cake

An early morning baking session yielded a softly sweet streusel-strewn coffee cake that was perfect for snacking with mid-morning (that would be SB) tea. Later in the day, it became a cozy dessert with a pot of hot tea.

Puddings, Cakes, and Bakes ... A Random Recipe

This month's random recipe brings us to the back of the book, so to speak ... the sweets and baked goods that end a good meal or give us a little bit of sweetness alongside tea or coffee. So here we go ...

Pflaumenkuchen with Almond Streusel

The plums of September are not the plums of August ... no huge round orbs of sweet flesh with tangy after bite. The prune plums of September are small blueish ovals, sweet and fleshy and easy to go soft.

Every autumn, one sees the foragers in Germany gathering these blue prune plums along agricultural paths or off along the walkways of parks. Home they go with their cache to make pans of Pflaumenkuchen for their daily Kaffetrinken. This 'cake' is a soft cross between a coffeecake and a soft bread with a fruit topping (kinda like a pizza, SB, but NOT !)

Deni's Cranberry Coffee Cake

An easy and delicious use of leftover cranberry relish .... that's where this recipe started its run at the grey cottage (and before that, at the Hopkinton Homestead). My dear friend, Deni always made this for staff brunches and also as holiday coffee break treats for our little classroom staff kaffeeklatsches. She graciously shared her recipe all those years ago and I have been making it at least two times a year ever since!