a long day at canada's wonderland

You know how you feel after a long hot day, waiting in endless lines and walking for miles at Canada's wonderland? It was pointed out to me the other day that that's what I looked like... I laughed my face off and realized how accurate a description it was. I felt like a long day at Canada's wonderland. Two whole weeks full of open and close shifts. That was it, opens and closes. It was exhausting and I'm so thankful that I made it through, even if I did look like I'd been hit by a bus.

The last two days off have been wonderful... frustratingly wonderful as much as that's an oxymoron. I decided to wake up as early as I could both days and spend my time catching up on some very missed baking.

I've been experimenting with spelt lately. It's kicking my ass. I wish I had a less dramatic way of explaining it but really, it's knocking me down over and over. Josh is adorably supportive, reminding me that I'm going to have to fail a lot before I'm successful. I get that, but I'm also impatient. Couldn't I succeed a little bit and fail a bit too instead of just failure after failure after failure? But I guess that's just my half empty way of looking at it. I did learn, and that's the point right? I learned that I don't really like spelt. So take that ancient grain. Ok, again with the drama, I don't completely hate you, but alone, I don't enjoy the way you taste. I do appreciate your health benefits, and I'm in love with the idea of you but I've yet to have any first hand experience with how wonderful you can be. I'll hold out though... and I'll change my mind if the day you work for me ever comes around, but until then you will have to share the bowl with other sturdier flours that actually do work for me.

End rant.

Day off one was spent coming to my spelt realization. To end the day of failure I made a dinner that I knew would feed my soul enough to put me back in the right head space for day two of baking.

It worked.

Lime grilled chicken over greens with strawberries, pecans, avocado, red onions, goat cheese and a maple balsamic dressing.

I love salad.

Day two day off was equally as wonderful as day one if you consider that I spent the whole time in the kitchen... but it was still filled with frustration. My oven hates me... I'm blaming it on the oven. (my inexperience with yeast could quite possibly have something to do with it too, but I'm still blaming the oven.) I made whole wheat rolls and oatmeal rolls, both recipes from school. They were alright... Maybe my expectations were too high... They had hard bottoms and tops that weren't golden brown enough. I think I'm going to have to fail a whack load more with this yeast business before I start making bread the way I can make cupcakes... Cupcakes I can do, especially when they come in the form of my chocolate cupcakes. I could make those with my eyes closed. I got asked to make cupcakes for a book club meeting and so to boost my ego I decided to make them fancy. Cupcakes I can do.

Chocolate cupcakes dipped in a mocha ganache and topped with a raspberry buttercream.

Side note: I managed to find a use for the freeze dried raspberries. Toot toot.

Of course I had leftovers... holy heck, delicious!

So this brings me to the end of two wonderfully frustrating days that in retrospect were kinda just wonderful. Next time I say I'm going to spend the whole day baking, I'll be sure to be more specific in saying I would like to spend two days baking goods that are successful... but I guess success is all relative...

At least I don't look like a long day at Canada's wonderland anymore.

coffee love and bringing life back to basics

If baking is my first love then I think coffee would have to be a close second.

My love for coffee started quite a few years back, one milk one sugar from Tims, endless days of chillin' with my little big brother in the red ranger. I have the fondest of memories from those days, though like most things they didn't last nearly long enough. The days of having no real responsibilities, just endless time on our hands, listening to Biggy and 50, doing doughnuts, just cruisin'... and like those days, my love of tim horton's one milk one sugar turned into one milk and then to black and then to I can't drink their coffee at all.

I must give credit where credit is due to my sister Margie and my Dad for introducing me to Starbucks. They have been strong advocates of their coffee for much longer than I have. I remember in the beginning tasting nothing but burnt... strong burnt. And then something happened, or maybe my taste buds did their 7 year flip and it wasn't strong burnt so much anymore as coffee. Yummy coffee! I drank Pike Place for a very short period before moving onto their bolder more flavourful coffees (though I'm not going to knock pike... It for sure has a time and a place, I just don't happen to be in either the time or place very often.)

We, Margie my dad and I, have spent many hours of conversation over a venti bold (personal tall decaf for papa), and like the days of the red ranger, I treasure the time we've spent over a good cup of coffee.

I'm blessed for my family, and I'm blessed because of coffee.

Since moving to St. Catharines so I could go to baking school at Niagara College, I've taken up the job of being a shift supervisor at Starbucks. I love my job. I love being a barista. I love making drinks, and I love the family I've made with my partners. Like any job, there have been many ups and downs... my first shift closing I got punched in the chest... twice... two managers left, inadequate training, someone else left on stress leave, came back, left again... It was my Starbucks family that got me through that... and my sister, and my fiance, who wasn't always my fiance.

During the craziness of our lives at 4th Ave the first night we closed at 6pm, October 4th, 2010, after working a 10 hour day, kinda beaten down, trying not to break, I came home and Joshua went from being my boyfriend to my fiance. Pajamas and a beater, dancing to no music at all, it made everything different... it made everything better.

In the months to follow, like any job, there were still more ups and downs, and again it was my starbucks family, my sister, and my fiance who got me through it... are getting me through it. I am blessed for my family and I am blessed because of Coffee.

Back to basics isn't just about baking, though it was born out of a desire to keep things simplier in my kitchen... as cliche as it is, I'm learning that it's so much bigger than flour and sugar and the end result. It's about how I get there, what I learned on the way, and how many cups of coffee were drank through it all. I love my life and I love where I'm taking myself, but even more, I love how I try with everything I do to bring things back to basics...

begin.

cookies for chocolate... and a little bit more.

My fiance Josh works for Chocolate F/X. It's a girls dream, I have to say, I just love that he comes home smelling like Willy Wonka... or at least how I imagine Willy Wonka smelling. He has wonderful bosses who genuinely appreciate the work he does and lately, they've been super good to me too!

I got asked to make my oatmeal dark chocolate cherry cookies for a presentation that Art was making. I'm still not overly sure what the presentation was for, all I knew was that I had to use these bits called Fruchaka instead of the chocolate and cherries. 4 dozen cookies later, and (fingers crossed) hopefully a great presentation, Art and Wilma gave me as a thank you some goodies.

First, a 40kg bag of sugar... I've never seen a 40kg bag of sugar. Actually I still haven't but it's on it's way. They also gave me a whole bag of semi sweet chocolate chips that rival the chocolate chips PC uses in their decadent chocolate chip cookies. So yummy! I can't wait to start using them!

The other thing they gave me is a bag of freeze dried raspberries. I've never heard of freeze dried raspberries. To be honest, the only thing I know about freeze dried anything is that astronauts eat diets that consist mostly of freeze dried foods. Or so I think anyway, things could very well have changed since I learned about that in like 4th grade. But anyway, they gave me a bag of them... and I'm not talking a small bag I'm talking a BIG bag. I put a jar of my granola next to it to show off it's sheer size.

This one I'm kinda speechless on. I'm going to have to do some research with what to do with them.

I can't wait for the sugar!!! SWEET!

maple bacon spelt biscuits

Ever since I started using spelt flakes in my granola I've become a little obsessed.

I've got a lot of ideas, but very little experience with using spelt, so I've been researching as much as I can about this ancient grain. The idea for maple bacon biscuits came about while developing a fictitious menu for my final project in baking management class. There aren't many recipes out there for spelt biscuits, especially not with maple, so I decided to kinda wing it. I know you can't substitute equal parts of sugar for maple syrup so I made a slight adjustment... and then an extra 150g of organic spelt flour later to account for all that added moisture and the result was... well not too bad. Absolutely edible, but not overly mapley... or bacony. I ended up brushing the tops with maple syrup right after they got out of the oven which helped, but it wasn't what I was going for. Anyway, despite the lack of the two flavours in the title, these biscuits turned out super crumbly with a distinct nutty flavour from the spelt.