sorry sorry sorry!

wow, it's been over 2 weeks since i last posted. jeez. but in my defense, i have been extremely busy! i'm trying to get caught up with my online english class (the bookstore didn't get my books in until a MONTH after classes started) as well as study for history tests and the SAT and practicing piano as much as possible, since i've decided to be a piano performance major at university of north texas. i have to get together a "portfolio" cd with six pieces on it sent in ASAP. basically, my life has been doing school and playing piano for the past 14 days. intense!

so i obviously haven't had much time for blogging unfortunately, much less baking. but hopefully things will calm down a bit soon and i can get back to semi-regular posting.


i bought the happy herbivore sneak-peek e-cookbook! i made the chocolate chip cookies with the suggested alteration of subbing 2 tbsp cocoa for 2 tbsp of the flour, as well as doubled the recipe. they turned out delicious! i didn't bother to try to shape them into nice circles though, i really just wanted to get them in the oven and cooking so i could eat them, haha. sorry about the bad lighting!



also, i made the pecan cinnamon buns, leaving out the pecans and icing because i don't like that stuff. i sprinkled cinnamon sugar on top though. these were great! next time i'll add a bit more sugar to the dough to make up for the icing.



this was all in one day. so with cinnamon buns for breakfast and a ton of cookies plus the REQUIRED licking of the bowl/spoons/anything with batter on it i'm a little sugared-out. this week i'll get back to my normal (kind of) healthy eating. ;)

chocolate-chip oatmeal cookies.

cute and yummy cookies from the soy of cooking! actually they were supposed to be cranberry-oatmeal cookies but i really wanted chocolate chip ones :P i actually made no modifications besides that (for once), otherwise i would post the recipe. it's a book worth checking out though, it has a ton of great recipes.

my puppy--i say that, but she's really ten years old--was sitting in the kitchen the whole time, hoping i would drop something so she could have a little snack, but she eventually gave up to sit in the corner.



sorry wendy, none for you!

pocket pies.

i actually had nothing to do this morning. no school and i didn't have to go into work till 11. perfect day for a special breakfast treat! so i made pocket pies, based on a vegweb recipe.



very simple; i just used 1 cup whole wheat pastry flour and 1/2 cup margarine and a bit of water, rolled them out, and filled them. two were filled with strawberry all-fruit spread, one had blackberry, and one had some leftover chocolate sauce i made for my chocolate cake!




this one is strawberry.
not very cute--i might have done better if i had been awake for a few more hours--but quite tasty.

bonus: a NOT-plain banana! dipped in the same chocolate sauce and coated in sprinkles.




awkward-looking picture :P those things don't photograph well.
the sauce also worked perfectly for strawberry-dipping. i had no idea it would be so versatile!

satisfying my cake craving.

i finally got around to baking today! my aunt who evacuated from lafayette is staying with us for awhile so i decided to make the super moist chocolate cake from vegweb i've been dying to try. no, really, i think i have been dying from cake withdrawal. it's been two weeks since i last had some! thank god i had an excuse to make one.



basically the only change i made to the recipe was to replace about 1/3rd of the cocoa powder with dark cocoa powder. i am a huge fan of dark chocolate. if it was humanly possible to marry it, i would.

i made some frosting from a recipe i found somewhere (don't remember) that was basically a container of silken tofu, a few tablespoons of cocoa, some vanilla, and a lot of powdered sugar. it ended up like pudding. i tried adding more powdered sugar and it just got sweeter. i tried adding a bit of toffuti cream cheese but it didn't thicken up at all. so i just poured it over and topped it with some strawberries.




my cake presentation skills are severely lacking, but at least it tasted good. i am really nothing like my mother. she made me a chocolate treasure chest cake for my 6th birthday. literally, a treasure chest made out of cake. she filled it with chocolate coins and all this other stuff. insane.

i just realized how many food pictures i have with strawberries in them!