Tartine+Ice Cream

I've made more batches of biscotti this past summer than you'd care to know about. Excepting those kind of crisp "coffee" cookies, I'm really haven't been much of a cookie person lately. Not that I don't like eating them- I am firmly committed to loving that variety of baked good to the end of my life.

Lately, though, when I want to new recipe out, I'm more likely to make something like scones.

This summer I met the Tartine Cookbook. And I instantly fell in love with it. Tartine Bakery is located in San Francisco and purportedly has a ridiculous amount of people lined up outside waiting to enter every day. I've never been, but I believed the rumors after I tried a few recipes out.

(This recipe is for lemon bars.)

I think the thing that made me first love the book was the amazing food photography. I follow a number of food bloggers- not because I'm in the habit of making their recipes, but simply because I'm in love with their photos.
The Tartine Cookbook made me want to visit the bakery, take pictures of it- and eat it in its entirety. Er, I mean just the food.

Anyway, I usually don't say this about those outdated things called "cookbooks." I'm an Allrecipes person. I have entered the twentieth (I mean twenty-first) century. Come and join me. I know you'll like it here.

But I cannot resist Tartine's pictures. Or their food.

Yesterday I saw a recipe in the book for chocolate cookies. As I said, I'd been in a major scone/pastry making mood- but I was busy and this particular recipe looked tempting.

We had a lot of leftover ice cream from a pizza party with friends last Friday. I got the idea to make homemade ice cream sandwiches using the Tartine cookie recipe.

Behold:  (And yes, I'm sure Tartine's cookies are more photogenic than mine. Sorry.)

Now these are not the prettiest ice cream sandwiches. The edges are not scalloped-rather falling off. 

The cookie recipe was a little frustrating. You're supposed to take them out of the oven when the centers are still soft. I learned that I had to trust the recipe, but also use common sense and not remove them from the oven when they're still a pile of hot, gooey chocolate. 

Despite their uncouth appearance, these were SO INCREDIBLY GOOD. And it was all Tartine's fault. 

You can find the recipe here- on some other person's

 blog. I love getting out of "hard" work like typing recipes. Go check it out! (

And remember, LEAVE THE COOKIES on the sheet until they cool a bit. Otherwise, like me, you'll end up with misshapen, bent cookies. Do as I say. Also- the ice cream depicted is mint chocolate chip. It blended nicely with the super-rich cookies.

Love,

Natalie

Cookies

Every August for three years I've made a gift basket for the county fair that takes place close to where I live. The rules are simple:

4 kinds of cookies

6 cookies of each kind

None of the contents of the baskets are tasted. The whole gift-basket thing is basically an exercise in packaging. (And making durable cookies. Or at least learning how to glue and tape broken pieces of food together.)

I won't tell you all the rules for cakes, essays, beer, spices, paper-mache sculptures, fudge, quilts, bread, woodcarving, scarecrow-making, gourd growing, blackberry arranging- and goodness gracious, photography! 

(Don't get me started on that- I'll discuss it later. The photography part of the fair is my absolute favorite place. Seriously. I think I'll just camp out there for a week until the fair is over.)

Anyway.

The baskets are usually themed.

My theme for this year is "flower garden." Not terribly original, but I'm pleased with the results:

I got these amazing plastic bag gift bags a few years ago. I finally used the last of them to wrap up my cookie pops. (And yes, they ARE cookie pops. I stuck the "stems" into florists' foam hidden in the bottom of the basket.)

 

OK, so the frosting on the mushrooms got a little squashed. But I still love the color combination. (Plus they taste wonderful with all the cinnamon and chocolate...)

The chocolate biscotti look kind of unappetizing, and I'm still wincing at that squished polka-dot...but I'm done! Which makes me happy.

The fair starts next week, so sometime later I'll get to go and see if my stuff is still in one piece!

The drop-off date is Saturday, and since I'll be gone until Sunday night, my helpful grandpa is going to deliver the basket and my photos.

Speaking of photos....

Never mind.

I need to finish packing. Louis and I had a contest today to see who could pack the lightest. He won, of course. 

This is the only bag I'm taking. With a few things on the side;) I love my Pindar bag.

All for now,

Natalie

Books, Cookies, And Lucy

To be honest- I have a hard time during the summer staying focused and inspired to do things. After a spring full of essays, theater rehearsals, script-writing, piano recitals and syllabus- everything seemed blank. Which is not to say that I'm always diligent when projects abound- I can and do waste time. (Twitter? Facebook?) But I am the type that either works ridiculously hard on a task- or doesn't do anything about it all. Which is bad, or good- depending on how you see it. I'm thinking it's bad.

My companion for the next two months is Tacitus' Annals of Imperial Rome, assigned to all of Alexandria Tutorial's students who will be entering Great Books II next year. (Don't Roman numerals look more scholarly?)

Anyway, it hasn't proved to be as gory as Herodotus- yet. I've actually never met a book like this that didn't contain some enjoyable parts, though I always do drag my feet somewhat at the beginnings. At any rate, mutinies are always fascinating.

There are good speeches in this book, too. Oh yes. Kind of makes me want to read one out loud, but I'd hate to repeat the Tom-Sawyer-Reads-Patrick-Henry's-Give-Me-Liberty-Speech incident.

"For heaven forbid that the distinction and glory of having helped Rome and suppressed the peoples of Germany, should go the Belgae- Gauls and foreigners- for all their offers. Divine Augustus, I call upon your spirit now in heaven! Nero Drusus my father, I invoke your image that is in our memories!  Come to these soldiers of yours (into whose hearts shame and pride are making their way); wash clean this stain! Direct these revolutionary passions against enemy lives instead....Will you give the senate back its delegates, be obedient to the emperor again- and return me my wife and son? Then shake of the contagion. Single out the culprits! That will show you are sorry, and prove you are loyal...."

Oh, ahem, sorry. Just got a little carried away there. And now about the past few days:

---The performance of Handel's Messiah I went to see on Sunday was amazing. Especially "Surely He Has Borne Our Griefs."

---Meg from Our Spare Oom had a giveaway recently, and as I was the only one who entered it- I won! I thought it was really sweet and thoughtful of her to give away a copy of C.S. Lewis' The Horse And His Boy. (And going to all the trouble of shipping it halfway across the world, I might add).

This happens to be my favorite book in the Narnia series. Thanks Meg! 

Thursday night my family had another track meet. I decided to stay home and make cookies- Elspeth and Autumn came over. It was more fun than running in circles.

Behold, the Ravioli Cookies- that really do not look like ravioli at all:

And no, my family does not survive on a diet of shortbread (Though some people would gladly accept such a proposal).

I've just been baking a lot this July- it's a cookie/scone/biscotti/pie month for some reason.

I shoot many of my food pictures outside- where the lighting is better. We took these cookies outside forgetting about Lucy who was inside helping herself to the second plate. We dragged her outside so we could resume our photo shoot- and came up with this priceless image.

It's the stuff dogs dream about. 

Hope you all have a lovely weekend!

Natalie

P.S. My "readers widget" is up now on my sidebar, thanks to Gabrielle's suggestion. You all can follow me now. Or not;)