rice krispie treats

If you've spent any time looking at the recipes on Dulcedo, my philosophy on cooking is probably easy to identify. I generally think the best food is simple and approachable, and made with fresh, quality ingredients. I eschew cake mixes and other preservative-laden, processed foods in favor of fresh foods with ingredients I can both recognize and pronounce. If I'm going to spend time in the kitchen, it's worth it to me to cook from scratch. And if I'm not up for that, then it's worth it to me to pay someone else to cook from scratch and I'll enjoy a meal out. That's just what I think. Generally.

grandma's oatmeal cookies

I am largely a self-taught cook. My mom taught me the basics of baking -- particularly the difference between a wet and a dry measure -- but she doesn't particularly enjoy being in the kitchen, so after that I was on my own. However, the way I feel about cooking and baking is largely inspired by my Grandma.

lemon bars

Back in January, I lost a close friend. His name was Jay. And he committed suicide.

I think I danced more dances with Jay than anyone else in the last five years. We had a great connection as partners and shared a common sense of dance etiquette. Every dance seemed effortless. And every dance (or nearly so) was insanely gratifying -- the highest of highs, unmatched by any drug and untouchable by anyone else in the room.

peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

Last Tuesday was a pretty uneventful day. I had a meeting that ran late after work, then I went to the grocery store, and then home to relax. The Cowboy had plans to meet up with a friend (who is known in real life as Thunder Dan...I wish I had a cool nickname like that), so I had the evening to myself. Like any productive 27-year-old, I put that time to good use by organizing pictures, filing credit card statements, and cleaning the air filter in my vacuum.

Just kidding. I actually ate buffalo wings, played Super Nintendo, and did nothing productive besides think about putting away my Christmas decorations. (I think that counts.) And it was awesome.

I also had toast and chocolate chips for breakfast that day. It's possible I'm not fit to live on my own.

Anyway, (un)productivity aside, I was asleep on the couch by 9:00 p.m. This was nice. Being awakened by someone pounding loudly on my door at 3:00 a.m., however, was not. It was scary. The couch is only a few feet away from the door, so if I got up, the person outside would be able to see me...and my panic-stricken face. I did not want that. Plus, it seemed logical to me that the person outside chose my apartment because there were lights on (my nearby neighbors are early-to-bed folks and, most likely, were fast asleep at the time). Proximity to the ax murderer, near certainty of premeditation, and my own paralyzing fear kept me frozen on the couch. After a few minutes, the person went away -- on foot, apparently, since neither a car door nor the sounds of an engine could be heard -- but I held my position on the couch for another 30 minutes and then, wide awake, wandered around my bedroom for two hours after that. Not nice at all.

cowboy cookies

Oh, my. It seems things have gotten away from me again over here in blogging land. Terribly sorry about that. It's not that I don't enjoy cooking, baking, and blogging -- you know I do -- it's that my priorities have shifted a bit over the last year. Last July I started taking dance lessons. As it turns out, dancing comes rather naturally to me, so what began as just a little Country dancing (two-step, Schottische, triple-step, etc.) had, by September, ramped up to include ballroom, swing, and salsa, too. I danced five to six days a week all through the fall and winter, then dropped down to three to four days a week in the spring, partially because I was running out of money (private lessons are expensive!), and partially because I wanted to spend more time with my Country music/dancing friends and less with everyone else.

Spring, as you have read, brought carrot cake, the introduction of The Pioneer Woman, and Snickerdoodle cupcakes. Oh, and Orlando Bloom. Ugh. Let's wrap up that last part right now. Outside of the initial introduction, the Orlando Bloom experience was a disaster from start to very quick finish. He was not so much cowboy as redneck, and that just doesn't work for me. Moving on.

pumpkin oatmeal cookies

Sometimes the business world is a rough-and-tumble place...and sometimes it is simply ridiculous. The nature of my position is such that, when an employee has a concern or suggestion, it usually finds its way to me. I'd love to tell you that most of these concerns are well founded, but that isn't quite the case...mostly because 50% of the concerns are born out of overworrying and and behaviors I would categorize as just short of hysterics. Case and point: There is an ongoing discussion in our office about the proper way to evacuate if there is a fire at the front of the office suite. Obviously I recognize that evacuation procedures are important, so I put in a request to the local fire department to have a marshal come out and make a recommendation. However, while I'm waiting for that person to show up, I have to deal with the third of our staff that is convinced that breaking the floor-to-ceiling windows and falling 25 feet onto concrete and glass shards is the best way to evacuate on the highly unlikely occasion that there is a fire in the front of our crackerjack-box-size office that has gone unnoticed long enough to prevent people from making a simple exit through the front door. I think Charles Darwin would have some interesting things to say about people who fail to notice a fire in 15' x 30' office. I won't bring that up, but when the fire department comes and explains why it's a bad idea to punch out a hole and feed a fire in a small space with loads of oxygen, all those glass-breaking tools ordered by the renegade third of the staff are going straight back to the supplier....

lime-glazed cookies

This morning I've been reflecting on a little get-together I held at my apartment last night. It was a simple concept -- cookies + cocktails + movie -- and so much fun! Why didn't I think of it before? It was easy to string a theme together and the prep work was not unduly burdensome for me, the host. I think perhaps Cookies & Cocktails should be a monthly event. (Yes, I did consider Cupcakes & Cocktails, but the cupcakes don't work quite as well for finger food.)

rugelach (for grandpa)

Do you ever think about where your hands have been? Sure, they go everywhere you go, but have you really thought about the unique -- and often overlooked -- role they play? In the last week or so, my hands have been on an amazing journey. They touched things in four different time zones within four days. They exchanged currency for bags of presents, were intertwined with the hands of one of my closest friends, baked dozens of cookies, lit a candle at Notre Dame's grotto, and embraced a former professor.

sugar drop cookies

I love sprinkles. I don't particularly care to eat them, but I love to collect them and decorate with them. And I think it could be argued that nowhere do sprinkles look better than on a beautiful Christmas sugar cookie. Lovely indeed, but I hardly ever make them because I just hate to roll dough. However, the fine folks at the Joy of Cooking, apparently quite aware of the existence of people like me, created a dropped sugar cookie -- all the sugar cookie, sprinkly fun without any of the rolling or icing required.

oatmeal-raisin cookies

It was 2:30 a.m. on Saturday morning and I was standing in the middle of my living room staring at two open suitcases and two very heavy carry-on bags. My ride to the airport would be here in just over an hour, and I had to get an entire week's worth of baking into my luggage. Sure, I thought about shipping it all, but what if the packages don't arrive on time? What if a postal employee accidentally steps on my box? And, most importantly, what if I die standing in the world's longest post office line? There would be no Christmas cookies this year!

mexican wedding cookies (snowballs)

When I was younger, my grandmother (on my mom's side) was the primary cookie baker in the family. She would make cookies throughout the year, but there were a few varieties she would only make during the holidays, leading me to believe they were extra special. One of these was a bite-size cookie that reminded me of a powder-coated pebble. Grandma called them "snowballs." I can't remember eating the snowballs often, if ever, but I don't think it was because I didn't like them. If my memory serves me correctly, Grandma put rum in her snowballs, and knowing I wasn't old enough to have liquor, I don't think I ever even asked to try one of the cookies. I can, however, remember my dad nibbling on them with glee. The sugar would always get caught in his mustache -- a sight that delighted me endlessly.

ginger snaps

Let's just start off by saying that I made 376 of these over the weekend. Yes, 376. Sometimes I get very excited about an opportunity to feed people and before I know it, my mouth has opened up and I have volunteered to take on a task that many people would consider their own personal hell. I usually end up realizing what I've done sometime around batch 5 or 6 of whatever baked good I have decided is tasty enough to feed the masses. Oh well; it's done.

lemon / key lime bars

I live in a strange place. A place with a spectacular landscape, a brilliant array of things to do...and so many Range Rovers that you can't walk from the parking lot to your office without tripping over one. (Seriously, if Range Rover Guy across the hall doesn't stop parking on the sidewalk....) Yes, in most respects, this place is a world apart from where I grew up. On any given day -- whether at work or at the grocery store -- you see women wearing diamonds the size of doorknobs and carrying purses that cost more than the average person's weekly income.