If you’re cooking out, you have a chance to make one of the best summertime desserts out there: campfire s’mores. Campfire s’mores are the original s’mores, where the marshmallows are toasted over and open flame and sandwiched with a piece of chocolate between two crisp graham crackers. Despite the name, you don’t really need a campfire (although it doesn’t hurt). Typically, I opt for a ... Read More »
If you do a lot of baking with fresh cherries, a cherry pitter is a good investment. They are easy to use and allow you to pop pits out of whole cherries with very little effort. But cherry pitters aren’t necessarily must-have items if you plan to pit cherries only very occasionally and don’t want to spend the money – or give up the cupboard ... Read More »
Nothing looks worse than a pasty, undercooked pie crust and yet there are lots of tips and tricks out there that tell you how to keep your pie crust from overbrowning. You don’t want the crust to burn around the edges, of course, but as far as I’m concerned, you want a pie crust to be a deep, rich golden color and to have a ... Read More »
Once you have double crust pies down, the next step in pie-making mastery is to learn to do a lattice top crust. Fortunately, lattice crusts are much easier to make than they look. They bake up the same way as an unlatticed crust (so no need to worry that the baking time will change) and give you a sneak peek at what the filling inside ... Read More »
Although you can frequently find strawberries in the off season at supermarkets, it isn’t until berry season hits full swing in late spring that you start to see fresh strawberries just about everywhere. They’re hard to resist when they look like bright red jewels in their little baskets, waiting to be purchased – and there is no reason to resist them, because they’re just as ... Read More »
Graham cracker crusts are easy to use, whether you bake them yourself or buy them at the store, because they take a lot less prep time and quite a bit less baking time than more traditional pastry crusts do. The drawback to them is that they got soggy very easily, a problem that is usually only made worse by the fact that the fillings placed ... Read More »
Creme brulee’s signature is that crisp, caramelized crust that sits atop the delicate custard. You make it by sprinkling on a layer of sugar, then caramelizing it with the flame of a kitchen torch. If you’ve made creme brulee, before you may have run into a common problem with this straightforward-sounding step. Sugar that is in too thin of a layer won’t caramelize into a ... Read More »
A piece of cake can look a bit lonely on a plate all by itself. Dressing up the plate with a little garnish or a little sauce can go a long way in making a plain chocolate cake look like something very special – perfect for a romantic dinner, a dinner party or just when you want to do something nice for yourself. Adding a ... Read More »
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