This week, I’m starting off the round of Bites with a reminder that you all might want to check out this year’s Menu for Hope. It’s for charity and you can win some great prizes from some of your favorite food bloggers.
- Moving on to the recipes, I was intrigued by Habeas Brulee‘s Forbidden Rice with Persimmon and Coconut. I’ve only had the “forbidden” purple rice a handful of times, and this recipe is certainly an interesting – not to mention colorful – twist on rice pudding.
- Over at Cupcake Bakeshop, I spotted one of my favorite winter flavor combinations in Cranberry White Chocolate Cupcakes. The cupcakes are almost too decadent for words, with lots of chocolate and butter in the recipe – and that’s before you get to the Cranberry, Clove and White Chocolate Buttercream frosting that they are topped with!
- And this week we can’t talk about white chocolate without a peek at the White Chocolate Pudding at Tartelette. The pudding is super creamy, thanks to a bit of thickening cornstarch, and rich in flavor. It is made with milk, rather than cream, and the serving sizes are small, so you don’t have to feel entirely guilty eating it, either. T topped it off with some fresh, juicy pomegranate seeds, but I think that my preference would be for a few dark or white chocolate curls.
- Apple crisp is one of my top fall and winter dishes, but I’m all for using a crisp topping with any kind of fruit and pears are a close second to apples (a mix of the two is delicious, as well). Smitten Kitchen‘s Pear Crisps with Vanilla Brown Butter are individually-sized desserts that make for a more elegant presentation than a single, casserole-sized homey apple crisp. They still have all the flavor and charm of grandma’s dish, though.
- Citrus season is just beginning, an observation I am making based on the almost-ripeness of the fruit on my lemon and orange trees, and this is as good a time as any to start thinking of good uses for the juice and zest. The Lemon Slice Cookies at Cast Sugar are a perfect citrus tribute cookie because they not only have lemon in them, but they look like lemon slices!
- While I’m still not anywhere near adding bacon into my cookies, brownies or cakes, I’m impressed by the culinary chutzpah that it took Never Bashful with Butter to put together Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies with a Maple Cinnamon Glaze. They’re certainly different, and probably pretty appealing for a bacon-lover, but I think I’d have to see what else is on the dessert table before I would take one with my after-dinner coffee.
Stephanie
December 12, 2007Hi Nic!
I love your little snapshots of what’s going on in the blogging world…I never have enough time to find this stuff myself!
I was hoping to start a new BBM in January (I’m constantly getting asked about the next round), and was hoping for your ‘OK’…please let me know!
Thanks.
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