Spring and Baking

It's spring!

I've baked a lot in the past week, but I've been slacking on photographing my creations. Nevertheless, you should try out these recipes:



KALE CHIPS:

Yes, that's right, kale chips. Just kale leaves tossed with salt and olive oil and baked in the oven. So good you won't be able to stop eating them, even if you're not normally inclined to eat kale by the fistfuls. Trust me on this one.



QUINOA MUFFINS:

I doctored up this recipe to experiment with healthy substitutes in baking. I used skim milk instead of whole, applesauce instead of vegetable oil (same amount), whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose, half a mashed banana instead of an egg, and cut the brown sugar to 1/2 cup. They turned out really well! They're dense and chewy, and great as breakfast with a cup of coffee.



ESPRESSO CHOCOLATE SHORTBREAD COOKIES:

I baked these with a friend for the espresso break during our weekly Italian seminar. They turned out really well for what they are, but I'm not that crazy about shortbread, so I'm not sure I'd make them again. Don't get me wrong, they were delicious - espresso, chocolate, butter, how could you go wrong? - but I think I prefer a more doughy, chewy cookie.







And a few recipes I want to try soon...

Strawberry Bread

Raspberry-Topped Lemon Muffins

Crispy Salted Oatmeal White Chocolate Cookies

Let me know if you make any of these, or anything else, and then give me the recipe!

More of The Little Prince

Yes, I know, it's been a while. I should write a long entry about my spring break service trip to New Orleans, but for now, I'll just write a quick update on my Little Prince collection!

You might remember my collection of The Little Prince books in different languages. (See this post for photos.) I recently got two new copies, bumping my collection up to 21 languages! When my parents went to Lancaster, PA in February they bought me a copy in Pennsylvania Dutch (yes, that's right) and my friend Carly, who was traveling around Brazil for the past two months, bought me a copy in Brazilian Portugese. (A different edition, with a slightly different title, is published in Portugal.)

Pennsylvania Dutch

Brazilian Portugese

I'm hoping to be able to buy myself a copy in a new language this year - we'll see where my travels take me! And if you happen to travel to a country that speaks a language I don't have a copy of, keep your eyes open for bookstores and a book with a little boy standing on a gray planet.

Yummy foods

Just to make you drool...

On Valentine's Day my housemates and I made pork chops and risotto with broccoli (click for recipe), with white wine.



And for Mardi Gras, I made this King's Cake for my Italian class to have during our espresso break halfway through our seminar. It's actually just cinnamon buns formed into an oval, with colored frosting and a coin baked in. The coin comes from the Three Kings / Mardi Gras tradition of baking a baby into the cake. The person who finds the baby is the king or queen for the day, and also must provide the next King's Cake. My Italian class is all about Boccaccio's Decameron, in which a group of seven young ladies and three young men escape the plague of Florence in 1348, and go to the country and tell stories for ten days. Each day there is a different king or queen who picks the theme of the day's stories, and then picks the next king or queen. Our professor had provided cookies to go with the espresso until this past week, but he decided that since there are 10 of us in the class and 10 weeks left, from now on we'll take turns bringing something to go with the espresso. Therefore, the person who found the coin in my King's Cake has to bring something next week, and will be the queen of the day. So I thought that the King's Cake fit in very well not only with the celebration of Mardi Gras, but also with the theme of our class!

Lisa Kudrow is speaking at graduation

Vassar just announced that Lisa Kudrow (class of '85) is speaking at our graduation in May. I've seen her speak on campus before and really enjoyed it. We're very excited because last year's speaker was...really boring. Although now this will make seats at graduation even harder to snag, if you're one of my blog readers who's planning to come (it's first come, first seated). Luckily, I'll have a reserved seat. ;)