Fruit & Piping

Front: Shortbread Barquette filled with made-from-scratch Orange Creme, piped with Chocolate Ganache and topped with Candied Orange. Back: Apricot Tartlet

Clockwise from top: Apple Empanada; Blackberry Fruit Tartlet with Creme Anglaise in a Shortbread Crust, German Chocolate Tartlet with Chocolate Ganache Piping; Victoria Tartlet (Shortbread Crust filled with Chocolate Ganache, topped with Raspberry Preserves, Ganache Piping and a Fresh Raspberry; Mazeriner (Shortbread Crust filled with Frangipane and topped with Strawberry Preserves, Toasted Almonds and Powdered Sugar; Casatta Cake

Clockwise from top: Raspberry Fresh Fruit Tartlet with Creme Anglaise; Blueberry Fresh Fruit Tartlet with Creme Anglaise; Apricot Fresh Fruit Tartlet with Creme Anglaise; Linzer Tartlet; Orange Creme Tartlets with Chocolate Ganache

Fresh Fruit Tartlets

Everything you see has been made from scratch.... with love.

Hazelnut-Honey Sugar Cookies

I improvised this recipe trying to use the limited or random amount of ingredients I had on hand. I looked for a good chocolate chip cookie base (just planned on omitting the chocolate chips) and this one had a good ratio of ingredients with the nice addition of cracked sea salt. Using the base recipe (only slightly switching the ratio of brown sugar to granulated sugar in brown sugar's favor) I added hazelnut paste, honey, vanilla bean paste, almond extract and cinnamon. The dough was soft so I chilled it for about an hour. Before dropping them onto the cookie sheet I rolled them in cinnamon and sugar. These came out soft and cakey. They tasted like a mixture of a good gingersnap cookie and a snickerdoodle. They were delicioussssss.

Sweet Potato Cupcakes topped with Candied Walnuts

I improvised this recipe out of necessity to give to my neighbors as a thank you. I started with the basic idea of a frangipane base and substituted sweet potato butter for the almond paste and brown sugar for regular sugar. I upped the flour content and also added honey, cinnamon, nutmeg, and vanilla bean paste. I looked for a specific batter texture more than focusing on my measurements. I know that's a bit of a no no but sometimes you just have to roll with it, which in this instance turned out great. I candied some walnuts before baking the cupcakes and then added them to the top a few minutes before pulling out the cupcakes so they were a nice golden brown color and won't fall off the cupcake when eaten. These were amazing, everyone wants me to make them again... Which means I'll have to make sure to write things down next time.