Baking time!

I've been baking up a storm the past few weeks! So much so, that I'm afraid I haven't been properly documenting each adventure!

Suffice to say, the oven in my new flat is quite different to the one at Mum's... and therefore I've had some interesting... challenges... figuring out baking times.

My first go at cookies this season were the traditional cinnamon cookies, detailed elsewhere in this blog. They burned to a crisp. Mum ate them, but that was about it.

I also made some almond squares (my favourite), but once again they burned. I made my way through them slowly, and plan to make another batch sometime soon.

I was more daring with some cookies I made for the office. I found the recipe in one of those gossip rag magazines - Almond Jam cookies.  They took quite a bit of work to make - first I had to make the cookie dough, roll it out, use cookie cutters, bake, warm up jam, and then create cookie sandwiches. I had a lot of fun, but it was labour intensive!

Almond Boysenberry Cookies

They were a huge hit at the office - they disappeared in about an hour, with many pronouncements of 'yummy' made. I'll try them again sometime, perhaps trying to tweak the recipe so the cookies have a stronger flavour.

I then decided to really have fun, and tried to re-create a childhood favourite: Jam Tarts. The recipe for the pastry is lost in time, so I had to figure something out... being slightly pressed for time, I ended up using the pastry recipe on the cristco package. It's alright, but not fantastic. I'll have to experiment again.   The largest lesson I learned in making these tarts was that you need to make deeper 'wells' and put less jam, as I had a bit of a... sticky... situation:

They should not look like this!!

A few made it out alright, so here's what I was aiming for:

Boysenberry Jam Tart

My most recent baking fun has been Banana Bread. A friend faxed me the recipe ages ago (so long that I can't remember which friend!! oops!)... I'm typing this entry up at the office and I don't have the recipe with me, but suffice to usay it was easy enough for me.  Lesson learned: don't freeze bananas and then thaw them overnight in the fridge, without a plate or bowl underneath, unless you want to do a full-fridge scrub down... ahem. 

No photo of this one, much to my chagrin. I made 8 baby loaves and they are so cute!!!

More baking is coming up, tonight and this weekend, so stay tuned! :)