Year of Cookies - April

April seemed a bit more calm than the last few months. Just working away, and trying to get outside as much as possible.

We went home for Easter, and had a good visit with my family. We set up multiple Easter egg hunts for the girls, which they loved. I tried to get them psyched about pie, but that didn't happen. But when we were out getting groceries for Easter dinner Isabella convinced me to buy marshmallows, so we made rice krispie squares. And when we were finished Talia says, "That's it?!" I guess she feels she's mastered cupcakes and sugar cookies, so she needs more of a challenge - the 3 year old master baker that she is.

And last weekend we went to Princeton to visit Corey's parents. He spent most of his time fishing with his dad, out in the canoe a few times and off the dock. He was using his fly rod for the first time, mostly just practising his cast. But, just as we were deciding to call it a day and pack up to had home, he caught a fish! A little 7" rainbow trout, which was too small to keep, so he released it back into the lake. But it was so exciting! Seeing how excited he was and being right there next to him as he reeled it in, totally made me want to start fishing with him. So we'll see how that progresses.

Meyer Lemon Meltaways, Easter Egg Brownie Cookies,

Oatmeal Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies, Salted Brown Sugar Toffee Cookies

Week 14 - Meyer Lemon Meltaways, via My Baking Addiction - baked for 13 minutes, made 29 cookies

I think these were the first slice cookie I have ever made, which seems kind of odd. I think I sliced mine a bit too thin, but they were perfectly lemony and slightly sweet, just from the icing sugar, and great with a cup of tea.

Week 15 - Easter Egg Brownie Cookies, via Foodess - baked for 10 minutes, *2/3 recipe made 29 cookies
This was a great way to use up leftover mini eggs… I know, what do you mean leftover? There is never been such a thing in our house, so this gave me a great excuse to raid the marked down Easter candy at the grocery store. And I hid the last half of the bag in the pantry, to be discovered at a later date. These cookies are just like brownies, without the wait time! They are also great without the chocolate dip and crushed mini eggs.

Week 16 - Oatmeal Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies, via Foodess - baked for 9-10 minutes, made 33 cookies
These cookies are everything I crave in a cookie - crisp, chewy, chocolately, slightly oaty & slightly peanut buttery.
Also, if you don't know Foodess, I suggest you check her out. She's based in Vancouver, and has a great collection of straight forward, fresh recipes. I've made quite a few of them - including these Chocolate, Pistachio, Cranberry Granola Bars.

Week 17 - Salted Brown Sugar Toffee Cookies, via Wit & Vinegar - baked for 11 minutes, made 22 cookies
This is actually Joy the Baker's Brown Sugar Cookie recipe, just with the addition of some toffee (skor) bits and a little sprinkling of flaky sea salt. They are nice and chewy from the brown sugar, and lightly spiced from a touch of cinnamon & ginger.


I've been spending the last few days at work getting geared up for EAT Vancouver, at BC Place this weekend. Our store will have one of the biggest booths, right across from the chef's stage. So I'll have a front row seat on Saturday for Anna Olsen - jealous Kristine?

What are all of you up to?


Sending love,

Xo, A

Happy 26th Ella!

Happy 26th Birthday Ella!

I pulled this one out of the archives… taken about 19 years ago.

Hope your day is filled with joy!

Lots of love, A

happy Easter

Epic Kitchen fail today ladies.

Tomorrow we are having our family Easter dinner and I was on dessert. Everyone one loves brownies.  Real brownies! 👏 so I volunteered my amazing baking skills... Anyways I think I accidently put self raising flour in the plain flour Tupperware container.  Now I have an oddly dense cake. Which I am sure still taste amazing. Just not Brownies. 😢

Anyways on that note..

Kristine got your wedding invitation in the mail. So lovely! Hopefully we may be home for a wedding shower or something like that before we go home.

Aarons getting a bit worried about the content on this blog. He thinks it's a place we go to winge about our husbands😳 I told him no such thing! Hehe


Looking forward to coming home.  Not long now.  Xoox

Year of Cookies - March

March came in like a lamb and is going out like a lion, in terms of busyness. 

This last week has been crazy! Work has been super busy, and we had a very full weekend celebrating Aaron's birthday with him and Michelle here in Vancouver - with some very special guests, Martin & Kristine! Which I had kept a secret from Corey since December - that's right, I'm so proud of myself for that! He was in shock, teared up a bit, and exclaimed "What is happening!?" 

It was wonderful.

Another accomplishment this month… 

Doing the dance to Spice Girls' "Stop Right Now" at our neighbourhood pub in front of my co-workers (and the rest of the crowd), and winning a pint. That's right. All that dancing to Spice Girls in elementary school finally paid off!

Sour Cherry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies, One Pan Skillet Cookie, 

Chocolate Stout Crinkle Cookies, Vanilla Bean Shortbread, 

No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Bites

Week 9 - Sour Cherry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies, via Bakers Royale - baked for 10 minutes, made 36 cookies
I think this is the closest I've come to a cookie fail so far. I thought this recipe would be similar to my "kitchen sink" oatmeal cookies I make when I've realized how many random small amounts of bulk nuts, seeds, dried fruit, chocolate, etc I've collected in my pantry, But, when I was mixing the dough it was really forming a dough, it was a weird granola-like texture, unlike any cookie I've ever made. I scooped balls of dough and really had to compact them. Then half way through baking they kind of started cracking, and I had to squish them together with the back of a spatula. It was a really weird experience, and they turned out okay. But I probably won't attempt these again.

Week 10 - One Pan Skillet Cookie, via Sophistimom - baked for 17 minutes in a 10" skillet
After the previous week's disappointment, I felt I needed to stick with a tried & true household favourite. We Corey makes this whenever we get a cookie craving, and need a quick dessert. I love it because you make and bake the whole then in the skillet. Our 10" cast iron skillet is probably the harder working item in our kitchen, we use it at least once a day. Bake until golden on top and around the edges, but still soft in the centre. Serve with a scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Week 11 - Chocolate Stout Crinkle Cookies, via The Beeroness - baked for 8 minutes, *half recipe made 13 cookies
In the spirit of St. Patrick's Day I had to make cookies with beer. I made these with Parellel 49's N2 Milk Stout, which is a bit sweeter than a regular stout and quite flat because they use Nitrogen to carbonate it. I love baking with the combination of beer and chocolate, usually adding beer to chocolate cakes & brownies, but I haven't tried it in cookies yet. It adds a depth of flavour and enhances the chocolate. I also haven't made chocolate crinkles before, but they are a staple Christmas cookie Corey's Dad makes every year. For these cookies I refrigerated the "dough" - it will be more like batter - overnight (about 22 hours) and it firmed up a lot. She warns not to over bake the cookies, so I pulled them out at 8 minutes. They were quite gooey in the centre when I tried one, I probably could have let them bake a minute or two longer, but they did firm up a bit once they cooled completely.

Week 12 - Vanilla Bean Shortbread, via Butter Baked Goods
This recipe comes from the cookbook of one of my favourite Vancouver bakeries, Butter. If we all lived in Vancouver we would be having tea at Butter on a weekly basis! Their buttercream black tea is amazing!

1 cup Butter
1 cup Icing Sugar
2 1/4 cups All Purpose Flour
2 tbsp Vanilla Extract - I substituted 1 Vanilla Bean & 1 tsp Vanilla Extract

In a stand mixer cream together butter & icing sugar on medium speed until light & fluffy.
Turn the mixer to low, add the flour and mix until just combined.
Add vanilla and mix to combine.
Place the dough on a lightly floured surface and roll to about 1/4" thick, cut out cookies, space about 1/2" apart cookie sheet.
Bake at 325 for 14-15 minutes, or until the cookies are lightly browned around the edges.
Remove from the oven and sprinkle the cookies generously with granulated sugar while they are still warm. Cool on wire rack. 

Week 13 - No-Bake Chocolate Peanut Butter Bites, via How Sweet It Is
I've tried a few different recipes for "granola bites" in the last few months. They satisfy the urge to eat cookie dough, and you can adjust the recipe it to fit whatever you have on hand. You could easily swap out the peanut butter for almond butter, sunflower seeds for pumpkin seeds, add dried cranberries… the list goes on.

We're heading to Port tomorrow for the long weekend. I think I'm going to teach my nieces how to make pie!
Hope you all have a great Easter!

Sending love,

Xo, A