Adventures in cooking

I love to bake, cook, eat. Basically if it involves food I enjoy it! I actually missed cooking, not only for myself but for others, while I was sick. Lo and behold I arrive in sunny Florida feeling much better than the previous 4 months so I have been on a cooking spree! I began this baking binge with my sister, Meghan's, whole wheat bread recipe. The picture pretty much says it all but let's just say it was an oven I'd never used and I got distracted during "rise time!" I just laughed but kind of wanted to cry when I opened the oven door and saw this!

They were edible just not very pretty.

My second attempt I knew how to use the oven, I am now aware of Florida and it's lack of altitude and I had this cute little helper! It made a world of difference!

I love Meg's recipe (thanks again!) and so does Jared! The loaves turned out pretty and very soft!
After the first week here I realized how quickly bananas go bad and decided to whip up some banana bread. Well my 3 bad bananas turned into 11 somehow and I made 3 loaves with different toppings (plain, chocolate chip (which turned into chocolate smear), and brown sugar pecan. They were all made with whole wheat flour which made me feel a little less guilty as I shoveled in my 3rd piece of nutty deliciousness!

Then there was the craving that had to be satisfied! I crave pretzels! Not just any pretzels. I'm talking mall pretzels that are salty, buttery, and scrumptious. And they HAVE to have the HOT cheese for dipping otherwise the whole thing is ca put! Well for some odd reason, that is completely unknown to me, Florida doesn't have a Pretzel Time or anything remotely close within a 50 mile radius! So the ladies (fellow Floridian wives) and I decided a baking session would be our best bet! We found a promising recipe that included ingredients we already mostly had and began this new cooking adventure.

Pretzel dough is quite tough to knead and dries out quickly, just FYI.

Again we had cute little helpers that wanted to help make the "snakes!"

Pretzel dough also shrinks back pretty quickly so ya gotta get the "snakes" pretty long. Brynn, Tommy, and a little someone named Michelle liked to steal pieces of dough!

My craving was satisfied! But now I just want to make them again!

These babies were enjoyed by all, as you can see.

To recap: I heart food and everything involved with it. I just wish I had all the ingredients and all the know how already to make anything and everything I desired!