Baking Has Commenced

T'is the season for tons of baking. 

I've already started.

My house will be smelling like the holidays today. 

I have cherry cheesecake tarts in the oven right now. Mini tarts, these suckers are so good I could probably eat the whole damn batch alone.  I'm also planning to bake with the kids the gingerbread and sugar cookies which we made the dough for last night. I also have nut cup dough and roshky dough in the fridge that I put together this morning.

They need to chill.

Next on my list here is baklava. I only make that once a year, because the phyllo dough is ridiculously pricey($4.49/two sheets...and that was on SALE!) and I only buy the Pepperidge Farm brand because that's the brand I've used time and time again.  The other reason I only bake it once a year, is it's a sticky mess to make and I "suffer" with peeling those thin, thin pastry sheets and rolling them up. It's like taking wet tissue paper and trying to wrap a gift with it without it tearing.

When I went to the grocery store yesterday, I asked the young girl(about 20 years old or so) who was ringing my order up if she knew which aisle the Phyllo Dough was in. I explained that they are pastry sheets used for baking. She looked at me and said, "Did you try the baking aisle?" I wanted to say, "I was in the baking aisle but it's in the grocery section NOT the frozen one where the sheets are..somewhere...well hidden."  I just grinned at her instead and said to her, "You have no clue what they are do you, let alone where they might be, huh?" with a grin on my face. She probably thought I was a bitch, but I truly was joking around. 

So I run into the front end manager and ask her and as we are walking down the aisle and I relay the above mentioned story, she laughs and looks at me and says "Some of our people are SPECIAL." She is so direct when she talks, doesn't hold back for a minute on her opinions. She cracks me up some times. Although it wasn't really a nice thing to say, the way she said it made me laugh.

I couldn't help myself.

Just plunked another one of those tarts in my mouth. 

Don't look at me like that! I see that smirk. I have to test them to make sure they are good! Wouldn't want to give a gift of cherry cheesecake that was bad ya know! Geeze!

Hee hee....

Anyway, I'm just sitting here waiting for my kids to wake up so we can start our day. My son had a slight emergency situation on Thursday night. He's fine now. But has stitches in his hand from playing in an area I told him not to play in, yet when he's with his dad it's out of my hands. Perhaps he's learned his lesson now.

Probably not.

I have last minute shopping to do. I was so mad yesterday, went and made myself a list, then transferred my list to another piece of paper that had each department in the store, you know, produce, grocery, paper, frozen....wouldn't ya know it I forgot the damn list. Well, not really forgot it, when I ran out the door with the kids I grabbed my original list not the neat list with all my categories and non-scribbled notes all over. I was so mad.  So now I have to run out, yet again, to get last minute stuff I need for dinner. Thankfully it's just sour cream and zwiebac crackers for my baklava. I can't find those suckers anywhere these days. Hopefully the baking Gods will be smiling on me and they will be at Wally World.

I hope so anyway.

I wonder if there are baking Gods. Maybe a patron Saint of Baking? 

What do you know!!!  There is a patron saint of baking!!! I just Googled that and low and behold found out that St. Honore' is the patron saint of bakers and pastry chefs. I'm gonna guess that's a man, but I could be wrong.  There are Terry's and Sam's and even Billy's(Billy Jean...ha ha) that are girls. So who knows? Guess I could Google if St. Honore is a male or female but I'll just go with my gut here and say he's a he not a she.

Glad we got that out of the way.

Now I have to clean up the mess. The cheesecakes are done and all that I have to do is head out the door and shop for my two items. You know though that when one, meaning me particularly, goes to shop for just ONE thing, one never gets just one thing. I'll probably end up spending another ten bucks on stuff I don't need. I do need mini gift boxes and tissue paper. Crap...more stuff to buy.

Well, I guess I should get going now.

Lots to do today and sitting on here won't get it done.

I was on a roll but then the kids dad came to pick up our boys and now I lost my mojo. Need to get it back really soon.

Have a lovely Sunday. Have a lovely week. 

Not sure when I'll be back here.

Until the next time.....