Do you know the “smell good people”? You know the people. The ones who go to the beach and smell like coconut oil or go to the country and smell like wild flowers? Yeah, well I’m not one of those people. I go the beach and smell like dead fish and if I go to the country I usually end up smelling like dirt and doo doo. With that said, I have obviously found perfume, showers, and deodorant essential necessities. My other little helpers are lavender sachets. You can stick these puppies anywhere: suitcases, drawers, purses, etc., and then you too can join the “smell good people”!

P.S. I love Lavender so much I included a Lavender cookie recipe for extra credit!

Lavender Sachets:

You can use these to add fragrance to your any drawer, or cabinet in your home.

What you’ll need:

10” Squares of Muslin, Linen, or Cotton

¼ cup Dried Lavender Flowers

Ribbon (optional)

Directions:

Sew two 10” squares on three sides. Fill the bag with the lavender flowers and sew the fourth side.

If you are planning on giving these as a gift, or would like to bundle them up, tie four sachets together with the matching ribbon of your choice.

Lavender Cookies with Meyer Lemon Glaze:

Let’s be honest, a cookie can make almost anything better. These delicate cookie slices will surely brighten up your day!

What you’ll need:

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup sugar
1 extra large egg, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 tablespoons dried culinary lavender, chopped

Directions:

In a large bowl, mix the butter and sugar until creamy. Beat in the egg. Sift together the flour and baking powder into the mixture. Stir in the lavender until combined. Transfer the mixture to a clean surface and gather into a ball. Roll out the dough into a cylinder shape, cover it with parchment paper, and chill in the freezer for about 40 minutes until firm.

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

Slice the dough into thin rounds and place them on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper.

Bake for about 12 minutes or until golden brown. Let cool for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Meyer Lemon Glaze:

Whisk ¾ cup of confectioner sugar with the juice from one Meyer lemon until the glaze is nice and smooth. Drizzle over the lavender cookies and eat them up!

Traditions make our life richer, deeper, and give us something to look forward to in life. One of the greatest traditions my Mom started when I was a kid was the “breakfast dinner”. Once a month we would put our pajamas on early in the evening and make breakfast for dinner. It is one of my most vivid childhood memories and dammit I’m bringing it back in all its glory. There will be cartoons, jammies with feet attached, and pancakes.

You can start this tradition too! You can do it with your family, your roommate, or someone you met on eHarmony. Actually you probably shouldn’t do it on an eHarmony first date scenario because it says “Hey this is what you have to look forward to if you and I make this thing work …me in pajamas at 6pm, eating an unacceptable amount of carbs while watching cartoons”.

These oven baked eggs are hearty enough to serve for your breakfast dinner and they only leave one dish to clean up. Tradition…Tradition! (Please sing this part of the post as if you were Tevye from Fiddler on the Roof).

What you’ll need

• 4 eggs
• 2 Ovenproof bowls
• 1 cup of tomato sauce
• Olive oil
• Salt & pepper
• Parmesan Cheese
• Fresh Basil, chopped

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Add ½ cup of tomato sauce into each ovenproof bowl. Crack 2 eggs into each of the bowls and be careful not to break the yolks. Drizzle the eggs with olive oil, salt, and pepper. Bake the eggs in the oven for about 15 minutes or until the whites have set. Remove from the oven and sprinkle with freshly grated parmesan cheese. You can garnish the dish with some roughly chopped fresh basil.

Serve with warm Focaccia bread.

Heirloom tomatoes are in season and are very easy to find at your local farmer’s market.  Also always in season…LAZY. Some people look great in pastels, others in bright colors, me I look good in lazy. This is a dish that works damn well for your lazy days.  Plus if the delivery guy from Pizza Hut knows your name, your embarrassing yourself sister! Get some pride…make bruschetta.

Ingredients:

• 4 Heirloom tomatoes (any variety, chopped)
• 1 Loaf of Ciabbatta Bread (cut into slices)
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• Fresh Basil
• 1 clove of garlic, minced
• Olive oil
• Balsamic Vinegar
• Salt & Pepper
• Parmesan cheese (optional)

In a large bowl combine the tomatoes, garlic, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and season with salt and pepper. Chop the fresh basil into thin strips and toss into the mixture. Melt the butter on a large skillet and grill the ciabatta until crispy and golden brown.  Arrange the bread on a serving dish, and spoon the tomato mixture on top of each slice. You can grate some Parmesan cheese on top for added flavor.

What you’ll need:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 1/4 tsp unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
• A little less than 1 ½ cups of sugar
• 1 1/4 cups buttermilk
• 3 eggs
• 2 ½ tbsp of Blue Food Coloring
• 1 1/4 tsp white vinegar
• 1 1/4 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/8 cup water

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Sift together flour, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder into a bowl and set aside.

In a large bowl mix the oil, sugar, and buttermilk. Add eggs, food coloring, vinegar, vanilla and water and mix well. Add the dry ingredients a little bit at a time and mix at low speed until combined. Don’t over mix the batter or it will become tough.

Line your cupcake pan with paper liners of your choice and use a spoon to scoop the batter into the liners.

Bake for about 20 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let them cool.

Cream cheese frosting:

• 1 Stick of butter, room temperature
• 8 oz of cream cheese, room temperature
• 2 – 3 cups of powdered sugar
• 1 teaspoon of vanilla extract

Using an electric mixer, combine the butter and cream cheese until smooth. Mix in the vanilla. Slowly add the sugar while mixing. The frosting will become thicker as you add the sugar. Add as much or as little sugar as you prefer. (It really depends on how sweet you like your frosting to be).

I love the fair. Live stock, belly shirts, and Ferris wheels.

As far as I am concerned that is pretty much the formula for a good time…it’s just missing one thing…the piece de resistance of the fair formula of fun…THE CHURRO.

Is it a donut? A Mexican coffee accompaniment? Something invented by the spice company that makes cinnamon as way to increase sales? Who cares! Let’s make these bad boys!

When you think of churros, the word complicated comes to mind. As it turns out these Spanish little treats are not that hard to make. The key to making great churros is the oil temperature.

What you need:

• 2 teaspoons of Sunflower oil
• 1 cup of all- purpose flour, sifted
• 1/4 tsp of salt
• oil deep for frying

Boil a cup of water along with the sunflower oil and salt. Add the flour and stir constantly until a smooth dough forms.

Heat the oil until it reaches 350°F.

Transfer the dough into a pastry bag with a star-shaped tip.

Make long strips of dough in the oil and cook until browned.

Remove the strips from the oil and place on paper towels to drain excess oil.

Sprinkle with sugar, and enjoy!

To make them a little more interesting, try injecting them with melted Nutella or milk chocolate.

(Cooking syringes are available for purchase online or at most food specialty stores).

If I am going to have to lie to my trainer* about eating bread, you better bet your ass that I am eating it with butter. I assume bread and butter to be a dietary luxury for dinner party guests as well, so I figured I better make it extra snazzy.

If you’re looking for a jazzed up way of serving butter this is the perfect little trick:

Wrap softened butter in rose petals (any color) and place in the refrigerator for a few minutes until chilled.

The rose petals act as little vessels while infusing the butter with the fragrant scent of the rose.

Remove the petals from the fridge and serve!

* Steve if you are reading this I just want to say…THAT I AM NOT SORRY! I don’t want to live in your carb free world of perfect abs. As as long as we are being honest with each other, every time you leave me at the end of a work out to do cardio on the honor system…I don’t honor it! I like bread and hate running…sue me.

I would like to make an announcement…I have the smartest child on the planet. There is no hard evidence with which to back up this claim, more of gut feeling, but at any moment I am pretty sure Harvard is going to call and offer her spot in the 2011 class.  She is also quite gifted in the kitchen. This morning I made haystacks and when I stopped pouring the butterscotch chips into the bowl she let out a large burp which I interpreted as a “put more butterscotch in there, Lady” so I did…and it was a better finished project because of it.  I am just saying….

Here is the a recipe for Haystackies written in part by my daughter.

G-E-N-I-U-S. —————->

What you’ll Need:

1 bag butterscotch chips 

1 bag of milk chocolate chips

4 cups of chow mien noodles

1/2 cup of peanut butter

1 teaspoon teaspoon of cinnamon 

1 teaspoon of vanilla

Directions:

1. Place the peanut butter and butter scotch in the microwave for one minute (the butterscotch will only be partially melted)

2. Mix in vanilla and cinnamon

3. Stir in chow mien noodles and chocolate chips

4. Dump spoon size chunks onto a wax paper lined cookie sheet and place in the freezer for 45 minutes

5. Make sure no one whose opinion about you matters is in the general vicinity

6. Lick the bowl 

7. Lick the spoon

8. Remove the haystackies from the freezer and allow to adjust to room temperature 

9. EAT!

10.  ENJOY!

Everywhere you look this summer people are drooling over cupcakes- waiting hours to get their hands on some Sprinkles, swapping their traditional tiers for wedding cupcakes and even good ol Baskin Robbins is now offering ice cream shaped cupcakes.  Here at Things Your Mother Never Taught You, we like to think outside the box or in this case, outside the pan, so today I bring you the Ice Cream Cone Cupcake.  It’s a cupcake baked into an ice cream cone (and it’s awesome). If anyone is interested here are a couple more things I would like to see in combo…

1- The all chocolate-sit on your couch and lose weight diet

2- The No-hangover double vodka martini

3-The self esteem building drunk dial…which usually follows the No-hangover martini…;)

Click here to learn how to make an Ice Cream Cone Cupcake.  In the meantime I’ll work on these other gems in my laboratory kitchen.

Look, I want to like watching Soccer, the guys are HOT and the whole Euro undercurrent feels very sophisticated.  But mostly I just don’t want to be some Cheesy American who says ‘The World Cup is on?  Is that a big deal?”  But I’ve got to be honest, to me it is like a hockey game with no prospect of someone getting the shit kicked out of them.  The chance of seeing more than a few goals is slim to none and Mama needs more action than that. So in typical default mode I feel food or liquor will spice it up a bit for me…so I share with you now a little thing called Game Day Fondue(click for video)…serve it with over priced European beer and you will practically feel like you are at the football* match.

*Look who’s catching on!!!!

Those of you who are not within in a ten mile radius of me may not know that I am just a few short days away from having a little girl! Those of you who are within a ten-mile radius have heard me bitch at some point in the last nine months…I am loud and not prone to ‘keepin my complaints to myself’.  Since this site is named ‘Things Your Mother Never Taught You’ I have been thinking a lot about what I want to teach my little lady and I think ‘GIRLS RULE’ pretty much sums it up! Here are some of the things I know… a public letter to my unborn daughter:

1. You can bake a cake AND run a boardroom my darling little girl. You can wear a tank top from old navy whilst wearing pants from Gucci. You can read Bronte one night and watch American Idol the next. Don’t let people tell you life is either/or…it can be BOTH!

2. Be a girl’s girl. PERIOD. 

3. There are more brilliant women on this planet than you will ever find time to read, listen to, watch, learn from, or emulate…but that sure as hell doesn’t mean you shouldn’t try to seek them out.

4. Listen to wise women, here are a few to start with:

CHARLOTTE WHITTON: Whatever women do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult.

MARGARET THATCHER: If you want anything said, ask a man. If you want something done, ask a woman.

GLORIA STEINEM: Any woman who chooses to behave like a full human being should be warned that the armies of the status quo will treat her as something of a dirty joke. That’s their natural and first weapon. She will need her sisterhood.

JACQUELINE KENNEDY ONASSIS:  I am a woman above everything else.

So in the honor of my future President/Teacher/Artist/Rocket Scientist/ or whatever she chooses to be daughter…I give you a the first cake recipe my mama ever taught me and some words of wisdom from brilliant ladies because in life I believe you can have your cake…and eat it too.  Roma’s Pineapple Upside Down Cake…The Jr. Version!

Ingredients:

1. Box of vanilla cake mix

2. 3 eggs

3. ¼ cup vegetable oil

4. ½ cup of citrus soda (sprite or 7-up works like a dream)

5. 1 can pineapple slices with juice set aside

6. 1 bottle of maraschino cherries

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees 

2. Line the bottom of a non-stick cake pan with pineapple slices and place a cherry in the middle of each slice. This is a great cake to use a casserole dish for so that you have maximum surface area for pineapple slice. If you use a casserole dish ya gotta non-stick spray the hell out of it so your cake slips out like butta when you flip it over. 

3. Mix cake mix, pineapple juice from the can, soda, vegetable oil, and eggs together and whisk for a few minutes until there are no lumps. 

4. Pour over pineapple slices and toss into the oven for about 30 minutes depending on the depth of your pan. The guide on the back of the cake box is pretty accurate. 

5. Let cake coolio and flip that puppy over onto the serving dish of your choosing.

Extra Credit- mix a little rum with some whip cream to garnish the cake for serving.

Finally, I don’t have a lot of rules for you my dear daughter but this (see pic) will NOT be happening at our casa…just so you have fair warning. There is a time and place for dressing like a hussy and trying new things and it’s called college.

Love,

Mom

** My actual favorite things are naughty time with Daddy and liquor but that didn’t sound as good as the title ‘Cakes and Babies’.