Italian Rainbow Cookie Cake

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There is no better way to celebrate the end of a year or the beginning of a future than with a triple layer triple color ganache-covered cake.

(That’s a fact.  Medically proven.*

*NOT.)

Or that your family made it to Christmas dessert without a single ounce of blood being shed.  And with a less than double-digit number of attempts to pay you to eat sausage. See, they’re really trying to understand this whole vegetarian thing.

(I doubt it has anything to do with the fact that you threatened to withhold cake from them if they didn’t stop.  And has everything to do with their growing compassion and the Christmas spirit deep within their souls. Right.)

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Lentil, Potato and Pumpkin Curry…and Top Ten Reader Favorite Recipes of 2011!

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If you’re looking for a skinny jeans friendly recipe to help you subsist from now until New Year’s, then check out my recipe for Lentil, Potato, and Pumpkin Curry over at Marcus Samuelsson’s blog!

And now…I bring you…

…YOUR top ten favorite recipes of 2011!

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10. Carrot Cake Cookies!  These are one of my most requested cookies, and with the flavors of carrot and ginger in the cookies combined with a dreamy cream cheese frosting filling…I definitely understand why.

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9. Pumpkin Biscuits with Cranberry Curd I made these for my Eggland’s Best Pink Party in support of breast cancer research and they were a huge hit.  Perfect for any holiday morning breakfast…or just because.

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8. Peanut Butter Honeycomb Pie  My father declared this the best dessert I’ve ever made. He’s probably right.  At least for us peanut butter addicts out there.

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7. Chickpea Pot Pie with a Cornbread Crust  This vegetarian version of a winter classic tastes just like the frozen pot pies we all remember and love…but healthier!

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6. Pad See Ew  Thai food is probably my favorite cuisine because of it’s perfect balance of flavors…sweet salty spicy sour…it has them all in every bite.  And pad see ew is one of my favorite dishes to order! However, it’s not figure friendly at all…but this at-home version is!

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5. Maida Heatter’s Johnny Appleseed Bars Part cake, part pie, these bars give you the best of both apple worlds.

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4. Pecan Pie Bars Perfect to satiate those pecan pie cravings…even when they occur at seasonably inappropriate times. (Plus they’re made with honey instead of corn syrup – major PLUS!)

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3. Sweet and Salty Brownies These are far and above the fudgiest most delicious brownies I have ever had.  And once you make them, you will never need another brownie recipe again. Yup, the Baked boys have done it again!

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2. Baked Penne with Roasted Vegetables Essentially baked ziti but chock full of loads of veggies instead of meat.  Comfort food at it’s best.

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1. Pumpkin Swirl Brownies  With over 85,000 hits (and counting), these are far and above your favorite recipe of 2011!  I made them for a Halloween party and unfortunately only got to try one…but it was one heavenly pumpkin/fudgy brownie, that’s for sure.

You are reading this post on Eats Well With Others at https://joanne-eatswellwithothers.com. Excerpts and links may be used, provided that full and clear credit is given to the author and or owner of Eats Well With Others. All rights reserved by Joanne Bruno.

Garlic-Roasted Butternut Squash and Kale Wheatberry Salad with Pomegranate

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My gift to my family this year was a week’s worth of vegetables, a lifetime supply of antioxidants, and vitamin A levels that are through the roof.

(And fiber.  Lots and lots of fiber.)

All in the form of a nice compact, user-friendly salad.

This, my friends, is the epitome of the “gift that keeps on giving”.

It will give you lower cholesterol.  It will give you a smaller waistline. It will give you orange skin (if you eat it for every meal for a month on end.  Which some may or may not be wont to do).  It will give you the ability to eat two slices of rainbow cookie cake for dessert without even a hint of guilt.  And it will probably give you superpowers.**

**Results are not typical. Individual responses may vary.

**I am not a doctor.  Take everything I say with at least five grains of salt.

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White Chocolate Gingerbread Cake Balls

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When I brought these into lab meeting last week I definitely called them cake pops so that I wouldn’t have to say balls in front of my boss.

And so that he wouldn’t giggle like a twelve year old boy.

And so that the entire rest of the lab, with our collective maturity of prepubescent children wouldn’t be compelled to make ball jokes for the next hour when we were supposed to be talking about science (or how some of us *ahem me* are completely unable to repeat other labs’ published findings).

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Curried Eggplant Soup…Eat.Live.Be

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There are days like today when I remember that the sweet success of self control can taste better than two slices of pumpkin cake with butterscotch filling and brown sugar icing snuck from the fridge when no one is looking.

Better than spoonful after spoonful of peppermint brownie batter from the stand mixer bowl when you find yourself baking for lab meeting at 10pm on a cold and kind of rainy Tuesday night.  (How else are you going to distract everyone from the fact that absolutely zero of your experiments are working?  Here’s to crossing our fingers for scientific success in the new year.)

Better than Hershey’s candy cane kisses that you always somehow manage to eat twenty of even though you swear to yourself up and down, every time, that you’ll only have one.  (Why do you ask the impossible of yourself when it’s so much easier not to start than it is to stop?)

All of which are absolutely delicious, don’t get me wrong (and are all coincidentally going on my kitchen. Right. Now. Save. Me.)

But.

The feeling of waking up and knowing that you held the reins.  That your stomach isn’t crying out in sugar overdose.  That you actually are capable of doing this.

Tastes way better than the transient pleasure that a slice of cake can afford.  And it’ll stay with you for much longer.

(NOTE – Remind me of this in a few days when I’m knee deep in flour, butter and sugar again and that container of cream cheese frosting in my freezer sounds like the cure to any and all holiday baking stress. Mmkay?)

(NOTE x2 – Why do I even do things like freeze cream cheese frosting?  I’m totally asking for it.  How is that a good idea?  Ever?)

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