So much better, in fact, that I’m going to attempt a VERY short, very easy run before work tomorrow (on the treadmill, so I can stop immediately if anything hurts). Fingers are crossed that it goes okay and I can still run that half marathon next weekend. Yep, not holding my breath.

Ellie has been showing off her new trick of sitting up, which she can do successfully most of the time (the rest of the time she folds in half with her face on her feet, which weirdly doesn’t seem to bother her. Strange kid.) Sophie helps her out.

But what’s better than playing with Sophie? Playing with Dad! The hour between 6:30 and 7:30, when he’s home and she’s still awake, is definitely her favorite hour of the day.

I was a little sad when I realized St. Patrick’s Day wasn’t falling on a school day, but that was not about to stop me from baking for my co-workers. These are just simple chocolate cupcakes frosted with a basic mint buttercream. I colored half of it green and left the other half white, and put them together in the piping bag to get a swirl.

By the way, if you still need St. Patrick’s Day recipes, I have some for you here!

Courtney is a Facebook and blogging friend that I’ve never met in real life, but I’m SO excited to be a part of a virtual baby shower in honor of the little girl she’s expecting next month! (Thanks for hosting, Josie!)

It took me forever to decide what to make for this. At first I was thinking something savory, and then I decided I wanted to make cupcakes (sort of fitting since Courtney worked at a cupcake bakery!) Pink lemonade cupcakes seemed like a pretty good baby shower dessert, and Mike and I both loved these.

The recipe I found online called for cake mix and pudding mix, which definitely was not going to happen, so I turned to Joy of Cooking and cut their white cake recipe in half, with a little lemon extract instead of vanilla. Then I just mixed some pink lemonade concentrate into the frosting.

Courtney, I’m so excited for you and your husband to welcome your sweet baby girl, and she’s one lucky kid to get you as parents!

(adapted from Joy of Cooking and inspired by The White Library)

I guess it could have been the weather (50 and raining…just like home!). Or it could have been my new shoes.

Sorry, they’re a little dirty. I always hated Brooks, but when we were running shoe shopping a couple weeks ago I decided to try them. Going in I was pretty sure I wanted Newtons, but I liked these SO much more (and in the interest of full disclosure, I bought them with my own money and Brooks has no idea I’m writing about them). They’re light and feel just cushioned enough. I normally run in Asics 2170s, but these have become my shoe of choice.

Anyway, the run. I started out with a mile warm-up, then picked it up for three miles, which I ran in 6:53, 6:43, and 6:34 (whaaat?). I don’t think I’ve ever run that fast in a tempo run, and since my 5K PR is 6:51 minutes/mile I think there’s a good chance I’m in PR shape. We’ll see…I may be making an attempt this Sunday.

Lately I feel like I haven’t been baking as often as I want to, so in addition to planning my weekly dinners, I’ve been planning for a couple baked goods every week too. First up was Black Bread (um, Heidi’s pictures are about a million times better than mine).

Rye bread with carrots in it is actually pretty good, who knew?

My sister gave me The Pastry Queen cookbook for Christmas and these brownies looked completely amazing. As my mom would say, they’re so sweet they’ll make your teeth curl, but to me that’s kind of a good thing.

This is the LAST day of my maternity leave! It’s gone by really fast, and although I know I’m really going to miss Ellie, I’m really happy to be going back to work. I stopped by for a department meeting the other day and ran into several of my students from last year who are now in high school. They were some of my favorites, and they all ended up running Cross Country this fall. One of them said she never would have considered it if I hadn’t encouraged her and talked about how fun it was. She started last year hating running, and now she’s already starting to train for the track season!

I’m going again today to pick up my work laptop and some of my teaching materials, because this weekend is going to involve a lot of lesson planning. I’m kind of nervous about how I’m going to balance teaching, training, blogging, and most importantly, being Eleanor’s mom, but fortunately Mike is amazing and has no problem trading off morning duty so we can both get workouts in, so that will help a lot.

Oh, and I finished the hat! It fits Mike perfectly, yay. Next up: a stocking for Ellie. I found a pattern but I’m pretty intimidated. Thank goodness for youtube videos – any time I get stuck, I find a video of what I’m trying to do, watch it about 35 times, and attempt it myself. It worked out pretty well for the hat, but that was a ridiculously simple pattern. There’s a good chance Ellie will just end up with a stocking from Target, but I’ll do my best.

I also like graham cracker crust about a hundred times more than regular pie crust, so this recipe has that going for it too.

The recipes I found for pumpkin pie bars all had an oatmeal mixture and buterscotch chips sprinkled over the top, but I wanted to keep it simple. The filling isn’t overly sweet, but it goes perfectly with the crust. I think these should replace pumpkin pie as the standard Thanksgiving dessert.

Mike and I made the mistake of putting the pan on the table and taking turns cutting pieces. Over half the pan disappeared within about ten minutes. Oops.

I skimmed a few pages and ended up checking it out, and I’ve actually really enjoyed it! I appreciate that the author doesn’t take herself too seriously, is able to recognize her flaws, and doesn’t do anything too unrealistic. At the outset, she acknowledges that she’s not unhappy, she just wants to see if she can make herself a little bit happier, and tries various things based on her research. Some of them work, and seem like things that I would definitely do (like getting rid of clutter and finding more fun); others don’t interest me (like keeping a gratitude journal or starting a collection). But I think the thing that really stuck with me most was the concept she kept coming back to: “Be Gretchen.”

I’ve definitely noticed that the periods in my life that I was the least happy were when I was trying to be somebody else. I will never be interested in interior decorating, and that’s fine. I’d rather throw a bunch of stuff in a pan and end up with blondies than spend hours decorating sugar cookies with royal icing. I’d rather run for miles than go to Zumba.

I know it seems really obvious, but I found it really helpful to be reminded “we can chose what we do, but we can’t choose what we like to do.”

I like putting things in blondies.  Like M & Ms and pretzels, or in this case, cranberries, white chocolate chips, and toasted pecans.

The peaches at the farmers market are absolutely PERFECT right now, but I know the season is almost over. It seems like a lot of people are getting excited for fall baking with pumpkin and apples, but I still want cherries, peaches, plums and strawberries!

Somehow I managed to keep myself from eating all the peaches I bought last week and actually had a few left to bake with (for the first time all summer!) I used a mix of yellow and white because they each contribute their own flavor.

For the topping, I made sweet drop biscuits so I wouldn’t have to deal with rolling out dough and cutting it. I like the rustic look it gives, too.

Peach season, I’m going to be devastated to see you go…

Recipe:

4 medium or large peaches, peeled and sliced (here’s how to peel them)
2 tbsp brown sugar
2 tbsp white sugar
1/4 tsp cinnamon
pinch nutmeg
1 tbsp corn starch

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tbsp baking powder
pinch salt
2 tbsp sugar
4 tbsp cold butter, cut into small cubes
3/4 cup whole milk

1 tbsp sugar, for sprinkling over the top

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Combine the sugars, spices and corn starch, and toss with the peach slices. Place in a 1 1/2 quart baking dish.

To make the topping, whisk together the flour, sugar, salt, and baking powder. Using a pastry blender, blend in the butter until it resembles coarse crumbs. Stir in the milk and mix with a wooden spoon.

Drop spoonfuls of dough evenly over the peaches, the sprinkle with 1 tbsp sugar. Bake at 350 for about 40 minutes, or until the topping is golden brown.

Some things I’ve really come to appreciate lately:

1. Trader Joe’s and their vast selection of appealing non-alcoholic beverages

2. The elephant slippers I got at the night market in Luang Prabang, Laos. We do not have a single square inch of carpeted floor in this house, so slippers are pretty necessary.

3. Mike’s excitement about the giant Swiffer-like floor cleaner he found at Home Depot, which has WASHABLE cloth covers instead of disposable ones. Clean the floor, save the earth.

4. Squats. (I don’t have a picture for this one) When I was running all the time I never did squats because they made my legs too tired. Now that I’m stuck on the elliptical and bike, I’ve been doing a lot of squats to keep up my leg strength and I LOVE them!

5. Pinto beans. Not only to eat, but to use as pie weights.

6. Orange blossom water. Because it makes desserts taste like flowers.

7. FRESH FIGS. For a limited time only. I can’t get enough.

I have been really loving the idea of tarts lately, so I wanted to figure out a tart that incorporated figs. I made a cornmeal crust (my new favorite crust, for sure), filled it with honey pastry cream (just leave out the sugar and a little of the milk and use honey) with a little orange blossom water, and topped it with thinly sliced fresh figs. I was extremely happy with this tart, and Mike was too. So happy, in fact, that we ate half of it in one sitting. We don’t do moderation very well.

The only tart pan I have is 11″ wide, which is pretty big. This would definitely be better in a 9 or 10 inch pan, so if you have one, use it!

Recipe:

makes 1 9″ tart

crust
(adapted from The Secrets of Baking by Sherry Yard)

1 stick butter (4 oz), chilled and cut into small cubes
1 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup yellow cornmeal
1/4 cup sugar
2 large egg yolks
2 tbsp heavy cream
1/4 tsp salt

pastry cream
3/4 cup whole milk
1/4 cup honey
1 1/2 tbsp corn starch
pinch salt
2 large eggs
2 tsp butter, softened
1/2 tsp orange blossom water

6-8 fresh black figs, sliced thinly into wedges

First, make the crust:

Whisk the egg yolks and heavy cream together in a small bowl.

Combine the flour, corn meal, sugar and salt in a food processor and pulse a few times to mix.

Add the cubes of butter and pulse until it resembles small pebbles. Add the egg yolks and cream and pulse until the dough comes together.

Press the dough into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap, and chill for about an hour.

Preheat the oven to 400 F. Roll out the dough between two sheets of plastic wrap (or on a floured surface) and transfer to a 9″ tart pan. Prick a few times with a fork.

Put a sheet of parchment on the crust and fill with pie weights (or dried beans). Bake for 10 minutes.

Turn the heat down to 350 F, remove the parchment and pie weights, and bake an additional 10 minutes. Let cool completely.

To make the pastry cream: Bring the milk and honey to a simmer in a small saucepan.

In a medium bowl, sift the corn starch and salt over the eggs, then whisk until smooth.

Once the milk is simmering, pour it into the egg mixture, whisking constantly. Return the entire mixture to the saucepan and bring to a boil over medium, whisking constantly. Once it is thick and pulling away from the sides, remove from the heat, and pour through a strainer into a clean bowl.

Stir in the butter and orange blossom water. Press plastic wrap onto the surface and chill completely. If it’s a little lumpy, give it a spin in a food processor or blender to smooth it out.

Spread the cooled pastry cream evenly in the tart shell. Arrange the sliced figs on top.