Watermelon Mallow Cookies

I can't believe that it's September! I totally meant to post these cookies weeks and weeks ago. Why? Watermelon screams summer. Watermelon does not say "pumpkin spice latte," "cozy sweaters" or "chilly evenings." Sorry, I have a good reason! I'll be sharing more on that later. For now...

Check out these cute cookies!  So adorable!

I had this image in my mind at the beginning of the summer. I was dreaming of a watermelon mallomar with cute black seeds and bright green cookie. After two weeks of searching for candy coated seeds, I gave up and stopped by my favorite NYC baking shop and picked up these black sugar pearls. And hot pink sanding sugar. So Pink!

These cookies are just a new take on my traditional mallomar cookie. Now, I know they aren't a true mallomar, since they aren't coated in chocolate (FYI, I can't wait until the classic mallomars hit the grocery shelves soon!!!). I decided last year that I didn't like to coat my flavored cookies in chocolate. Why? They just taste like chocolate! The flavor of the marshmallow is so subtle, the chocolate flavor just overpowers the marshmallowy flavor.

So, if you aren't sick of summer yet (if you are... seriously? Summer is awesome), give these cookies a try! You will most likely need to pick up some things at the store or online (i.e. - Watermelon candy oil, pink sanding sugar, bright green food coloring & black sugar pearls). Have fun making these, they're super fun!

Once Year Ago: Sour Apple Fruit Chews
Two Years Ago: Homemade Coconut milk & Thai Chili Sauce
Three Years Ago: Italian Sweet & Sour Chicken
Four Years Ago: Chilled Asparagus Salad

Watermelon Mallomars

A Wilde Original

Warning, these cookies will make your entire house smell like watermelon. But not real watermelon. Candy watermelon! If you don't like the flavor of a watermelon Jolly Rancher, these cookies might not be for you. I was toying with the idea of making the marshmallow out of watermelon juice, but didn't think the flavor would be powerful enough to shine through the sugar. Maybe that's a plan for next summer!

Almond Cookies

I used the French almond sugar cookie recipe that I always use for mallomars. Follow the recipe in this link and just add some green food coloring at the end of the dough mixing. Roll it out just like in that recipe and you're good to go! Let the cookies cool before adding the marshmallow and decorating.

Watermelon marshmallow

Adapted from Marshmallows

For the gelatin bloom
1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons cold water
1 dram watermelon candy oil (Use the concentrated stuff)
3 tablespoons unflavored gelatin (I use Knox powdered gelatin)

For the sugar syrup
3/4 cup water
1 1/4 cups corn syrup
pinch kosher salt
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar

For the mallomars
1 cup small hot pink sanding sugar

In a small bowl, whisk together water and birthday cake flavoring.  Add gelatin and whisk until smooth.  Let sit while you prepare the sugar syrup.

In a 4-quart pot, combine all four ingredients for the sugar syrup.  Bring to a boil and cover with a lid.  Let boil for 2 minutes (this will wash down any sugar crystals from the walls of the pot).  Uncover the pot and clip on your candy thermometer.  Heat to 250 F.  Remove from heat and add bloomed gelatin.  Whisk until the gelatin is incorporated.

Pour mixture into the bowl of your stand mixer and turn it up!  Beat the sugar mixture on high for 10 minutes, until bright white and fluffy.  Transfer marshmallow batter to a piping bag with a 1-cm tip.

Pipe blobs of marshmallow onto the cooled cookie rounds.  Let marshmallow set for 30 minutes. Add three or four black sugar pearls and dunk in sanding sugar.  Be sure all the marshmallow is coated in sugar, this will keep them from sticking to each other.  Revel in your work, they are so adorable!!!

CTB 2014 - The Sono Baking Company Cookbook

What is the best thing about summer? Is it the lazy days spent at the beach? Maybe the long nights huddled around a campfire? Is it the picnics spent with family or brunches spent with friends?

Nope, it's not any of those things. It's fruit.

Plain and simple, summer is all about the fruit to me. I can do most of those other things at any time of the year. There are always beaches and brunches, but fresh and local produce is something that you can only get now. I've been stocking my counter with all sorts of stone fruits and berries since I saw the first white peaches at Trader Joes.

I like to make simple desserts during the summer with fresh flavors. I made this peach and raspberry crumble into single serve portions so that I could grab one from the fridge, pop it in the microwave and have a personal dessert. The boyfriend tells me that fruit doesn't belong in dessert, so I had this entire recipe to myself! He doesn't know what he's missing out on.

Summertime Salad

One of my favorite thing to to during the summer is to make vegetable slaws. I'll put together the ingredients on Sunday and toss the dressing with the veggies when I'm ready to eat. This brocolli slaw is my absolute favorite thing to make in the summer.

Normally, I hate raw broccoli. It just tastes dry and boring to me. When mixed with slivered almonds and dried cranberries, broccoli becomes so much more delicious. This is the only reason I ever have mayonnaise in my house.

If you are heading to a pot luck picnic, having a quiet dinner at home, or want something to eat at midnight, make this recipe. It barely takes any time at all to prepare and lasts for at least five days in the fridge. Well, it will last for five days, but I doubt it will stick around that long. I've been known to eat a big bowl of this stuff for lunch.

CTB 2014 - The Little Paris Kitchen

I can't believe that we are already in the final days of July! Where has this summer gone? Last summer was so different from this one. I was unemployed, enjoying a summer of job hunting and severance checks. Each day was long and filled with 6-mile runs, trips to Manhattan and working on my blogs.

This summer I'm working at a new company, traveling constantly and rarely getting into the kitchen. I'm so far behind on my 2014 challenge, I'll have to make something from two cookbooks each day just to make it by the end of the year!

In an effort to make a little headway on my Cook the Books challenge, I made dinner from three different cookbooks last week.  Today, we start off with the side dish - Asperges a la Parisienne from Rachel Khoo.

I first saw Rachel Khoo, on The Cooking Channel, years ago. Her simple and elegant way in the kitchen made me want to pick up, move to Paris, and cook in a tiny kitchen too. When I saw that she had a cookbook out, I knew I just had to have it.  The pages are filled with very simple and beautiful French recipes and some of the most pretty pictures around. She has a new cookbook out - "Sweet and Savory Pates." I'm tempted to pick it up, since this first book has been so perfect. Though I'm not sure how much pate I need in my life!

If you are looking for a simple and semi-light side dish for your dinner this week, pick up some asparagus and heavy cream. You probably already have most of the ingredients in your pantry!

Buffalo Summer

It's summertime! I'm just a few hours away from boarding a plane and flying home for a visit! I tend to go home to see my parents twice a year, Christmas and summer. That way I get to see both of the Buffalo seasons, winter and July. 

Well, that's how the old joke goes. I'm more in the camp that Buffalo has four distinct, yet unequal seasons. 

Fall starts rolling in immediately after Labor day. In mid-September, the leaves start to turn and the sweaters and jeans quickly reappear. I think it's Fall that WNYers live for. I always loved Fall because it meant going back to school. But then again, I'm a nerd and totally loved school. Feel free to make fun of me.

Yes, winter is long and snowy, but you'll rarely hear a local complain about it. "What is winter without snow?", they will tell you. I remember several Christmas eves, driving through blinding snow to get to my grams house. 

Spring is rainy and cool and it tends to last from early May until mid June. It gives you plenty of time to plant your gardens and clean up from the winter mess. 

Summer pops it's head in around early July and brings sticky, hot weather. We didn't have air conditioning in my childhood home. I was only ever upset about it for one or two weeks a year. You don't get 100 degree days in Buffalo, but humidity will make you wish you had a cold drink in your hand all day. 

One easy way to tell that it was summer in my childhood home? Check the freezer for ice cream. If it was summer, there was a solid shelf of Perry's ice cream. If it wasn't summer, there was probably just half a shelf. My dad seriously loves Perry's ice cream. (Remember, I took him to the Perry's ice cream factory last year? It was his birthday present, he loved it.)

You might remember that I'm lucky enough to be a Perry's Inside Taster! This means that once or twice a year, then send me ice cream! This is super important these days, because my Wegmans in New Jersey have stopped carrying the brand! (Worse day ever) This summer, I received a large box of dry ice and three containers of Perry's. Three containers of ice cream that were all destined for something different. 

First, the French Roast Coffee. I never saw this ice cream. The package arrived and I put the containers in the fridge. I left for a conference. When I came home, the ice cream was no longer in the fridge. The boyfriend may or may not have eaten the entire container of ice cream himself. He wouldn't fess up.

Next, Otto's Cupcake. I saw this ice cream a few months back, during Sweet 16 basketball time. It's chocolate ice cream, with pieces of chocolate cake and orange frosting swirled in. Let me be clear though, the frosting swirl is orange in color, not orange in flavor. My dad and I both had some and discussed this point for a good five minutes. We were both expecting orange flavor because we didn't read the box before we ate it. This ice cream was tasty.

Finally, All Natural Dark Chocolate. This ice cream made its way into those ice cream sandwiches you see above. I was inspired by these brownie ice cream sandwiches from Smitten Kitchen. 

I knew that I still had a container of chocolate Perry's in the freezer and thought nothing would pair better with the ice cream, than peanut butter. I whipped up a batch of my favorite peanut butter bars, divided the batter in two and sandwiched almost the entire container of ice cream between the two slabs of peanut butter bar. The boyfriend thinks my ice cream to cookie ratio is off. He's just crazy, these ice cream sandwiches are amazing.  Give them a try! Or come over, I have a whole pan of them to share!

S’mores Cupcakes

I don’t know about everyone else, but these are the facts of my life. Once I moved out of the house, my parents got all sorts of cool toys. I’m not saying that I was a deprived child (other than my sad cable tv-less existence), I had plenty of things to fill my childhood days with fun. I played the flute and my parents bought me a fancy flute with open keys. I still have it and think about trying to play it once and a while. I was a baton twirler and went to competitions all over the country. My trophies are still in residence at the Wilde parent household. My brother and I spent summers camping out in the backyard and riding our bikes along the creek.

Look at that chocolate ooze!

What I’m talking about are the cool toys that would have made our childhood even more carefree. It started slowly, with the John Deere. Johnnie showed up when I was in College and he was my dad’s new best friend. They would ride around the lawn in the summer and plow clean canyons in the snow in the winter. What Johnnie didn’t know, was that he was taking someone’s place. He was replacing my brother and I, Johnnie didn’t complain when he had to plow two feet of snow from a very long drive-way. Dad just had to feed Johnnie some gasoline and away he went to chew up the snow or grass.

Then came the boat, the hot tub, the air conditioning. The current toy that I’m totally jealous of is a fire pit. I think that is what I was thinking of when I threw together this recipe. Spring is coming soon, I can feel it trying to sneak up on winter, and spring is when the fire pit comes out. My dad gathers the firewood, the dog breaks up sticks to make kindling and my mom gets the marshmallows. Sounds like a great evening and I don’t think my apartment building would go for one in my unit.