emmalish

Oh trust me @TdeV I don't need any persuasion on the toys 🤣

You're a bad influence @TdeV!!

I've always wanted to try Rancho Gordo beans, but I'm in Canada and the shipping costs are pretty prohibitive. I finally broke down and decided to treat myself a few months ago. I bought a variety of beans and enough to justify the shipping cost. I'm still working my way through them and continue to be blown away by the quality and flavour. And now I'm spoiled and looking for some good dried beans available in Canada (because I can't afford to keep paying those shipping costs!).

I've gotten used to doing the conversions myself – a lot of things, I have memorized, but I also have a few handy conversion sites bookmarked. Funny thing is I have a blog and even though I prefer to work with weights, since the majority of my readers are in the US and use volume measurements, that's the way I set it up. I'm planning to include both in the future, though. Trying to figure out the most logical way to lay it out. That said, while working with weights is easy and much more accurate, it's absolutely possible to get good results using measuring cups. Maybe not consistent results, but certainly edible!

Okay, cookies totally count as baking! While I agree that what so many amazingly talented people are posting here is on another level altogether, you totally shouldn't discount what you're doing. Trust me – I know people who can't even manage brownies. (does my post say "schedule" @ the end? Every time I hit submit or edit, it seems to tack the word "schedule" at the end...) Schedule

I canNOT believe you have a fear of baking after following this thread! And I feel the same way about there being different forms of payment. For the past few years, I've been baking cookies for my office every single week. People occasionally chip in a bit of money for the ingredients, but for the most part, this is something I'm just really enjoying doing because it gives me a chance to try new recipes that I probably wouldn't ever get around to if I were just baking for myself. To me, that's worth the cost of ingredients. Not to mention getting to see people enjoying what I bake. That's the real reward of baking.

Thanks tikidoc! I've actually already pinned that recipe as a potential – love Smitten Kitchen. :-)

That's gorgeous! Do you have a good recipe? I've never made babka, but I've been requested to one of these days.

I've been meaning to try that one. Thanks for the reminder.

I'm just going to go ahead and link to some recipes on my site that I think would hold their shape well and work for what you want. Several of them, you'll see, were made with exactly the type of cookie cutter you're looking at, so you can judge for yourself :-) espresso shortbread cookies spiced cardamom cookies cinnamon animal crackers chocolate ginger cookies molasses spice cookies soft sugar cookies Flavour-wise, I think the spiced cardamom cookie may be my favourite. I ate wayyyy too many of those.

That looks beautifully moist, Franci.

I'm so sorry to hear this. I don't know her personally, but after awhile on the forums you get to recognize certain names. Annie, thank you so much for posting.

Kim, it's sounding like I may need to make this more than once, to try the different variations.

Anna, what did you think of the dark brownies? I know where I can get some of the black cocoa powder.

Kim, you RULE! Thank you so much! And yes, I totally get requests to make things for people all the time. I mostly don't mind because I love baking, but I don't always accommodate, because I totally have my own list of recipes I want to try!