Working on the baking badge has coincided with my efforts to spend more time doing things that I love, one of which is baking. Recently, I tried to remember just when I first became interested in baking. I originally told John that it was when I was a teenager, but I don't think that is true. The summer before fourth grade, I entered some cookies in the Ventura County Fair and won a blue ribbon. (Snickerdoodles, if you're interested.) Even before that, though, when I was very small, I had a cardboard kitchen like this one.
I loooooved my cardboard kitchen. You couldn't actually make anything in the cardboard kitchen. So my mom and my grandma Gerry just let me do the real thing. (I realize now that my cardboard kitchen did not even include an over but did include a sink. Despite this early exposure to the required equipment and the concept, I still do not enjoy washing the dishes.)
John couldn't think of any hobby he'd retained interest in for such a sustained period of time. I don't know what, if anything, this says about either of us. (Side note: both of us have loved to read since we learned how, but neither of us considers reading a hobby. It is required for survival.)
So, the baking badge seemed like a good fit. I started on familiar turf - cookies. For the badge, I made the sugar cookies pictured at the top of this post (which were much better than this picture implies), snickerdoodles (big surprise), and lacy oatmeal cookies. I thought the sugar cookies were good but my coworkers neither commented nor ate them all, so I think they were more mid. The snickerdoodles were a gift so I don't know how they turned out. (Well, I did test one, just to be on the safe side. It was tasty.) But the lacy oatmeal cookies - oh my! These were amazing. The recipe came from Heirloom Baking with the Brass Sisters. More about the sisters here. I highly recommend this cookbook.
I am now moving on to cake, which is still familiar but less so than cookies. (I bake MANY cookies a year. It's my go to for any occasion, happy or sad. Or even just to celebrate the every day.) I have so far made a carrot cake and an apple cake. The carrot cake is one I have made many, many times and is always a crowd-pleaser. It contains neither raisins nor pineapple, which is why I chose it originally. If I wanted pineapple cake, I would make pineapple cake. The apple cake was new and not one I will try again. It was dry and did not have much flavor. I realize now that both of these cakes involve produce, which is certainly not something I usually seek out in a baked good.
One more cake to go and then we'll be moving on to less familiar territory (probably breads and eclairs) and then eventually to completely unknown worlds. I am very much looking forward to expanding my horizons!
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