#also can i just say i hate when recipes measure butter in cups instead of TBSP
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evildeerboy · 26 days ago
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tried to avenge my earlier baking fail (the spicy banana saltloaf) by making a pinterest recipe of those cream cheese pumpkin muffins from starbucks from scratch including the pumpkin puree
dw i still fucked up the filling placement as you can see. but actually they still slap. so i win at baking again
come to my house and eat these
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mellon1998 · 1 year ago
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It's baking season and, as a person who bakes as a hobby, I wanna post some tips beyond the usual "Just use milk instead of water for boxed cake" tip that everyone seems to think is some big secret.
Get parchment paper. It's super useful for cooking, too, but trust me you will want it for baking. Unless specified, most recipes will assume you're using parchment paper. Things bake differently on parchment paper than foil, get the parchment paper. Also, you don't need to put anything on the parchment paper to prevent sticking.
I don't care what the box or recipe says when you are making brownies DO NOT GREASE YOUR PAN. What you are going to do is line it with parchment paper and leave about 2-3 inches of paper sticking above the top of the pan. Once they're all done, you simply grab the paper and lift it out of the pan.
Brownies will bake fine in a glass baking dish if that's all ya got, you don't have to have a brownie pan.
When you are measuring ingredients use dry measuring cups for dry ingredients and level the ingredients. If you do a heaping "cup" of flour you have measured more than a cup of flour.
FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS. This isn't cooking, this is baking. Doing things in the wrong way, wrong order, wrong amount will impact the final product in terms of texture and taste in big ways.
If you are baking some kind of pastry (pie, tart, etc.) And the pastry tops/edges are done but the center and filling are not, cover the top and/or edges with foil. This will prevent burning while the rest bakes.
Be patient when you are creaming butter and sugar. The creaming process has phases. First the butter just gets coated in sugar (popcorn phase), then it kinda starts to break down and mix (lumpy mashed potatoes phase), then it will be nice and smooth and properly creamed (creamy mashed potatoes phase). Be patient.
Cube your butter before you cream it, it will make your life easier.
Unless specified, bring eggs and butter to room temperature before you use them. It will affect the texture.
Use whole milk if you can, the recipe will likely assume you are and it's taking the fat content of the milk into consideration.
When adding the dry ingredients into the wet do it in portions. It will incorporate better and make less of a mess.
Folding ≠ mixing. When you fold your dry ingredients into either whipped cream or egg whites, DO NOT MIX THEM. You are undoing all the work you just did. Instead, pour some of the dry ingredients in, use a spatula to cut down the center and fold it over onto itself. Look up a video if you need to. Do not overfold, either.
Use wooden spatulas instead of silicone. Maybe this is just personal preference, but silicone spatulas have never been good to me and I hate them. Wood is much kinder and can actually handle thicker doughs and batters.
If you are baking cookies that you need to roll out and cut (either with a knife or cookie cutter), please make sure you chill the dough before you cut it. Not only will it be easier to cut out, but chilled dough holds its shape and doesn't spread while baking.
If you are doing a one bowl recipe, where it specifically says to mix everything in a single bowl, mix between ingredients. For example, if you add the flour first then the cocoa powder, mix after you add the cocoa powder. If it says to add baking soda next, mix after you add the baking soda. If it doesn't specify an order in the directions, just go down the ingredient list. This ensures everything is fully incorporated into the dough/batter.
I have no clue if anyone will actually need these, but I think people get intimated by baking so they never try it. It's one of my favorite ways to destress and it's not that scary, there are just a lot of things that aren't common knowledge for people who don't bake. Just start with easy stuff and you'll be fine. Feel free to reblog with your own little tips and tricks.
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cosmiclatte28 · 4 years ago
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Baking! (Yuta x you)
a/n : heyyo it’s friday, let’s have some “me” time and enjoy some imagine with Yuta! Idea came from @yutahoes comment on previous post HOT PATCHED
warning : none! suggestive, how you ended up with a bun in the oven! (your beloved Nami), and of course 2020 was a baking year and I am more than willing to share you the recipe i am referring to for this story! DM me :D also i got a bit too carried away :) but it’s gonna be fun :D
tagging : @2-3-t-i @yutahoes @ailoveyuta
with that said.. enjoy your scene! 
Ever since the pandemic started and staying at home becomes a mandatory rule, you and your fiance, Yuta have been trying to overcome boredom with all possibilities. On the first month of staying home, you two are very excited about having “leisure” time while working at home. Both of you are delighted by the fact that you don’t have to wake up early, drive in the busy streets, and you just have to slip into your proper clothes when there is a board meeting. Considering your job is a magazine editor, you have meetings but luckily not every day.
Second month, you start to do yoga and exercises with Yuta every time he is bored, and he has nothing to do. Well, his comeback is still in preparation, so he only comes for regular practice and always got home when your office hour ends.
Fourth months, you pick up a new hobby and because your magazine company needs to make a new fresh content that suits the situation, the team comes up with a baking page. You are assigned to make the content, including taking pictures and trying the recipes your team made. You also have to do the editing but there’s help with that. You take the challenge, though you never bake before you see this as the perfect opportunity to start a new hobby. Things were great, the content is rising in demand since the world is baking suddenly! You got your raise and you enjoy doing this until your silly ass fell from challenging yourself to a wild yoga pose. You hurt your arms, they are a slightly fractured and you cannot make your baking content for the first three weeks of recovery, but you are so irritated to just stay in front of the laptop and watch your other friend make the pictures and cakes. So, when you can no longer hold yourself back, you plead the director board to give you back the baking section and they did love your job so you won the part back.
“Yuta can you come home earlier today?” you question the man who already wears his mask and has his training bag ready on his shoulder.
“Me?? I guess I’m done after lunch, I only have to practice singing today. Why?” he asks you back
You put on your sweetest smile “Don’t you want to try baking? I need some help with the rubric.”
Yuta’s eyes twinkle, it’s been his wish to try baking but because of practice and the amount of tools to wash and lack of time he hasn’t been able to do it. Now that you are offering him, he thinks he can seize the opportunity.
“Okay, I’ll try, who knows NCT will have a baking vlog after this, might flex about my skills” he smirks and you only grin at his cockiness.
“Okay, you can go.” You push him away after kissing his cheek and blushing when he winks at you and disappear behind the door.
Today you just have to wait for the team to send you the ingredients and recipes. You wonder what you’ll bake today no, what Yuta will bake today.
He was lucky the baking procedure he has to do today is easy. Simple lemon cake and you manage to get good pictures of Yuta’s hands and the aesthetic bowls and whiskers. You manage to hold the camera with your stiff casted hand, but it works even when you look super silly.
“Oh gosh! This is healing.” Yuta exclaims when his first cake comes out of the oven nicely and with a good aroma. You quickly take pictures and once it’s done, Yuta has already cut a slice and pops it into his mouth. “Yummy, I am talented indeed.” He sounds so confident and you hate to admit, his cake is better than what you expect and knowing your husband, you know he won’t stop bragging about this, he might even go as far as trying more baking recipes.
--
Your nightmare comes true, once his promotional schedule with NCT is over, he comes home with a load of baking supplies.
“Yuta, what’s all of this?” you ask when you help him bring in bags of spices, butters, and decorating tools.
“My promotional week is done and I have our well deserved rest! I am going to be productive and bake for you every day!” he smiles like a little kid who just get a chocolate and you can’t say no to him.
“Oh no, not every day Yuta!” you joke as you help him organize the spices into the kitchen racks.
He brought different types of flours and sugars, even bought yeast and baking sodas. Oh he really is planning to bake!
“Well, I have to finish some works have fun baking! Make sure you wear the apron and don’t set the oven too high. Wash the bowls too okay.” You pat his long hair and skip into your room.
Yuta takes his time to shower, sing in the bathroom, check the internet for easy recipes and even compare recipes from different websites.
His choice finally is decided on the famous banana cake, it doesn’t require mixer and he notices you have bananas at home.
“Flour, bananas, eggs, butter
” he bends to take the things out and places them all on the counter. Next he brings out the bowls and whiskers and the rest of the stuffs he needs.
“Okay all set,” he rubs his hands and takes the apron you have. Yuta’s lucky he can use your apron well, (thanks to his small waist). “And where is it,” he walks to the living room to get his small rubber band and as he bites the rubber between his teeth you happen to leave your room to get some water.
“Oh!” you exclaim when you see a hot scene reveling in your eyes. If you bring something, you’d drop it already.
There under the golden hours of the sun from the window, Yuta is tying his hair up and his lip bites is not helping you. Not to mention the apron fitting him well. You kinda regret not buying a “cute” apron.
“Let me help,” you grin when Yuta fails to tie his hair. Somewhat in the middle of tying his hair we was surprised to see you gawking at him. He blushes a little when you step closer and take his hair into one bundle and expertly you tie the band around it.
“There you go! Neat and tidy.” You click your tongue and run a hand down his exposed biceps.
“You’re teasing me, aren’t you?” you playfully ask him this when you learn just how “dolled” up he is. In your apron, smelling good, looking hot, and smirking.
“As much as you want me to tease you, see that?” he points to the kitchen and you follow his finger direction “I am baking you cake.”
You lead him to the kitchen, cool yourself down with a glass of iced water and Yuta starts to busy himself with the recipes.
He starts by measuring the cups of flour, sugars, and spoons of cinnamon and baking soda.
You choose to observe him instead of coming back to your work. You’re glad you have saved your works earlier and don’t have to return for it.
Yuta looks super serious when he cracks the eggs and starts mixing them to the dry ingredients. You take note at how accurate he is, you learned about the small details about baking through your rubric.
“Need help?”  you ask when Yuta starts to whisk the mixture together. He brings his bowl to his waist and with his tilted head and angled hand, he starts whisking the batter.
You have to hold yourself back when you see how he looks delicious right now. With an apron, a tied hair, tongue sticking out of his lips from focusing, his flexed arm and how he smirks at you. Gosh he’s the real cake here! You wonder how will he react if you suddenly come and bite him there on his neck which is inviting you to bite a mark there. Hey mark!
“No, I got this.” He winks at you and continues whisking the ingredients. Another minute passed by, he adds the mashed bananas and some cut apples for better taste. You focus on his actions but mostly enjoying the show he gives to you.
“You look hot.” You blurt that out loud as you secretly eat the choco-chips he will add later. “You think I look hot? You haven’t seen me whisk a whipping cream or make a meringue!” Yuta says as h places the bowl down and begin doing the next step.
You lean over the counter, eager to see what he is doing next. “Okay, all set just add choco-chips and stir and pour to container.” He smiles nicely to you, expecting to get praises or just a satisfied face. But all Yuta sees is your side smirk.
Yuta can always read you like a book, so without losing his cool, he checks you up from head to toe. He notices how you’re not focusing on him, biting your lips, and your ears and cheeks are as red as strawberries right now!
He connects the dots in his head and snaps his finger in front of your face. You jump in surprise “What?” you yell, clearly annoyed that your fantasy session is destroyed.
“No you’re staring at me too intensely! Stop it,” he acts like his innocence just got violated.
You click your tongue “Yuta, blame yourself!” you pull your hair in despair when you feel your body heating up more and feel tingles slowly creeping up.
Yuta is ignoring you when he shows off his flexibility by bending forward to put his container in the oven. “And that’s the right temperature, now we wait!” he tosses the mittens aside and leans his body to the table you’re seating at. He glances to the cup of water with only ice cubes left, he grabs it up and swirls it around before sipping the remaining drops.
“What are you looking at Princess?” his playful remarks are slipping from his lips. You bite your lips down and try to shake whatever idea you have in your head after seeing him drink the last drop of water like that is the best water in the world. His Adam’s apple bopping is not helping you at all, you lick your lips and lowkey will kill him for making this looks so yummy and advertise-able.
“Nothin’” you lie though it is as clear as day that you are “eating” him in your mind.
“You sure? You don’t look like that.” He says and then knocking the glass to his lips to take the remaining ice cubes in his mouth.
You nod your head and turn redder if it’s possible. Dang Yuta is clearly teasing you and you love it. “I-“ you can’t stop your sentence for the next thing he does is taking your lips there with ice cubes in his mouth. The cold sensation wakes you up from your day dream and you press your hands over his trained arms. He passes the cube into your mouth and you’re surprised with this new sensation. Oh Yuta and his surprises!
He continues taking you there until there’s no more cubes left and both of you are already breathing harder and the atmosphere has turn super hot. Next thing you know, you’re already on the sofa pinned down by Yuta as he teases you with butterfly kisses here and there.
“Yuta-“  you moan out his name when you have the chance, your hand pulls on his hair so he can stop kissing you for a while “Your cake.” You breathily remind him about the cake in the oven.
“Hm? My timer hasn’t gone off.” He ignores your attempt to stop taking you here.
“You want this right? Or do you want to eat me instead? You really look desperate earlier.” He nuzzles into your neck and gives some generous kitten licks there.
“Oh you were teasing me!” you defend yourself “Admit it.” You push him away to see his eyes and get the truth out, but Yuta is Yuta and he always has his way of making you lost. “No, I did not. You were this turned on by me, that you were having such sexy thoughts in the middle of the day.” His hand travels south and you already stifle a moan so he won’t be cocky about it.
He already plays with the hem of your pants, only seconds to pulling them away and eating you raw there, but his timer goes off and he has the biggest grin on his face, while you the biggest disappointment. “Yuta!” you’re already sounding so desperate, tears are forming in your eyes and Yuta only chuckles, he wipes your tears and stands up from between your legs.
“Oops! My bad, cake is done! Why don’t we try it when it’s hot?” he leaves you to turn the oven off and takes the cake out. He left you like that! All teased up and messy.
“Yuta- you will pay for this.” You groan before ignoring the pain from the edged pleasure and stomping your feet angrily to the kitchen.
“Come try this, tell me if this is good.” He offers you a forkful and you angrily chomp down on it.
“Bad.” You mutter, as you cross your hands over your chest but still chew on the delicious cake.
“Bad? This is so yummy! I can take this to the boys, and they’ll ask for more.” Yuta towers above you.
You pout “Fine, its yummy.” Your hand reaches out for some more bites, but you stop and shake your head “You. Finish what you did to me, or I cannot enjoy my cake.”
He giggles and in one swift motion already has you in his arms “Alright my princess, let me enjoy my cake instead!” he brings you to the room and you’re already giggly again, giving him kisses and playing with his hair.
You swear you will kill him if he only leaves you in the room and goes back to eat his cake in the kitchen, lucky you he did not do that. You both know that the cake will be cold once you’re done with the session but who cares when Yuta can bake more of them!
ïżœïżœAnd that is probably how you end up putting a bun in the oven with Yuta!
fin.
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softholand · 4 years ago
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chocolate kisses - t.h
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pairing: bestfriend!tom x youtuber!reader
words: 2.9k
warnings: none, just pure fluff
a/n: so... i did it again!!! i had this ideia after watching a video like this from one of my favorite youtubers. anyway, i really hope you guys enjoy and please do let me know what you think!! again, english is not my first language so that’s that. thank you @definitely-not-black-cat for proofreading this, you’re the best and i love you 💛 enjoy!!!!!!
You adjusted the lenses of your camera one more time, making sure everything was ready to start recording. Since you started making videos for the internet and became a youtuber, you were practically obligated to learn about filmography. Sometimes you had your friend Harry around to help, since he’s a professional but today he got a job to do, so you were on your own. In fact, you had another Holland around, the oldest of them all and your best friend since you were kids, Tom.
Ever since you made your youtube channel, your viewers have been begging you to bring Tom to a video, so when the opportunity came, you finally asked him and he was more than happy to accept.
“You ready?” You asked your brown haired friend.
“Yep!” He said, making sure to really pop the “p”, knowing you hated when he did that.
“Tom, I was being serious earlier. I need you to behave!” You said, feeling like you were talking to a child instead of a 24 year old.
But that was the thing about your friendship with Tom, when you guys were together it felt like time hasn’t passed at all and you were still two little kids, doing stupid things and constantly misbehaving.
“I got this! Don’t worry!” Tom answered, a smile wide on his face.
“Saying not to worry actually makes me worry even more, you know?” You huffed, making sure the memory card was in.
“It’ll be fine, y/n! I promise!” He said, looking at you with those big brown eyes that made you forget what you were even asking.
“Okay, I’m going to start!” You told, seeing him clap his hands excitedly, but the years of friendship had taught you that this was just a thing he did when he was actually nervous. “And go!” You said, pressing the record button and joining your friend behind the kitchen island, where you had all the ingredients for the recipe already measured.
“Hey everyone, welcome back to another video! This week we have another one of the baking series and if you couldn’t already see, I have a guest with me today. Ladies and gentlemen, the star of the moment and my very own best friend, Tom Holland!” You said enthusiastically, while he observed you with a big smile on his face.
“Hello everybody, I’m Tom and I’m really excited to be here today!” He said, giving a little wave at the camera.
“Today we’re making a chocolate cake with chocolate frosting. This is one of my absolute favorites and it’s actually your mom’s recipe, that she was kind enough to pass me so I could share it.” You explained, looking at your friend.
“I love this cake! Mum used to make it when we were kids but suddenly she stopped doing it, saying we were too grown up.” Tom pouted to the camera, making you laugh.
“Well, it’s your lucky day because we’re gonna start making it right now. You ready?” You asked, seeing him nod, looking at all the ingredients in front of him. “I know it seems like a lot but this cake it’s actually pretty easy and quick to make, just take a little while on the oven.” You explained, knowing he probably thought it was way too difficult for him to make a cake like that.
“Great! Where do we start?” Tom said excitedly, which again made you laugh.
“Okay, the first step is always preheat your oven, in this case at 180 ÂșC, for at least fifteen minutes before putting the cakes in. Then we can start creaming together the butter and sugar. I’m using a stand mixer today but you can totally use a hand one. It’ll work perfectly fine.” You said, pointing to the ingredients.
“This is such a pretty mixer, y/n! I wonder who could have given you something like that.” The boy beside you pointed to your pink Kitchenaid with a smirk on his face. “It was you, dumbass!” You said, shoving his shoulder.
“Wow, I’m such a good friend!” The smirk on his face grew even more, seeing you rolling your eyes at his antics. “Can you stop praising yourself and start making the cake?” You pleaded.
Tom nodded and after you told the camera the ingredients and correct measurements, he put them in the mixer, looking confused when he couldn’t find the buttons.
“It’s on the side, Tom!” You told him with a laugh, showing exactly how to do it.
While the butter and sugar creamed together, you took the time to observe your friend, who seemed completely entertained with it. A couple minutes passed and when everything was looking good, you told him to stop the mixer, so you didn’t have to shout at the camera.
“When you mix those two together, you can start adding your eggs, one at a time. Always remember to crack them on a separate bowl, to make sure you don’t ruin your mixture with a bad one.” At that, Tom’s eyes light up, as if you had said the most clever thing in the world. “You can turn the mixer on low while I’m adding the eggs.” You instructed Tom, who nodded and made exactly that.
“This is looking gross!” He said to you once he turned the mixer off.
“Yeah, it does not look pretty when you put the eggs in but as soon as we put the flour, it’ll all be fine.” You reassure him. “Also, stopping the mixer and scraping down the sides of the bowl will help everything incorporate much better.” You advised, giving a pink rubber spatula to your friend, so he could do what you just said.
“Still look gross!” Tom scrunched his face, making you laugh.
“Stop it, we’re going to add the rest of the ingredients now.” You scolded, which caused him to pout at you. “We’re going to put 1 tablespoon of baking powder, 1 teaspoon of bicarb, a pinch of salt and 1 cup of cocoa powder into the flour and mix it really well before alternating this with the buttermilk. Got it?” You asked him, making sure he understood your instructions.
“So, baking powder, bicarb, salt, cocoa powder, mixing really well.” He kept narrating his moves, which you found adorable.
“Okay, now we have to put the mixer on the lowest speed, otherwise we’ll have flour everywhere. And don’t look at me like that, we DO NOT want flour everywhere, Thomas!” The smirk plastered on his face was the same one of a child before doing something they shouldn’t be doing.
“I swear I didn’t think of doing that, y/n/n!” He stated, putting his arms up in surrender.
“Yeah, right! Like I didn’t know you for twenty four years.” You rolled your eyes, making him laugh.
Once he turned the machine back on, you slowly started to add the flour, followed by half of the buttermilk, more flour, more buttermilk and finally the rest of the dry mixture.
“Perfect! Now we can turn off the mixer and scrape the sides one more time, then turn back on for about a minute or so, just to make sure everything is really well combined.” You said smiling.
“That’s it?” Tom asked, as soon as you took the bowl out of the mixer. “That’s it, the batter is done! Easy, right?” You said and he nodded. “Now we can divide the batter into three separate pans that I already greased and lined with baking paper.”
“Baking paper?” He questioned, seemingly confused.
After explaining to him what baking paper was, you proceeded to put the batter equally into the pans.
Just as he was about to lick the spatula, you swatted his hand, making him wince. “Don’t eat that!” You exclaimed. “Why?” Tom asked.
“It has raw eggs and flour. It’s not safe!” You told him, sounding obvious. “Fine, I won’t.” He promised, putting the bowl and spatula aside.
With the pans ready, you told the camera you were going to put them in the oven, for about 40min or until a toothpick came out clean. While you were away, Tom looked right at the camera and sneakily gave the spatula a good lick, scrunching his face at the taste of raw batter. When you came back, you rolled your eyes at your friend.
“What?” He questioned, trying not to sound guilty. “Was it good?” You asked him with a smirk.
“What?” He repeated himself. “The batter, was it good?” You laughed, seeing him widen his eyes. “How do you know?” He asked, confused.
“You have some on your face, silly!” You said, throwing a towel at him. Tom flushed, feeling embarrassed for being caught. “It wasn’t even good!” Tom said, cleaning his face. “I told you!” You laugh at his scrunched face.
“Okay, now we’re going to clean this up and wait for the cakes to bake, then we’ll come back and make the icing.” You told him, walking to the camera and stopping the filming. “You’re such an idiot!” You tell your friend, making him laugh.
Even after you denied, Tom insisted on helping, but his help ended with him splashing and playing with water more than actually washing the dishes. When you finally got the kitchen cleaned, the timer of the oven went off, indicating the cakes were ready.
While the cakes cooled, you prepared the ingredients for the icing, which consisted in butter, icing sugar and melted chocolate. Once everything was ready, you joined Tom on the couch, where he scrolled through instagram on his phone.
“What are you looking at?” You asked plopping down next to him. “The comments on my last post.” He said, looking at you.
“Yeah? What is it?” You questioned, looking at your own phone, seeing a brand new notification. “It was you.” Tom answered plainly.
“What?” You almost yelled, quickly clicking on the instagram app, where you found a picture of you taking the cakes out of the oven. “Tom!” You exclaimed, sending an annoyed look at you friend.
“What? Everyone’s saying you look good!” He told you, making you groan. “Yeah, gorgeous!” You mocked.
“Oh, there’s one saying you have a great ass!” He smirked. “Thomas!” You send him a reproving look. “Not my words, darling!” He shrugged, the smirk he wore growing even bigger.
“They’re also saying we’ll make a cute couple.” Tom smiled, looking at you and catching your eye. “As if, Holland! As if!” You mocked, getting up from the couch and making your way back to the kitchen to check your cakes, while his eyes stayed on your body.
“You know what? They were right! You do have a great ass!” He smirked. “Can you stop being a flirt and help me finish this cake?” You asked, not believing the words that left his mouth.
Once your annoying friend joined you, you hit the play button again and started recording. “We’re back!” You said enthusiastically. “We’re back!” Tom repeated, making you laugh.
“Our cakes are baked and cooled, I’ve put them in the fridge now, just to make sure they’re completely cold when we put the icing, which we’re going to start making now.” You said to the camera, followed by the ingredients and correct measurements. “Once again, we’re using a stand mixer, but just as the cake, a hand mixer will also work. Now Tom, you can put the butter and sugar in the mixer, but be careful with the icing sugar, it’s very powdery and can go everywhere, so start at a lower speed and just go up when it’s fully incorporated.” You warned him.
“Right, boss!” He mocked, making you playfully hit his arm. “While you do this, I’m going to melt the chocolate, okay?” You asked and he nodded.
Just as you turned around to put the bowl in the microwave, you heard your mixer going on full speed. The sight that greeted you once you turned back to your friend, was unbelievable. Tom was covered with powdered sugar, from head to toes, his curls where white with the powder and the look on his face was one of pure regret.
“It really does go everywhere!” He said looking guilty.
“I can’t believe it, how old are you? 5?” You rolled your eyes.
“I’m old enough to do this!” Tom said before jumping at you and wrapping his arms around your body. “Tom!” You yelled, getting out of his grip.
“Now we’re equal!” The brunette winked, making your blood boil.
“You idiot! You know we’re gonna have to clean this mess, right?” You questioned, shaking some of the icing sugar from your clothes.
“It was worth it!” Tom laughed and hearing that sound made you chuckle too.
After a little bit of tidying up in the kitchen, you started recording again, this time hopeful that you could finally finish the cake.
“Now that the butter and sugar mixture is light and fluffy, we can add the melted chocolate and mix everything really well.” You informed, both Tom and the camera in front of you.
Tom helped you with the chocolate and after mixing the icing for a couple of minutes, you passed him a spatula to scrape the bowl and make sure everything was well combined. But, just as you were about to take the spatula back from his hands, he put it in his mouth, licking a stripe of the chocolate icing.
“Tom!!! Not the spatula that you’re mixing the frosting!!!” You yelled, seeing him roll his eyes. “Why not?” Asked the brunette.
“I’m going to eat that cake too!” You exclaimed, sounding obvious. “Oh, c’mon! It’s not like we never shared saliva before.” Tom smirked.
“You know I’m gonna have to cut this part off of the video, right?” You questioned, shaking your head at his cockiness. “Why?” He insisted, not taking that stupidly handsome smirk out of his face.
“Your fans already think that we’re a couple, they don’t need to know that we drunk kissed at my twentieth birthday party.” You stated, shaking your head to try and get rid of the memorie.
“Whatever, I think they would like it!” Tom winked, giving the spatula another lick. “Oh, they sure would!” You said, taking the object out of his hands and putting in the sink.
Back to the recipe, Tom helped you put the icing stuff away and bring the now cooled cakes, a knife, a cake stand and of course, a clean spatula to start icing it.
“Now with a clean spatula
” You said, glancing at your friend, that couldn’t help but laugh.
After filling the cakes, you helped him spread more chocolate icing on the sides and the top, before putting some sprinkles.
“It’s finished!” You screamed, making Tom laugh. “It looks really good. Can we eat?” He asked with hopeful eyes.
“Wait! I have to take some pictures first!” You warned, before taking your camera and snapping a few shots of the finished cake.
Once you were done, you finally let him slice the cake, putting the piece on a plate for you guys to try. “This cake it’s so good!” Tom moaned, taking another bite.
“It’s so moist and the icing is not too sweet. It’s just
 perfect!” You agreed, also going for another bite, but Tom was quick to playfully take the plate away from you.
“Well, that was it! I hope you guys like the recipe and try to make it at home because it’s delicious. Thank you again for joining me today and helping with the cake, Tom!” You smiled, looking at your friend.
“Of course, thank you for inviting me and you guys for requesting this video.” He said, smiling at the camera.
“Don’t forget to subscribe and like this video, also leave your comments down below letting me know what other recipe you guys want me to make. I’ll see you next week. Bye!” You said waving at the camera, followed by Tom.
Once you finally finished recording, you and Tom got each one another piece of cake and went to sit on the sofa, where you eat it while watching some tv show.
Your attention was brought away from the show once you heard Tom lightly chuckled beside you.
“What?” You asked, already knowing he was up to something.
“You have chocolate on your mouth.” He said, pointing at your face.
“Of course I have chocolate on my mouth, I’m eating a freaking chocolate cake.” You rolled your eyes.
“No, I mean
 outside of your mouth. Here, let me help you.” Tom offered, getting face to face with you.
And of course, just when you thought he was going to clean your face and just forget about it, he surprises you once again, this time taking you by the neck and sealing your lips together.
You were so startled that your first instinct was to fight, but once you realized the familiarity of his lips, you relaxed and kissed him back. Unfortunately, it didn’t last long but you’d be lying if you said it didn’t leave you wanting more.
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done this
” Tom, being the gentleman he was, started to ramble and apologize for what he had done but you just rolled your eyes.
“Just shut up!” You smiled, leaning back in and kissing him again.
You knew that you two would have a lot to talk about after this but right now, all that you wanted were more of those chocolate kisses.
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tagging some mutuals: @stuckonspidey @bi-writes @missnxthingg @peeterparkr @tomhollandthing @wazzupmrstark @screamholland @fallinfortom
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thegreatdeprussian · 5 years ago
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Great Witcher Bake-off
https://archiveofourown.org/works/23908951
because there’s no better way to say “i love you” than to (not so) subtly suggest to get fat together
It’s been weeks since quarantines and total lockdowns have been implemented all around the world, disturbing everyone’s daily routines with ghastly news headlines. Households in the countryside and cities alike continued to mind their own business, but the prolonged isolation persuaded a vast number of citizens to rummage their minds for more ideas on how to make the most out of an unprecedented phenomenon.
There are wealthy individuals earning six figures and enjoying the nights swimming on their pools who thought singing will achieve world peace. There’s the common folk who are either working from home, or taking the time-off to practice meditation and self-care. There are also those who wish to have a magical glow-up after the quarantine and has long started to diet and exercise. However, there are still households who function on food—mainly cooking and baking. Yes, baking.
And among those people are Jaskier and Geralt, with the former assisting the latter tie his apron.
Milk, yeast, salt, and other ingredients were laid out on the kitchen table. Bowls (a round metal helmet, according to Jaskier) and cups of assorted sizes sprawled across the granite countertops. A tea-stained book with pages dedicated to recipes was placed nearby; however, it was rarely used as one can simply look up online on guides for main dishes and desserts.
“Alright, Geralt,” Jaskier clapped his hands—highly anticipating the chore, “What’s the most important ingredient in baking?”
Geralt sighed, “The ingredients.”
“That’s the second one! The most important is love.”
The taller one among the two no longer bothered to ask what mayhem did he get himself to. He chose Jaskier, after all. Instead, he opted to reorganize the clutter formed by the baking supplies.
“For this afternoon, we will be making a soufflĂ©.”
“No.”
Jaskier, though stunned at the sturdy answer, was optimistic nonetheless, “And why not?”
“Why can’t we just make a normal cheesecake?” Geralt retorted, “I will not beat egg yolks for 25 minutes just for your damned soufflĂ©.”
Then there was a short recollection back when they first attempted to create some meringue cookies. Their mechanical mixer was, in Geralt’s phrasing, not heavy-duty enough and it strangely heated up during the first seven minutes of beating the egg yolk. The remaining time was spent with Geralt manually doing the job.
“Fine,” Jaskier responded, remembering how he hated having to wait for the egg soufflĂ©, “but normal is boring. So, we’ll go for a colorful and vibrant theme.”
In an instant, Jaskier poured a bunch of marshmallows on to the bowl.
“Marshmallows? Sweets? I don’t trust this already,” Geralt’s eyelids closed.
“Oh, shush.”
After adding butter, Jaskier placed the marshmallow to the microwave for two minutes, stirring the mixture before adding six cups of fruit cereal—the whole ordeal making Geralt flinch.
“This is a recipe for diabetes,”
Jaskier chuckled, “Trust me, even though you’re a sweet toothless creature, you’ll love this,”
Geralt wasn’t sure about loving the results. The process is bearable, however.
The marshmallow and fruit cereal mixture is then placed on a circular molder, acting as a base for the cake. Its surface was flattened using a measuring cup before it was set aside. What followed was cream cheese, lemon juice, heavy cream, vanilla extract, and more sugar. Jaskier tried to add another pinch, but was instantly blocked by Geralt.    
“We’ll just freeze this for at least three hours, as we move on to another cheesecake recipe,”
Geralt groaned, taking the cheesecake to the freezer.
And the next recipe proved to be disgustingly sweeter.
A bigger batch of cream cheese was set to another bowl. A cup of sugar and a tablespoon of vanilla extract was poured instantly before being stirred. Warm milk and gelatin followed after.
“Geralt, bring out the ice cream wafer cones.” The said man complied without arguing.
Three smaller bowls were then sprawled on the countertop. Jaskier poured the mixture in each of them, and when Geralt returned, he tasked him to pour a pint of food coloring in each bowl—blue, purple, and pink. One color, one bowl, was his strict instruction.
“It this supposed to be a flag?” Geralt asked, connecting the dots.
“Uh, not intentionally? I don’t mind the coincidence. Although, I intended to make a unicorn cheesecake.”
“
 unicorn?” Disbelief clouded Geralt’s face, only to be met with Jaskier’s mischievous smile.
“Deal with it. This is your life with me now.”
Geralt wiped the beads of sweat that formed on his forehead, while on the other hand, Jaskier formed the base using graham crackers, butter, and sugar. The cream cheese mixture, now colored, was placed on the base on top of the base layer by layer. Jaskier then introduced the finishing touch—the homemade unicorn horns. He dipped the ice cream cones on melted white chocolate, sprinkling its surface with blue and pink powdery edibles.
“Why are you dumping everything?”
Earnest eyes gazed at Geralt, “You can dump anything. Anything can be your dump,”
The taller one exhaled a heavy sigh, knowing he can’t control everything. Everything was then placed into the freezer and the remaining hours was spent cleaning the kitchen, sweeping the floor, and putting the unused ingredients back to their assigned cabinets. Jaskier talked, hummed, and sang along the music playing on the radio, eradicating the silence an afternoon is most known for. Sometimes, he’d wiggle on the beat, encouraging Geralt to do the same, in which he would persistently resist until the last minute.
Then, the other would tell him that baking day is equivalent to Jaskier day, and it will require his cooperation, so he dances anyway. Geralt alleviates his embarrassment by swearing to give a strenuous workout regimen to Jaskier when it’s finally Geralt Day.
A few more hours pass by until the radiant one among the two drags the other to eat their most awaited cake.
“There we go,” Jaskier takes one cake and hands Geralt the other, “our rainbow cereal cheesecake and unicorn cheesecake!”
Geralt huffs, “Looks like something you feed to little brats,”
Dinner time with these two closely resembled a children’s party instead, but it’s alright because there’s no better way to say “I love you” than to (not so) subtly suggest to get fat together.
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muppetsilas · 5 years ago
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My Plan
The absolute biggest thing to keep in mind through all of this is that this is NOT a diet! This is not temporary and painful. You’re not denying yourself things, don’t tell yourself you “can’t” have a thing. Keep in mind that these are smarter permanent choices that you’re making and every time you put something in your mouth, you’re making the decision that it’s “worth” the calories. The ONLY rule to weight loss is to burn more calories than you’re taking in, so you can adjust to whatever foods you need within moderation, don’t treat this as torture.
Also, DO NOT weigh or measure yourself AT ALL until after the sixth month. Take all measurements before you start and then avoid it until then. Daily/weekly/monthly progress fluctuates too much and muscle weighs more than fat per square inch, so do not focus on numbers; nothing will de-motivate you quicker. You’ll be able to tell things are changing by how you feel and how your clothes fit.
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First Two Weeks: -Make a list of all of the non-carby foods you like and won’t get sick of. There are many lists online to draw from. Don’t worry, you’re not cutting all of the things out now; but the list will be helpful later. -Come up with three or four things you can make in bulk and freeze in baggies or containers (already cooked or ready to cook portions) for once weekly meal prep (helps when you’re busy or on the go - I use quiche/fritatta, chili, chicken stir fry, and pork chunks). -Do the same listing bulk things for the fridge that you can grab for snacks instead of snack foods (I use tuna salad, crack slaw, cheeses, lunch meats, and hard boiled eggs). -Cut out carbonated drinks. Even fat free, calorie, even sparkling water. It’s not about that; they are stretching out your stomach with their bubbles, and making more room in there to convince you that you need more food in there to be full. -Cut back on sweets if you can. Have half of what you used to have. -Switch to five scheduled meals a day, one of which is a protein shake. SCHEDULED is important. Set alarms and just spend this time getting into the groove of five smaller meals instead of three larger ones. Don’t worry too much about portions right now, however try not to ADD more food than what you’ve been eating, just spread out what you’d normally have for the three and make sure one of the five is a shake. Any shake you like that has more than 10 grams of protein per serving. That extra protein will curb your hunger and get your levels up for when you start working out (don’t panic, you can do this). Anyone on food stamps, be aware that if you’re getting your shake stuff on that, it has to be one that has a “nutritional facts” label, NOT a “supplements” label.
Second Two Weeks: -Replace a second meal with a shake. Any meal you like. At this point, you’re having two shakes and three smaller meals a day. Note that it’s different for everyone; no one can tell you how much to eat as it depends on what/how you were eating before. So don’t stress about amounts. YOU know how much you were eating, so trust yourself and eat less than that per meal. Don’t be worried, those two extra shakes a day will make a difference and you shouldn’t need as much in the three meals. -Get into your meal prep and eating schedule routine; set one or two days a week when you cook and store food and by now you shouldn’t need alarms as much for your meals.* *Amazon sells cheap little take-out storage containers, like 40 for $10 that can be frozen or refrigerated that have lasted me years that are “correct” portion sizes (half cup). -Get moving. We’re taking this slow, so don’t push it, you don’t want your body to get scared about what’s happening. It will push back, but you got this! Pick any activity at all that will get your heart rate up for at least five minutes at a time, three times. This is called HIIT (high intensity interval training), and it’s the best way to work out as it maximizes your calories burned. Make a fun playlist on Spotify or whatever service, that gets you HYPE, and just go for it. -WATER WATER WATER. The more water you drink, the less hungry you’ll be and the better you’ll feel overall. Yes, it’s annoying to pee more, but even if you’re not taking in more fluids than before, at least replaces your sugary beverages with water. I HATED water when I started this, now I’m addicted. We should be addicted! Trust me, your life will change with water. And a secret: Decaf coffee counts as water up to three cups a day! So enjoy that, but don’t go over three, or you’ll be worse off. -Cut out sugary coffees and juices. -Cut out the rest of your sweets (for now; they’ll be back once you have more self control on how much you have in one sitting. Better just not to have them in the house as a temptation).
Month Two: -Replace another meal with a shake or a protein bar. -Start focusing more on your portion control. By the end of the month, your goal is to be at a half cup per normal meal (2) and 8 fl oz shakes for the other three. -Stay on your eating schedule. -Time to up your activity! I know this is the part that sucks, but try to make it fun! Don’t stick to the rigid guidelines of what people say is exercise. Make up your own. There are literally millions of videos online for every activity and any ability level. I am disabled, and I had to find things I could do with my limited mobility. If you have no equipment at all, you can things around the house! Or you can invest in an affordable resistance band set on Amazon. Try to do either 10 minutes three times or the five minutes 6 times. Either way, you’re doubling your activity. -No drinks except water. -No sweets or spreads. Time to drop that mayo, butter, BBQ sauce, etc. I know it’s tough, but you shouldn’t need it anymore with all of the great recipes you have in your repertoire now.
Month Three: -Alright, time to crack down. You should be eating protein, veggies, and limited fruits only at this point. You should be feeling pretty satisfied with the two half cup meals and three protein shakes a day. You should only be drinking water, no other beverages. -How’s that workout going? You should have been getting at least a half hour cumulatively of cardio every day and now you want to add some weight training if that wasn’t what you were doing already. You want to look up “core” exercises. We’re not looking to get you “swole” or ripped. You don’t need to work out all of your muscles. You’re just looking to get your core strong. That will be the basis of all future workouts and it will make you feel better overall AND it will help to avoid any injury when you want to work out harder later.
Stick with this as long as you can; depending on how much weight you have to lose; and in a few months, you’ll notice that unfortunately you’ll plateau. This stall can last one month to many, and it’s the hardest part of this whole adventure. You’ll want to quit and give up and pig out. I PROMISE it will end and then you’ll lose weight even quicker than you did before. If you want to jump-start the loss again, you may need to increase your workout and/or food intake again.
Lastly, just try to listen to your body! The society we live in has made that really difficult to do. Our whole lives we’ve had to eat in the rush or “clean our plate” or have our veggies... We don’t really listen to our bodies anymore. Your body will tell you when you need certain foods and water. Don’t assume that the more you eat, the less hungry you’ll be after. You know from Asian food that that’s not true. Protein, as a rule, will keep you fuller than carbs and sugars. Just try not to eat because you feel like you have to “finish this serving”. I did that for so long because I didn’t want to waste food. Unfortunately you may waste food during this journey, but you’ll come up with ways to store it and have it later and make adjustments as you go.
I lost 90 pounds this way over the course of 11 months. It feels slow, but think about how quickly a year actually goes by!
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basketofverbiage · 5 years ago
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Candy and Tradition
So, I decided to challenge myself to write and post 25 drabbles between now and Christmas. Here is the first (also, all the recipes listed are real things my family makes, so if you are curious about them, let me know and I can post some of them)!
For 90% of the year, Y/n was perfectly happy with her life in Seoul. While she did get a little bit homesick from time to time, her beautiful boyfriends made everything better on those days. Namjoon and Jungkook were the perfect mix of brains and brawn, art and sport, sweet and spicy, and kept life interesting enough that Y/n really didn’t miss her home country. However, the 10% of the time where homesickness was paramount was the holiday season. Since she grew up in America, Y/n’s family all celebrated Thanksgiving, and she’d grown used to not being able to do the same in Korea. Her family had never been traditional about the turkey and all the trimmings, so that part was easily displaced for Y/n. In fact, one year, her family had had a taco bar instead; however, the tradition that they kept without fail was that the entire family came together the Saturday after Thanksgiving to make homemade candy of all varieties. While other families baked Christmas cookies together, Y/n’s family spent 8-12 hours making all kinds of confections; if it wasn’t nailed down, it got covered in chocolate that day.
Y/n usually would fly home for a few days to participate in the candy making festivities, but this year it just wasn’t feasible due to her work schedule. Her family was okay with it, and her mom had promised to video call her so that she could see her nieces and nephews experience the day for the first time, but it just wasn’t the same. So, when the week of Thanksgiving came, Namjoon and Jungkook noticed how upset she was becoming.
“Hyung, we need to do something to help Noona. She’s so sad about not seeing her family,” Jungkook told Namjoon as he brought the elder a cup of coffee to his studio.
Namjoon accepted the steaming cup of coffee with a tender kiss to the younger’s lips before speaking. “I know. I’ve been thinking about it all morning and I think I have a solution. What if we call and get some of Y/n’s favorite recipes from her mom and we have our own candy making day here in Seoul? We have this weekend off for a change, and maybe Jin-hyung would be okay with us taking over the kitchen for the day.”
“I’m sure he would because he’d get to eat some of the things we make,” Jungkook said thoughtfully. “When can we call for those recipes? It might be hard to get some of the ingredients so we might have to overnight them from online.”
“I’ll reach out by text since it’s the middle of the night there. Maybe we can tell Y/n that we can’t come over to her apartment tonight because something came up here, and we can stay late here and video chat her then.”
After getting a goodbye kiss for the road, Jungkook headed off to record some vocals for their new album. He felt a bit better now that he had a plan in place to cheer up their girlfriend, and he knew that she’d love the surprise. He’d loved Namjoon since he was 15 but was still amazed at how intuitive the man was and how quickly he could come up with a solution to nearly any problem. He trusted that Namjoon would let him know when their important call was, so he threw himself into his work to finish in plenty of time.
Y/n’s mother was a morning person and responded excitedly at 5 am her own time and scheduled a time to call the boys. They would call her at 10 pm KST; it would still be morning for Y/n’s mom, but it would give her time to get some recipes together. She wanted to scan them in and email them to Namjoon.
Jungkook knew that Namjoon would probably work on music right up until the call, so he called Y/n himself.
“Hello, my Love!” she answered.
“Hi Noona. Have you had a good day at work today?” he asked through the biggest smile. Just hearing her voice squeezed his heart in the best way.
“Oh, you know. It’s been work,” she giggled. “Have my amazing boyfriends been working hard?”
“Yeah, we have. And that’s part of why I called. Something has come up, and we won’t be able to come over tonight, Noona. We have to re-record all over our vocals for 3 songs. The computer they were on crashed and the vocals were lost, so we have to stay late to catch back up. I know you have to work tomorrow, and we don’t want you to stay up too late waiting on us. I don’t know what time we will be finished.”
Jungkook felt guilty lying to one of the loves of his life, but hopefully the surprise they were coordinating would make up for it. It tugged his heartstrings at the way she sounded so sad not to see them.
“I’m so sorry, Noona. We will make it up to you this weekend when we are off,” Jungkook promised.
After talking for a few more minutes, Jungkook made Y/n promise to text him when she got home safely after work so that he could order dinner to be delivered to her. Even if they weren’t physically going to be there, he could make sure that she ate well. He pondered over their plan a bit more as he returned to Namjoon’s studio.
“I talked to Noona. I told her we had to re-record all the vocals for like 3 songs so we wouldn’t be over. We should tell the others so if she asks they will play along until Saturday,” Jungkook told him. “I hated lying to her.”
“I know. I talked to her earlier today after we heard back from her mom, and I couldn’t bring myself to tell her we couldn’t come, so I’m glad you did. When I tried, my voice just stopped,” Namjoon replied.
They curled up on the sofa in the studio and ordered dinner for themselves as well as dinner for Y/n once she arrived home. After they ate, Jungkook curled up into Namjoon’s arms for a bit, just loving the warmth and love radiating off of him. The recipes that Y/n’s mom had emailed came through, so they looked them over and started a grocery list. All the recipes had either standard names or weird Christmasy names; Jungkook didn’t have any idea what the hell an Elf Bite was, but it sounded super good. Y/n’s mom called right on schedule and let them know that if they needed her to she could ship some of the ingredients that they might not be able to find in Korea from America. Namjoon pre-paid the postage for a package since they figured even sending a package second day from America would be expensive and since this was their idea, they wanted to cover the cost of everything.
“Boys, you have to have someone record her reaction to this for me please. I know we were a bit hesitant about your relationship at first, but I’m so happy you found my little girl. You are both wonderful for her,” Y/n’s mom said to Namjoon and Jungkook before ending the call. “You really do bring so much light and love into her world. Thank you for doing this for her.”
The next few days were a whirlwind as the boys worked hard and also spent a lot of time searching out the rest of the ingredients that they needed. Y/n mom had shipped nearly everything they needed for a few of the recipes, and with the help of some of the staff, they were able to get everything together. Jin helped hide everything in the dorm and was wholeheartedly supportive of their endeavor. So much so that he offered to help with the plan.
Namjoon and Jungkook were going to get everything out and get started on the peanut butter ball recipe that Y/n’s mom had sent. She had been very specific about how some of the ingredients couldn’t be measured, but that Y/n would just know if it was right by taste. Jin was going to call Y/n at 6 am on Saturday morning and beg her to come over. He was going to say that he was trying to make waffles and he just couldn’t figure out what was going wrong and beg her to come help him. Y/n loved to cook and to share her recipes with others, and this wouldn’t be the first time that Jin called her at a random time of the day begging for her help in recreating something they had eaten in America. Hopefully, by the time Namjoon and Jungkook had stumbled through the first part of the unfamiliar recipe, Y/n would be there to make the special adjustments to make the recipe complete.
They had stayed at the dorm Friday night so that they would be in place to spring their surprise. Y/n had had to work late so it worked out all around. Once they had showered after dance practice that day, they curled up in Namjoon’s bed and facetimed their girl. She looked so sad and tired, but Jungkook hoped that the next day would lift some of that sadness. Jungkook slept wrapped around Namjoon, their bare chests pressed together, until their alarm went off. At 5 am, Namjoon and Jungkook were sleepily getting ready for their day. Jungkook felt like he had barely slept from his anxiety that they would fail at the surprise, but it was go time. Jungkook made coffee and a light breakfast for them while Namjoon got dressed.
Namjoon came down the hall with Seokjin following behind. They were talking quietly amongst themselves as Jungkook put eggs and toast onto 3 plates and poured three cups of coffee.
“Are you guys ready for this?” Jin asked between bites of eggs.
“Yes, hyung,” Namjoon smiled softy. “Call our baby over.”
Nearly 30 minutes later, Y/n finally arrived. They had left the door unlocked so she could get in with no issues.
“Jinnie?” she called softly as she removed her shoes.
“In here, Y/n,” Jin called from the kitchen.
When Y/n rounded the corner into the kitchen, her mouth dropped open. Seokjin was standing against the back countertop with his phone raised, filming her reaction. Namjoon had both hands buried in a bowl, with powdered sugar streaked up his cheek. Jungkook was laughing as he stirred something in a bowl placed over a boiling pot while still watching Namjoon struggle.
“We’re not making waffles, are we?” she finally gasped out.
Jungkook turned off the eye of the cooktop before coming over and wrapping her in his arms. “No, Noona, we’re not making waffles. We know you were so sad you couldn’t be with your family for making candy with them. So we talked to your mom, and brought candy making to you. Your mom even shipped some ingredients from America for us.”
“Um
my loves, I hate to interrupt this beautiful moment, but I have no idea what I’m doing. Please help me,” Namjoon whined.
After she finally recovered from the shock, Y/n jumped right into showing the loves of her life and her best friend how to make the recipe that her grandmother showed her how to make as a toddler. No one was surprise when Namjoon dropped the first peanut butter ball he dipped in melted chocolate onto the floor while Jungkook lived up to his golden maknae nickname by making a peanut butter ball that was perfectly dipped and looked better than Y/n’s example. As time went on, the other members started getting out of bed and following the smell of peanut butter and chocolate until the entire group was standing around in various states of dress, rolling dough into balls and dipping into chocolate. Even Yoongi got into it.
They made so many different recipes of candy. Y/n’s mom had sent over several different recipes: Mounds balls, peanut butter balls, peanut butter Elf Bites, S’mores balls, chocolate covered pretzels, turtles, and peppermint bark. Half of the group was nearly sick from all the sugar, so they ordered pizza. Everyone else took turns in the shower while Y/n, Namjoon, and Jungkook curled up on the couch together. Y/n was sitting in Jungkook’s lap with her legs draped over Namjoon’s gorgeous thighs.
“Thank you both so much for today. I can’t explain how much this means to me,” she murmured to them through tears. “It made me feel less like I was a thousand miles from my family. It was so amazing that you were able to make my family’s recipes with me. Some time it would be amazing to merge the two, but even if that can never happen, I feel like it will be okay. The world won’t end if we start our own traditions here in Seoul.”
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thenervouscook · 5 years ago
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Nervous Cooking: An Intro and How To
Hello there. I’m a nervous cook. I hate wasting food. I don’t like being bad at things. I have a very complicated relationship with food, thanks to an eating disorder.
In short, I often feel daunted in the kitchen, have felt that a lot of recipes gatekeep information and make it hard to me to feel like cooking is accessible and fun.
I like food. I love the idea of cooking. With the help of some nice people I know, I’m making good progress into enjoying the kitchen, and playing around making things and swatting away the dreadful pretentiousness, snobbishness, and pomposity that sullies what is supposed to be a joyous, wholesome, and ultimately tasty activity.
So where to start? Before we get to sharing recipes, let’s have a breakdown of what we’re trying to do for ourselves, before we even turn the oven on.
How do we become less nervous in when cooking?
1. Put some music on.
There’s nothing as daunting as standing in your kitchen with a recipe open, feeling like you’re already set for failure before you’ve even begun. So with that, put some good tunes on. You might have to turn the volume down occasionally as it is distracting you too much from the task at hand, but honestly, set yourself up for a good time.
Hall & Oates are great for making your meal with.
2. Read the recipe first. Maybe read it a few times.
Too often, I’ve started cooking and followed the recipe as a go, only to find that the person who wrote the recipe can smash out some sauce in 40 seconds while it takes me ages to do, while I burn my onions in the process. 
Reading the recipe first enables you to plan for any tricky moments where you feel unsure, or indeed, helps you to work out how to re-word something that might confusing rather than having to translate it when you’re in the middle of cooking something.
Recently, I made something that said “add 100ml of stock”, which wasn’t included in the recipe itself - reading it through before setting off meant that I didn’t have a nervous breakdown halfway through.
3. Prep the ingredients
Foodies call it ‘mise en place’ - don’t worry about foreign phrases yet, we won’t be using them here and we’ll probably do a translation of cooking terms at some point. These phrases are perfectly fine to use if you know what you’re doing, but of course, when you’re a nervous cook, your brain can go “AAAAAAAAAARGH I DON’T KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS AND I’M ALREADY TALKING MYSELF OUT OF COOKING AND I MAY AS WELL JUST GO TO THE CHIPPIE”.
Calm down. It’s all good. Maybe we’ll do a glossary of terms later, so we can understand what these people are talking about.
Don’t worry. Mise en place basically means getting everything ready before you start, like they do on the telly. You’ve seen a TV chef saying “add half a tablespoon of paprika’, and they just tip it out of a little bowl, rather than measuring out while the pan’s on? It’s that.
So, if you’re making a curry and the recipe says that 4 spices are all getting thrown in at the same time, then measure them out first, put it in a bowl, or a little glass dish you’ve saved from when you ate a fancy yoghurt that came in a glass thing rather than a plastic pot, or even a cleaned out plastic yoghurt pot - it literally doesn’t matter - you measure them out, throw them all into a thing, and when the time comes to add them to your cooking, you can lob them in the pan without thinking about it, because you did the groundwork before the stress of the timer.
And ‘mise en place’ will not be used again on this blog, because there’s no need really.
4. Convert American measurements in advance
If you’ve found a recipe that looks ace on an American site, you’ll soon find out they measure everything differently. They have a ‘cups’ system. 1 cup is 128g or 4.5 oz.
If your scales are accurate enough to measure 128g exactly, go nuts. If not, take the time to find another recipe that has measured things out in a way that is more useful to you. If you have the money, have a look online and buy something cheap that measures out in American cups. 
Just don’t get caught on the hop while you’re in the middle of cooking your tea and get yourself worked up.
5. You can still eat a cock-up
American writer Hanif Abdurraqib said: “I'm not normally one for baking — I get that it is mostly all about the following of instructions, but I think that has always made the task more daunting for me and my many anxieties. If I failed, that failure would be speaking to some greater inability, or it might tell me something about myself. But, my anxieties, though busy as ever, aren't very interested in whether or not I fail at the moment. Also, I have such a low bar for edible desserts. Even a failed baked good is still a baked good worth consuming, in my home.”
That’s one of the golden things good cooks never share - even when you mess up, chances are, you can still eat it. Set your bar low. Don’t tip it in the bin because you’ve failed or because it looks like a mess.
I made a banoffee pie, and was worried I was going to balls it up, because I’m rubbish at whisking. Talking to a very talented chef I know, she said “don’t bin it - mix it up and call it Banoffee Eton Mess style!”
That was a very important lesson to learn - if it doesn’t work out perfectly, then re-brand the fucker and eat it anyway.
6. Follow good food people and ignore perfectionists if you want
A lot of broadsheet food writers and TV chefs are perfectionists, and don’t share their mistakes. When they appear on TV, they’re often berating some poor amateur cook for messing up their flans or whatever, because they’ve entered a talent show like Great British Bake Off, Masterchef, or whatever.
Ignore all that if you want, or if it puts pressure on you. It’s just you in your kitchen, making something to eat. Doesn’t matter if it looks like a road accident when you put it on your plate, as long as it tastes good.
Everyone’s Instagram accounts only show you their successes, so you can write those off too, if they’re doing your head in.
That said, there’s good people out there who will show you short-cuts, things to not worry about, and enjoy food that looks like an absolute mess. David Chang is a good chef to follow - on his Instagram, he cooked chicken thighs in a plastic bag in the microwave ‘round his mums, and has a show called Ugly Delicious where the focus is about getting rid of the pointless rules and aesthetic bollocks that stops a lot of people from wanting to cook.
Brad Leone at Bon Appetite is another good egg - he’s very much a ‘bung it in, that should be alright shouldn’t it?’ type of cook. Very unpretentious. Good fun. Pronounces the word ‘water’ funnily.
7. Focus on flavour, not aesthetics
I talked to someone who knows a lot of professional chefs, and they told me the difference between restaurant food and what we cook at home is the delicious but disgusting amounts of salt and butter they put in everything. Like, you’ll use a splodge of butter in your food, and a pro chef will stick a whole pack in. 
Season the crap out of everything too. Keep tasting it as you go along - you’re not a pro kitchen who has to worry about sticking a spoon in your mouth and then returning it straight to the pan.
When a recipe says 2 cloves of garlic, and you know you love garlic, sod it, put 3 or 4 in.
If you’re nervous about making your food too salty, for example, then just follow the recipe to the letter, and then when you serve it up later, if it needs more, just whack a load on as a booster at the end. It’s cool.
8. Don’t worry about having loads of gear
You might read some recipes that ask you to pulverise something in a food processor and you might not have one. If you can afford the gear, fine, go wild. If not, see what the alternatives are. You might be able to do it by hand, or you might be able to cheat by buying some pre-mixed stuff. Cheating is good. Don’t worry yourself.
If you’re bad at mincing garlic, just buy a tube of garlic paste. The only people who would judge that are terrible people, and terrible people don’t deserve your cooking.
9. Worst case scenario
You’ve burned your food. You’ve used salt instead of sugar. The whole thing has gone so badly that it is inedible. You feel defeated and annoyed at yourself. You swear you’ll never cook again.
It’s okay to wallow for a bit, but remember this - if you angrily sling everything in the bin and walk to the chip shop or Maccies - a Big Mac or chips pie and gravy is still a 10 out of 10 meal to have. In terms of you eating, you’ve not failed yourself.
Get stuck into your nuggets meal and enjoy them, and you’ll remember to not put salt in, instead of sugar next time.
10. Give yourself a break
Chefs, foodies, and cooks often forget to tell you what it feels like to not know how to cook. That makes sense - they’ve been practising for ages.They’re at a certain level, and assume the person they’re talking to is at a certain level too. 
When they casually say “knock up a quick roux” and you’re not sure what a roux even is, that’s okay - you can either stop listening to them, and watch a YouTube video about what a roux is, how to make one, and what they’re for... or you can carry on watching your show and just have a holiday in someone else’s good skills.
I can play guitar quite well, but I don’t hear a blistering solo on a Steely Dan record and think ‘well, I may as well throw my guitar into the street’ - I can pootle along on mine, while enjoying someone else who is better at a thing than I am. Try and do the same with food shows. You can always turn them off if they’re making you feel depressed - you don’t owe anyone shit.
Remember how grateful you are when absolutely anyone else cooks for you and how you don’t judge anyone else’s food harshly, because you’re not an arsehole? Do the same for yourself.
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remedialpotions · 6 years ago
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Over Biscuits
Happy birthday to one of my very favorite people, the amazing @aloemilk ! I feel so lucky to count you as a friend ❀ I hope you enjoy this fluffy little fic!
Word Count: 2,075
Rating: K+
This can also be found on FFN (author: bowtruckles) and AO3 (author: remedialpotions)
***
Pausing in the doorway, Ron furrowed his brows at the scene developing before him. Hermione stood at the stove, her bushy hair just barely contained in a thick knot at the back of her head, gaze fixed intently on a saucepan. Not unsurprisingly - she was skilled at a great many things, but this really wasn’t one of them - her face betrayed more stupefaction than she’d ever displayed in Potions class. Given that this was his wheelhouse, he knew he should help her, but when she started nibbling on her lip, a flush rising in her cheeks from the heat emanating off the range, he thought there also wasn’t much harm in allowing himself to watch her.
Just for a minute, anyway. He didn’t see as much of her lately as he would have preferred, and it gave him a small glow of warmth, deep in the pit of his stomach, to see her standing in the kitchen of the Burrow, scowling at a recipe. Too many times over the past four months, he had thought the Christmas hols might never actually be upon them and that he would spend the whole of his life missing her, but she was home. For two glorious weeks, he had her all to himself, and he wasn’t going to let any of it slip away.
He always loved watching her when she didn’t know he was looking. Hermione was rarely vulnerable, but when it was just the two of them together, or he caught her in a moment when she thought she was alone, all of her pretenses fell away. She stopped being Hermione Granger, Head Girl and war hero and ‘brightest witch of her age’, and simply became the woman that he loved - the one standing in his parents’ kitchen with streaks of cinnamon across her cheeks.
“After melting butter on low heat,” Hermione was muttering to herself, eyes fixed on the stained and crumpled parchment before her, “stir in brown sugar, molasses, salt, and spices.”
She tugged a sack of brown sugar toward her, picked up a measuring cup, and dutifully dug it in.
“There are spells for that, y’know,” said Ron, opting to make his presence known and striding across the faded tile floor toward her. He plunked a tub of molasses down on the work surface and grinned at her.
“Yes, well.” Hermione used the back of her wrist to push a rogue lock of hair out of her eyes. “It never hurts to do things the Muggle way, does it?”
“No, s’pose not.” Stepping behind her, Ron set his hands on her hips, his chin coming to rest on the fuzzy wool covering her shoulder. As she leaned back against him, one of her hands falling onto his, he peered into the saucepan. “Er - I should probably tell you-“
She craned her neck to meet his eyes. “Oh no, what?”
“The butter,” said Ron, wincing. “It’s a bit - er -overmelted.”
With a sorrowful glance down at the oily, golden-brown liquid in the pan, Hermione let out a sigh of resignation.
“You can just say that I burned it, Ron.”
Suppressing a laugh, he pressed a firm kiss to her temple and tightened his arms around her waist. So many times over the past four months he had wanted to hold her, just to feel the warmth of her in his arms, and he wasn’t about to take it for granted now. He only had a second to relish it, however, before she wriggled out of his embrace to retrieve her wand from the kitchen table. In the next instant, the burned butter had vanished from the pan, replaced by a fresh new block from the cooling cupboard. Instantly it began to sizzle and hiss against the scorching cast iron.
“Oh, that’s too hot, see?” Ron reached around Hermione’s hip to dial down the flame. “It isn’t supposed to bubble like that.”
With her lips pursed tightly together, she glared at the butter as though it had committed a personal slight against her. She never did cope well with being less than the best at anything, even something as trivial as baking gingerbread biscuits.
“Just pretend that it’s Potions class,” he told her, wrapping one arm around her shoulders and using his free hand to gently stir the butter with a wooden spoon. “You’re brilliant in Potions.”
“But you hate Potions - and yet you like doing this-“
“Yeah, well, this is better, it results in food,” he grinned. “And anyway, Potions was different, there’s no way to like a class when you've got either Snape breathing down my neck, or Slughorn, who poisoned me and still couldn’t remember my name-“
“Technically it was Malfoy who poisoned you, not Slughorn-“
“Still,” argued Ron, that little spark inside of him igniting like it always did when they bickered back and forth, “you’d think if someone nearly drops dead in your office, you’d-“
“Oh, stop,” Hermione whined. The genuine anguish on her face was like a blade through his chest. “Let’s not talk about that anymore.”
“Sorry.” He dropped a chaste kiss on her lips by way of apology. “Look, it’s really not a big deal,” he continued, deciding to pick up where she left off with the brown sugar. “We’re only responsible for the entire pudding portion of Christmas Eve dinner, so no pressure - oi!”
For she had pinched him on the arm.
“That isn’t funny,” she moaned. Eyes closed, she leaned her cheek against his shoulder. “What if I end up ruining it-“
“You won’t.”
“But-“
“You won’t,” he repeated gently. “We - we’ve had some pretty shit Christmases in our day, my family, but none of them have been completely ruined.” He quickly shoved away the thought that, in his eighteen years of life, no Christmas on record had ever followed events like that of the spring, and instead offered Hermione a smile. “It’d take a lot more than some botched gingerbread biscuits, I promise.”
She gave an relenting nod. “Fine.”
Her fingers brushed his as she took the wooden spoon from him, stirring as he poured the brown sugar into the melting butter. There was still a streak of cinnamon across her cheekbone, and he wiped it softly away with the pad of his thumb.
Unbeknownst to Hermione, Ron had actually offered, in conversation with his father one Sunday evening, to make all of the Christmas puddings. It was the one part of the meal he felt he could successfully prepare, and while he wasn’t naive enough to think that it would relieve the weight that had permanently settled onto his mum’s shoulders since the second of May, he felt it was the least he could do. He wasn’t naive, but he also wasn’t blind. He saw the weariness in her every time he and Harry visited for Sunday dinner, and as the pang of guilt shot through him, he would always promise himself he would do more, be there more. The only problem was that the Ministry of Magic seemed to think he had no life outside their intensive Auror Training program - and then George had asked him for help getting the shop back in order, and he couldn’t say no to that - and he’d also been Apparating to Hogsmeade every chance he got-
Anyway, baking a few batches of biscuits and a treacle tart felt like the very least he could do.
A companionable silence fell between them as they continued to prepare the dough, punctuated only by the occasional shared kiss or murmured request for an ingredient. And Ron let himself pretend, just for a second, that perhaps this wasn’t his parents’ kitchen, but their own, and maybe they weren’t baking for his family, but for their own children - and it was madness to think about, at eighteen, things like marriage and babies, but he couldn’t stop himself. He looked at Hermione, and he saw the whole world before him.
“So now,” he said, giving the sticky dough one last stir, his biceps sore from the effort, “this has to cool for about an hour, then we bake it.”
“So how do we spend our free hour?” asked Hermione, a sort of mischievous twinkle in her eye that made Ron deeply remorseful that his parents were in the next room. Kissing was one thing, but he definitely couldn’t sneak her up to his room undetected.
“I - well - as great an idea as that is, I - I got you something,” he confessed.
He had never seen her look so indignant. “You - but we promised-“
“I know, but it really isn’t a gift - just stay here for a second, yeah?”
Before she could respond, he kissed her hastily on the forehead and darted out of the kitchen.
It had been a strategic move to stow this little token of affection in his former bedroom at the Burrow, knowing that he and Hermione would be spending a good portion of her Christmas hols there. And while he understood why they had agreed not to exchange gifts, given that neither of them had any income to speak of, he couldn’t resist wanting to show her what she meant to him. He hoped this little item, silly and useless as it might have been, would maybe at least come close to doing that.
Her eyes were still shooting daggers at him when he returned to the kitchen.
“If it helps, you don’t have to think of it as a Christmas gift,” he said as he pressed the box into her hands. “It’s really just because I love you, anyway.”
At his words, her expression softened, and she leaned back against the work surface as she prised open the box; Ron’s stomach shook with nerves.
Gingerly, as though scared to harm it, Hermione pulled the little gold key from its bed of cotton with two fingers and looked expectantly up at Ron.
“It’s to Grimmauld Place,” he explained, though this did nothing to assuage the polite bewilderment on her face. “And I know what you’re thinking, that you don’t need a key to get into Grimmauld Place, but it’s - y’know, so that you know that it’s as much yours as it is mine or Harry’s.”
Her lips were on his before he could keep talking. Though he had more to say, he couldn’t help leaning into it, forgetting everything but her and the taste of sugar on her lips.
“But also,” he said around one last kiss, “it’s really mostly symbolic so it could also be for - for anywhere, really, that you and I might live together. Y’know, in the future.”
As Ron watched, a series of emotions crossed over her face in rapid succession as she pieced his words together: confusion, surprise, happiness.
“So you want to live together,” she stated as a smile split her face.
“I definitely don’t want to live apart,” he assured her. “Not any longer than we have to, anyway. This is for later, by the way,” he felt compelled to clarify. “For once you’re done at Hogwarts and you’ve set the record for most NEWTs achieved by a single student or something-“
“Stop-“
“I just mean,” he said, sobering a bit, “that it’s there for you whenever you’re ready - if that’s what you want-“
“Of course it’s what I want-“
“I’ve completely bungled this up, haven’t I?” said Ron, now a bit sheepish. “It was supposed to be romantic-“
“And it was - oh, come here-“
And she grasped him by the ears and kissed him soundly on the lips. When she pulled back, her fingers remained plunged in his hair.
“You still don’t really get it, do you?” Her nails tickled down the nape of his neck. “I love you-“
“I know you do-“
“And I want all the same things that you want.”
He knew that. Of course he knew that. Two people couldn’t share all that they had over the years without knowing, but she had never stated it quite so plainly before. It was something quite different to hear it aloud, to see their future etched more clearly before him.
“All right,” he said, reaching up to take her wrists in his hands. “All right, you decide, then. Wherever you want to live, whenever you want to live there - you just tell me and I’ll be there.”
“Sounds perfect.”
“And in the meantime,” Ron said, giving her forearms a tender squeeze, “we’ve got a treacle tart to make.”
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theamateurbakerblog · 4 years ago
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Recipe 2: Best-Ever Blueberry Muffins
Resource: https://www.biggerbolderbaking.com/blueberry-muffins-best-ever/
Author: Gemma Stafford
Follow:             
           YouTube: Bigger Bolder Baking             
           Instagram: @biggerbolderbaking                        
                             @gemma_stafford
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I don't know about you guys, but blueberry muffins are my favorite type of muffins. They're soft, moist and chock full of antioxidants thanks to the blueberries, which, you gotta appreciate. Just between us, a little TMI, I also like to think of these as my period muffins. Why? Cause I have this bad habit of having a cup of coffee for breakfast every morning, and I'm trying to get better at having it every now and then. Plus, when I start my period, so does my "7-Day No Coffee Regiment", which allows me to get creative in the kitchen when thinking about what to have for breakfast. Thus, I sought out a blueberry muffin recipe to add to my arsenal. And if blueberry muffins are not your cup of tea, no worries, if you click on the link above there are plenty of breakfast ideas and then some. With that being said, let's get started!
Step One: Gather, Measure, Sort, Store, Preheat (GMSSP)
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Gather: All of your ingredients, equipment and tools on your table top so  you can see what you have, how much you have, and make note   of any grocery runs you'll need to make if your ingredients are running low.
Measure: Your ingredients before you start to mix anything together. I       recommend measuring the ingredients that require the most to the            least, so you could see if I have enough of each ingredient before you        begin baking.
Sort: Your ingredients across your table, so you can just grab one ingredient after another without thinking twice.
Store: Away your ingredients after you use them.
Preheat: Your oven to the temperature in the recipe
Step Two: Optional- Making the cinnamon crumb
Some of you may hate me for this, but I don't make the cinnamon crumb for this recipe. I'm more of a plain or sugar crystal type of gal. Call me lazy, an idiot, or even crazy for not making it without even trying it once, but sometimes a girl just wants a plain muffin top. Plus, my stomach is usually sensitive in the morning, so I can't really handle a big balanced meal like some, which is why I usually stick with coffee or a simple muffins.
Step Three: Batter Up!
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Now mixing the batter is pretty self-explanatory, pour your wet ingredients into one bowl and your dry in another and combine each separately in their respective bowls. Then mingle them up into one bowl and mix them up until it forms a loose batter.  And as the recipe says, don't overmix otherwise you'll work the gluten in the flour too much, resulting in a tougher muffin. Just a little baking science for ya!
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Finally, you want to fold the blueberries in, which simply means combining ingredients gently together without vigorous stirring or whisking.
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Step Four: Distribute the batter
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After all of your ingredients got to know each other, now it's time to distribute the batter into your muffin or cupcake pan. Always remember to grease your tins with cooking spray or butter and flour before hand! Fill according to the recipe instructions, and if you went the extra mile and made the cinnamon crumb, go ahead and put as much as your heart desires. This is a Bigger Bolder Baking recipe after all, go big and go bold!
Step Five: Baking Time!
Bake according to the instructions. However, remember to bake at the bare minimum and constantly check on your baking. You never know if you'll need more or less time recommended. And don't go blaming your timer even if you do set it on the bare minimum and your muffins turn out burnt. You're the one in charge of your baking, the timer is just doing it's job of counting down the seconds you put on it. In my case, it only took about 30 minutes to bake, which is why I implore you to heed my warning.
  Step Six: Enjoy!
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Once you've done the toothpick test several times through, and it does indeed come out clean or with a few dry crumbs, follow the recipe instructions and let them cool slightly. Though who am I kidding, we're bakers for crying out loud, it's our job to snack along the way and take the first bite to "see if it tastes good." Eat away my friends!
Sincerely,
The Amateur Baker ❀
Results:
As expected, the muffins were moist, fruity and down right amazing, even without the cinnamon crumb. If you play your cards right, you could manage to make 12 muffins instead of 10. I don't know, maybe someday I'll get around to making the cinnamon crumb, then I'll have to bite my tongue and take back everything I said against it. But for now, a plain top muffin is all I need.
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I'm making spaghetti and GIANT ASS MEATBALLS for dinner so in honor of that, my birthday, and the exactly zero fucks I have left to give, here's my personal recipe for spaghetti and meatballs for any and all folks who want to do it. Please bear in mind that, while I find this recipe to be low-spoons for me personally, there are definitely steps in it that will not be for everyone. Plan accordingly. Ingredients: (this list has been severely edited because I am shit at writing down my recipes and I literally just wrote the steps and then came back here and added in the ingredients list because fuck if I know what I'm goddamn doing) ~2.5 pounds of ground beef - this recipe may sort of assume you, like me, live within reasonable transit of a wholesale butcher's where ground beef costs $14 for a five pound bag. The good news is that there will be enough leftovers from this to keep you in dinners for a week, so blowing your entire meat budget probably won't lead to protein deprivation later on. ~1 pound of SWEET ITALIAN SAUSAGE, GROUND - I cannot stress enough how important it is that you not just get plain ground sausage, although my dead great grandma and I would be fucking thrilled if you picked a spicy tomato sausage instead of the sweet. ~a handful of Italian herb mix - how much is a handful? Exactly as much as it takes to make a middle aged Sicilian woman ask "are you sure that's enough oregano?" Probably. Try like 3 table spoons at first and then next time adjust to your specific tastes. If you want hard mode, instead of buying the container of dried flakes labeled "Italian" or "provincial", then buy fresh rosemary, thyme, sweet oregano, basil, lavender, and get ready to grate a goddamn lemon peel over some minced garlic. ~4 to 6 eggs. Do you like your meatballs soft and just a little squishy? 6. Do you prefer them to be solid enough that they don't feel like the slimed underbelly of a frog with phlegm when you're shaping them? Maybe stick with 4. ~bread crumbs. I like the Italian seasoned ones. Because that middle aged Sicilian lady was right and you ABSOFUCKINGLUTELY did not put enough herb mix in there. ~any combination of the following four types of cheese in frankly unreasonable amounts: mozzarella, asiago, Parmesan, and Romano. Hard mode is to mix these grated monstrosities into the meatballs themselves. Easy mode says drop into your bowl after it's all been heated and prepped and fucking stir. ~2 pounds of noodles. You're feeding people for a week, shut up and make it 4 pounds. I like those cheap ass 2 lb boxes of elbow macaroni from Aldi's, but sometimes I splurge and buy the fancy spinach flour pasta or the fucking wheel noodles because I'm a goddamn child. Hard mode says to mix flour, water, eggs, and herb mix into dough, let rest for 24 hours in plastic wrap, and then roll, slice, and drop in the pot to cook for maybe 7 minutes but probably 5. ~a jar full of pasta noodle marinade. This means that you mix together garlic salt, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, lemon juice, and those little red pepper flakes they give you at pizza restaurants along with some fracked black pepper. Fill your pot with water, dump this in, and let it come to a rolling boil before you ever introduce noodle to wet, or my great grandmother's ghost will personally haunt you for exactly two days to tell you that your cooking tastes like sadness. There's a reason my mother never cooked pasta in my house and it's mostly because great grandma Josephine is a fucking irritation. If you want her to haunt you except to say nice things, you can use fresh garlic, kosher salt, sliced lemons and bell peppers dropped directly in the water, and a splash of red wine vinegar because Josephine was a bit of a lush. ~pasta sauce, at least 16 oz of it. The reason I know so much about Josephine is because I refuse to take the mother fucking time out of my day to personally crush the dozen tomatoes and two bulbs of garlic, dice a sweet onion, chop the flowering herbs, and layer in the white wine vinegar and chicken broth that she insists is the appropriate way to make sauce. Store bought costs like $8 for a week's worth on a fancy day and doesn't make my kitchen look like the scene of a grisly murder. I'm pretty sure she only haunts me for this out of spite and loneliness though, so you shouldn't need to worry and can just use storebought as well. The recipe itself is as follows: get a giant mixing bowl, crack in your eggs, whip with the herb mix, then dump in all the meat (and cheese if you took hard mode - Josephine is so proud of you) and the bread crumbs (which should be at a ratio of about 2:1 of meat:bread crumb) and just fold and squish. If you're like sane people and hate the feel of raw meat under your finger nails, I recommend dumping all this stuff into a giant plastic bag instead of a mixing bowl, sealing it tight, and just squishing it around a lot until the texture feels consistent. If you're like sane people except you have children who are constantly under foot and in your way, this is a great part of the recipe to let them do as long as either a) they're not four, or b) you don't mind losing some of the meat mix into the floor. Once your meat is mixed, scoop and shape chunks of it into lil balls. Or if you're like me and want to scare people, into something roughly the shape and size of 1.5 baseballs. I like this version because it means 1 meatball per meal per person is usually slightly pushing it, and since the recipe can make 20 of them....... well, portions are really easy to judge and it feeds a lot of people. Put these balls into one of two containers. Either an extremely large baking pan or a crock pot. Whichever cooking container you use, pour in enough sauce to basically cover the meatballs as if you were going to boil them in sauce. Because you are. If it's a crock pot, put on your lid, set on low, and let them slow cook all goddamn day while you're at work. If it's the baking dish, cover with tinfoil securely, preheat an oven to 400 degrees, and bake for about an hour and a half. Maybe two and a half if you made the baseball sized ones. Once you're mostly down cooking them (15-20 minutes left) you put a pot of water on to boil with your noodle marinade in it. When it reaches a rolling boil, drop in your pasta and cook to your preference. Strain the noodles and - this is absolutely fucking critical - rinse them with cold water (removes starch and prevents your leftovers from becoming a slimy block-o-noodles in their container) and put them into a giant bowl before tossing lightly with like a quarter cup of your noodle marinade. Hard mode involves putting some asparagus in a frying pan with steak seasoning, olive oil, balsamic vinegar and red wine vinegar, and a little butter until they're soft and a little seared to serve with the pasta. Once you're done, you put some noodles, a giant (or a few smaller) meatball(s) with some sauce, and a healthy amount of shredded cheese onto a plate, microwave it for about a minute to soften the cheese, and mix thoroughly. Then enjoy. This looks like a lot of steps. And it is. But it also typically only takes me 10-15 minutes of prep time and since the cooking is all done without needing attention (besides maybe stirring the noodles two times while they cook or flipping the asparagus during hard mode) I tend to find this to be one of the lower spoon feed-an-Army-and-pretend-you-slaved-for-hours-to-do-it recipes in my book. Hopefully it'll work for a lot of you all too. See you next time on the "I am the literal worst at measuring out ingredients and honestly you should just assume you haven't put in enough garlic" cooking show.
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evasthoughtsandfoods · 7 years ago
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Special - QUICHES
Hello! There’s been quite a long time since my last post, but that’s because the semester finally started (delayed, due to some occupations that happened last year, of students trying to get the government to give up some real pretty bad reformations) and I haven’t had the time to write anything since that. Even so, one of my friends moved in with me, and we’ve been cooking almost everyday! Also, he’s way better than me when it comes to handling cameras and editing images, so the photographs might improve a bit too :P
Anyway, let’s get started! I’ll be describing three times I baked quiches and how the tries evolved. I also want to do something similar to brownies, but first, I’ve got to find all the recipes I used -and there’s plenty.
First try:
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Dough:
–> 150g of butter
–> Flour “as much as it’s necessary” (around 2 cups)
–> 1 pinch of salt
–> 2 spoonfuls of water
Filling:
–> 1 can of corn
–> 1 box/can of table cream
–> Âœ cup of creamy cheese
–> 1 garlic tooth
–> 2 eggs
–> 1+Âœ cup of shredded chicken
–> Mozarella cheese
–> Salt
This first version was made to be served on a dinner we had at a friend’s house (the same that now lives with me). It wasn’t bad per se, just wasn’t what I wanted.
The dough is a version of a dough used in pies (empadas, which google says are “patty”, but definitely are NOT), but it’s a butter-based, easily broken, melting dough, really good, but not what I was looking for. I had already made other dough like this, but didn’t notice at the time.
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(Empadas)
The seasoning of the fillig was kind of a problem too. Probably beacuse I used only salt and a little bit of garlic (I hate onions and one of my friends doesn’t like garlic very much, so I reduced the quantity).
Also, the cheese didn’t color (not that a pale cheese is less tasty, but it’s less pretty :P).
Second try:
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Dough:
–> 1+Âœ cup of flour
–> 100g of butter
–> Âœ can of table cream without serum
–> 1 teaspoon of salt
–> 1 teaspoon of baking powder
This one I made at home, to eat alone. I don’t have a blender, which would be necessary to make the corn cream from the first try, so I used the same filling as the pie cake from the last post: bechamel sauce and shredded chicken.
Remembering: with the chicken already cooked and shredded, make some bechamel sauce (don’t even ask. I never measure anything here, so I still don’t know how much I exactly do, and it’s always a struggle), season it and add the chicken & other complements (corn, peas, olives, whatever). I also added eggs here, to make the filling more consistent and quiche-like.
Again, the seasoning could be better (new series: everybody against seasoning!) (or maybe it’s just me #cry), but at least the dough was on point! Definitely better than the first one, more fitting for a quiche.
The cheese also didn’t stick to its color, but I seems to be in a hurry to take it off the oven, and didn’t let it color properly. Besides, I simply cut it in rough pieces, instead of grating it.
Third try:
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Second’s dough + First’s filling
Oh yeah! This was the quiche-supreme. I barely have anything to say about this one, as it was perfect! -I don’t even have any complaints!
The dough turned out even better than the second, super soft and I used a different salt, with other spices on it (pepper, mainly), which gave it a great touch! Same goes to the filling, where I also used this different salt, and it even highlighted the corn’s flavor. Seasoning problem solved!
The cheese was also so beautifully colored! I made it for a dinner, just like the first and nothing remained.
After that, I repeated the last try in my parents’ house, but we didn’t have the special salt, so it wasn’t SO good (and my mom’s cake pan was really thin and the dough almost overcooked :/). Anyway, I don’t even have any photographs of this try, so the third still counts as last :P
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