spiced nuts with maple bacon

Snack food.

Diapers. 

Cat sounds.

Warm milk.

Pancakes. 

These are all thoughts that run through my mind at the wee hours of the morning. 

You know, when normal people sleep.

Unfortunately, I am not normal, and I no longer sleep through the night. 

My body seems to like 4:30 am as a good wake up time with thoughts of coffee cakes and baby slippers.

Not cool body, not cool at all.

Since I can't sleep and all TV is crap at 4:30 am, no baby story is not a good thing to watch, ever. I'm writing a blog post.

About spiced nuts. With bacon. 

I made them for our New Year's Eve party, and my goodness they were amazing. 

The spiced nut mix was spicy and sweet, salty, full of cumin flavour, they were excellent on their own. But then you cooked some bacon drizzled with maple syrup and crumbled it in with the nuts. Turn down the ridiculous, it was amazing. 

The husband first started picking out all of the bacon before he realized, hey, the nuts are pretty damn delicious too. 

The nut mix didn't last long, much like my sleep.

Spiced nuts with maple bacon

[ from Serious Eats ]

I highly recommend doubling or tripling the recipe. I doubled it and it gone after one evening. 

2 cups raw, unsalted mixed nuts

1 large egg white, beaten

2 tablespoons brown sugar, firmly packed

1 tablespoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper, or to taste

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

4 slices bacon

1 tablespoon maple syrup

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper, set aside.

In a medium-sized bowl, combine the brown sugar, salt, cumin, cinnamon, cayenne pepper, and ground ginger. Stir with a fork to combine well. In another large bowl, toss the nuts and the egg white until the nuts are thoroughly coated. Pour the spice mix into the large bowl and toss to coat the nuts evenly.

Spread nuts out onto prepared baking sheet in a single layer. Bake for 15 - 20 minutes, stirring frequently and breaking up any clumps that may form, until nuts are just toasted. Transfer nuts to a large plate, in a single layer, to cool. Reserve the baking sheet and leave the oven on.

Place the slices of bacon on the reserved baking sheet and brush each slice with maple syrup. Bake for 20 minutes, or until crispy, turning over only once. Transfer bacon slices to paper towel to drain and let cool completely.

Break, or chop, the bacon slices into fine pieces and toss in a large bowl with the nuts.

Serve to hungry, bacon loving friends and insomniac pregnant women.

unexpected break

Grandma S's Christmas tree

I'm back!

This feels great.

I haven't posted since December 16th.

curried crab, artichoke + spinach dip

Since then, we've moved, had a crazy Christmas, thrown a New Year's Eve party, unpacked, setup the babe's room, made tons of food, ate tons of food, ate tons of Christmas chocolate.

I haven't been sharing my adventures due to the lack of internets at our new house.

I went 3 weeks with no internet.

Shameful.

new, HUGE kitchen

But today (!!!), our new service provider hooked us up. Watch out pinterest, I'm back.

Until I get my fingers rocking on a post, here's a recap of my life from the past little while.

I missed you.

my pops, with my sister's tiny dogs

spiced nuts....WITH BACON

peppermint meringues

The husband and I had a bit of an arguement last week.

It was about cookies.

I kid you not.

I have a bad habit of making a whole bunch of cookies (duh, I write a baking blog), eating one cookie, then not touching the rest.

I don't see it as a problem, my co-workers and my waistline love it.

The husband has zero self control when it comes to treats. Remember how he ate 12 apple turnovers? He is a cookie monster.

His thought process is that if he eats them all, then they are gone and they won't tempt him anymore.

Is anyone else thinking that maybe eating an entire batch of cookies is a bad idea? Me neither.

So he's grounded me from baking cookies.

At least until after Christmas.

But crunchy, minty, pretty meringues don't really count right?

I didn't think so.

Peppermint meringues
[ from Bon Appetit ]

3 large egg whites, room temperature
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
1/3 cup white sugar
1/2 cup icing sugar
1/8 teaspoon peppermint extract
12 drops red food colouring

Preheat oven to 200 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchement paper, set aside.

Using an electric mixer, beat the egg whites on medium speed until white and foamy. With the mixer still running, add the sugar in 3 seperate additions, beating for 2 minutes after each addition. Once all the sugar has been added, beat until stiff peaks form, about 2 minutes.

Add the peppermint extract and the icing sugar, beat to blend, about 1 minute. Dot the top of the beaten egg whites with the red food colouring, do not stir or swirl, it will swirl when you pipe it.

Spoon in to a pastry bag fitted with a 1/2-inch round tip or with the large star tip (which I used) and pipe onto baking sheets, about 1 inch apart.

Bake until dry, around 2 1/2 hours. Remove from oven and let stand for 1 hour. Meringues will crisp as they cool. Store in an airtight container at room temperature.

wordless wednesday ~ tiny Christmas

cranberry, pistachio + ginger blondies

My mind is on overdrive.

I'm starting to stress out about everything in the upcoming months.

Not only about the tiny, kitten clothed, Canucks fan who will be arriving in 15 short weeks.

But also, we are moving. In 8 weeks.

traditional pumpkin pie

Hi.

I'm lonely.

The husband went on a boy's trip this weekend. He's probably half-drunk, yelling obscenities at Oilers fans right now.

I'm probably going to eat popcorn for dinner, watch the hockey game, and make a pie to keep myself occupied.