500 miles of apple orchards 'til we meet

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I finally tried my first Joy the Baker recipe after reading her blog obsessively for a while: Fried Apple Cakes!

They were. So much more amazing than I was even anticipating. And the little bit of maple syrup with sour cream was. Amazing. Haha. I'm also thinking about just making up a bunch of batter for when I want some cause they were that good! I definitely need to try more of her recipes soon. <3

yes, this is really happening

I am in love. In love with Clif Bars. And to commemorate this, I'm going to review all of the flavors I've tried so far.



Let's start with where it all began, when I decided to buy a bulk box of 3 varieties from Costco.

Crunchy Peanut Butter Out of the 3 included in the variety pack, this one is, by far, my favorite. Awesome chunks of peanut and over all amazing. A classic. A

Chocolate Chip This may come as a surprise, but this is the worst one! Not really chocolate-chippey and has a weird glyceriny syrup all over. Edible, but kinda gross. D

Chocolate Chip Peanut Crunch A nice combo of the Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip, but without the weird syrup. Has a mostly PB taste with flecks of chocolate chips. Okay, but nothing special. B

After suffering through 2 variety packs of the Chocolate Chip, I decided to start buying them individually from Trader Joe's. I realized that it's not that much more expensive to buy them that way, plus I can pick out any flavors I want. Here's what I tried...

Chocolate Brownie FANTASTIC. After trying this one, Chocolate Chip is dead to me. Seriously, if you want something chocolatey, Chocolate Brownie is for you. A-

Cool Mint Chocolate ALSO FANTASTIC. Basically the Chocolate Brownie but with the added amazingness of peppermint, which is probably my favorite chocolate combo ever right behind chocolate and coffee. A

Black Cherry Almond Meh. This one's just ok. I like the idea more than the execution. It could probably use a bit more cherry and a bit less almond. I think if I want a good cherry granola bar, I'll stick with Kashi's Cherry Dark Chocolate. C

Blueberry Crisp This is another really good one. When I first tried one, I thought it might be too sweet, but now I think it's just right. It's got almost a creamy texture which is a nice change of pace. B

Carrot Cake I've never been a big carrot cake person, but I decided on a whim to try one, and it turns out it's really good! I love spiced things that make me think of autumn and Halloween and this was just that. Maybe I'll have to try actual carrot cakes now? A

That's all I've tried so far. The rest are: Peanut Toffee Buzz, Chocolate Almond Fudge, Apricot, Oatmeal Walnut Raisin, Banana Nut Bread, Maple Nut, and White Chocolate Macadamia Nut. Trader Joe's only carries so many different types, so who know's if I'll ever get to try them all. I sure hope so, though. =D

leaves tea? never.

I've officially been doing Project 365 for over a month. I'm really glad I decided to do this. Even though a lot of them are not very good, it's good be just be taking photos.



I also like that I'm learning more about flowers from working in the garden center. Woo!

Poor Gretchen's pot

It's all broken. I don't know how.

In other sad news, I am done with buying watermelon from WalMart. The past two I've gotten there have not been sweet at all. The last one was a yellow watermelon which I was pretty disappointed with. But it sure was pretty.



I have to give it a little credit, the very middle (or heart) was mildly sweet so I just ate that out of it. I ate it's heart out!

applesauce!

Today felt like an applesauce day. I didn't have much but I made it work. Here is how I made mine:

• 2 apples cored, medium diced, peeling optional (I like the peel, what can I say?)
• 2 heaping tablespoons sugar, to taste
• splash of vanilla extract (not essential but it makes your house smell amazing)
• a couple shakes of cinnamon, also to taste

Place diced apples into a medium saucepan, fill with water just enough to cover (apples tend to float so if it's a little less than covered, that is just fine). Bring to a boil, reduce heat, simmer 10 minutes. Mash apples with plastic spoon. Add sugar, vanilla, and cinnamon. Simmer until desired consistency. If it's still a little watery, it should evaporate off as it cools.

You can also easily double, triple or quadruple this recipe to suit your needs.

the cake is a liar

Today I experimented with cake and I would have to say it was a rousing success. I used a basic cake recipe and added cinnamon and one diced apple. The icing is just a basic glaze made with heavy cream instead of milk.

i really need to get better about posting. geezy petes.

I went to The Taste on Saturday with my family and boy was it insane. For those who don't live in Chicago or have never been: imagine a sea. A sea of sweaty disgusting people all eating and breathing and rubbing up against you with food in their mouths. But it can also be really fun and it's a good opportunity to try something new. My knockout favorite of the day was the cochinita pibil tacos from the Adobo Grill.

One major disappointment was a gelato stand that kept running out of cups. We seriously went there like 3 times and every time we got to the front of the line they ran out. It was getting to the point where we were all thoroughly tired and sweaty so I settled on a frozen chocolate dipped banana and everyone else got cheesecake. I ended up enjoying the banana more than I expected. It was almost creamy like ice cream and the chocolate was pliable enough that it stayed on for the duration of the eating without cracking off.