Last night I was really craving Cinnamon Burst Cheerios, but as luck would have it, I only had Frosted, Chocolate and Yellow-Box (my stash was running low, as I have been working a lot this week and haven't had a chance to go to the supermarket yet).

So, since I had sugar and cinnamon on hand (I always have those, thank goodness), I decided to create my own Cinnamon Burst Cheerios by putting the cinnamon and sugar in a large zip-top bag along with a lot of Yellow-Box Cheerios, closed it and tossed it around a few dozen times.

Miraculously, it worked a trick! I may never need to buy the "real thing" again, since the plain ones are cheaper already (at least where I live) and I always have the ingredients.

So, my question to you Eaters is this: Have you ever done this? Did it work, or was it a failure? Are there things that you would want to do like this and just haven't?

Since I don't currently have a job, and there are only so many hours in the day that I can job search and network, and since my mother has been kind enough to buy for me all kinds of baking ingredients (from flour and sugar, to raisins and molasses), and since I *love* to bake, I was wondering if I could put a little structure into my days (more than I have already) and enter some baking contests.

So, does anyone know of any place where they might list a bunch of contests that I can go through? I have tried the standard Google search and such, but haven't really brought up anything helpful.

Thanks!

So, last night (just because I had never fried anything before) I decided to try to fry up some classic cake donuts.

Well, they worked really well, but left my whole condo stinking of fry oil and I ended up deciding not to finish frying them all (I don't really even like donuts - again, I just wanted to see if it would work). Now I have half of the dough left sitting in the fridge, but I don't want to throw it out.

Does anyone know what else I can do with that batter? It's very firm, firmer than a cookie dough, but can I bake them like cookies, do you think? There is baking powder in the dough, but not baking soda. Any ideas would be very much appreciated!

Thanks in advance!

I ask this question, because yesterday I made my mother my "famous" coffee cake that she absolutely loves. Now, she and I are both connossieurs (sp?) of coffee cakes and have baked and eaten more than our fair share over the years. However, we keep going back to this one over and over again. It's incredibly simply and tasty, but that funny thing is that it came from my old Home Economics teacher from way back in the day, from a textbook that she had to use for it. Now, I don't know about you, but when I took Home Ec, the recipes were pretty basic, like spaghetti or maybe sugar cookies. And they were good, but nothing special. Just something meant to teach you the basic techniques of cooking and baking. The fact that the best ever coffee cake that I have ever made and/or eaten came out of that surprises me, but in a good way....

...so, where is the most random place that you have ever gotten a really amazing recipe?

Coffee Cake Swirl:

Ingredients:
1 cup of AP flour
1/4 up of granulated sugar
1/4 cup of packed dark brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 T cinnamon
1/2 buttermilk
1/3 shortening (butter works the best)
1 egg

Topping:
1/4 brown sugar
1 T cinnamon
1/2 nutmeg

Glaze:
1/2 cup powdered sugar
3-4 teaspoons milk
1/2 vanilla

Directions:
1. Grease and flour a 9-inch square baking dish. Heat oven to 305 degrees. Mix together all of the first set of ingredients and pour into dish. Blend the topping ingredients and evenly sprinkle over the top of the batter. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until set in the middle. Remove from oven and set on rack to cool. When still warm, drizzle with the glaze. Serve warm and enjoy!

My parents are gone for a few days visiting my new niece for her first birthday, but I am home here taking care of their house. I normally go to the supermarket to stock up for them (juice, milk, bread, etc.), but this time they are already stocked, since they are only away for a few days.

However, the flights and layovers, etc., all add up to a long day of travel and I want to make them something to have in their fridge (to reheat) that they can just pull out, throw in the oven/microwave, and enjoy after a long trip home.

If you were my parents, what would you want to come home to? Lasagna? Pizza? Casserole? I am open to all ideas!

I have just recently decided that after a long time of being at a particular company, that it is time to move on and pursue other opportunities in life.

It's been a very rough few months, with a lot of long nights and crying myself to sleep and after coming to this decision, I feel like a giant weight has been lifted from my shoulders.

In order to celebrate my new freedom and the possibilities that life holds for me now, I wanted to thank my parents for their eternal support by taking them out to a nice (but not too expensive - I don't have another job yet) dinner somewhere in Minneapolis or Saint Paul. The problem is that I don't know where to go. I love seafood, but my father is deathly allergic. My mother can't eat spicy food or citrus and I am allergic to mushrooms, which pretty rules out French and most Asian places.

What we can agree on is that steak is good, sandwiches are fantastic and a good beer and wine list are a must.

With that in mind, does anyone here have a good recommendation that might work? I would appreciate any help and ideas!

Thanks!

I had a gift card to Williams-Sonoma that I received back in July that I hadn't been able to use, since everything there is more expensive than what the gift card was for. However, on Black Friday I actually found a great deal on a 4-cup Cuisinart food processor that I have had my eye on for a long time (up until now, I have been using a meat tenderizer and a ziploc bag to crush things like nuts and graham crackers) and I really want to get started on using it, but now I suddenly seem to be suffering from a mind-block and cannot think of what I want to make...it is that I have too many ideas floating through my head? Is is that I have never used one, so I don't know their limits and don't want to break it? Who knows.

I would just love a great idea or two of what to do with it...pesto? What kind? Cookies? Which ones?

What do you use yours for and what works the best? Any ideas are welcome!!

Thanks in advance!!

I currently have an open bag of those seasonal Pumpkin Marshmallows that Jet-Puffed came out with this year that I bought in the hopes that I would like them (I didn't - no pumpkin flavor at all). Now I don't know what else to do with them. I don't want to throw them out, but I am stumped. There aren't enough to use for Rice Krispie bars, really, and I just made some anyway...my family will be eating at a restaurant for Turkey Day, so I can't use them for that.

Does anyone have any other creative uses for them? I am thinking something baked or otherwise in the dessert category, but I am open to all ideas.

Thanks in advance!

Recently, my mother found out that she has an auto-immune disorder that is causing her some trouble in her mouth and as a result, the doctor recommended that she start using a juicer to get some of her foods, since she is having trouble chewing.

She bought one of the "Bullet" things, but doesn't like it very much and thinks that it doesn't work very well. She has an idea that she likes the Breville brand of juicers, but I don't know enough about that sort of thing (I would rather chew my calories whenever possible) to really help her find one. I wanted to sort-of surprise her with one for her birthday...Are the Breville ones any good? Are there others that are better? I know KitchenAid, but do they have decent juicers? Or would a blender just be better?

Any help would be much appreciated!

I ask this, because I don't seem to have this issue with any other condiment in my fridge; just the mustard. Any kind of mustard, too, so it isn't even limited to a particular brand or style.

Here's the situation: If I have the bottle (because I like to make sure that I get as much of it as possible) completely upside down, so that ideally the mustard will slide to the end where the opening is, it sticks to the butt of the bottle (which is now on top). However, if I tilt it at all, it slides right to the end, just like I want it to.

This doesn't happen with my ketchup, or any other condiment, though. Just the mustard. Does anyone else have this issue? Do you know why it happens? Where is Alton Brown to explain things when you need him...?

It's just the strangest thing!

I am just curious to know if I am alone in the fact that I dream about food a lot. And I have really vivid dreams - a rather permanent side-effect of an anti-malarial drug that I used to have to be on...

Anyway, last night I had a dream that I was one of the Keebler Elves (yep, full outfit and everything, plus living in a tree), but instead of making any of the cookies, I was in charge of handmaking every single little marshmallow that goes into Lucky Charms, of all things.

Seriously, this was strange, and what's interesting is that my dreams don't end when I wake up in the middle of the night. If I get up to use the restroom or something and go back to sleep, the dream essentially picks up where it left off, so this was the whole night spent making teeny tiny marshmallows!

So, guys, what was your last food dream? Was it a good one?

Since I just bought a kitchen-style torch over the weekend and have been happily making s'mores with it ever since (and am eagerly anticipating getting home to make creme brulee tonight in honor of Julia Child) I have being thinking about this...

...my mother's first reaction to telling her that I bought the torch was that it could double as a self-defense weapon in a pinch (though, I am not sure that she quite understands how small this thing is, but that's another story)...

...so what food prep item do you own that you know is meant for one purpose or another, but you use it for something different. For instance, I don't have a food processor, but I love my little $5 meat tenderizer for crushing nuts and other items for baking!

Just in time for National S'mores Day (who knew?), I followed the advice that you all kindly provided for me earlier and ended up at the local hardware store buying myself a wonderfully serviceable, small torch that I have since successfully used to make lovely s'mores! I just wanted to thank you for the tip to head there, instead of Williams-Sonoma or other places like that. Now I have a great torch and they sell all the refueling bottles that I need, and it was cheaper, too!

Now...other than s'mores and creme brulee, what else do you guys use yours for? :)

I was recently given a very generous gift card to Williams-Sonoma and have been trying to find a good way to use it. I have been looking for a nice kitchen torch for awhile now, but upon looking through their site, the customer reviews disappointed me, revealing that the torch doesn't even come with the butane cartridges for it, and many of the reviews complained that they couldn't even buy them from WS. So, I searched around a few other sites, and all of the reviews seemed similar, no matter the store (online or B&M) and that has led me on a mission to find a good, not too expensive, kitchen torch that either comes with the cartridges, or where I can at least buy them separately, but at the same time.

Does anyone know of a place, either a store or online that has a good torch that will last, and that either comes with those cartridges, or sells them at least? Or does anyone know of a source for those cartridges that won't require me driving two hours to a random store in the middle of nowhere?

Any help is much appreciated!!

After over five years of constant effort, including getting another Master's degree, countless networking meetings and endless hours of interviews, I found out this morning that I finally landed the job that I have been aiming for that whole time.

Now I want to celebrate, but I have a few restrictions: It would be with my parents, but my father is deathly allergic to seafood, so Stella's is out, and hates Asian food. My mother has a mouth condition that prevents her from eating spicy foods, like Indian, or tomato or citrus-based foods. Finally, I don't want to spent too much money on it, so the Lexington is out.

So, with all of that in mind, does anyone familiar with or living in the Twin Cities (Minneapolis/Saint Paul) have any good ideas on where to go? I am totally open for ideas, just keeping in mind my parents' issues. Any ideas are happily welcome! Thanks in advance!

I have a dear friend in the UK to whom I would really like to send some sweet treats, but I would also like to ensure that they are going to make it there safe and sound, considering that we are in the midst of a lovely record-breaking heat streak at the moment...so basically, no chocolate bars, right? I tried making marshmallows yesterday, but it must have been a combination of the heat and humidity (in the midwest we are dying of the humidity alone) that caused the goo to be too terrible to work with. I ended up throwing the lot out. Does anyone have any ideas for a candy that I could make to her, which would likely make it there intact? Or does anyone have a cookie or brownie idea that might also work? I have sent chocolate chip cookies before, but I fear that even they might not last. Gingersnaps?

Has anyone else ever been disappointed by a candy bar or other foodstuff that you thought would be really tasty?

I was at the mall yesterday and came upon a candy store that was liquidating due to imminent closure and was selling everything at 50% off. Naturally, I had to see what they had left, and was thankful to find a few rolls of Necco Wafers (yup, I am one of the five people in the world that love those things) as well as a few oddball candy bars that I had never tried before, but had heard really good things about. So, since they were cheap, I decided to pick up a few of them to try, including the Big Hunk, a giant Charleston Chew and Moon Pies.

I tried the Charleston Chew last night: A large candy bar of basically just nougat with a chocolatey (note: not chocolate) coating over all of it. I was expecting something like a Mars bar, but perhaps slightly different, but was disappointed to find that the nougat really lacked any flavor and the chocolatey coating was at best "meh." Not that it didn't taste faintly of chocolate, just that it didn't wow me at all. I ate the whole thing, but afterward I really wish that I had chosen something else and not wasted my money.

Has anyone else had this happen to them? You hear great things about an old school/oddball food that you happen upon and then realize that it really isn't "all that"? And do you think that it's because the people that recommend it are thinking about fond memories, rather than actual tastiness, or something else?

So, ever since I started making marshmallows I have been in love and have sent a few bags over to my BFF in the UK. Now, she wants to try to make them herself, but I worry that she won't be able to get any true corn syrup, which is one of the key ingredients in marshmallow recipes that I have seen. I used to live over there, and I don't ever remember seeing corn syrup in the shops. I found some online, but the cost of shipping is a little dear, since she is pinched for money as it is. I can't afford to keep sending them to her all the time (the last parcel that I sent literally held four medium bags of marshmallows and was over $30), so I wanted to know if anyone here knew of alternatives to use as corn syrup in the recipes. Would Lyle's Golden Syrup work at all? Any help or alternate recipes would be much appreciated!

Finally, after much anticipation and waiting, I got my business registered and am now in the process of trying to get everything figured out, from labels and business cards, to a website. However, I have a question for anyone that might be able to help. I have looked online quite a bit for supplies like decorative bags and boxes for my cookies, brownies and candy, but can't really find any place that has things like that. Most of the online resources that I have found have similar items, but they are mostly for coffee shops, hot dog stands and things like that. Nothing that is just simple and on which I can put a label of some sort. Does anyone have a good resource for something like that? I am thinking just something like what you would find at a party store, but more professional and simpler, and preferably in bulk. Any help would be great!!

Okay, so since I have fallen in love with candy making now and have been making flavored marshmallows nearly every day, I spotted some root beer extract in the store the other day and bought some. The bottle is enormous, and it turns out to be a great flavoring for marshmallows, but I fear that, since it's so much, that I will forget about it and it will languish in my cabinet until I want to make another root beer marshmallow batch.

Does anyone have any other good uses for root beer extract that I could use? Baked goods, candies, etc are preferred, but perhaps even a nice savory recipe. Any suggestions are much appreciated!

Okay, so since I have been trying to really push myself into trying to make new things, out of the blue yesterday (okay, after reading David Lebovitz's book about Paris) I got inspired to try to make marshmallows for the very first time. This is my official *candy.* As in, having to use a candy thermometer and everything. So, I fully anticipated screwing it royally and potentially even burning down my house...and what happened...magic! This morning I awoke (you had to let them dry out overnight, I guess) to a beautiful tray of homemade maple-flavored marshmallows! I couldn't believe it!

So, now that I actually got pound cake to work and now this, I wanted to see what you would suggest for me to try next...maybe the third time is a real charm and I should try something very difficult, but I would love to hear your suggestions...

...and also...what should do with all of these marshmallows now? I feel like they are too pretty and cool to put in something or use for Krispie bars, but what are options that you might have?

And have any of you ever made them before? Are the tips and tricks for making them even better?

Since people were impressed that I actually accomplished this and a few people requested the recipe, I wanted to give to you all, so I hope that someone else gets a chance to try it, because it really did work for me!

Ingredients:

3 cups of AP flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 cups of sugar
1 cup of butter, room temperature
1 tablespoon of almond extract
5 whole eggs
1 cup of milk (I used skim, but you could probably use any kind)
1 cup of chopped cherries (I used the jarred ones that you have to drain first)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease and flour (really thoroughly) two 9 by 5 inch loaf pans.
2. Cream the butter alone until it appears to have a whipped texture.
3. Add in the sugar and continue to cream until the mixture is light and fluffy.
4. Add in the almond extract and mix briefly.
5. Add in the eggs, one at a time, until fully incorporated.
6. In a separate bowl, combine the salt, flour and baking powder.
7. In three batches and using a wooden spoon, work in the flour and milk, alternately, until just incorporated. Do not over mix, or it might get dense and tough.
8. Fold in the cherries.
9. Bake in the oven for about 1 hour. Turn off the oven and leave the door closed and continue to let the cakes bake for another 30-45 minutes as the oven cools.**

**I did this, because I have found that with pound cakes, the outsides cook too quickly and the bottoms/centers do not fully bake - I know this from pulling them out (even when a toothpick comes out clean) only to have them sink in the middle. This seems to have solved that problem, and the edges didn't burn, but everything baked perfectly and the loafs came out really light.

Enjoy!

I just have to say this, because it's been nearly 32 years in the making...finally, after many years and many *many* failures, I *finally* succeeded at making a delicious, light, airy, perfect pound cake!

This has been the bane of my existence for years, possibly decades. I can make a perfect pie crust, chocolate mousse, endless kinds of cookies, but for all this time, the simple, plain pound cake eluded me. I thought that I would never get it, but last night I finally did it! An almond cherry pound cake, complete with complementary almond glaze!!! I love it!

The down side? I brought it in to work and I am the only one that has even had a bite of it. :( Maybe no one like pound cake anymore?

On that note, what recent successes (possibly after many years of failure) have you recently had? And was it just a personal thing for you, like it was for me? Meaning that you wanted to get it right, just because it was eluding you? Or was there another reason (a request from a family member/friend) that made you try it just one more time?

Okay, so I did something stupid. I managed to buy a canister of those new Kraft mini marshmallows...the kind that are meant to mimic the ones that come in the hot cocoa mixes that I am sure that we are all familiar with. They taste good in hot chocolate, and i liked them and have opened the canister and used a few....

...That was before I stupidly decided to give up all sweets for Lent. So my question for you all is this: I cannot have them sitting in my pantry, staring at me, wanting me (no, daring me!) to eat them, so I want to use them in something that I can bake and then bring to work and leave in the office kitchen.

Does anyone have any ideas on what I can make with them that would be a good use for them, make them taste good and rid me of their taunting?

Any ideas are much appreciated!

I was hoping to get some inspiration from other SE'ers out there, if you have any for me...

Long story short, I am currently in a position at my job where I might not have one soon, because of some re-organization going on around here (this is my fourth time in five years and I have already been laid off once from this company, so I am not holding out much hope). Given all of that, and since I am still fairly young, have no family/kids/pets or even house plants, I have been talking with some friends and family and have been seriously contemplating starting a small catering business based around the following premise: I would like to offer baking services to people for their family gatherings, such as first communions, graduations, funerals/wakes, etc. The times where people have other things that they need to concern themselves with, and don't have the time/energy to bake things themselves (I would also do basic other foods, but probably nothing fancy starting out).

In order to get some things started on it (business cards, website, etc) I need to come up with a name that works well. I was hoping that some of you might give me some inspiration for names or suggest places to look for inspiration. I have a few ideas, but nothing that so far seems to really click with me. Any help is much appreciated!