Showing posts with label Bikini Baking. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bikini Baking. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Alice's Tea Cup Pumpkin Scone Recipe


Half Batch Alice’s Tea Cup Pumpkin Scones

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
3/8 teaspoon kosher salt
2 full tablespoons ground ginger
2 full tablespoons ground cinnamon
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces (mine was cold)
5 oz buttermilk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin puree (all pumpkin, not pumpkin pie filling)
1 tablespoons pure vanilla extract
Caramel glaze:
1 stick (4 oz) unsalted butter
1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/8 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 cup heavy cream
Preheat the oven to 425°F. In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, ginger, and cinnamon. With clean hands, work the butter into the dry mixture until it is thoroughly incorporated and has the consistency of fine breadcrumbs.
Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients, and pour the buttermilk, pumpkin, and vanilla extract into the well. Still using your hands (I did this with a spatula scraper), combine the ingredients until all the dry mixture is wet, but do not knead!
Turn the mixture onto a floured surface and gather the dough together. Gently pat the dough to make a disk about 1 1/2 inches thick.(My dough was pretty soft, so I used about a 1/3 cup measure and made drop scones) using a 3-or 3 1/2- inch biscuit cutter, cut out as many scones as you can and lay them on a nonstick baking sheet. Gather the remaining dough together lightly to cut out more scones—just don’t knead the dough too much (Again, I bypassed all that and made drop scones.
Bake the scones for about 12 minutes, or until lightly browned. Let the scones cool slightly on the baking sheet (about 20 minutes) before glazing them.
While the scones are cooling, prepare the caramel glaze: Place the butter, brown sugar, lemon juice, and salt in a saucepan over medium heat and whisk gently until the mixture is smooth. Just as the mixture comes to a light boil, add the heavy cream and reduce the heat to low. Whisk well for 2 minutes, or until the glaze is thickened and smooth; then remove the pan from the heat.
To glaze a scone, hold it by the bottom, dip the top in the warm caramel glaze, and place it back on the baking sheet. Makes 5 o 6

Wednesday, August 8, 2012

A Yummy Thank You

Sometimes hosting in your bikini is as fun as traveling in your it! Especially when your  guests happen to have a divine bakery of treats called Ruby et Violette!  Thank you Heather Sue & George! And if anyone needs a unique gift or just to treat yourself -- these cookies and brownies can't be beat!!! 



Friday, November 25, 2011

Finally Mom Shared Thanksgiving with the Bikini Chef Tai!

Tai cooked for twenty sharing a wonderful Thanksgiving feast --
 so happy to have Norma to share the day!





Sunday, September 11, 2011

Bikini Sunday in Malibu

Just a typical Sunday in the Bu...


Thursday, March 31, 2011

Sunday, March 27, 2011

Monday, February 21, 2011

Cupcakes...

Tai's friend Karin Taylor is visiting from Palm Beach Gardens and brought over a variety of Crumbs cupcakes for Sunday Fun-Day! We ate them till we all had tummy aches and swore them off forever...but then Monday came and we all ate until we felt sick again...Yumm...

Saadiq Hassan, Tai Collins, Jane Bakerink, Karin Taylor, Hannah Robinson, Montrel Yates

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

It was a Bikini Super Bowl!

Tai & Marissa shared a perfect beach day with sunshine, girlfriends, champagne, the Super Bowl & sparkle football cookies!!!







Thursday, November 25, 2010

Then On To The Kitchen...

Veggies ready to grill!

Marissa posing with the pies Tai baked! But she looks good with them!
...where they prepared their Thanksgiving Feast!
Tai's famous grilled kale.

Monday, August 2, 2010

Din Din

So this may not help our "bikini Bodies" but Debi was so thrilled when she discovered that California had Dairy Queen's (and there just happened to be one on the way home) -- that we had to have Blizzard's for dinner! Marissa had cookies dough, Debi had banana with hot fudge, and Tai Oreo cookie! Yummmm. We don't eat at home the same as we did in Europe.



Sunday, August 1, 2010

Sunday Fun Day!

Seriously, we're not sure what's going on with the weather this summer. It's August and summer has never quite arrived. So much for wearing all of the cute dresses we got in the South of France. But Sunday's are still for gathering and food and fun. Horseshoes are a must right there with our buffet that always includes Tai's famous guacamole. We LOVE Sundays!

The Guest List Included: Greg Bonann, Tai Collins, Marissa McDaniel, Debi Tucker, Saadiq Hassan, Jessica and her sister Jenn Brakulis, Jay, Jane & Julia Bakerink, Kathe Marshall, Eric & Lori Rovner, Lon Rosen, Eric Locko

Friday, July 23, 2010

YES MORE SHOPPING!

We're sorry Alessandra but we just LOVE shopping!




...and fun lunches too!

Lunch at Mick's Cafe

Friday, July 2, 2010

We Are Home and This Journey Has Ended but...

...stay tuned for our future travel adventures as well as our Sunday gatherings in Malibu!

Thursday, July 1, 2010

Tai: Thoughts from My Journey



When I decided to take this trip, I remember talking to my dear friend Elizabeth telling her that I had purchased a round trip ticket to Geneva. I would start and end the trip by visiting my friend Gabriella. I knew a few places I wanted to visit but the rest would be "come as it may." She LOVED the idea – to go where you are led because of people and freedom – not for the sites. And funny enough, just the weekend before I left, a reporter was interviewing me and one of his questions was along the lines of “How much of my life was planned and how much did I just follow the path I was led to?” My response was that none of it was planned – just like my vacation. I knew I wanted to visit Gabriella, Zach, Alessandra, and return to Positano. I also knew I wanted to go to the “concert in the sky” in Ravello (which I have to go back to because rain moved it inside.) Rome, Amalfi, nor Capri were on the top of my list to return to – and Naples not at all. But they all offered gifts that if I hadn’t been open and followed where I was led – I would have missed. I cooked with a four and a five star chef.  I cooked with a precious family over an open fire because they choose to live with no electricity. I ate in five star restaurants. I had picnics on the ground with the ants in the open fields as well as on the floor in my Best Western Hotel (making a tablecloth from a towel – eating cherry tomatoes and fruit out of their little plastic baskets and breaking fresh bread slathering it with local cheese.) I got to share time and laughter with my dear friends and meet new ones every step of the journey. I returned to Positano – a place that felt like home from the moment I arrived last year – and saw my friends there. It was a magical month that each step of the journey worked out perfectly. I believe it is how I have lived my life – being open for the best and it always arrives! I am blessed.

The trip, like life, was not without a few bumps.  Our first hotel in Cannes didn’t live up to what we thought  and we moved as soon as we could. But even our two nights there gave us the gift of eating the best pizza I think I have ever tasted – and allowed us to explore the place finding the perfect hotel in the heart of where we wanted to be (at the perfect price!) And dealing with rain and boats and planes being canceled – we simply discovered new places and stayed loner in places we hadn’t planned – all offering gifts we would have otherwise missed.

With so many monasteries around us, I wondered about the monks who reside there. How they are “missing” so much. I wonder if they couldn’t do more good out in the world making  real human contact – touching people. But when you are on top of the mountain open to the wide expanse of sky above and their voices are lifting us all to heaven, I wonder if it is possible that could they could touch us more? It’s as it they are exactly where they need to be…sharing their gift. There’s a whole world they’re missing and yet the beauty of a paradise surrounds them…

If I had to have a theme of this trip it would be "beauty." The beauty of the sea, the food (and presentation of the food), the people, and lifestyle. I will forever cherish the beauty that echoed each day in the sounds of bells ringing from the church bell towers, the cowbells, the monastic choir, birds, children playing by the sea. Talloires, Positano, Capri, Ravello, Rome – all offered such incredible beauty to the eyes with towering  rock cliffs, old buildings, historic sites, flowers in bloom, the sea, the people, and the bikinis!  People -- whether friends (especially Gabriella, Alessandra & Marissa) or others we met so openly and free -- they all offered beauty in their kindness.

My “bikini journey” with Marissa was a beautiful gift I will treasure forever. And I look forward to MORE!!!

Bikinis - the Universal Language


Bikinis were first worn in France, so it seems to fit that it is in France that we realize how 'Bikini" is a universal language. When we visited out chef friends at Le Cottage, we shared with them our cooking experience in Capri at Villa Marina. Only one of the chefs, Thibault, speaks fluent English -- but when everyone heard the word bikini - they all perked up giggling. I think next year we will be cooking at Le Cottage in our bikinis!

Le Cottage




With only one day back in Talloires we had to go visit all of our wonderful friends at Le Cottage. We visited Jean Claude Bise and his lovely wife Christine as well as Chef Pascal Noyon, Thibault Casasole, Olivier Suire, Jimmy Heintz, Mickael Marzollie, and Yves Gaudin. Thank all of you again for everything! We had a wonderful lunch and spent the afternoon by the pool. Le Cottage is truly our favorite setting in Talloires.


Beautiful Capri