Sicilian Girl

Tweet A coffee and tea time favorite, this praline pound cake is one of those Southern cakes that is a consummate example of down-home goodness. I love this type of “needs no icing” kind of cake, that is not only the perfect offering for a friend who stops by for coffee, but is right at [...]

Tweet Souffle’s may be sweet or savory, simple or complicated. I rarely do anything complicated any more so this lemon souffle is simply delicious. The word souffle is taken from the French verb souffler which means to puff up. The puffing up is caused by the beaten egg whites creating steam that is trapped inside [...]

Tweet   Many years ago when my son Joe was just a little boy, we spent Easter in the California Sierra’s. We have a cabin surrounded by sugar and ponderosa pine trees, white firs, cypress and a couple of magnificent oaks with a redwood forest down the road. It’s our own little piece of heaven [...]

Tweet Who among us doesn’t love a good cupcake? Apparently not too many based on the number of cupcake shops popping up around town. Have you seen the program Cupcake Wars currently airing on the food network? How many different recipes can they come up with week after week? It’s nothing short of amazing.  Well, [...]

Tweet King Cakes are a huge part of Mardi-Gras traditions throughout the south. Also known as Twelfth Night Cake, you will find this brioche-type pastry in bakeries from January 6th (Twelfth Night) to Ash Wednesday. This cake was used to celebrate the coming of the three wise men bearing gifts twelve days after Christmas. In [...]

Tweet The town of Marsala is located in the north west part of Sicily and produces a fortified wine bearing her name. In the late 1700′s the wine was ‘fortified’ with Brandy thus giving it a longer shelf life for all those seafaring men. I recently had a neighbor (who is an excellent baker) ask [...]

Tweet   During  the 1980′s when I lived in Campbell, California I entered a baking contest. It was for the Campbell Prune Festival held in the streets of our historic downtown. This was a wonderful celebration of community sponsored by the Sunsweet Prune Company, formerly known as The California Prune and Apricot Growers Association. Judged on [...]