message in a cookie

Check out these cute cookie cutters from William Sonoma that I read about in Style at Home magazine this weekend.  You can customize a message that will be stamped into the cookie when you cut out the cookie.  How efficient is this invention?

Boaboca Gourmet

Boa Boca Gourmet is Portugal’s answer to food meets design.  What began as a project back in 2004 in Evora, Portugal has landed the original team of five international design awards and recognition for the company’s design focused packaging and high quality products.  Boa Boca Gourmet makes chocolate, cookies, dried fruits, coffee, tea and liquor and are currently sold at the Boa Boca store in Portugal, as well as in Scotland, Amsterdam, Los Angeles, Barcelona and Buchareste.    What is notable about Boa Boca’s products is that a lot of care and time are put into the selection of ingredients and baking.  For example, the cookies, made by hand in Alentejo (south Portugal) come from an old recipe and all the ingredients are natural and baked in a firewood oven.

Sucre

Did I just stumble on a gem of a place: Sucre in New Orleans.

If you are lucky enough to live in New Orleans, you no doubt have stopped by Sucre for one of their many fantastic looking artisanal desserts/pastries/chocolates.  This place truly looks like a one stop shop for all your sweet tooth entertaining needs.  If you live in the US you at least can access their products via shipping.  If you are like me and live in Canada, you can only drool from the border like I am.

view from the exterior

view from the inside

via the cobbled path

Crafty Gift Bags

I wanted to blog about this craft project last week but I was so busy baking and working that I don’t know what happened.  Better late than never I suppose.

So I wrote about stationery store, Stamping Bella this past year, recap- Owners, Emily + Ryan have a  fabulous paper, stamp and everything else you could want to scrapbook your heart out store in Thornhill, Toronto.  Stamping Bella also offers workshops and I decided to try out their holiday gift bag workshop.

It was a three hour workshop led by an instructor, but after the instructions were done it was a holiday gift bag and decorating free-for-all.  I would totally go to another one of their workshops.  Aside from walking out with fun gifts for friends and family you get to meet other people who are really into crafts and creative things and are great conversationalist and teachers if you happen to be a beginner such as myself.

Here is what I put together at the workshop:

 

 

Babble Candy Tower

Happy Holidays + Christmas Eve Day.

I have made two of these hostess gifts with more on the way and received rave reviews so I wanted to share my hostess idea with you incase you have more gifts to assemble/buy in the weeks to come.  My inspiration for the babble candy tower started this week when I went to buy my family friend a house-warming gift at my favourite home accessories/gift store in Toronto, Dana Jordan at Bayview Village.  I would provide you with a website for Dana Jordan but sadly the store has not embraced technology and is a traditional brick and mortar store sans website/ecommerce (nudge nudge hint hint, Dana we would love to buy more from you if you made our life easier and offered an ecommerce site). 

Back to my story, I am a fan of the Koziol Babble fruit stand (see pic).  Koziol is a German home accessories design brand and another company called, Seven Hints worked with Koziol to design the popular Babble.   

koziol fruit tray

 So I went and bought five Bablbes (they come in small/large) and dressed them up holiday style.  Please don’t mind my amateur pictures.  I think I have to go take a photography course in the new year!

First you take your Bable

Then You Choose Your Favourite Candy

Assemble

Wrap in Cellophane and Ribbons

You can find Koziol products at gift and home stores that tend to carry modern, contemporary products or when in doubt, just google it.  What is great about this present is that after all the candy has been eaten, the host/hostess is left over with a great, stylish, home accessory that can be reused for entertaining in the future.

Heaven on a Plate

This is my hevean on a plate.  I tasted it while I stopped for a rest at Beijing’s Opposite House hotel Village Cafe. This dessert is their pavlova with fresh strawberries, passion fruit and home made vanilla bean ice cream.  The dessert’s stunning presentation made the dessert taste even better.

Delica

I was meeting a friend for a quick catch up tea yesterday and I had the opportunity to pop my head into the new Delica Kitchen at Yonge and St. Claire. 

Finally a quaint little spot with a New Yorkesque village/Brooklyn vibe has opened in Toronto.  There is a lot of great looking food and baked goods on the menu and prominently displayed on the counter.  While waiting for my friend to show up, I enjoyed reading a copy of the Australian publication, Gourmet magazine- of course Delica would have a great foodie mag like that lying around.  I will warn you though, there is not much space to sit (only bar/stool seating) if you are thinking of spending a long time here.  That being said, for a quick stop, in/out trip I would recommend a visit to check out their treats.

Pink Tree

I love this pink tree that I saw on Making it Lovely.  It is non-traditional, pink goodness!  There is something quite peaceful about the way the pink branches and ornaments work together. 

via making it lovely

Lottie and Doof

There is a great new food blog that I found called Lottie and Doof.  (The blog is not new, it is just new to me- i want to clarify that). 

The logo spoke to me when I landed on the site and kept me browsing through the amazing food photography and recipes on this blog.  FYI: There are some good ideas for holiday cookies if anyone is still looking and I have included some pictures to show you how fabulous food can look.  I will be testing out the Chocolate Caramel Tart this week for a holiday party I am attending.

via thibeaultstable.com

via lottie and doof

via the kitchn

via color me in

via lottie and doof (a holiday cookie)

baked

I am obsessed with Baked.

I paid the bakery a visit this past weekend en route to the Butter by Nadia sample sale all the way out in Red Hook, Brooklyn.  While I walked away dressless from the sample sale, boy was it worth the Ikea water taxi across the river for a cookie and a look around the charming industrial/residential area that is Red Hook.  I had the most scrumptuous ginger molasses chocolate chip cookie that I have ever tasted in my life.  This was a serious cookie.  Moist, flavourful, a balance between soft and chewy in the middle and crispy on the edges.  I liked the cookie so much, I even spent $30 on the Baked bakery cookbook, thereby making it one expensive cookie!  Well worth it. I’m just kidding.

If you are in New York and you are feeling a bit adventurous, get yourself down to Pier 11 by Wall Street, take the Ikea water taxi (a lovely 10 minute ride on the water where you get to listen to top 40 music and read Where magazine!) and then walk over to Baked.  You won’t regret this trek I promise!  From what I understand from digging around a bit (here) about the bakery, the owners also opened a baked in Charleston and there are some great pictures here.

via coolhunting.com

via austin chronicle

via lottie and doof