Good Cakes Bake Shop

January has been an exciting time in the Bloom kitchen. I’m excited to share that I have started a collaboration with the Deutsche Samstagsschule in Houston (a non profit that offers German language classes to kids and adults). Many of the parents are German expats and miss access to German bread and rolls. So every two weeks or so I will be baking through the night to bring fresh bread, rolls, and pretzels to the school.
A special thanks to my husband for his support. He’s washing lots of dishes, weighing out dough and has learned to shape dough balls. Not to mention luggs the flour bags and fixes broken down mixers.
I’m looking forward to what this year has in store for my little bakery.

Now that the holiday season and related eating is behind us I’m trying to get back to a more balanced diet. To me that mostly means more fiber, less processed sugar. No more cookies or Lebkuchen for breakfast.

With that in mind I made a batch of Granola - old fashioned oates and almonds tossed in coconut oil and butter (I know, one could argue butter doesn’t fall in the better diet category, but moderation is the key in my world), honey and palm sugar, 30 min in the oven and it’s done. Break up into clusters and add whatever dried fruit you like. In the spirit of cutting back on sweets, I omitted the chocolate chips. Tastes great with yogurt and some fresh berries and it keeps you full for hours. I’m not against store bought granola. It’s convenient. Some are actually pretty good, but this is better😀.

This year it’ll be 30 years that I moved to the US. This was before ‘artisan’ bread was a thing. Mostly all you could find was fluffy presliced bread and hamburger buns. That and Bagels. Bagels were the closest thing I could find to a German Roll and I love them. Not the store bought kind, but the fresh ones from the Bagel Shop, which are lots of in the Twin Cities where I first lived. For some reason in Houston, they are not as common so I turned to baking them myself. I don’t make them often, the dough is tough to form and the whole boiling process is a chore, but lately I’ve had a craving so today was the day. Pop what doesn’t get eaten today in the freezer and it’s a quick breakfast during the week.

Christmas Baking is in full swing.

Spritzgebaeck is always a favorite. So simple yet so delicious. They last for several weeks stored in a tin so you might as well make a big batch!

Give me a shout if you would like to order some.

Next week we celebrate Thanksgiving and I usually start with Christmas cookies the following weekend in time for the 1. of Advent. This year I was antsy to try out a few new recipes so I spent the day in the kitchen just for fun. I tried 4 recipes, two with marzipan, one with coconut, and one with Ba**er. The only one I’m not sure about is the one with the Ba**er. The baking instructions seemed to be wrong. Even though I did come up with a fix for it, I think they are too sweet for me. But they’re cute so I might try them again. The other three were amazing and are keepers for sure. Comments under the photos.