SMiLes by Meg

Simple Fruit Tart

I’m writing this post from my phone, sitting in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where I decided not to bring my laptop and the house decided not to have super consistent internet. Overall, this is a great feature, because it means I spend much more of my time hiking and biking and reading than looking at a screen. However, when it came time to blog, it did make it a little trickier. 

Banana Muffins

Ever look over at your fruit bowl and realize your bananas have turned almost completely brown before you even had a chance to eat one? Looking for a quick recipe when you don’t necessarily have all of the ingredients on hand for the best banana bread ever? Good news: if you bake (from scratch) ever, you definitely have everything to make these muffins and feel like you didn’t waste food after all.

Cinnamon Pinwheels

I’m officially on summer vacation! With a month before I start my last year of school ever, I’m definitely trying to pack a lot in. In a couple of hours, my mom and I will leave for our annual Nantucket trip. Then, two days after we get back, I’ll head out to Montana and Wyoming for a couple weeks of hiking and generally not being in an office. With all of this traveling, baking will be a bit more challenging, but don’t worry – I’m committed.

Strawberry Ice Cream Sandwiches

I learned so many things yesterday. First, baking bread when your kitchen is over 80° is destined to be a disaster. Rather than rise up, the bread spreads out, and then you have flat sourdough, which is really only good to be cut up into crostini. Second, my apron has pockets, which means that when I discovered this and started storing my phone in one, I spent far too much time searching the counter for said phone whenever I needed to take a picture. Finally, there are some recipes that you just know how good the finished product will be

Lemon Blueberry Ricotta Cake

It feels like forever ago that I made this cake. (It was Thursday.) I brought it to brunch on Friday with some coworkers, but since then I’ve spent two nights up in Vermont with my cousins, making Friday brunch a distant memory. Fortunately, I remember that it got a lot of compliments.

Coconut Lime Popsicles

In this week’s baking adventure, I learned two things: (1) A popsicle mold would be a really great investment for the summer. (2) Popsicles are a hard thing to take flattering pictures of. Fortunately, though this may not be my best food photography, the end product is still a refreshing summer treat.

Gluten Free Chocolate Cookies

I’m usually pretty wary of gluten free recipes that seem to be making odd substitutions, or just eliminating flour and thinking the baked good will come out the same. If they don’t do that, they require weird ingredients (has anyone ever actually found xanthan gum?) before they’ll reach a kind of close-to-right consistency.

Twix Cookies

This week, my recipe has a story! At my internship this summer, lunch meetings always have some kind of dessert. Usually it’s cookies and brownies, pretty standard. But one day this week, there were these little slices of chocolate cake with caramel, very much like a Twix, and I instantly decided I needed to make something similar. However, with a cake, you don’t get the same satisfying crunch that the cookie layer in a Twix bar provides.

Sourdough Bread

This was quite the weekend. Yesterday, I baked sourdough bread from scratch for the first time (more on that later). More exciting, I finished knitting my first sock! One more and I’ll have a set! AND my family made an impromptu visit in to have dinner with me (but really for Father’s Day – love you Daddy-o!). This morning I ran a Spartan race. And all afternoon I got to hang out with my best friend from college (hi, Cate!).