A Valentine’s Day Table with Chocolate Raspberry Heart Cakes

by Helen Kain | Feb 9, 2021 | Holiday, Sweets, Valentine's Day, Winter Recipes

Chocolate and roses are traditional Valentine’s Day fare. Combining them in a cake is the best of all possible worlds – served with tea, and augmented with pink champagne, of course! Add in pretty pink china and we have a lovely (albeit chilly) setting for...

Cranberry, Pistachio & Orange Biscotti

by Helen Kain | Jan 13, 2021 | Breakfast, Fall Recipes, Food Gifting, Holiday, Spring Recipes, Summer Recipes, Sweets, Winter Recipes

Our virtual baking session just before Christmas produced more than Orange Chocolate Cake. My friend Leanne had assured me her recipe for biscotti was quick and easy, and she was right. We whipped it up in no time. Biscotti means “twice-baked” in...

A Festive Chocolate Orange Cake

by Helen Kain | Dec 13, 2020 | Christmas, Recent, Sweets, Winter Recipes

This cake is the result of a happy collision of ideas. First, the plates (as so often happens around here). They’re Woodland Berry by Williams Sonoma – a combined gift from daughter Lauren and daughter-in-law Annie for Christmas last year. I’ve been...

Gingerbread Village Spice Cake

by Helen Kain | Dec 4, 2020 | Christmas, Sweets, Winter Recipes, Winter Tablescapes

When I was little, a crisp, spicy gingerbread cookie adorned with crunchy icing was the tantalizing reward to encourage exemplary behaviour while Christmas shopping with my Mum. Trailing around after her, scarf dragging and winter boots clumping, my thoughts would run...

Peach Cornbread Skillet Cobbler

by Helen Kain | Aug 30, 2020 | Breakfast, Fall Recipes, Summer Recipes, Sweets

Six luscious peaches beckoned from the kitchen counter early one morning, on a day that threatened imminent rain. After a quick cup of coffee, we snapped leashes on Clementine and Churchill, the youngest of our wriggling golden retrievers, and headed out before the...

A Jewel-Toned Table with Roasted Plum Tart

by Helen Kain | Aug 16, 2020 | Fall Recipes, Fall Tablescapes, Pink and Red, Summer Recipes, Summer Tablescapes, Sweets

“Apples, Peaches, Pears and Plums, tell me when your birthday comes!” Does anyone else remember jumping rope to that rhyme? It often pops into my head in late summer when overflowing farmers’ markets send me scurrying into the kitchen, eager to...