Emergency Saturday dispatch, friends! We have an update! My parent’s are visiting New Orleans this week which means I’ve convinced my dad to make my favorite cookies (twice now and once more before he goes) – his Browned Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies. I’ve made hundreds of dozens of cookies in my day but none better…
Your next spring baking project has arrived! We’re making spring-themed conchas, also known as pan dulce, also known as Mexican sweet breads. Conchas translates from Spanish as seashells – usually appropriate because the sugar top traditionally resembles a seashell. This season we might want to call these conchas fresas (strawberries) or flores (flowers) because we’re…
Hello friends! I woke up last Monday determined to get after it. The week prior felt lost to gloomy weather and equally gloomy body aches so I just let myself be. This week though? Sunshine and not a moment to lose. I visited with a few friends (one of them being my real estate agent…
I just spent two workdays in the kitchen testing and perfecting next week’s recipe. It’s a recipe for conchas. You know, Mexican sweet breads that are somehow even more delicious a day after baking. Perfect dipped in milky coffee. I found myself surrounded by four dozen conchas too many, trying to get just the right…
Hello, friends! Happy spring! Happy floral dress season! Happy Easter! We made it through another April Fool’s Day and I gotta say, April 2nd might be my favorite day because we have an entire year mostly free of pranks. You’re either a prank person or you’re not and, as your most gullible friend, I’m here…
In my cheese drawer right now I have a half eaten block of fancy gruyere (that’s the snacking cheese I eat in the morning while my coffee brews… I dunno), there’s a bag of shredded cheddar cheese for impromptu nachos, and there’s a bag of vegan jalapeno jack cheese that make my favorite grilled cheese…
Hello friends, welcome! You’ll forgive me this Sunday, won’t you? I don’t have a lengthy Sunday post for you today but I feel like we have such a tradition here every week, I didn’t want to leave you with an entirely blank space. I spent much of last week in Pittsburgh Pennsylvania helping a dear…
This week I found myself taking the long way to a tube of toothpaste at the drugstore. (Somehow, well into adulthood, toothpaste is one of those things that even with daily use, an empty toothpaste tube always seems like a surprise.) The long way to toothpaste, in case you aren’t familiar with this technique, involves…
Hello friends! Happy Sunday, I’m so glad you’re here! We made it to Spring, didn’t we? I cut these fine snapdragons from the front garden yesterday and felt pretty dang proud of myself for nurturing a plant outside long enough to bring it inside to nurture me further. Tron is pretty pleased, too. Yesterday I…
I do have the best of intentions. It’s best to assume positive intent, right? Even of yourself. Over the past year I’ve noticed a commonality in the apps that have made home on my phone. There’s an app to help me be a better runner (be a runner at all, honestly). There’s an app to…
Hi friends, good morning! How are you? Feeling good? Feeling strong? It’s ok if you’re not. It’s ok if things feels a little blurry. Sunday, afterall. A day to eat crackers in bed if you want to. This week I’ve been holding on to small victories: a few good laps in the pool, my fastest…
Lemon bars are right up there with clean sheets, new house slippers, pastel colored sweatpants, and a fresh bath towel and bath mat. We’re talking high-quality, high-functioning adult indulgences that we have ourselves to thank for. You feel me feelin’ myself headed into these spring days? Citrus season always feels like an awakening to spring. These…
Hello friends, good morning! Let’s nod our heads knowing we get another Sunday here together. I’ve got a record playing this morning: Bill Evans. It sounds like he’s in the room even though he lived his entire life before mine even started. Did you know that Bill Evans named his son Evan? Oh the places…
Dough-whatnow? Doberge. Doberge Cake. It’s common knowledge that Doberge (much like many other things New Orleanians take pride in) is confidently pronounced the way your grandmother said it. Since my California (through Alabama and New Mexico) grandmother likely never uttered the word Doberge, I tend to say Doh-berj. Doh-bashj is more common down south and…
There is no one cookbook you can buy to learn how to cook heartfelt New Orleans food. To learn to cook food from the south, I think you first have to learn how to EAT food from the south. More specifically, learning to discern what to eat from whom. Everyone has their specialties – the…
Hello friends! Happy Sunday, welcome to it! How are you? How are you sleeping? Me? Not so much this week. Is it the moon? Hormones? Unconscious stress? All I know is that I’m not alone. So many of you said on Instagram that you can’t sleep either. It’s ok really. I seem to muster the…
Hi hi! It’s your old friend Joy waving excitedly with another gluten-free recipe for you! It’s not that every recipe on Joy the Baker is now going to be free of all the gluten, sugar, and diary we love (and we love it, we really do). But this is a place I get to play….
Hello friends, Welcome to another Sunday. How are you? Really. Have your socks on and your mug full of something warm in your hands? I don’t quite know how to describe this past week. It was cold – really so cold. It was without our beloved Mardi Gras It was without the daily energy I’m…
You’ll find me in a bit of a haze this week. It’s too cold down in New Orleans to keep our feet on the ground for too long. Down here our houses are lifted three feet off the ground so during these winter cold snaps there’s nothing but frigid air between our uninsulated floor boards…
Hello friends! In a normal world it would be the big Mardi Gras weekend and gosh what I wouldn’t give to dance in the streets with the entire city! Will and I rode bikes around town this afternoon (cold… toooooo cold) to look at the houses decorated as floats. I have glitter on my face…
Hi friends! Let’s talk about a few things. Are you ready for a midweek chat? Consider this a check-in / overshare – that’s what friends do. It’s February which means that last month (which feels like a lifetime ago) I did that thing so many of us do – I made a New Year’s resolution…
Hello friends! Welcome to the 6th Sunday of 2021. They fly by if we don’t mark em down with out thoughts. This particular Sunday happens to by my mom’s birthday so I’d like to take a minute to mentally hug Patty and thank her for making me the strong, independent, and appropriately nosey neighbor I…
For the past few, oh I dunno…. decades the only real question for family gatherings is: who is going to make the Texas Sheet Cake? It’s goes without saying that this unassuming, pecan studded cake will be sliced up at the end of every family celebration. As sure as the sun will rise, ya know?…
Hello, friends! Happy Sunday! If I’m being honest, I don’t know what I think this week. I’ve head my head in recipes and food styling all week and that’s what I know. I know I mostly kept up with laundry and “swimming”. I know I didn’t keep up with text messages and emails. I know…
