No-Churn Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

No-Churn Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

In high school, I was smitten over the boy who sat in front of me in Latin class. It was a quiet crush; I was a shy and modest girl, only becoming more introverted when faced with the back of my crush's head. In the four years we shared the same small Latin class, I never worked up the courage to talk to him. We had quite a bit in common, both in and out of school, but when we'd find ourselves alone in the classroom, I'd bury my face in my notes instead of facing him. When I did open my mouth to speak, the words would stop before leaving my mouth, leaving me looking like a fish out of water.

I can only imagine what he thought about me, if he thought anything at all.

Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

This particular boy I admired also wrote for the school paper. Each month I made it a point to page through it, as girls with high school crushes will do. One particular month, however, I came across an article that made me stop. It was written by a girl proclaiming her crush on a boy for all the school to read. The article would not have been nearly as interesting, except for one detail: part of the article had been lifted from a creative writing assignment I had written for English class the year prior. Confused by the plagarism, I scanned the article and gasped. This proclamation of "like" wasn't written about just any boy. It was for my crush and this girl was using my words to profess it!

It was a moment straight out of a sitcom.

Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

I immediately folded up the paper and looked around for my best friend. As the girl who had heard me gush about this boy for the better part of two years, she was the only one who could understand and share in the sheer irony of the situation. As I showed her the paper and told her the story, we laughed until I cried. It was comedic and devastating, all at once. Looking back, it was, in essence, one of those quintessential high school experience.

Though I chose to ignore the plagiarism, I eventually learned my crush had turned the other girl down. As happy as I was about this turn of events, it still left me with one unanswered question: did he turn her down because he didn't return her feelings or did he turn her down because of the words she used to profess it? Would he have turned me down if he had known where those words originally came?

I may never know.

Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream

No-Churn Blueberry Cheesecake Ice Cream is creamy, dreamy, and you don't need an ice cream maker to create it! Blueberries are swirled into a cream cheese base, creating a colorful dessert that tastes remarkably like blueberry cheesecake. It is very rich, so a little does go a long way. One scoop will make for a refreshing dessert after an evening meal.

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Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

It's a common practice, when one is feeling under the weather, to partake in retail therapy. Buying expensive shoes or a new shirt, in those moody moments, makes the weight of the world seem a little lighter. It's hard to say exactly why spending loose change can turn a mood from blue to bright. For some reason, it's easier to face the world with a cheery face when you're working a new pair of blue jeans. Whenever my mood is headed toward melancholy, I like to go food prop shopping.

I doubt you will find anyone get more excited about dirty, thrift store silverware than me.

Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

Thrift stores and yard sales are the holy grail of food prop shopping. Not only is everything exceptionally inexpensive (as a young woman, extra cash is something I do not have), but the kitchen tools and dinnerware are each a unique find. Certainly this type of shopping can be the definition of hit-or-miss, but when you stumble across something you didn't know you'd been searching for, the union feels fated.

I've recently been caught up in old bakeware. Scratched and blackened, only years of dedicated cookie making could have turned these baking sheets into the perfect state of used. Old jam jars become glasses for milk and vases for stray wildflowers. Glass candle holders become cups for serving puddings or containers for jam.

Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

Though I have an entire closet filled with baking gear and food props, I find myself using the same things over and over again. The old cotton sugar sack in the photos above is used so often, you could easily spot it in every other post (go play a game of I Spyβ€”I wish I was joking). The white rimmed plate holding the honey cake is another find that frequents the pages of this blog whenever a slice of cake or a stack of cookies need to be held. Lately I've been wondering why all my photographs seem to look the same. I think I have my answer.

Last weekend I found myself on a food prop shopping spree. I came home with so many bags of old dishware, I began to wonder if I'd need another closet to hold it all. Plates so old they have the appearance of broken egg shells and colorful silverware now fill the shelves of my closet. Now to wait for inspiration to strike...

Honey Wheat Cake with Cream Cheese Icing

This Honey Wheat Pound Cake with Cream Cheese Icing is a real treat. The cake is a simple one, made with part whole wheat flour, buttermilk, and honey. The honey, however, turns this cake into magic when it hits the oven, caramelizing on the bottom and sides of the pan. Topped with a honey sweetened cream cheese icing, I found myself eating this cake for breakfast and lunch. I used a dark honey for this cake and I suggest you do the same to get a deep caramelized flavor. However, if dark honey isn't available, regular honey will work just fine.

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Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

Lethargic, listless, lackadaisical. I've been utterly lazy the last week and half. At first, it was because I was jet-lagged, blaming time differences and long flights on my reason for not getting up from the couch. However, after the fatigue wore off, so did my excuses. I began setting my alarm to get up for the gymβ€”an honest attempt to drag myself back into a normal schedule. Waking up to the loud beeping with cloudy skies overhead, I found myself hitting the snooze button and turning over for another hour's rest.

Not today, I'd tell myself. Maybe tomorrow...

Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

One day turned into two. Then three, then four. After rolling out of bed, I'd eat breakfast before situating myself in front of the television to watch hours of sitcoms and Lifetime movies. I made up excuses to convince myself I didn't need to leave the house. Overdue library books sat by the front door, accumulating small, but bothersome ten cent charges each day that passed. I wasn't sad or depressed, sick or under the weather. I was simply and inexcusably lazy.

I don't really need to go to the gym, I'd tell myself while eating through a bag of potato chips. I'll bake something tomorrow, I'd assure myself, scrolling through more recipes on Pinterest. Laziness was a luxury, wasn't it?

But, as the days turned into a week, I wasn't so sure of that anymore.

Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

Abraham Miller once said that he who knows how to loaf is wiser than three sages. I have the feeling, however, he wasn't talking about me. With all the reality television I was watching, I couldn't hope to be as wise as one sage, much less three. Laziness was no longer a luxury. It was becoming a chore (and no one likes chores).

Exactly 10 days after my lazy streak started, it abruptly ended. I pulled myself together. I went to the gym. I cuddled back up to my Kitchenaid mixer and made sweet, sweet desserts. I returned the library books back to their rightful home. Though laziness does have a time and place (and I will look back upon mine fondly), sometimes enough is enough.

The real world comes calling and we all must get up off the couch.

Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies

These Peanut Butter Cornmeal Cookies are the product of curious thinking and experimentation. Gluten and dairy free, the cookies are made with crunchy peanut butter and rolled in sugar for sweetness. The cornmeal adds a little extra texture to these cookies, without a distinguishable taste. Though the cornmeal can give the cookies a drier texture, it isn't anything a glass of milk can't cure.

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