Mango Bread

I have never heard of Mango bread before this week. I wasn't sure what to expect. Would it taste good? Was is a moist, tropical bread or more of a coffee cake? It had lots of cinnamon, ginger and lime zest in addition to the mangoes. I think it would have tasted better with out the cinnamon. I had a hard time getting the center of the bread completely cooked. It took over the 1 1/4 hours mentioned in the recipe. I also found it needed a lime glaze for a little extra flavour. I shared it with my Bible Study. I don't think I will try this recipe again. It wasn't great and a little on the dry side. I think I should have measured my mangoes a little better instead of guessing how many cups I added. I don't think I had quite enough. Thanks to Kelly of Baking with the Boys for choosing this recipe. Don't forget to visit the TWD Blogroll to see what everyone else did!

Nashville is over, so what next?

Waiting for me to arrive.
The kids are still waiting....
Is Mom ever going to get here?

Then my family left when I did come by since they thought they had missed me.

I have been busy this last week. Our family took a trip to Nashville for the Nashville Marathon on Saturday. My friends Jeni and Jill did so well! Nashville is such a beautiful city. The weather was extremely warm for this time of year. It ended up being 88 by the end of the race. The hills were rolling for the entire 26.2 miles! I had some stomach problems after the race and so we have zero pictures of me with my medal. I am very disappointed about that! This was my hardest and slowest marathon yet. I am hoping that my next one will go better.

This race has been my excuse for making desserts and eating them every week (especially my TWD baking group). That is over and I am on a two week running break. I have been trying to find other ways to stay active at the gym. I have tried yoga, weight training class, elliptical machines (we have 3 different kinds at the gym) free weights, biking and walking. Nothing has given me the "Runners High" but I am enjoying my recovery time.

World Peace Cookies with TWD

This week the TWD recipe was chosen by Jessica of cookbookhabit . She chose World Peace Cookies, page 138-139 of Baking From My Home to Yours By Dorie Greenspan.

These cookies are not what I thought they would be. They are a rich dark chocolate and have a salty/sweet combination with bites of chocolate mixed in. I love salt and chocolate together and was excited to see how they would turn out in a cookie. I had the same problem as everyone else with my dough being too crumbly. I rolled it into logs and put it in the fridge to set up. I had a really hard time getting these to stay together. They came out crumbly and oddly shaped mounds. We still enjoyed them. The kids liked them straight from the oven. Once they cooled they no longer tasted as good. Thanks Jessica for choosing this unique cookie!

TWD Caramel Peanut Topped Brownie Cake

This was such a great weekend off from work and school! We had warm Fall weather and even enjoyed a family hike on Monday. I think Fall is my favorite Season of the year. I love the cool evenings and early mornings. I also love all of the leaves changing colors. It is definitely my favorite time of the year for running outside.

This recipe was for last week but I am a little behind so I chose today to write about it. Tammy of Wee Treats by Tammy chose this yummy, caramel and chocolate goodness! I have been wanting to try this recipe. It has all of my favorite things in it: chocolate, and caramel. I was so excited to read the list of recipes that I get to make this month. I made this into a 9 square baking dish since my spring form pan was destroyed in our move. I could easily eat a couple of these at one time and I did. I made these for a BBQ on Sunday! They were a big hit with the neighbors as well. I decided not to do the peanuts at the last minute but sprinkled the top with Grey Sea Salt. I have a recipe for salted caramel brownies and combined the 2 recipes into 1. After I baked the cake I noticed it being very dry and crumbly. I made a simple syrup and poured over it to regain some of the moistness. I also chose to follow my friend Jeni's family recipe for the caramel topping. I have had too many batches of caramel crystallize on me in the past. She makes the most incredible caramels ever. She shared her secret recipe with me before she left Germany and walked me through each step of making them. They are so good!

P.S My husband deleted all of the pictures for this recipe. This is the third time that this has happened. I think I need to get my own camera to avoid this from happening again!