a crush-worthy handcrafted cookie company

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In a sea of sugary boutiques boasting on mini-cakes with crowned tops, it is an obsessive sweet tooth's relief when something fresh falls into the dessert-drenched mix. Better yet, what plops the genuine icing on any crave-worthy cake is the availability of the notable treats in proximity to you.

Working just around the boutique bend from Handcrafted Cookie Company is a situation that should victoriously receive two gold stars. One, being that they celebrate the blessed cookie and two, being that it takes me less than a minute to trot to their only location.

Let me digress momentarily, you see, I do adore the cupcake. Even those who say they are sick of them, honestly are not. But, when you reminisce to your childhood years and your time spent baking with your dearly grandma, are you contemplating the notorious papered-stump? NO!

Chad and Theresa Williams, the darling duo behind the all-natural baking company, fulfill the need for sugary fiends breezing around Bridge Street to treat themselves to a health-conscious marveled mouthful.

Making use of original recipes that are free of hydrogenated oil and corn syrup, the couple crafts everything from classic chocolate chips to creative concoctions of lavender vanilla and chocolate hotties (fiery japs in rich cocoa). And with the mouthwatering blends too interesting to not continue, with raspberry mint and coconut sugar cookies, blueberry oatmeal, honey roasted nuts, chocolate mint and chocolate grapefruit, I may never stop gushing over the adventuresome appeal to these Main Street-made circles.

The Williams' are also currently hosting a community-search for recipes, asking anyone interested in participating to submit an original how-to and a sample for consideration to their baked shop. The contest concludes April 30 and the recipe best suited to taste will be featured June-August.

The Handcrafted Cookie Company is also as much of a cafe as a brick-bearing bake shop, selling organic bubble teas and milks, including soy, and also, an ever-changing choice of other sweet treats, including their baggies of brownie butts and their German chocolate cakies, as seen above.

Handcrafted Cookie Company, 24 S. Main St., Phoenixville, 484-921-4934

peanut butter eggs, a success of the strausses

There are not enough words to describe the love that the Strausses have for their glue that stuck them ever-so-willingly together, Naomi Strauss. 

 My grandmother & I, circa October 2006.

If you've read any of my posts where I trance back to my days with my beloved grandmother, it's obvious that you know that I possess an undying love for her. This month, it has only been three years that she has passed,  and as the days dwindle by, I always think of her more and more.

My Mammy had a keen eye for crafting the tastiest treats anyone's sweet teeth could ever experience, and I must modestly admit, this is not a biased statement. My family members and I hold these dear recipes as a triumphant trophy and as holidays approach, with appropriate traditional Strauss treats in tune for each, we are sure to gather together to reenact what our dear grandma did best in her comforting kitchen space.

Most recently, my cousins and I, as we like to think we're blessed with the gift that our grandmother possessed so gracefully, gathered to sculpt her chocolate-covered peanut butter eggs — a tradition we've began since her passing.

This year was the first festive occasion for the Strauss family's newest member, Cheyanne Naomi Willman, and as you see below, she too now loves these candies as much as we ever could (and, that is a hell of a lot!).

Here's a photographic step-by-step of our family-sacred, sugary Easter concoctions:

for valentine's, waltz on wine and chomp on chocolates

For wine-loving locavores, the Berks County Wine Trail has a Valentine's Day gift that might be more welcome than the typically gifted fresh bouquets of flowers or heart-shaped boxes of chocolates.

Offering lovers a weekend-long event of self-guided wine tours throughout their eight participating locations that span from Reading to Philadelphia and Lehigh Valley, each winery is set to host an array of activities sculpted around chocolate tastings that specifically accompany their locally produced varietals.

The Berks County Wine Trail requires no reservations, and all wine pairings will be offered for free, and even better, couples are encouraged to start and finish at any winery location most convenient to them. Also, to lessen the pressure of traveling from one winery to the next, each location offers directions to journey to the following sipping spot that falls nearest to them.

In appreciation of what southeastern Pennsylvania has to offer to individuals who adore smooth sips produced in our neighborhoods, the Berks County Wine Trail encourages couples to plan a pleasurable afternoon locally, all while providing what every lady loves - chocolate in all its assortments.

Begin at one of my closest winery, Kog Hill of Morgantown, and you will be delighted by the tastes of their Raspberry Dessert Wine paired with the light bites of chocolate torte. Their bottled raspberry sips are rich in flavor and color, and offer an excellent comparison to the sweetness of the cocoa dessert.

Kog Hill, Morgantown's winery is a close stop to either Clover Hill of Robesonia and Manatawny Creek Winery of Douglassville, who will entice traveling samplers with sugary treats like cannolis rolled with miniature chocolate chips or a slice of ultra-chic chocolate Cabernet cake.

Pinnacle Ridge Winery of Kutztown will serve classic French crepes pumped with strawberries, drizzled with decadent bittersweet chocolate sauce and dusted with confectioner's sugar and chocolate shavings. The winery's homemade crepes will be paired with one of their decadent red wine, the beloved bottle of Sweet Seduction.

Family-run Blair Vineyards of Mertztown, who are slated to relocate to Kutztown in April, will tantalize sweet teeth with a dessert titled Mocha French Kiss, which is a coffee truffle treat that goes perfectly with their Lower Block Pinot Noir. Bashore & Stoudt Country Winery of Shartlesville will offer chocolate fondue for fresh fruit dipping, which is offered inconjunction with their series of fresh fruit wines like pear, peach, elderberry and blueberry.

Also participating is Calvaresi Winery of Bernville and Long Trout Winery of Auburn. Long Trout plans to whip up wine-infused Chex Mix batches to accompany their series of cocoa wines, while Calvaresi warps into a chocoholics' haven by joining their Cayuga White with chocolate-covered mango and their 2009 Concord red wine with triple-chocolate malted-milk balls. The Auburn winery also produces sherry, which they will offer to individuals with chocolate-covered red raspberries.

Although J. Maki Winery of Elverson is not a partner of the wine trail, they too make for a great Chester County sipping spot, offering boldly distinctive red and white varietals made in the European premium dry wine tradition. The winery of Grove Road will be open both days of the wine tasting weekend, on Saturday and Sunday from noon until 5 p.m.

Also published here.

sugary sensations of sweet ashley's chocolate

In the 1940s, Miller's Candy and Ice Cream sashayed into the hearts of Royersford's sweet teeth by offering an assortment of sweet treats that would offer anyone an ultimate sugar rush.

50 years later, at the exact same store front, Connie and Rob Lawson maintain their shop for all things sweet on Main Street, singing praise to the area's very best, taste-test approved, chocolate assortments.

Beginning the official journey of a chocolatier in the fall of 2005, Connie Lawson always dreamt of opening her own chocolate factory. An unofficial milk and dark chocolate maker since the young age of nine, Lawson began her sales of sweets when living in State College with her husband while managing a coffee shop.

Wooing college students with her homemade sweets, she adored the construction of chocolates because it was something she always excelled at, it was her gift that has never been a frustrating challenge, but has always been an example of a hobby (now career) that was pure enjoyment to her.
Her husband Rob, the son of William Lawson who is a wonderful help to the business, being a business partner and shop assistant, was raised in the Spring City area, where the couple now lives with their 11 year old daughter Ashley -- the business' namesake.

Continue reading here.

it's amazing bread, he said.

We fell in love over bread.

The loaf—larger than my the width and height of my petite head, and baked in a building without electronic—was pumped with whole grains and coated with a powdery, delicate firm crust. Delicious and organic, the bread had travelled over five hours to get me to, and I gushed over every last bite.

Complications do come into this relationship's making, yet with such a profound love for things in a similar fashion, those things can eventually be forgotten, and last month, one year of our courting had been marked.

Before this, I had never met another who shared my (secret) love for wonderfully-made carbohydrates, and better yet, appreciated the artisan craft of breadmaking in such an intense nature as I did myself.

It comes back to that special, environmentally-friendly bakery that first sparked our interests to one another. The old-world, loaf-crafters of Hungry Ghost Bread of Northampton, Massachusetts (which I previously blogged about here) daily produces small doses of their inventory, in an amazing wood-burning brick oven.

Redefining ancient bread traditions into modernized masterpieces, the crew at HGB sculpt a multitude of flavors from simple French, potato, rye and local wheat, to thyme fougasse, semolina fennel, 8-grain pumped with chocolate (as seen above, that i'm chomping) and locavore flat breads made with local wheat, beets and squash.

As a special threat for my birthday this year, we traveled to New England together, to experience the bread jointly for the first time, rather than the various other times, we were enjoyed the loaves together, but just through words.

While, at some times, it seems far, far fetched, but our goal is to someday own a place like Hungry Ghost, taking what we love from their place and transforming them into something of our own.

mexican mocha minis

There is not anything better than a gift of a cookbook. I obsess over my cookbook collection, having to have the best new additions to the cookbook scene, as well as the oldie-but-goodies. However, sometimes the best books are those that are free, or more so, those that warmly belonged to another and then, were passed onto you.

My cousin recently gave me The Better Homes and Garden Homemade Cookies Cookbook, published in 1975. Packed with retro-styled cookies, bars, candies and teacake pastries, the hardcover kitchen companion was received at the most perfect time of the year.

Opting to start my Christmas cookie baking with a little bit of chocolate, I selected a recipe from the above-mentioned text, a 3-dozen batch of a walnut-packed, cocoa blend that undeniably proved that this baking handbook stuck around for obvious reasons.


Mexican Mocha Minis
makes 3 dozen

1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar (or raw sugar)
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour (or 1 cup all-purpose, 1/2 cup flax seed meal and 1/2 cup whole-wheat flour)
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon instant espresso crystals
1/4 teaspoon of salt (or sea salt)
1 cup finely chopped toasted walnuts (or almonds)
1/2 cup chopped maraschino cherries (or more more choc-crunch, add chocolate chunks here)
powdered sugar for dusting


Cream first 3 ingredients. Sift flour with cocoa, coffee and salt. Gradually beat into creamed mixture. Stir in nuts and cherries. Form into 1-inch balls. Place on ungreased baking sheet. Bake at 325 degrees for 20 minutes. Cool on rack. While warm, but not hot, dust with powdered sugar.

cream-filled cocoa mini-cakes

To be honest, I have no love for the store-bought Oreo.

Sorry, shoot me.

It's just that the cardboard crunch does nothing to please my everlasting aches for satisfying sugary substances. And, it's even more horrible that recently Mr. B shamelessly consumes multiple packages of Oreo Cakesters. I'm a baker for Christ's sake!

He says it's a guilty pleasure; I say it's in bad taste.

But, in all fairness and for just this once, I will allow my dessert elitism to be pushed aside and admit that Cakesters aren't so bad. However, I know I could make them better and uhem, slightly healthier.

So, to mostly prove a point and feel better 'bout not eating those packaged mini-devils, I whipped up this simple cakey sandwich cookie recipe that I *hope* (pretty please, with mounds of sugar on top) replaces those grocery shop wonders.

Cream-Filled Cocoa Mini-Cakes

Makes 24 cookies

cake

• 2 eggs
• 1 cup evaporated milk
• 1 cup canola oil
• 2 cup brown sugar
• 3 cup flour (1/3 flaxseed meal, 1/3 whole wheat, 1/3 all-purpose)
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 8 tbsp. cocoa powder

cream-filling

• 1 cup veggie shortening
• 1/3 cup evaporated milk
• 2-2 1/2 cup powdered sugar

Preheat over to 350 degrees.

Sift & mix together cocoa, salt, baking soda and flour. Add remaining ingredients. Plop chocolate circles onto a greased cooking sheet and flatten the tops with a fork. Bake for 7 minutes and immediately remove from baking sheet. Let cookies completely cool before transforming them into sandwiches.