Livin' the Dream in Lima

Ahhh... sweet rolls. The ultimate Sunday breakfast. Nothing better than a sweet cinnamon roll or sticky caramel pecan bun before church. However, I saw these Lemon Sticky Rolls  on Pinterest, and was immediately intrigued. Lemon?! Sounds a bit different, but definitely delicious! They sort of reminded me of these sweet rolls of my childhood - did anybody else eat these? Orange Sweet Rolls were the best! Since I was an only child, I always got the best  roll in the pan... the middle, ooey gooey one with all the extra frosting. What can I say, I might have been a bit spoiled. What's so great about these Lemon Sticky Rolls is that they're the perfect amount of sweet. You know how sometimes you eat a cinnamon roll, and you feel like you just ate a 3 lb. chocolate bar? Yea... these are not quite like that. They're a bit sweet, a bit tangy, a bit perfect. The filling is just a simple mix of sugar, ginger, and lemon zest. Kinda resembles sand, but makes your ...

I never posted a pumpkin recipe this past Thursday. The reason? I was waiting until Saturday to prepare it! I've been wanting to try a pumpkin-themed french toast casserole for awhile, but it's not all too practical for a weekday meal. An hour in the oven? No thank you. However, we had some special visitors arrive late last night, so I knew that a french toast casserole would be the perfect lazy morning breakfast treat.  Who came to visit? One of my best friends from college, Michelle! She and her fiance were traveling up to Michigan for their Thanksgiving break and I forced lovingly convinced them to make a pitstop in the Bean Town.  We spent the morning doing what we do best--going for a run and catching up on each other's lives. Running is the best way to catch up with old friends... we might have not seen each other for 3 months, but the instant we start running, it's just like old times. I guess that happens when you spent 4 years of your life running 5 ...

As you're reading this, I should be on a plane to Vegas to join my sweet Business Man there. I may or may not be just a bit nervous about the whole flying on a plane, laying over, flying on another plane, and then catching a shuttle bus to the hotel thing. I'm sure I will survive. I'll pop in with at least a picture to celebrate my arrival. ;-) --- Well, it is  Thursday, which means it's time for another pumpkin recipe. You sick of these yet? I hope not... because it's still a good long while 'til Thanksgiving. (Not that I'm counting or anything. Thanksgiving is just our next big 'break' at school. Only 39 school days away! Haha.) Sundays are "fun breakfast" day in our house. Basically, the only day of the week I actually make something for breakfast. (Other than pouring a bowl of cereal or some good ole' maple & brown sugar instant oats.) It usually goes down like this: I go for a run, rush through the end of my run in ...

Earlier this week , I posted a few pictures of some cinnamon rolls. Some Cappuccino Cinnamon Rolls to be exact. I've been on a kick with sweet breakfast recipes lately, but I'm not complaining. Either is my Business Man. Except that he didn't get any of these cinnamon rolls. Whoops. And cinnamon rolls are his favorite. (Bad wife award.) Anyways, my friend Alissa loves to bake. She does not have an oven at her apartment in South Korea, where she is living and teaching currently. So when she was back in the States for two weeks, and we got together, you betcha we had to bake! And we wanted to make something for breakfast, so we could enjoy it after our beautiful run. So we made Cappuccino Cinnamon Rolls. We've made these before, three times, and they always come out beautifully. The coffee flavor is very slight, not too overwhelming at all. They're soft and sweet and gooey and everything a cinnamon roll should be. The cappuccino-flavor...

I've had coffee cake on the brain lately. Ever since we were in Door County two weekends ago and I saw a cherry coffee cake in one of the little  markets, I've been wanting to make a coffee cake. A strudel-y yeasted coffee cake. I'd never made a yeasted coffee cake before. I've made bread and pizza dough, and that's about it for yeasted things. Oh, I did try making whole wheat bagels hockey pucks with my friend Kristi. They were not the best. What I didn't realize when I set out to make this Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake was that it requires several sets of rising times. It took 9.5 hours from start to finish. Not a big deal if you're a teacher and have the summer off to do as you please every day. (12 days until school starts! And then I have to start actually planning meals out and planning recipes around their ease and quickness of preparation. Ah, such is life.) I started preparing it Tuesday around noon, and finally pulled it out of...

The birds are chirping, the sun is shining, and the grass is turning green again! Yay for spring! Spring weather makes me crave "spring" food. Like fruits and salads and quiches and asparagus and citrus. Lemon especially. I haven't posted a lot of breakfast recipes on the blog. On most days of the week, we usually just eat oatmeal, cereal, or a Clif bar on the way out the door. Hey, it's life. But on Sundays, I actually cook, err.... bake. Sundays are Fun-days in the kitchen! Usually I make some sort of muffin, sweet roll, or scone. Mostly scones. I love scones. I have posted about scones once before, right here .  That is my absolute favorite scone recipe. I am constantly changing up the mix-in ingredients. My favorites are cherry-chocolate chip, apricot-almond, blueberry-walnut, apple-cinnamon, and cranberry-orange. (Favorites? ha! That was five flavors right there.) I am constantly searching my brain for other flavor combinations that work would fabulou...