J'adore Friday #2 - Holidays!

J'adore Friday! Holiday edition! BECAUSE DECEMBER STARTS TOMORROW! How in the world did that happen? Quickest year ever. Anyway, this is so my favorite time of year, and here are some cool holiday-ey things that I thought you all might enjoy.

Check out these adorable North Pole cupcakes from Tablespoon!

Image from Table Spoon

Most cutest Christmas cards by Lisa Stubbs on Etsy!

Who doesn't love Christmas sugar cookies, especially with peppermint!

Image from The Recipe Critic

Every year I'm so jealous of the people who wrap their gifts so beautifully. I would love to be able to do something like this from Sparkles and Snowflakes

Happy Friday everybody! I hope you are enjoying the holiday season!!

New Items in the Etsy Shop!

I hope you all had a great Thanksgiving!! Mine was full of food, fun, and family, and I loved every bit of it! I ended up making three pies, which turned out so good. I did a deep dish pecan, caramel apple, and pumpkin crumble. They were a hit! And I must admit I ate a bit too much of each.

YUM!

Now that Thanksgiving is over, it's time to start thinking about CHRISTMAS! During my days off last week, I got my behind in gear and started getting some new items in my shop, including a few non-baked gift items. I hope you all consider Etsy while doing your Christmas shopping! 

Here are some of the new things you'll see in my Etsy shop!

Gluten Free, Vegan, Paleo Chocolate Chip Cookies

Fudgy Crinkle Cookies

Chocolate Oatmeal Florentines

Organic Oatmeal Brown Sugar Scrub

Mulling Spices

Holiday Gift Tags

Happy Holidays!

Thanksgiving = PIE

It's PIE TIME! Hey guys! Hey guys! It's PIE TIME! I mean, I know you can make pie all year long, and I did make a couple of pies this year. And if you ask my friend Haya at The Calculated Kitchen, you should really make a pie every day. However, for me Thanksgiving is at least 75% about the pie. I loooove fall pies, especially the quintessential pumpkin. My boyfriend loves Pecan pie most, so Thanksgiving brings our pie loves together and we rejoice with mouthfuls of holiday goodness.

In past years, I have most often been in charge of the whole Thanksgiving dinner, so I kind of cheap out on the pies, and get store bought. It's a little overwhelming to do the whole dinner AND the pies. And I really just don't have the time or the hands. Last year Kris and I went down to LA to spend the holiday with his sister and brother, so I got out of dinner duty and had the opportunity to JUST do pies!

This year I am yet again getting out of cooking the dinner, and only have to provide the pies. Woo! I'm especially excited because this year I have MASTERED pie crust. It's true, people. Pie crust aint no thang for me anymore. I used to be terrified of crust. For some reason it was so intimidating and I always felt like my crusts were lame. But TIS NO MORE! I have made pie crust my bitch, and it's mainly been with the help of Joy the Baker (this chick is awesome and I feel like if we ever met we'd totally be friends. Can we be friends, Joy??). Her method for pie crust is pretty much the bomb. Do people still say the bomb? I'm pulling that out special for this because it really is the bomb. Try it. It will change your life. Never have you had anything as flaky and delicious.

Photo from Joy the Baker

So now that I am a pie crust whiz, I am super pumped about this year's Thanksgiving pies. I'm torn between going extremely classic with just regular ol' pumpkin pie and regular ol' pecan pie, or if I should jazz it up some... There are some pretty great Thanksgiving inspired pie recipes out there and I'm so tempted to get crazy and try something different. Sorry family, you're coming with me on this pie adventure!

These Cream Cheese and Butterscotch Pumpkin Pies by Chef in Training sounds so amazing, but should I go non-pumpkin and try Alton Brown's Sweet Potato Pie?

Photo from Chef in Training

And for the pecan pie, I looooove Trisha Yearwood's classic pecan pie recipe, but I know there are a lot of good pecan pies with CHOCOLATE! How can that be bad? Or this "Mystery" Pecan Pie by Paula Deen has cream cheese as a bottom layer and to me that sounds like something to be thankful for.

 Photo from Foodnetwork.com

What are your favorite holiday pies? Do you change it up every year or stick with tried and true classics?

The holidays are coming... Cider time!

This is absolutely my favorite time of year. Once fall hits, I'm ecstatic. I love the crisp air, I love the change in colors, I love the smell of rain and the quiet blanket of fog in the morning. To me, the season means peace, family, warmth, love, and coziness. One of my favorite things about the season, something that completely represents all of these feelings in one, is warm mulled apple cider.

I love to keep a small pot of cider simmering with mulling spices during the holiday season. It just fills my house with the comforting warm smells of apple, cinnamon and allspice. I usually make up little satchels of cheesecloth filled with my own blend of mulling spices, but this year I found some tea filters at Teavana that I think are awesome for individual cups or full pots of tasty cider.

Using these fill-able teabags, I made some of my mulling spice mix and put together cute individual spice bags! 

They're now available in my Etsy Shop. I hope they make your home smell as delicious and cozy as mine! And I hope your cider tastes extra yummy! 

These sets also make excellent gifts, and I am happy to provide gift wrapping for anything in my Shop :)

Photo shoot with Danielle Capito and Twigss!

Guys, guys! This is super cool! One of my favorite photographers, Danielle Capito, of Danielle Capito Photography asked if I would like to provide some Tartlet baked goods for a photo shoot with Twigss Floral Studio! HOW RAD IS THAT?!

Of course I jumped at the chance, and worked with Addison at Twigss (she is so super nice) to come up with a menu that fit their theme, haunted library. What an amazing halloween theme! I love it! Twigss put together a beautiful menu chalkboard that listed the items from Tartlet. Their studio is adorable and in the lovely downtown Danville, CA. I highly recommend checking them out for weddings, parties, etc!

I'm so excited to share with you some of the photos from the shoot. Danielle was awesome enough to send some to me. Check out the rest of the shoot at her blog!

Behold, some of the amazing Danielle's photos!

The beautiful menu

Some fig and honey galettes along with plum galettes :)

Plum and blackberry thumbprint cookies with some mini caramel pecan tarts.

German chocolate and salted caramel macarons, with some butterscotch oatmeal crisps.

The lovely models feeding each other Tartlet treats :)

Plum galette!

The full spread.

I'm so super impressed and very grateful to have been involved in this awesome shoot. Addison and Danielle are the nicest ever and very fun to work with. The shoot also got featured on Ruffled!

Thank you ladies for getting Tartlet involved with your photo shoot!