Baking Day Plan: Butterhorns,"Snow Balls", and Carrot Cake Cookies

For the year before I was pregnant, I was baking pretty much everything from scratch...bread, bagels, rolls, pizza dough, English muffins, soft pretzels, pita bread, muffins, granola, granola bars, and more, I'm sure. I was a baking MACHINE!

And it was really fun, frugal, easy, satisfying, and everything tasted SO much better than store bought. It's so great knowing and controlling everything that's going into your baked goods..and scary when you realize how basic everything should be and all the junk added to everything in the stores!


But with a toddler running around now, baking just seems incredibly daunting.


I know I need to just jump back into it. I do miss the satisfaction of it. And I would really love to have homemade healthy snacks for my daughter.

So I decided to start doing "Baking Days" again. By dedicating a few hours once or twice a month, I can store extras in the freezer and get the mess over with all at once.  Plus, it really helps to start with a plan in place.

If you've never baked from scratch before, I'd highly recommend giving it a try, even just starting with one recipe. I started off making bread and dough with my bread maker but lately make just about everything using the dough attachment for my Kitchen Aid mixer (which I LOVE..thank you Aunt Linda!!).

I thought I'd list my baking day plan here on the blog, so you all can keep me accountable! My husband is deploying with the Air Force the beginning of December. I'm trying to fit in as much Christmas before then, so I'll get started on Christmas cookies. I also have some pumpkin to use up before it's out of season.

I'm going to try out some new recipes for "healthier" cookies and snacks...made without or with limited refined sugar and flour. I will update you with how everything turns out!


Here are the recipes I'm planning on making (baby permitting!):
Chocolate Butterhorns (like chocolate croissants..AMAZING!)
My all time favorite "Snow Ball" Christmas cookies
Itty bitty carrot cake cookies
Pumpkin pie banana chunk oatmeal cookies
Wedded Bliss Soft Ginger Cookies
Pumpkin butter oat squares


Non-Baking items:
maple-cinnamon-almond-butter-with-hemp-flax-and-chia-seed
And do something with the beautiful head of cauliflower I got at the farm stand and has just been sitting in my fridge.


You'll notice most of the recipes come from a vegan blog. When looking for "healthified" recipes, I've found vegan recipes are a good place to start (like my yummy vegan Pumpkin Bread Recipe). Sometimes I un-veganize them though, depending what I have on hand (ie. butter and eggs).



A little over ambitious, I know. I just got a little excited about getting back into it. Rule #1 though, I don't stress about what I don't get done.  I'll probably give myself several days to get as much done as possible. I'll let you know soon how it goes!