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Baking Sweet Memories

I love this time of year. When fall rolls around I get even more excited about baking than I do any other time of the year. Summer ends and the real baking begins. The last months of the year are full of special reasons to spend time with family, share smiles, and bake sweet memories.

Pecan Pies

One of my favorite baking memories is making pecan pies with my uncle. We make them every year around Christmas but I thought I’d share the recipe with you again a little early this year. It’s too good to wait until December.

My grandmother used to make these pecan pies. Her recipe made three perfect pies at a time. She made them every year for family and friends. She loved it. And when she became less able to keep up with the same quantity of pies she liked to make, my uncle Ronnie became the official pie maker. He doesn’t bake and he’s not really a dessert guy but he makes a mean pecan pie. He’s been making them now for well over a decade since my grandmother passed away. He’s continued making them every year for friends and family to carry on his Mama’s tradition. And now I bake with him every year I can and if not I make sure to bake them in my own kitchen. It’s our family’s way of keeping her with us during the holidays.

And the pies are delicious too, so that’s awesome.

Mini Pies

Of course, I had to put my touch on them and make them mini. Major cute. But I still wrap them just like she did. Simple and sweet. I love these refrigerated and I eat them like a giant pecan pie cookie.

Here’s the recipe how my grandmother made it and here’s a link to the original post with step-by-step photos demonstrated by my uncle and a little more about my grandmother.

And keep scrolling for a fun giveaway below…

Mama's Pecan Pies
Yield: 3 pies or 32 mini pies

Mama's Pecan Pies

Prep Time 20 minutes
Cook Time 45 minutes
Total Time 1 hour 5 minutes

Ingredients

  • 16 oz. pecans
  • 2 sticks margarine
  • 16 oz. package light brown sugar
  • 1 heaping tablespoon (serving tablespoon, not measuring spoon) self-rising flour
  • 16 oz. bottle Karo light corn syrup
  • 1 tablespoon vanilla
  • 6 eggs
  • 3 regular size (not deep dish) frozen pie crusts - or make your own (enough for 3)

Instructions

  1. Melt margarine in the microwave for about 2 minutes or until melted and set aside.
  2. Prepare your pecans. Remove any unwanted dark brown pieces from the pecan crevices and shake out pecan crumbs in a colander.
  3. Place brown sugar in a large bowl. Work out any lumps with the back of a spoon. If the brown sugar is too hard, you can loosen it up in the microwave. Heat it for a few seconds and it will be fine.
  4. Add a heaping serving tablespoon of self-rising flour and stir until the flour disappears into the brown sugar.
  5. Add the bottle of corn syrup. Then add 1 serving tablespoon of vanilla and stir until thoroughly combined.
  6. Add melted margarine. Fold carefully into the mixture so it doesn’t splatter. Fold until the margarine is thoroughly worked in and disappears.
    In a separate bowl, crack open six eggs. Remove the “roosters” and loosely beat the eggs with your spoon.
  7. Fold the eggs into the pie mixture until they disappear.
  8. Add pecans and stir until completely coated.
  9. Remove three pie shells from the freezer at this point and check for cracks. (If you do have a crack, thaw and knead the crack together and refreeze.)
  10. Pour the mixture evenly into the three shells. You’ll probably have a little bit leftover in the bowl. Tap tops with a spoon to check consistency and make sure there is the same amount in each pie. Redistribute pecans if necessary to make equal.
  11. Bake for 45 minutes to an hour at 350. Cook pies until they swell and then fall. At that point they are done.
  12. Remove and cool for about three hours to set. Store on the counter or in the refrigerator depending on how you like your pie. Or eat right away and really warm - the pie just won't hold it's shape at this point but it will be amazing.
  13. For mini pies: chop pecans, use mini frozen pie shells, removing them from the freezer as needed and bake in three batches on a baking sheet for about 35 minutes each. I’m guesstimating the time. Watch them and make sure they are done.
Enjoy!

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And now, I’d love for you to share your favorite baking memory.

Holiday or any day.

You could be the lucky baker to win a KitchenAid Stand Mixer and a Williams-Sonoma Gift Card.

prize

  • Prize includes a KitchenAid Stand Mixer (valued at approximately $650) and a $200 Williams-Sonoma gift card. Approximate Retail Value: $850. Tasty!
  • Giveaway runs from September 24, 2012 at 12:00 am ET through October 8, 2012 at 11:59 pm ET. Sorry, Time’s Up! Winner will be announced this week.
  • One entry per person. You must live in the U.S. for this one (I’m sorry my international friends) and be 18 or over, too to be eligible to win.
  • To enter for a chance to win the mixer and gift card, just leave a comment on the website and share your favorite baking memory. And if you don’t have one yet, the giveaway lasts long enough for you to bake one. : )
  • One winner will be chosen at random and announced during the week of October 8th in a follow up post here on the site.
  • Note that it may take a few minutes for your comment to display.

Good luck guys and I can’t wait to read your baking memories.

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This post is sponsored by Nestlé® Toll House® Morsels, the perfect special ingredient for all of your family’s favorite treats!


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6,453 comments on “Baking Sweet Memories”

  1. My favorite baking memory is from a Christmas that I spent the school holiday at my grandparent’s house. My granny and I decided to make cookies, which she called ‘Making Memories’. As all good southern women do, we baked to excess for anyone and everyone for the holiday. I was so tired at the end of the day that I told her I ‘didn’t want to make memories anymore’ :) She laughed and then told the stories for years as I got older.
    She’s been gone almost 2 years and I smile everytime I think about it.

  2. The opportunity to bake with each of my nephews as they get old enough to mix batter, pour etc. :) Completely priceless.

  3. One of my favorite holiday memories was the year my brother and I mad Thanksgiving dinner together. He’s a great cook, and I’m the baker in our family. We decided to make Cornish Hens instead of turkey. The overwhelming sight of about 8 raw hens made me almost pass out. I had to sit while he got them in the oven. Despite the near accident, it was so much fun to be in the kitchen with my brother! :)

  4. My sister and I have been baking for Thanksgiving dinner together for the last couple of years and we have so much fun doing it! We always bake while watching Macy’s Thanksgiving Parade and then when the parade is over we watch Christmas movies. It is so much fun – the house smells so wonderful. I love the holidays!

  5. Baking Limpa (Swedish orange rye bread) with my Mom for Christmas, and then pilfering it with my siblings.

  6. My favorite baking memory is with my son. I was beginning the process of baking a pirate ship cake for his birthday, when he comes in, gazes at me with his big, green eyes, and in his ooeyest-gooeyest voice says, “Pweeeze can I hewp you, Mommy?” How could I say no to that? So I put aside my “great, now this is going to take forever” thoughts, and handed him a spoon. While he sat, barefoot, on the counter helping me mix the cake batter, the look of wonder and excitement on his face was so precious. Totally worth the extra time it took to get that cake baked.

  7. I remember maing cakes with my mother when I was little.

  8. My favorite baking memory is the ones I have made with my own children. Now 9 and 6, they love helping me in the kitchen. My mom never let me in to help her so I always told myself that would be a memory I would make with mine!

  9. For my seventh birthday, I remember watching my wonderful mother make a sunflower birthday cake. She always gave me the bowl and spoons to lick. This simple memory is my most memorable baking memory.

  10. My favorite memories from childhood were baking chocolate chip cookies with my mother and sisters. I can remember being so proud of myself when I could read well enough to follow the nestle chocolate chip cookie recipe on the bag all by myself.

  11. My favorite memory was the first pie i ever made from scratch. I was 16 and was making a Coconut Cream Pie for my boyfriend. It turned out perfectly accept… I forgot to bake the premade pie crust. Oops! :) I have been attepting to perfect my baking skills ever since!

  12. my favourite memory … making a dessert without the oven while living in Seville, Spain, for 5 months ;)

  13. one of my favorite memories is with my grandmother in the kitchen making hard candy and fudge for every christmas! I still love to go to her house on christmas candy baking day!

  14. One of my funniest baking memories happened when we put “gravy master” in the toll house chocolate chip cookies instead of vanilla!
    My fondest baking memories are of getting up early with my grandma & baking her bread – it was so simple, but so delicious!

  15. I have no favorite childhood memories of baking, because my mother neither cooked nor baked. ): I do LOVE to watch my teenager bake though! She loves to bake cookies and cupcakes!!!

  16. Baking chocolate chip cookies, I started baking them when I was 8, my sister and I were home alone and I found some chocolate chips, I used the recipe on the package and they were really good, then gave them away to the neighbors so that my parents wouldn’t know that I had been baking, 50 years and 1000″s of chocolate chips cookies later my cookies are still in demand

  17. Baking sugar cookies (with frosting and sprinkles) for every holiday with my mom! We loved hearts, shamrocks, bunnies, stars, pumpkins, Christmas trees…

  18. Anytime I get into the kitchen with my grandma! It is fewer and fewer these days, but I do love spending that quality time with her doing something that shows love!!!!

  19. When I was small I learned how to cook and bake everything from scratch from my mother. The raisens, nuts and Toll House chocolate chips were our ‘prepared’ ingredients. When my son was born I taught him using the same cookbook passed down from my grandmother. His kids are now learning yhe love of cooking and baking from him.

  20. My favorite baking memory was baking all sorts of goodies with my Grandma! Before she passed I would always stand right by her side and watch her make all of my favorite treats! I learned from her and I will continue to learn as I get older. I take all my memories that I have baking with her, with me where ever I go and I always try to make her proud!

  21. My favorite memory is baking Christmas cookies every year with my nieces, sister, mother and grandmother. We’d bake massive batches of many different kinds of cookies and decorate sugar cookies, and then package them up and give them our friends and family as gifts.

  22. none

  23. Favorite baking memory was actually a frying memory with baking ingredients…A rainy Arizona day, Pilllsbury biscuit dough cut into doughnut shapes, fried, and rolled in sugar. All while listening to Chicago’s COLOR MY WORLD, over and over.

  24. My dad is the cook/baker in our family, and some of my favorite memories are of sitting on the counter, adding ingredients, stirring the batter, and, of course, sampling the treats :)

  25. My favourite sweet memory is making sugar cane cookies where we intertine two strips of coloured cookie dough and hang them on the tree.

  26. my favorite baking memory was first baking with my niece when she was about 1. i did all the baking but she had so much fun decorating the cookies.

  27. I love baking with my daughter! She recently wanted to make her own cooking show. So we spent the afternoon together making cookies and recording it. We had a lot of fun and made tons of memories. I love how baking can bring you closer to the ones you love :)

  28. I remember baking a special sugar cookie recipe with my mom. They were super soft & difficult to work with (I can’t do it now because it makes me crazy).

  29. What a wonderful memory for you. Cooking is a special bond I have with my mother. I think my favorite was when we’d make Christmas sugar cookies. She and I both would eat the dough, the fresh cookies without frosting, the cookies with frosting, and even the cooled, unfrosted cookies because there wasn’t any frosting left. (The rest of the family would be lucky to get ANY!)

  30. My favorite baking memory is waking up early Saturday mornings and baking breakfast for the family with my dad :) My favorite was making applesauce muffins!

  31. I love holiday baking. My favorite memories are of my grandmother. She would always make meringue pies for holidays and would bring them over for the big meals. They had the highest meringue and always homemade fillings. She would even make the crust with a fancy pinched edge. I wish that I would have paid more attention during her baking lessons.

  32. My favorite memories were made when I was baking with my Grandma at her house. She always let me lick the spatula!!

  33. My mom made cookies every year to celebrate the first and last days of school. I have continued this tradition with my family!

  34. Oh my sister use to make the best chocolate chip cookies,oh how I miss her and her cookies.Thank you Sharon.

  35. Who said men can’t bake? My kids and I baked our own gingerbread house one year… we didn’t get the premade, just decorate kind becuase i was up for a challenge! It turned out really well, and we were very proud of our creation. It tasted great too!

  36. I remember baking with my mom and we always shared with our neighbors whose mom was ill and did very little cooking. Her children loved our chocolate cake.

  37. In 2008, my sister came to my house for the Thanksgiving holiday. My husband and I had just returned from a 4 year tour in England with the USAF. While there we met, fell in love, married and had our son. My sister had never met my husband or son until we returned to the states. Being able to have her come to my home with her three children and share the holiday after not seeing her for 4 years was amazing. That day was the most memorable time I had baking in the kitchen. I made a pumpkin pie and my sister made her deep dish apple pie. Being able to bond with my sister in the kitchen was the best!

  38. Watching my sister carry on the family holiday baking tradition with her 2 sons and our 2 nieces. Even now at 27,25,23 and 21 they still come over and help decorate and bake the cookies. Who said real men don’t bake? not this family :)

  39. My husband and I love to bake together and we have since we started dating. We try to make our favorite Cowboy Cookie dough before the oven beeps to tell us it’s preheated. We have the tasks down and usually can get it made and scooped out before it beeps, which means we have made this recipe hundreds of times and have it 100% memorized. Eating the cookies is still the best part though!

  40. I remember my grandma was a great baker, she always had an apron on when we went to visit. She had a small closet off the back porch where she “hid” all the Christmas candy and cookies that she made. Her best were homemade chocolate covered cherries & it took her weeks to make enough to share for the holidays. I miss her & wish I would have learned more from her to pass along to my kids and grandkids.

  41. I will never forget baking Christmas cookies at my grandma’s house. She would have tons of sugar cookie cut outs ready for us to decorate and we made dozens of other kinds. She was so patient with us and let us make a huge mess of her kitchen. We did it every year until she passed away. Now, my mom sets up her kitchen for us and our kids and we go crazy on cookies. So much fun!

  42. Teaching my daughter to make Christmas cookies! Looking forward to passing more family recipes down to her

  43. One year my kids and I made an Ice skating cake for a friend’s birthday. We marbled fondant and created little ice skates with laces, blades, and all. But the best part was seeing the look on the bday girl’s face when the cake was brought out : Priceless

  44. there was one christmas where my friend’s mother bought me a sugar cookie holiday gift set. i was so excited because she knew i’d always wanted to try baking. i prepared the dough and used the enclosed candy cane cookie cutter to my heart’s content. i placed the cut dough onto a cookie sheet and waited by the oven. after about 10 minutes, i looked in the oven and noticed the cookies had melded together to form one big cookie. i’d forgotten that sugar cookies need a lot of cooking space! i was so embarrassed, but we all had a fun laugh :)

  45. One of my favorite memories is helping my daughter make raccoon chef cake pops as thank you gifts for the Vacation Bible School workers. Our mascot that year was Scraps the Raccoon Chef and the cake pops my daughter designed looked just like him. They were adorable and we had lots of fun working on them together. Everyone loved them!

  46. Baking with my sons. Letting their creativity come out. Watching their faces as whatever we were making was ate.

  47. my favorite baking memory is baking cowboy cookies with my mom. she doesn’t bake at all, but the times she does, it’s always and only cowboy cookies. we would start baking together, and towards the end, it’s my mom giving the instructions while i’m hand-mixing the batter away. it was great mom-daughter time.

    thanks for the recipe :)
    will try it one day!

  48. I love to bake lemon meringue pies using lemons from the tree in my yard!

  49. My tradition of baking & sharing goodies with neighbors, friends & family started with my mom. I remember her making pan after pan of mint brownie bars. I remember the look in a person’s eyes when we delivered them.

  50. Favorite baking memory is one time a friend and I made almond shortbread sandwich cookies with chocolate filling. We made a huuuge mess filing the cookies but they turned out delicious and it was lots of fun :)

  51. My favorite baking memories come every time I make my mom’s recipe for pumpkin bread. It is, hands down, the best pumpkin bread recipe on the planet, and whenever I make it I get to think about happy holiday seasons past and future. I think of the great times we had as children and how much I love watching my own daughter grow up, and how much fun she and all her cousins have every year in the holidays. It’s my favorite recipe.

  52. My favorite baking memory is when I first started to learn to bake and decorate cakes I spent hours making a red velvet heart shaped cake for my boyfriend who I was going to give it to him when he got out of prison he loved it he never ate red velvet before

  53. My favorite baking memory is making pies for Thanksgiving every year with my mom. My great grandma has the most delicious chocolate pie recipe and we make about 5 of those and 5 pumpkins every year to bring to our feast.

  54. Love checking out your site weekly. Always enjoyed making Christ,as cookies with my mom and aunt.

  55. My favorite baking memories were of my Grandma Peterson visiting and baking homemade bread and sweets!

  56. I like to try weird recipes. I made chocolate maple bacon cupcakes a few months ago and they were a big hit!

  57. My favorite time was when i baked chocolate chip cookies with my son for the first time. He was 4 at the time and we both had a blast.

  58. I remember grandma going nuts making all sorts of goodies at christmas. My brothers and I thought her chocolate meringue pie was the best. Home made crust and all. I also loved her little chocolate covered peanut butter balls.

  59. Thanksgiving dinner is not complete without pumpkin pie.

  60. Definitely making “marzipan fruits” with my family for the Holidays. Because it was the only time we were entrusted with my Mum’s special fondant icing tools, to prod and poke marzipan chunks into oranges, apples and bananas.

  61. Baking Chrsitmas cookies as a teenager, all by myself, is a fond memory. I remember making so many different cookies and giving them away my Senior year of high school, and everyone really enjoying them and the fact that it was a gift from the heart.

  62. I remember baking pound cakes and pies with my grandmother as a little girl…..there was always wonderful aromas throughout the house…..so many great memories!!

  63. My favorite baking memory is learning how to bake cookies with my mom as a child. :)

  64. Baking cupcakes with my dad in the kitchen with my sister and brother when we were all little. I remember it so well, even licked the batter. I loved baking with my dad.

  65. Baking with family and sharing the goodies with loved ones and friends. Always warms my heart.

  66. My memories are going back to my mom’s love for bakeing, when I was about 12. Every Friday, the house would fill with bakeing smells after I would help her make the cake or the frosting. That made me a bakeing lover!

  67. Great website with yummy recipes!!

  68. My grandmother was a wonderful cook/baker. She had all the “girl” grandchildren gather around the kitchen table to learn how to make pie crust. It was very hard to understand because she didn’t measure a thing. That was 30 years ago and I still have trouble with my pie crust.

  69. When I was in grade school, we would have the neighbor kids over to make a yummy filipino treat called Polvoron. It consisted of browned flour, powdered milk, sugar and melted butter. After my mom prepared the mixture, all the kids would have molds that we would pack to make tiny ovals of these treats and wrap in a square of colored cellophane. We would have so much fun molding them, but the best part was eating the finished product! Those were definitely good times!

  70. Making gingerbread cookies and decorating them with lots of fun colors and sprinkles with my cousins around Christmas

  71. I remember when I was about 5 yrs. old. My mom baked chocolate chip cookies, it was the 1st time I had ever tasted them…I thought it was the best thing I had ever eaten in the Wole World! It was Magic…

  72. I have fond memories of when my mom would bake chocolate chip cookies. When they were done baking, she would say that we could have just one before bed. But if there were several stuck together, we would claim that was still one cookie, and she would smile and let us have the two or three stuck together. :)

  73. Every time I bake is a new and exciting experience. I can’t really narrow it down to a favorite one because I always have a blast when creating snacks and goodies; varying from cookies to cake and to cake pops and many more! :)

  74. My favorite baking memory is learning how to make my Dad’s secret mud pie which I have every year on my birthday. Delicious treat for my late july birthday!

  75. My favorite baking memory was making cream puffs for cook-outs. They were my brothers favorite dessert for cook-outs and I htink of him every time I make them for my family now.

  76. I loved making chocolate chip cupcakes to bring to school for my birthday each year. For my sons’ birthday party one year I had them help me make the cupcakes and they were so much fun!

  77. My favorite memory is baking pies and making candy with my grandma around the holidays.

  78. My favorite baking memories are baking Christmas candies every year with my friend Stephanie. Also, making a big breakfast for my family of five.

  79. i love making a real big batch of christmas cookies and having my three daughters decorating them..i made them every year since i was 17 .we had a lot of fun and created a beautiful memory

  80. Every year my mom and I make about 12-15 different kinds of cookies for Christmas and assemble cookie platters to give out to our friends and family. We make time in our busy schedules to make a different kind together almost every night and freeze them. We even got some ideas from your site :) All the hard work pays off seeing the faces of our loved ones light up trying each cookie. It’s my favorite part about the holiday season.

  81. We managed to get in 3 Christmases with 4 generations of ladies before my grandmother passed away. My daughter was too little to be much of a help, but just having all 4 of us in the kitchen working together was priceless

  82. I don’t have any as a kid because my mom would shoo us out of the kitchen, but I have lots of good memories lately of cupcakes galore!

  83. Baking peanut butter cookies from scratch w my grandma when I was 8! best memory ever.. :) she’s a sweet old lady now and cant do too much! I will always cherish those memories forever.

  84. We would take our summer vacations each year and drive to Northern Idaho to visit my grandma. The car trip took two full days and my Dad was exhausted by the time we arrived! Grandma would have a big box of chocolate chip cookies waiting for us when we arrived. With four kids the big box didn’t last to long, so we would prepare more later in the week, along with her amazing bread. Oh, I can almost smell the bread and cookies now. Great Memories for sure!

  85. Baking chocolate chip cookies with my mom around Christmas. Makes me so nostalgic (not to mention hungry)!

  86. My dad never cooked when I was a kid. He loves to now, but then it just didn’t really happen. The only exception was Christmas he would help my sister and me make cookies for Santa. My mom stayed out of it because that was one of our special father daughters bonding times. A lot of messes happened, but they were some great cookies.

  87. I always loved it when my mom was baking (which was all the time!). She and I would make my favorite cookie (Oatmeal Scotch) to bring into school at the beginning of the year. Because my birthday was in the summer this was my special treat day. She always gave me a small separate bowl because I would lick the spoon and continue stirring! I cringe thinking about that but at least she knew how to do a preemptive strick…my bowl was never made into cookies ;-).

  88. When i was around 9 or 10, I started experimenting. I was determined to find the best chocolate pie recipe out there. So I got all my grandma’s cookbooks and piled all the recipes and baked each one and had a tasting contest!

  89. Sugar cookie cut outs with the kids for both Halloween and Christmas! It makes the Holidays very special for me!

  90. I have lots of baking memories, but one of the funniest involved making spring rolls with my Vietnamese friend. She gave me a 6 or 7 inch knife to cut some pretty small carrots and I ended up cutting my finger a little. She felt so bad and apologized profusely. Then she gave me a 4 inch knife that was about an 1/8 of an inch thick and weighed a ton. Apparently she said it would be better because it was to thick to cut me…. I had my doubts. It took me over an hour to cut like 10 carrots : – )

  91. Well, my mom isin’t much of a baker but come christmas time she would always make her traditional christmas dessert, Tiramisu! I would help her soak and bathe the sweet lady finger cookies in a mixture of coffee and a sweet liquor. We would then stack them up, cover them with a homemade fluffy white whipped cream, double up the layers and top it off with some powedered chocolate as well as some curly pieces of chocolate shavings. After cooling it, the fork would slide through the cookies and cream, it was like a fluffy, chocolaty, coffee licious piece of heaven in your mouth!

    :-)

    <3 <3 <3

  92. I am the oldest child, and when I first started baking in Jr High, I made our family’s traditional chocolate cookies for the first time. I specifically remember my father telling me that “they might just be better than your mother’s, but dont tell her!”. For some reason this sticks in my head over twenty years later.

  93. My favorite baking memory would have to be making Thanksgiving dinner with my mom every year. We would both have the day before off so while I made pumpkin pie, she would chop vegetables and the house always smelled so comforting.

  94. My MOM is the BEST at baking Holiday treats-actually all baking treats! I can recall helping her in the kitchen as a little girl- 5 years old- and teaching me how to make candy-cane cookies!
    She is so creative when it comes to baking- when she is combining recipes together or adds a secrect ingredient, I can’t even begin to tell you how amazing her baking treats turn out! She sure could use a Kitchen Aid Mixer to help make this years Holiday Treats!
    GREAT site Bakerella!

  95. Love your website! I made your baby cake pops and bear macarons (at least tried but the ears kept cracking) last weekend for a baby shower and it was a hit!!

    I’m looking forward to your new book!!! YAY!

  96. Some of my favorite memories are baking peanut butter cookies with my grandma as a little girl.

  97. When I was little I remember my grandma used to make lemon madelines all the time. Recently I bought one so now I always think of her when I make them :)

  98. My favorite baking memory is baking christmas cookies and decorating them with friends and family in 2010. We went ALL OUT on the decorations! Sprinkles, jimmies, sugars, candy pearls and all! SO much fun! The best part was one of the families with us had never done it before-it was their first time spending Christmas in the USA! :)

  99. My favorite memory is the first time I baked with my daughter, she was two and was so excited to get to put the ingredients in the bowl. It was the start of many baking moments together.

  100. My favorite baking memory dates back many years to when I was 8 years old. I remember walking in the front door and was stuck by the intoxicating smell of chocolate chip cookies my mom had been baking. I remember how amazing they tasted right out of the oven. I fell in love with baking that day and have been doing it ever since. Baked goods make people smile and work as a stress reliever for me!

  101. Watching my grandma bake during the holidays. Now that she is gone, I wish I would have written all those recipes down. I still have the wonderful memories though.

  102. My mother didn’t bake or cook – I grew up doing those things for my siblings I now do it for my granchildren.

  103. A new family moved into the neighborhood and we invited the family over for a playdate. I made cookie dough and let the kids bond while decorating and baking cookies. It was a fun time and proved to be the beginning of a great relationship.

  104. I love baking with my daughter who is 9. She loves to be in the kitchen with me whether it’s baking or cooking dinner. I didn’t have that growing up so it is a very special memory that we are making together.

  105. I loved to help my mom bake chocolate chip cookies because I would get to lick a beater (one for me, one for my brother) and lick the bowl, too! Then when the cookies were baked, she would store them in one of those old-fashioned glass cracker jars, rectangular in shape with a red screw-on lid. We could tip the jar on its side and reach in for the cookies. What a bounty to see two of those glass jars full of home-baked chocolate chip cookes!

  106. One of my favorite baking memories was the year 2010. I was pregnant with my son & it was Mother’s Day. I was baking brownies & cupcakes & made one other special treat… chocolate covered strawberries. I was happy to share that moment with my family and grandmother who was also going to be a first time GREAT grandmother. i remeber her smile and sitting around with the women in my family talking and taking pictures.

  107. Our family’s Christmas tradition when I was a child was making roll-out cookies with cream cheese frosting. My Mom, Grandmother’ and Sisters would gather around the kitchen table and frost and decorate the cookies. By the time we had frosted/decorated a quarter of the cookies, my Grandmother would be the only one still at the table. Now my family has created the same tradition with some very good friends. However, the kids aren’t permitted to leave the table until the cookies have all been decorated.

  108. Sunday evenings were always waffle night which I made and served with ice-cream and syrup – of course I could afford the colories in those years :)

  109. There are so many fond memories that I have of baking, especially during the holidays! My favorite though is a tradition that we have always had in our family. (It’s a Mexican cultural tradition.) For New Year’s Eve, my dad would always fry up a batch of bunuelos (elephant ears) and make a pot of Mexican hot chocolate. It didn’t matter how late it was, even 2 minutes before the Ball dropped, we had to eat a bunuelo and drink hot chocolate! Closing my eyes I can taste the flavors of the cinnamon and sugar on the warm chewy dough and the grounds of chocolate that would always sink to the bottom of the mug!

  110. My favorite baking memory is making a chocolate nut cake for New Year’s Eve every year for my kids. They could hardly wait till it was out of the oven and used to be excited all week long about the New Year’s cake.

  111. My favorite baking memory is waking up to the smell of my grandma’s banana nut muffins in the oven. It was the perfect start to the weekend and all of us cousins used to gather around the table to enjoy them piping hot.

  112. My favorite baking memory is the first time I baked my son’s birthday cake and cupcakes, which were for his 10th. I made him a pull-apart baseball cake with matching baseball, soccer, football and basketball cupcakes for his sports themed birthday party. The look on his face, the hug and ‘thanks mom’ just made it all worth the hard work!!! :0)

  113. My favorite baking memory is baking my first cake from scratch! It was a trial for my boyfriend’s birthday cake. I’ve been hooked every since and now I will not touch a cake box.

  114. I made a train cake for my son’s 1st birthday, it was one of my first attempts at doing something like that and it was not going well…but my mother stepped in and helped make it a cute cake for my son, who is now 24, time flies so so fast!!

  115. My favorite memory is of my memere baking around the holidays. She would make pies and cakes and cookies. But the one thing i found magical was the small pies she made from the left over pie dough. She would put it in a small tin pie plate and fill it with brown sugar and pecans or walnuts and vanilla and I have no idea what else. And each time she did this, they were never quite the same, but they were always, absolutely delicious!

  116. My mom has never been an avid cook or baker, but every New Year’s, Thanksgiving, and Christmas morning she would make Chocolate Rolls. Yes, I said Chocolate Rolls, as in cinnamon rolls but with chocolate. I know, right?! She’d make the dough (just rolled biscuit dough from the Bisquick box), and the chocolate sauce (boiled almost like fudge!), then place them in pans the night before so that all we had to do in the morning was pop them in the oven. Ohhh, the smell! I really need to do this with my family, this Christmas morn. Thanks Bakerella!

  117. My favorite baking memory is baking with my 3 sons when they were little- like my twins were 2 and my oldest was 3 and how they would try to logically reason ( as much as 2 and 3 year olds could) who would get to lick the beaters on the hand mixer. They are 10 and 9 now- still arguing who gets the beaters :)

  118. One of my favorite memories a baking as a child was making christmas cookies with my mom. She is not a great baker or cook, but she always made cream cheese sugar cookies at Christmas time for my brother and I to decorate and leave for Santa.

  119. my favorite baking memory came last year. my parents came up to oregon from san diego for christmas. they rented a house that was in between where husband, daughter and i lived and where my brother and his fiance lived. we all came together and baked sweet treats together and celebrated christmas a week early. i was also 6 months pregnant, so we had a little something extra to celebrate! by the way, what are “the roosters?”

  120. One of my favorite holiday traditions is baking for the masses with my daughters and mother while she was still living. Since her passing, my girls and I have carried on the family tradition with every kind of cookie imaginable and pies to share with family and friends.

  121. My fondest baking memory would have to be the year my mom discovered spritz cookies…she would have me make the dough and we would go to town! We had cookies coming out of our ears but it was always a special time with just me and mom :)

  122. Your post made me cry… I only have one baking memory that inspires such emotion and it is the memory I have of the only time my Oma and I baked together… I was 7 and she showed me how to make coconut cookies with what I called Communion wafers on the bottom. I kept eating the sugar wafers, which is why we had lots of coconut cookie dough that was baked without them! Thank you for the give-away but thank you for the reminder of baking with my Oma!

  123. My favorite bking memory would undoubtedly be making the sourcream coffee cake my mothrt has made every Christmas I can remember. We also give it as gifts but Christmas morning wouldn’t be acceptable if we didn’t eat coffee cake! It is a special tradition and I am passing it onto my daughters. ;)

  124. My first experiences of baking and cooking were at the elbow of my maternal grandmother. She was a cooking from scratch woman before it became vogue. I could stand mesmerized for hours while she mixed biscuit ingredients in her large wooden flour tray, which now sits atop my fridge. Then pinch up a wad of dough, roll it in her palms before patting them gently out on a baking sheet edged with a brown halo from all the years of use. Nothing has ever tasted like the warmth of her buttered biscuits & homemade jams.

  125. My Grandma Mary and I use to make Toll House Cookies from scratch. Everytime I think of her, the memories of baking together are the most fondest. It was special for both of us. Now that Im the Grandma (Nonni is what he calls me) I make it a point to carry on this tradition. I was blessed with two sons and a grandson and boy do they know how to bake. My grandson Louie and I share the love for Toll House Cookies and we look forward to our semi-annual baking day!

  126. Oh my goodness this would be awesome for my little boys cakes I make every year! Thanks Bakerella! I’ve been following you since your first cake-pop post and I just adore you and your ideas!

  127. First time I baked cinnamon rolls in 7th grade home ec class. watching the dough rise and smelling the cinnamon as they baked. heaven.

  128. High school home-ec class was my introduction to baking. It was the first time I’ve seen a bakery sized oven. And for some reason none of my classmates wanted to turn the darn thing on. I suppose because you need to climb in there and light it up from the inside. Being as short as I was I almost always have to climb in halfway to do it and a couple times have burned my hair and/or eyebrows in the process.
    I guess I really wanted to learn to bake.

  129. Frosted windows on winter morning. Mom and her kids gathered in the kitchen with their jammies. Mugs of hot cocoa steaming on the counter. Recipe books and folders piled high, yet after all that scouring, coming back to the sweet simple standard in the Toll House chocolate chip cookie. Sharing in mixing, tasting and baking. Then waiting, for the ooey, gooey just-out-of the oven warmed delights to make their way into our inviting hands.
    Now I am full grown, but never tire of that memory or the new ones I make. Baking is truly sweet!

  130. In late November each year my 3 daughters and I bake together and mail boxes of cookies to out friends/family across the country. We makes sure the cookies arrive well before everyone is sick of eating holiday treats.

  131. Making cookies and when no one was looking the number of cookies cooling always seemed to get smaller

  132. I didn’t start baking until I began living on my own, so most of my baking memories revolve around my Easy Bake Oven. I would always make sure to “bake” something for each member of my family!
    My next challenge is cake pops! I tried a couple times before and everything fell to pieces. Will keep experimenting! Thanks for sharing all your wonderful and adorable cake ideas!

  133. In my family we all learned how to make our Great Grandmother’s Christmas “cakes” when we reached the age of 6. I have wonderful memories of all of my siblings covered in flour and icing, while our Mom patiently taught us how to make these delicious time consuming treats. It took a whole day, and we laughed through it every year!

  134. Great memories of very labor intensive lefse making at Christmas with my Scandanavian mom and building REAL (not graham cracker) ginger bread houses for my little Girl Scouts to decorate. So fun!

  135. my favorite memory is making chocolate chip cookies with my 3 yr old granddaughter on a day she was not feeling good, hoping to bring a smile and help her feel better. and i turned my back and she had puked all in the cooking dough, crying saying she was sorry and than asking if she could lick the bowl when i was done after I cleaned her up.

  136. baking for the less fortunate. making the sweets even more sweeter because of the children’s smile on their face. it was also the first time i made smiley cake pops

  137. hmmm… Let’s see, I have many baking tales of woe and tears BUT in every disappointment and every perceived failure, my sisters came alongside me to save the day :) My greatest memories of baking happen when Jessie is in the kitchen with me trying to rescue seized chocolate- telling me it will “ok” and she will eat the underdone cake whether or not its doughy (as I despairingly cry into a kitchen towel), or when I make something tasty enough to satisfy my (exasperatingly hard to please sister) Maddie, or when I finish whipping up a white, fluffy meringue and call out, “its done who wants a try?!” immediately hearing footsteps descending the stairs for a lick a :) I am so blessed to have such an encouraging family, and I would love to share more desserts with them! (mixed up in this beautiful kitchen aid ;)

  138. My favorite baking memories actually took place when I first moved out for college! It was my first chance to cook for myself as well as my friends around me!

  139. I remember one time I attempted to bake a cake for my boyfriend’s birthday. So I decided to try it out first. The chose a strawberry sponge cake with strawberry fillings. The cake came out beautifully, I was so proud of myself. =D But then when I tried to cut it, It was rock hard. Couldn’t even get the knife to cut threw it and had a hard time try to get it out ’cause I tried hammering the knife in to get a piece of that cake. lol. I was so funny. I have improved since then but still working on it. ;) No more rock cakes.

  140. Every Christmas, my mom, my sister, my brother and I make sugar cookies together, while listening to Christmas music. My mom makes the dough and rolls it out to the perfect thickness. My brother, sister and I pick out which Christmas and winter shaped cookie cutters we want to use and my mom places them in ways to fit the most cookies at once. Then she cuts them out and puts them onto the cookie sheets for my siblings and I to decorate with all my mom’s different kinds of sprinkles. She has so many to choose from and we use so many to decorate the cookies. My mom puts them in the oven and we wait anxiously for them to come out so we can taste them. Eating them is my favorite part because they are so good and I can’t wait for every Christmas to make these cookies with my family!

  141. My mom used to make these amazing pumpkin cookies around halloween and then she would let me decorate them with candy corn. I still to this day am trying to find the recipe she used.

  142. When I left the. Stuff inside the turkey by mistake

  143. My brother was totally against all vegetables when we were growing up (he’s better now). My mom bought a book called Old Witch and the Polka Dot Ribbon that has a fantastic Carrot Cake recipe at the end. I have fabulous memories of my mom, brother and I cooking that cake many times. Now I enjoy cooking it with my daughters, too, but it always makes me think of baking with my mom and brother.

  144. Decorating Christmas cookies with my mom and sister when I was a kid. My mom would ice the cookies and my sister and I would decorate them. I now make and decorate cookies with my son.

  145. Awesome prize, thank you!

  146. It is so good to bake, especially when the weather ccols down here in Ca.

  147. Best baking memory was making my brother’s 27th birthday cake. It was my first fondant cake and it was tiered too. Instead of going for something simple and hard to mess up, I went all out–Super Mario Brothers theme! In the end, everyone was asking if that professional cake artist down the street made the cake (Chef Duff of Charm City Cakes), it looked so amazing. It even garnered me a few marriage proposals when he posted picture in his online gaming forums.

  148. My son and I always baked cookies for the holidays together – cut out in shapes appropriate for the holiday. I hope he has good memories like I do!

  149. Learning to bake my cakes were always lopsided. Turns out the oven wasn’t level!

  150. I loves when me and my two sisters were younger everyone in the family would come over and bake for no reason other than to spend time together. Now me being a mother of four girls I always do the same with them. I love the tradition and the fun we have :)

  151. My favorite baking memory is helping my mom make various Christmas cookies/desserts every year. She would let me help pick out 5-10 different recipes to make, and we would spend a lot of time baking together and having a lot of fun. I really miss baking with my mom at Christmastime!!

  152. I’m making new memories all of the time with my kids now as we bake quite often. However, one of the baking times I remember from my childhood is when my mom and I baked bread together. We shaped the dough into a teddy bear and put it on top of the mantle to rise, as it was winter time. It made the house smell so good!

  153. I remember while growing up my mom, my brother, and I (& any friends who happen to be hanging around) would make sugar cookies for various occasions. Our family would collect special and fun looking cookie cutters from all over (especially when on a vacation) to use throughout the year. We would mix the dough, wait for it to chill, roll it out, and use the cookie cutters for lots of fun shapes that we could decorate once cooled from baking. We would make a confectionary sugar/butter frosting and then use food coloring to create a rainbow of colors for “painting” our cookies. This was the best part to us – we would spend hours “painting’ our cookies with the variety of colored frosting and then add the finishing touches with candies, sprinkles, etc.

    One particular year (way before the varicella vaccination started being given), there was a large breakout of the chicken pox virus in our school. My mom came up with the idea of making our beloved sugar cookies using our little “chick” cookie cutter (usually reserved for Easter or springtime) to make the sugar cookies and then frosting/painting “spots” all over the chick as a get well gift for anyone who had the chicken pox!

    We’ve made lots of special cookies in our time but this one stands out in my memory the most and is probably what has gotten me hooked on Bakerella because the ideas you give us remind me of creating that special, silly, and fun cookie!

  154. Growing up, my parents were macrobiotic and we didn’t get to eat a lot of sweets. However, at Xmas the rules would be laid aside and we would pull out the recipe box and bake 4-5 kinds of cookies. My best baking memories come from that time. :)

  155. My sophomore year of college, my two best friends and I spent a long weekend at my friend’s grandmother’s cabin in the woods of Maine. We wanted to make cookies one night, but we were lacking some of the basic ingredients. We modified a recipe in a vintage cookbook that we found up there and came up with a recipe that was an amalgam of all our favorites, along with some great improvisations. We called the recipe the “mad hella wicked cool, yo” cookies after the regional slang differences between our friends. Each ingredient was dedicated to a member of our group. It was great. Even when we burned one batch to a crisp and threw them off the back porch for the deer to eat.

  156. I would say when my grandpa made baked apples for us kids and let us eat them with ice cream.

  157. My favorite baking memory is during the Christmas holidays. I would always bake sweet treats to my friends, family and co-workers to make them feel that they are special in my life and it became a yearly tradition. Can’t wait for the Christmas holidays :)

  158. My favorite baking memory is actually the story of a good intention gone wrong, a true baking disaster story! I was about 4 years old, and my two older sisters and their two friends decided they were going to surprise my mom and bake her a cake for her birthday. My sisters were 8 & 9 and the friends were 7 & 11. The cake was supposed to be chocolate, but due to their lack of know how, it looked like chocolate cake with chocolate chips and white chocolate chips (pieces of egg shells). My mom was surprised, no question. The girls knew my mom appreciated their efforts so they weren’t upset when she didn’t even want to taste it. They suggested that we feed it to the dog next door, the “junkyard” dog who ate anything and everything under the sun, but he wouldn’t go near it (and this mind you, was long before it was commonly known that chocolate was poisonous to dogs)

  159. In general, my favorite baking memory is all of the traditional recipes that have been passed down through my family – saucepan brownies, paper bag apple pie, aunt bessie’s pie crust and Hannah’s butter cookies. Making these things makes me feel close to my family even though now we live on opposite coasts.

  160. My favorite baking memory was learning to make Christmas cookies with my mom! We have a family recipe that we make every year, I have spent most of my life eating just the dough but learning how to actually make these for when I have my own family!

  161. Since I was a kid, my parents, my brothers and I would all get together and bake sugar cookies on Christmas eve. I remember decorating with everything from marshmallows to red hots..it’s what got me into baking!

  162. My favorite memory is learning how to make chicken fried steaks with my dad. It’s my grandmas recipe and was such a treat growing up. The first time I went to make it, I remembered none if the measurements and just poured from memory and it was perfect!

  163. All of the women in my family bake, but my Grandma surpassed them all! My sister made a much-cherished book of all of our favorite family recipes. On each recipe page, she jotted down a few of my grandmother’s comments from their time together compiling the book. The comments range from sweet and poignant memories to “This one is fattening as hell…” and are as nice to have as the recipes!

  164. My favorite baking memory is making what my grandmother termed ‘Christmas fruit’ every December. . it reminds me of her.

  165. My Favorite baking memory was with my 5 year old son. We were baking cookies for Santa and I made sure to only eat the ones he made and then left him a message from santa saying that his cookies were the best cookies. That morning when he read the note from santa (wink, wink) he told me mom I have to be a baker santa knows cookies and he loved mine.

  166. Making chocolate chip cookies as a family when I was a little girl. Mom threw in all the ingredients while we gathered around Dad to watch him stir then my brother and I would make the cookies…so much fun!!

  167. My favorite baking memory is teaching my high school daughter and her best friend how to bake. They are such a joy at that age. And I think I will hold that close to my heart for many years to come.

  168. My best friend was over spending the night. We must have been 12. We wanted to make snickerdoodles. The recipe called for butter and shortening. The only Crisco we had was butter flavored, so we went with it! Then we greased the cookie sheets, even tho the recipe called for ungreased. They were the butteriest, greasiest mess ever! Every time I make snickerdoodles, I think of Lori and our buttery mess!!

  169. making cheese cake using the non dairy cream cheese! OMG so good and i made a blondie recipe with tons of chocolate chips, baked it, put it in the food processor, placed that in a spring pan and poured the cheese cake batter in the middle. baked it and it was OUT OF THIS WORLD! A kitchen aid is a must for this recipe :)

  170. I love the smell of fall baking…cinnamon, spices, apples, pies…it always brings back a flood of holiday and childhood memories!

  171. My grandma would make these amazing apricot bars that we called ‘wormy cookies’ because the crumble on top looks like worms. I’ll never forget being a little girl in the kitchen, marveling at her make them. I still have the recipe today.

  172. My favorite baking memory was when my mom taught me how to make filipino cassava cake for the holidays. So good!

  173. Santa’s being eating our cookies for decades!

  174. When I was 10 I made chocolate chip cookies with too much baking soda, they were awful! My dad, he’s so awesome, he ate them like they were the best thing he ever ate. I love that man!

  175. My favorite baking memory is making cookies with my son when he was still a preschooler. I loved his excitement over the addition of each ingredient and the finished product. He still helps me from time to time with the same enthusiasm :)

  176. I was eight years old the first time I was allowed to help my mother bake a pie. My mother and I prepared it the night before so that the next morning she could put it in to bake. But it wasn’t just any pie it was my mothers’ famous sweet potato pie. It is one of my sweetest memories because it was a moment me and my mother shared. That is not the only memory of that Thanksgiving I have to my dismay not all of my memories were so sweet.
    My most memorable thanksgiving encompassed a lot of emotions from the moment I woke up. I remember waking up to a lot of commotion down stairs. I knew my aunts were going to come early to help with the Thanksgiving dinner. I remember getting up and feeling the cold floor beneath my feet as I struggled to find my luscious slippers that would ensure the warmth of feet. The very first thing I noticed was when I opened my bedroom door was the sweet intoxicating smell of cinnamon. It was seven am but already my mom had started to bake. I walked down the stairs taking in all the new aromas that where now settling in lungs when my dad said in a surprised voice “Flora, what are you doing up? Go back to bed everyone is still sleeping”. But the sweet smell of candied yams and sweet potato pie levitated me and for a second I lost my balance. My father laughed and said that if I was going to stay up that I should go get dressed so I could go outside with him to gather wood for the bon fire. Every year we had a bon fire where we would gather around and get toasty with the warmth of the fire.
    The minute I stepped outside I felt a light breeze go through my hair. The color of the trees and leaves always fascinated me. There was something about the intense hues of reds and yellows’. I always felt that they mimicked the intense colors of the roses and sunflowers that inhabited my mothers’ garden in the summer time. I was supposed to be looking for dry tree branches but instead my eyes were devouring my surroundings. All I could hear was the crunching of the leaves breaking beneath me and the wind dancing all around me. I wondered at that precise moment what the ground felt like. To my parents dismay I was a very curious child. I proceeded to take off my sneaker and sock making sure my father didn’t see and I carefully placed my foot on the ground. It was dam and cold it reminded me of sand in the beach when the tide of the ocean comes and retreats leaving the sand cool and damp. But instead of a smooth surface I felt what at first I though was a twig that poked me. I did not feel any pain until I saw the blood envelop my foot. Then I felt a large throbbing pain that consumed my whole right leg. The blood was warm and it felt as though I had stuck my foot in warm water. The bottom of my pants was soaking up the blood and I wanted to brush it off as if it were dirt. I was starring at my foot when I heard my father scream. He quickly ran over, picked me up and took me into the house. My mother was frantic and at first all she was doing was screaming and crying. I could see my brothers and sisters peering into the kitchen through the opening of door. They were trying to figure out what happened when my father closed the door to the kitchen. I heard my youngest brother Noah say that I had been bitten by a snake and that I was so cool.
    While having a supposed battle wound did sound cool what was not cool was arriving at the emergency room with five screaming aunts and my mother in tears. When they handed me to off to one of the nurses I could feel the blood soaking through the towel my father wrapped around my foot. The nurse looked very calm and was telling me that it was going to be ok. At this point all I could think about was the scar he had on his arm. It was smooth and made me think about how he got it. They took me into a room where a nurse with too much make up stuck a needle into my arm. At first I thought I was receiving multiple needles but it turns out it was her nails that were digging into my skin. The needle was not nearly as painful as her nails pressing against my skin. I was not scared throughout any of this if anything all I could think about was the sweet potato pie that was in the over at home. Was it ok? What if it burned? When my mom came in to see me she asked me if I was ok all I could respond was “is the pie okay”. She began to laugh and said warmly while brushing my hair back “lie down you need to rest”. Before I could protest I fell a sudden heaviness in my eyes and quickly fell asleep.
    When I woke up I felt as if I was floating in retrospect I know that the drugs and mixture of antibiotics were the sole cause of this. While I was trying to take in a breath of air I was bombarded with the pungent smell of medicine. My mother explained to me that I had stepped on a nail; it had entered completely severing an artery, which is why there was so much blood. The doctor came in soon after with a big smile which at first made me uncomfortable. She said “you are a very brave little girl”. At that moment I thought that she couldn’t be too smart. She called me a little girl if she was a good doctor she would know that I was eight. She showed me the x-ray of my foot and went on to explain that a three inch nail gone through the bottom of my heel and imbedded itself. I had gotten surgery to get it removed and a cast that went up half of my shin. When I arrived home the next day my brothers embellished my cast with a flaming skull claiming that it would give me character.
    I was eight years old the year that I ruined Thanksgiving accept my brothers and sisters were not a loud to tell me this or make me feel bad. Every year there is a joke thrown around about how I didn’t cry when a nail went through my foot but that I cried when my tooth fell out. I have definitely had a lot of memorable moments in my eighteen years of living but this one will always stick out. I can only hope that I keep making memories such as these maybe not as painful but definitely ones that include my entire family after all what would thanksgiving be without family and friends.

  177. MY FAVORITE BAKING MEMORY IS HELPING MY MOM MAKE FROSTED SUGAR COOKIES FOR CHRISTMAS. SHE USED TO STORE THEMNIN ICECREAM BUCKRTS AND HANG THEM FROM THE RAFTERS IN THE GARAGE SO WE DIDNT EAT THEM ALL.

  178. My memory is meand my grandma would make bunuelos and we used to make the dough roll it out have dough everywhere in the kitch it would be a big mess but it was fun

  179. A few years ago my friend and I were baking heads at an overnight camp. We were up until the wee hours of the morning making dough for doughnuts for 300 campers .. We had a tried and true recipe and had to x the recipe by 60 … Once we finally figured all the insane amounts of ingredients we needed we got started measuring everything out … After an hour or so we have the batter up and running …. That is until we realized there was way too much yeast in the dough ..the dough started bubbling over the bowls and started filling the floor ..we had to keep grabbing more and mire bowls to hold our over rising dough !! The dough turned out the a little sour ..we just joke a lot abt the story recalling how we could have poisoned the camp! Lol

  180. I have such fond memories of my grandma making Scottish “dumpling”. We’d make it the night before we were going to eat it for breakfast, and the dumpling would bounce around the pot making lots of noise. We’d eat it fried up in the morning with eggs. Yum!

  181. I was making this crepe cake for my mom’s birthday, y was like 32 chocolate crepes with hazelnut filling, you had to chill it for a while then pour ganache, when I put it in the fridge, the cake slid, and 1/3 stayed in place, 1/3 on my hand and the rest on the floor. I wanted to die, got so mad with myself, but my mom helped me out with her cake and restacked the ones on my hands and said that everything was fine and that it still would taste great (which it did). Lesson learn, be patient and listen to mom.

  182. I love baking with my daughter. She is now the families official birthday cake maker and I am her assistant.

  183. My friends and I were making a cake for my birthday because we thought it would be more fun that way. When it came to decorating the cake, we had no clue what to do. We wanted to do something special and fun. So we thought that we would just wing it and my friend started to flatten the top of the cake. She made a mistake and cut it lopsided. Then we noticed that it kinda looked like a crescent moon. So instead of fixing it, we decorated to look like the moon in the night sky. It was so fun making that cake with them, that is definitely my fondest baking memory.

  184. The first time I went over to my aunt’s house to help her and my other aunt make their annual holiday cookies. I was about 15 and it was my first time baking from scratch. I remember baking with them and talking nonstop, and generally having an amazing time =) We also enjoyed the cookies very much the next day on Christmas!

  185. My favorite baking memory was baking with special needs students. It is always enjoyable to watch children cook, but seeing the feeling of accomplishment (baking a cake) really touched me. The mixer would be a great addition to the special needs kitchen! :)

  186. Baking my moms famous old fashioned sugar cookies at the holidays and decorating. I loved making them because she’d let me eat the dough since there were no eggs in it. Another was my mom teaching me how to make her homemade caramels!

  187. Every year at Christmas time me and my daughter bake over 20 different kinds of cookies to give away to our family and friends. We have over 1ooo cookies all over the kitchen! I love baking and she is turning into a baker too! Love the late nights for a week, we always end with Nighty Nights for the last cookie.

  188. The very first time I started baking!
    A year ago, last August. It was my boyfriend’s birthday and I had absolutely no idea what I was doing.. I’d never even baked with a mix before. I thought it’d be more meaningful to bake from scratch…so I did. I started baking at 12AM because I wanted to surprise him when he came over in the morning, and I ended up pulling an allnighter… I didn’t know cookies were so hard to bake. And I ended up knocking out on him right after breakfast and woke up at 4PM just in time for dinner.. bummer birthday, but it’s still so memorable.

  189. Making the Easter cake, shaped like a bunny, with my niece. She was so proud, so happy. She did most of the work and it came out beautifully. She was about 6 back then and later this month, my baby will be 20.

  190. My favorite baking memory has to be when I was baking with my niece and I gave her the hand-mixer to mix cookie dough and she turned it ALL the way up and threw cookie dough all over the kitchen. We still joke about it everytime we bake together.

  191. After Thanksgiving my grandma and I would begin baking for Christmas. She had a cold room so the peanut brittle and candy would come first. Then fudge, pumpkin bread, bars, cookies and so much more. When we were finished we would make boxes and deliver them to friend and family! It was so wonderful. Thanks!

  192. My grandmother makes fabulous apple pie, and I’ve always wanted to learn how to bake it the way she does. For my 18th birthday, she got my aunt to video her baking an apple pie, making sure to include all the tricks and bits of family tradition and history that go along with apple pie, and sent me a DVD. Now, whenever I bake apple pie, My grandmother is right there baking with me. I don’t have a written recipe so I’ve had to memorize most of the video, but I always play it so that I feel like my Grandma is baking with me. It always brings back all the memories of being a little kid playing in my grandmother’s kitchen.

  193. My grandmother used to make German coffee cake and orange rolls. They still remind me of Christmas!

  194. the website is setup very nicely and easy to read!

  195. My favorite baking memory is that in the past few months I have been getting orders to make cakepops and cupcakes, etc. and it all started with a little party my mom made for valentines day and so two of my moms’ friends asked me if I could make them some so they can sell them to their coworkers and so I did, so I had my sister help with all these orders I’ve been getting from all their other friends. Its been great, and really fun making different designs and spending time with my sister. So what really counts in this memory is having my sister help me out! It is awesome and hope to have more memories along the way. Thanks Bakerella for all your great recipes and designs. You’re awesome

  196. Oh, these pies looks so lovely! I LOVE pecan pies! My little sister loves to bake and she always bakes for my family and I. All the baking memories mainly includes me eating because I suck at cooking/baking. Ha. Maybe it’s about time I start to learn and help out in the kitchen!

  197. My favorite recipe is my Mom’s flan. It’s funny because I am not a big fan of flan but just knowing that she made it and it has become a staple at our gatherings makes me smile everytime I see it on the table. It brings back very good memories.

  198. My grandma used to bake chocolate chip cookies with us and tell us not to eat the raw dough… but then we would sneak the dough anyway :)

  199. The very first time I ever baked and decorated a cake for our 1st wedding anniversary 5 years ago. We didn’t keep with the tradition of keeping the top tier of your wedding cake, because seriously, I just won’t be able to put a year old cake in my mouth (no matter hdow much i love cakes!). That really started off my love for baking.

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