Food Photographer | Haleighdookramphotos

Extra Fluffy Berry Meringue Bars

There's always that one morning every year, when you wake up and all of the sudden you start to notice a few shifts in the season. The sun is just a little more golden and beats a little warmer on your cheeks. The snow is starting to disappear and flecks of bright green are poking up through the ground. Even the air has a familiar warmth, the smell of fresh blooms and sweet grass slowly starts to drift up into your senses. You inhale all the strain that winter once brought you and simply exhale in relief... just like that, with one delicate breath. It's finally Spring...once again.

Dough Recipe

5 Egg yolks
1 cup Sugar
2 cups Flour
1 cup of Slightly cold butter (chunks- warm enough to knead)
1 tsp Vanilla
Loaf Pan

Pre-heat oven to 350F
Toss in the chunks of butter with the flour, yolks, sugar and vanilla.
Knead everything together with your hands (adding flour to your hands if needed).
Bring everything together into a smooth ball.
Press the dough into a loaf pan.
Poke holes with a fork in the dough to allow the air to release while baking.
Bake at 350F for about 10 minutes or until at least the top surface is baked.
Take out and set aside for assembly.

Meringue Recipe

5 Egg whites
1 tsp Cream of tartar
3 Handfuls of icing sugar (depending on your sweetness level)
1 tsp Vanilla
2 caps Coconut Extract

Whip the egg whites together with a mixer, making sure not to break the elasticity.
Add in the cream of tartar in two intervals through mixing.
Add in the icing sugar in three intervals throughout mixing process.
Mix until you have stiff peaks.
Then, stop mixing and gently with a spatula fold in the vanilla and coconut extract.
Tale the
Spread the meringue layer over the bar dough and put the whole thing back in the oven at 350F and bake until the tips of the meringue starts to brown and look all pretty.
Let cool in pan.

Berry Jelly Recipe

1 cup Frozen berries
1/8 cu Water
Icing sugar (measure sweetness as you go)
1 tsp Vanilla
3 caps of Coconut Extract

Boil the berries on med-high heat in a pot on the stove with a bit of water.
Stir the berries until the ice melts and it boils down a bit.
Add in the sugar, tasting as you go.
Once the mixture starts to thicken, and you can scrap the bottom of the pot with a spatula without leaving residue in your path, add in the extracts and mixy mixy.
Again, taste as you go! But once the jelly is boiled down to a thick gelatinized viscosity, pull it from the heat and let cool but still stirring until it cools.
Turn off your elements.
Let mixture fully cool and then top your bars!
Serve now or put in the fridge before serving!
Enjoy!

Chewy Cardamom Coconut Cookies

Life is a big word...Life is a REALLY big word. Quite honestly, I'm surprised we can even sum up our existences into just one small, meager 4 letter word. This one syllable encompasses so much emotion and so many painful or indescribable experiences. It's almost as if simplifying it, makes everything we go through just more digestible. But isn't it the effervescent moments that catch us off guard, knock the breath out of our lungs or the ones that just simply don't make any sense...sort of the point of it all? So often we place our life's value in things that we can control. Like our social status, or titles and rankings. Achievements and capabilities. But, from my perspective, I would say this belittles the meaning itself to a reachable, confined and common worth.

Think about it. If the world itself, was being pushed and pulled simply by the things that are within our control, wouldn't it be awfully grim? This can be taken many different ways but I'm speaking in the most broad way possible. If we could be witness to our own life like an admirer in a gallery full of memorabilia...Walking through halls and halls of framed, moving moments, would we want to see perfectly aligned "by the book" compositions over and over again? Taking every step knowing exactly what's going to happen next...because in the end, it all follows the same, predictable algorithm? Halfway through our imaginations would've fizzled out from a vibrant, excited and lush palette to a dim, lifeless grey. Our mind wouldn't even want to keep going because it would already know what awaits. Aware of every single moment before it even witnesses it. Excitement itself just wouldn't exist.

Granted, witnessing the raw, painful moments once again, would hurt. Being able to see from the outside, in. Those cold, rainy nights that left your body empty, your mind racing and your heart burning for something you just couldn't grasp...But, at the same time. Where would those moments of healing that came soon after be without that pain? I'm talking about those fleeting thrills that felt like pure, tangible light beaming from deep down within. They never would've come about if it wasn't for your unearthed, gritty will to survive that pushed you past those bitter nights and propelled you into the light. In a way, I think we can all look back to some of the darkest moments in our life and after having learned some and grown some...be proud that we made it this far.

So after walking through these not-so-hollow halls of unexpected pain, anger, joy, relief and maybe a little bit of everything. We would bare witness to an unending gallery full of colourful stories with streaks of saddened blues, blissful greens, harmonious yellows, rich violets and even the occasional splashes of grey. Only to come to the end of it simply wanting more. Wondering what else lies ahead?...Why though? Why would we not want to know what comes next? Well, I like to think it's because our innate curious and bright eyed nature is what drives us to look past what makes sense and on to things that move us forward fearlessly.

More often than not, it's in the quiet moments when your mind drifts off into a place far back within your memories, it finds these framed stories in your daydreams. They play like an old movie come to life. As you think of them again, you feel a whirlwind of colour that is far from predictable or grey. Instead, those memories leave you yearning to make new experiences. Full of new feelings and they inspire you to pick yourself back up and fall forward into yet another untrodden path of this incredibly un-simple thing called life...

Well, now that we've had the chance to get REAL philosophical, let's get into the recipe to help you zone out into those deep thoughts this week!

Chewy Cardamom Coconut Cookies

1/2 cup Slightly cold butter
1 cup Flour
1 cup Sugar
2 tsp Vanilla
2 tsp Coconut Extract
Handful of coconut shavings
6-8 pods of Cardamom (depending on how aromatic you like it)

Pre-heat your oven to 350 F
Cut up the butter into chunks and toss in a bowl.
Add in the flour and sugar and set aside for a second.
Grind your cardamom in a mortar and pestle (This will allow you to manually pick out the shells and also bring out the aroma)
Then toss in your cardamom and coconut shavings to the mixture.
Add in the vanilla and coconut extract to the mix.
With your hand, start combining everything to bring it into one giant smooth ball.
Then on a baking sheet laid with parchment paper, start breaking your dough into smaller balls and lay them on the sheet, leaving a bit of space in between them to expand.
Bake at 350 F for about 10-15 minutes (to keep them doughy)
Then when you take them out and let them cool just a bit but not fully, you can place a fork over top of them for the lined pattern or leave them as is!
Let them cool fully and then cozy up with a plate of cookies and a cup of tea! They're also great the after being refrigerated!