Baby, it's (finally) cold outside...

Hyedie from the Cupcake Ride has started a series on winter bikers, and I'm honoured that she asked me to be interviewed. We rode to Queen's Park Circle, part of my daily commute, for photos at the beginning of December when it was still practically balmy.

You can see the interview here. Hyedie takes a nice picture.

In other news, it's finally Christmas vacation. I haven't been horribly in the Christmas spirit so far, although most of of my shopping is done already. I did go to the Sing-Along Messiah and visited the Christmas Market at the Distillery, so I feel a little ho-ho-ho-ier this week. Also, pickles were electrocuted.

Tomorrow is the last push. I have to buy one or two more presents and food-stuffs, make a few eatable presents, wrap the heck out of stuff, and make cranberry sauce and the raspberry semifreddo. No problem.

I'm gonna need a nap first.

I made them myself. At least, I helped.

I may have, once or twice in the past, mentioned my love of macarons. Well, last night I went with my friend R to Le Dolci to learn how to make them.

It turns out they're not as complicated as it seems, although there's still a bit of luck and technique required to get them to turn out right: our batch of pumpkin pie macarons looked perfectly cooked but were still wet and gummy on the inside. They ended up baking for a lot longer than the required 12 minutes. However, the mint-chocolate chip turned out very nicely indeed, and we eventually managed to get enough of the pumpkin pie to bring home three each, although we were given strict instructions not to eat any until they had stayed in the fridge for a day. I obeyed. Mostly.

And here they are.

I'm going to go on record and say that I really liked the texture of the "overcooked" pumpkin ones better than the mint-chocolate chip. I think it's the ganache. It's just too heavy for these cookies for my taste. I think that when I make my own chocolate macarons, I will try to find a less dense filling. Like a mousse, maybe.

Because? Hell yes, I will be trying these at home. Once I feel I have got the recipe more or less down, I might even graduate to the ones in the book!