Baking Break

I had thought that once my children were out of school, I'd be done with bakes sales. Yet, today I found myself spending most of my day in the kitchen whipping up some treats for a bake sale my oldest child is hosting for an Alzheimer's fundraiser. I usually only do "major" baking (more than one item) during the holiday season and found it wasn't quite as easy to make three different items. Maybe it was because I was doing a cookie, a muffin, and bread rather than just all cookies. I was running all over the kitchen trying to find the ingredients and getting lost in the process.

The main issue was that I decided to "just start baking" and didn't establish any game plan...like start with the longest to bake and while it was cooking preparing the batter for the next item. And, I was getting every ingredient one at a time rather than gathering them all in the beginning. It would have saved me a lot of time to do my "shopping" first for all the recipes and separating rather than hunting as I was preparing the batters.

Even though it took me longer than it should to bake all the goodies, everything came out looking and tasting fabulous. (can't send out items without tasting)

Dog Sense

No one who knows me or reads nearly any of my writing isn't surprised to know I'm an animal lover, especially dogs.  And most particularly my own dogs, Lexie and Mystie, who are Cavalier King Charles Spaniels.

Yesterday, Lexie surprised me by her level of knowledge of what I was doing.   

 

I include recipes in my Barkery and Biscuits Mysteries, even though I'm not much of a cook or baker myself.  The dog treat recipe in the first in the series, Bite the Biscuit, was provided by a friend, whom I was with when a sample batch was baked.  The ones I'm including in the next book in the series, which will probably be called Treachery and Treats, were provided by a couple of Facebook friends on my street team, and I wanted to try them out before putting them in the book.  I got the ingredients and started baking one of them yesterday. 

As soon as I started, Lexie was there, begging and acting as if she knew exactly what I was doing--baking treats for her.  Sure, she must have smelled the ingredients.  But when I cook people items for dinner she doesn't act a fraction that excited.  This time she even went into my husband's home office and started talking to him, as if telling him what was going on and encouraging him to visit me and tell me to give her a treat--even as they were just starting to cook.  There was no meat involved, just good, wholesome baking ingredients.  How did she know I was doing something different from my norm: cooking something not particularly for humans but for her?   

When the cookies were complete Lexie did indeed get a sample.  Several samples.  Even Mystie got a little, although she has a chronic tummy issue which prevents me from giving her much of anything outside her prescribed food.   

Both dogs surprise me, though.  Mystie's favorite toys are rubber chickens that squeak.  The other day we were out shopping and found a variation on them--a squeaky rubber chicken decorated as a pirate.  We bought one, of course, and didn't intend to give it to her immediately, but she smelled the toy and insisted... and so we obeyed. 

I always knew doggy noses were amazing.  I can sort of understand why Mystie knew the toy was hers, assuming its scent was similar enough to her existing ones. 

But how did Lexie know I was about to bake dog treats?