Bedtime story with a twist

March 30th, 2012. Published under family fun. 2 Comments.

Reading a story aloud with your kids is, in my opinion, one of life’s greatest pleasures. We like to snuggle under a blanket and giggle while we’re at it. No matter how foul my daughter’s mood is, it always gets better when I entice her with a book.

These days we have set aside our regular bedtime stories in favor of Coffee Indulgences by Susannah Blake. There’s hardly any story in it. I know. It’s a recipe book. I’d open it with a great flourish. We’d examine the picture on each page. Hhhmmm. I would read the name of the recipe dramatically. Cofffee-Toffee Swirl. I would follow it up with a description. Creamy, slightly bitter coffee ice cream marbled with sinfully sweet dulce de leche is the ultimate decadence. My daughter would give a thumbs up or a thumbs down to indicate whether it’s yummy or not. That’s my signal to proceed to the ingredients: 4 egg yolks, 1 tablespoon cornstarch, 3 tablespoons sugar, 1 1/4 cups milk, etc. Sometimes when I think that a recipe’s easy enough for me to make, I would read the procedure, but we usually just stick to the picture, the recipe title, and the ingredients.

O how she would squeal with delight. I don’t really understand why. She’d always turn to me and say, “Mom, we could be bakers someday and make all these things!”  Then we’d giggle ourselves silly.

Today we start working on that dream. I have all the ingredients ready.We will learn how to make mocha fudge cake.