Sprinkles and Wookie Cookies
One of my beautiful friends turned 40 over Labor Day weekend, and I was very excited to make the desserts for her sparkly glam soiree. For days I was surrounded by flour, sugar, butter, cream, and of course plenty of chocolate. Everything coming out of my kitchen was either dipped in chocolate, coated in sparkly gold sprinkles, or both. It’s a bit how I imagine Heaven might be.
After the weekend I was reorganizing my baking supplies as I put them away, and I noticed with some embarrassment that I might have a bit of a fetish. If you could call having 23 bottles of sprinkles, 18 different colors of cupcake wrappers, 15 frosting tips, 24 different food coloring gels, cellophane packaging to fit anything from a bag of cookies to a cupcake to a loaf of banana bread, 3 different sizes of cake pop sticks, a cake pop stand, 3 cupcake stands, and 6 pedastal cake stands in varying heights a fetish? Yeah, this could put a kink in the whole “I’m writing a blog about losing weight” plan.
Here’s the thing, I absolutely LOVE to bake. I think you could even call me a baking addict. If it’s been too long since I’ve baked something, I’ll start racking my brain to figure out who’s having a birthday, or which holiday is coming up, or which teacher could use a little treat the next morning. When my boys’ birthdays are coming up, I inevitably push them toward choosing the party theme with the cutest dessert ideas. You would not believe how many desserts you can make for a Star Wars party…Wookie Cookies anyone?
I remember my friend with the 40th birthday party marveling years ago about my ability to spontaneously whip up a batch of chocolate chip cookies when she and her husband were over for dinner. We were all saying how great warm chocolate chip cookies were, so I got up and started to make them. She was astounded that I actually had all of the ingredients on hand to make them. I remembered thinking to myself, well doesn’t everyone? Along with milk, bread, yogurt, apples and bananas, chocolate chips are considered staples on my grocery list.
How do I carry on in my quest to lose weight, while managing this baking addiction? I guess the obvious choice would be to just stop baking. (My heart actually hurt as I typed that sentence.) But not only would I be giving up something that I love, I’d be taking away fresh biscuits on Sunday mornings with my family, or holiday treats for the work peeps. So, I'm thinking the next obvious choice is that we're going to need to purchase a safe for the kitchen that only the hubs and the kiddos know the combination to. Anything I bake goes into the safe and out of my reach…totally normal. Totally.
I guess there might be some slightly less extreme options I could try. Perhaps I could find a way to indulge within reason? You know, that whole “eat in moderation” thing everyone keeps raving about. Try to enjoy just one cookie or just half a cupcake. I mean, anything’s possible, right? Or I could change up the ingredients in some of my recipes to make the final product healthier? I have to admit my inner “foodie” balks at this one, but it’s worth a try. I can't say I'm going to suddenly opt for tofutti cream cheese over the real stuff. My vegan sister swears by it, but honestly TOFU CREAM CHEESE? That's just wrong on so many levels. But I might be convinced to substitute some applesauce for oil, or even cut out some of the sugar, if I thought it could help me in this journey. It'll take some experimenting, but I'm willing to give it a go.
But on the chance that “less extreme” doesn’t cut it, I might want to start looking into that kitchen safe. Just saying…
-Stacee