A Claire - One Woman Named Claire...and Paying It Forward Give Away

A Claire - One woman named Claire.
Eclair - A yummy pastry, typically filled with a custard type cream and topped with chocolate.
If a Claire came over I would share my eclairs with her, instead it was my sweet neighbor Sarah.

This months Daring Bakers challenge was fun because it only took about 2 hours instead of 12 hours or whatever the last 2 took. And I had all the ingredients already. The directions were open to interpretation which means caramel or vanilla or pistachio or almond or orange or strawberry or licorice, okay ewww. But it is fun to have room for personal addictions and preferences. Make the Pate a Choux as stated, then pastry cream and glaze, and one of the last 2 must be chocolate. Easy enough. Yeah right. Those little suckers are hard to bake...bake, switch, water, spoon, open, steam, poke, tap, bake. But, and this but is giving me a big butt, chocolate pastry cream...well all I can say is maybe a baking group is the wrong place for me. Maybe I need to join a pastry cream/custard/filling group instead. I like the baked stuff because it has creamy stuff in it.


I went with the chocolate pastry cream because I love love love chocolate, and I found really nice rasberries. You just can not beat those two together, unless you maybe added butter. I had to share. Had to. Otherwise Amber (me) would eat them all.

Yes, there is one missing, and it was worth it even if it messed up the photo.

And now for the fun part...


I was so fortunate to have been chosen by pretty Dana from Vanilla Basil for a 'Paying It Forward' prize. You can click on her link on the right in my 'Tasty Things' list. This give away seems to have come from the crafting bloggers and ended up with us lucky and happily fed food bloggers. It is based off the movie 'Pay It Forward' with Kevin Spacey, Helen Hunt and Haley Joel Osmet. If you haven't seen the movie...DO, and then live the attitude. It is hope and goodness, and isn't that really what life should be about among other things? Make sure and check out Danas blog also, it is one of my favorites. She is a very busy, intelligent and talented young woman.

Dana sent me a wonderful package full of lots and lots of yummy stuff. Part of the fun is trying to guess what you will recieve. It had everything I could imagine, including a new wooden spoon which thrilled me because mine are always chopped up from my blender. There were dried mushrooms and chilies, pesto and soup, candy, balsamic glaze and tom yam paste, maple popcorn and punjabi snack mix, spices, tea and zinger drink mix, smoked tomatoes and wasabiko, did I mention candy? All I could think was YUM. There was nothing that I had in my cupboards already, okay except the spoon but this one is new and pretty. I get to try lots of new food ideas in the next few weeks.

Now it is my turn to Pay It Forward to one lucky person. I will love to send a package of local and favorite foods and maybe a little surprise or two. All you need to do is to leave a comment on any of my posts during this period and I will, in a super secret decoder ring style, choose from among you. Sucking up is allowed but it will not help you to get chosen. The last day to leave a comment for entry is Sunday, September 7, 2008, and I will announce the winner on the following day. Best of luck to everyone.

There is only one requirement of you. That you happily 'Pay It Forward' in the same manner to another lucky food lover. Remember, go visit Dana and leave her a sweet comment.

Sophie was pretty excited because she likes food a lot.