I’m on a miniature baked goods kick.

A few months ago, I was on a curry kick, and I daresay the lingering smell of muffins and donuts stuck in my clothes and clinging to my kitchen cabinets smells infinitely better.

Sugar and butter always trumps garam masala, coriander, and tumeric in my book. Unless I can find a way to get those spices in a cookie.

Don’t encourage me.

So, these mini-donuts – how cute are they? They’re all dolled up with the sprinkles and the sugar and the coconuts. And the jazz hands (those aren’t pictured).

Oh, and they’re lemon. Bright, citrusy, sweet, and miniature. With sprinkles and jazz hands. Does it get any better?

In fact, it does. This is a reasonably light recipe, so a few of these won’t massacre your diet. Slipping a few of these onto each finger and dancing around the house to the BeeGees as you nibble through each donut covered finger may put a wrench in things, but I think the physical activity wins you a few points.

Just make sure your curtains are drawn when you do it. Because, you know, the neighbors (ahem, and their company) may not have an appreciation for your new workout.

Miniature Lemon Donuts

1 1/4 cup cake flour
1/2 cup coconut sugar
1 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 egg
1 1/2 tablespoon melted butter
1 teaspoon lemon zest
1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup confectioner’s sugar
1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon half and half
1 1/2 teaspoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
5 drops yellow food coloring

Sprinkles, decorating sugar, coconut, etc for toppings

For the donuts: Preheat the oven to 425.

In a large bowl, sift together the cake flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk the egg, sugar, and buttermilk until well blended. Whisk in the butter, lemon zest, and vanilla. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir until combined.

Fill the donut wells until 2/3 full and bake 6 minutes. Allow the donuts to cool completely before glazing.

For the glaze: In a small bowl, stir together the sugar, lemon juice, zest, vanilla and food coloring. Whisk in the half and half slowly, until the glaze is well blended.

To finish the donuts, arrange a cooling rack over a sheet pan. Dip the top of the donuts in the glaze and set the donuts, glazed side up, on the cooling rack, allowing the excess glaze to drip down. Once the glaze has had a few minutes to set, decorate with sprinkles, coconut, sugar, etc as desired. Allow the glaze to harden before eating.

What can I say about this tuna and white bean salad?

Uhh, nothing.

Not because it isn’t just the perfect little bite of refreshing and tangy and spa-like deliciousness we need this time of year. Rather because I am totally brain-dead.

In the last 3 weeks, I packed up half my wardrobe and sent it halfway down the eastern seaboard. I packed up a car and corralled 3 dogs into it, driving 16 hours, landing amongst palm trees, sunshine, and perfect blue skies.

And later, Mr. Hausfrau and I took a new neighborhood and empty house by whirlwind, arranging deliveries and appointments to fill that house with this little decorative touch or that little special piece. Because we had company coming and there was shiz to be done.

And now the house is done, the company is gone and I am D.O.N.E.

Fo real, yallz, I’m tured. Yes, tured. Because I’m too tired to say tired.

But, if you must know more about this salad, it’s cannellini beans and tuna, tossed with a lemony, pesto-infused vinaigrette, a smattering of sundried tomatoes, a touch of onion and parsley. It’s healthy, it’s real and if you eat it on a dainty plate, it has half the calories.

So, I’m going to go pass out by the pool with a dainty plate of this balanced on my boobies. Wish me luck.

Tangy Tuna and White Bean Salad

3 tablespoons lemon juice
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 15-ounce can cannellini (white) beans, drained and rinsed
1 7-ounce can of tuna, drained
1/4 cup onion, finely chopped
3 tablespoons parsley, chopped
2 teaspoons pesto
1 teaspoon lemon zest
2 tablespoons sundried tomato, diced

In a medium bowl, whisk together the pesto, lemon zest, lemon juice, olive oil, and salt.

Add the drained beans, tuna, onion, parsley and sundried tomatoes and toss gently to coat. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to 2 hours to blend the flavors. Serve.

How was your Christmas? Was it merry and nice? Were your stockings filled with ice?

(Don’t ask. Just nod your head and smile.)

I know that I just posted a brownie recipe last week, and I know that I raved about how I love said brownies but here’s something weird: I don’t really, really love brownies. I mean that sometimes I want a brownie, and I REALLY just need a brownie. But most times, I can pass by a plate of brownies without much of a glance. Something about all that chocolate and not much else going on. I suppose that, alone, will get me voted off the island.

Give me a Blondie any day, however. I love the buttery brown sugar taste, the dense interior, and the crusty tops. Gve me that brown sugar base, and I can go to town pulling out all sorts of mad science moves, adding a little bit of this and a little bit of that.

This go round, I grooved with a lemon theme and added white chocolate chips. Admittedly, I was trying to suck up to Mr. Hausfrau, who la la loves la la lemon and hates the following:

Pumpkin
Sweet potatoes
Donuts
Peanut butter anyplace other than between two slices of white bread
Large quantities of chocolate
Mint desserts
Bacon anyplace other than beside a pile of eggs

(He’s such a boy.)

So, if you’re a regular reader of this blog, you know the past month has left him out of the desserts madness. And gifted me a few pounds. So, aside from sucking up, I thought it was high time for his pants to start straining some seams.

Not necessarily because misery loves company. But maybe because misery is ready to put away her elastic waist pants.

Lemon White Chocolate Chip Blondies

1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
pinch salt
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon lemon extract
1 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest
1 cup white chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350.

In a small bowl, combine the salt and flour. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, beat the butter until light. Add the sugars and beat until fluffy. Add the egg, vanilla, lemon extract, and lemon zest and beat until well combined.

Fold in the flour mixture until no streaks of flour remain. Add the white chocolate chips and stir until evenly dispersed. Scrape the batter into an 8 x 8 pan and bake 25 minutes. Allow the Blondies to cool before slicing.

In an ideal world, Maggie would have liked to give these gingerbread lemon whoopie pies two paws up and an A plus.

You see, a few weeks ago, as I was moving these cookies from a tray in the freezer to a bag in the freezer, one of them slipped and skidded to a dull, icy thud on the kitchen floor. Maggie developed wings and swooped in, locking it in her steely little jaw and running away before the other 2 dogs could sniff what they were missing.

She retreated to her girl cave – a pillow that we keep on the floor between the couch and the wall – where she goes to eat her treats and generally hide from Max’s womanizing ways. There she stood in her little alcove, all silky, magnificent 13 pounds of her, stock still, hoping mom and dad would forget about the melting treat in her mouth and, for heavens sake, stop trying to wedge themselves between the couch and the wall to snatch the sticky mess from her mouth.

It must have been quite the harassing 2 minutes for her, with mom and dad all like “NONONO MAGGIE DROPITDROPIT NONONO,” and the 2 boys all like, “What did she do? What did she do?”

I imagine that’s why she finally came out of her little den, all tentative tippy toes, big eyes, and long face. She waited at our feet while we pried the cookie out her mouth (girlfriend was not going down without a fight). Docile, but not dumb.

Besides, I’m sure she’d have never fully appreciated how the gentle, fluffy lemon cream filling perfectly plays off the gingery spiced cookie for a whoopie pie that is complicated but familiar all the same. She definitely wouldn’t have stopped to enjoy how the filling smushed out the sides when she finally bit into it, oozing into the corners of her mouth. The slight, sugary crunch that dusted each cookie and gave way to a cakey filling? Its delights would have been fully lost on her.

Of course, we felt bad afterward and, of course, we gave her a treat instead and, of course, the other two dogs got a treat because when one gets a treat then every body gets a treat.

And, of course, I looked they other way when Murphy high-fived Maggie and gave Max that knowing look. Of course, they wouldn’t cook up another hair-brained plot to get more treats out of the day.

Gingerbread Lemon Whoopie Pies
(Adapted from McCormick Spice Company)

3 cups flour
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teapoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup brown sugar, packed
1/2 cup molasses
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 7-ounce jar marshmallow fluff
1/2 a stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
1 teaspoon lemon extract
1 teaspoon lemon zest

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, spices, baking soda, nutmeg and salt. Set aside.

In a stand mixer (or medium bowl) beat the butter until softened. Add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy. Add the molasses, egg, and vanilla. Beat until blended. Add the flour mixture and mix it until well-combined. Remove the dough from the mixer and wrap it in plastic wrap, allowing it to chill in the refrigerator at least 4 hours.

Once you are ready to bake the dough, preheat the oven to 350. Place 1/4 cup of granulated sugar in a shallow bowl. Form the dough into 1-inch sized balls and roll the balls in the sugar. Arrange the rolled balls 2 inches apart on a cookie sheet.

Bake 8 minutes, until the edges of the cookies are just turning golden. Do not overcook, as the cookies become too crisp for the filling. Cool the cookies on a wire rack.

To make the lemon filling: In a large bowl, beat the marshmallow fluff, butter, cream cheese, lemon extract and lemon zest until fluffy.

Assemble the whoopie pies by sandwiching the lemon filling between two cookies. Store the whoopie pies in the refrigerator or freezer until needed.