Mother's Day Bake Sale 4

Both recipes were relatively simple to follow. These are the Tilghman Treats. You roll the dough into a log, refrigerate for a bit and slice little rounds and bake until they are golden and crunchy. I was tempted to try these myself. They reminded me of a cheesy whole wheat crouton.

I mixed up the batter for the muffins and I used a mini muffin pan figuring these would be easier to feed a dog. A whole muffin might be a little much. I specifically went to the store to purchase mini muffin cup liners so they would be all cute and individually wrapped. They seemed to bake just fine and I packaged everything up and went to bed. . . .

The following afternoon, I decided to let our dogs taste test the extra dog treats. That's when I noticed the error of my ways in terms of the muffins. The paper liner cups were impossibly stuck to the muffins! This of course was quite disappointing since I had already packaged up a bunch of treats. Ugh. There was some debate about how much a dog would care about a little paper stuck to their banana carrot muffin. But C and I ultimately decided we would hate for that paper to be somehow detrimental to a dog (thinking intestinal obstruction) so only Tilghman's treats made it to the sale.

I would make the muffins again but obviously omit the paper liners. The dog muffin batter isn't quite the same consistency as a typical muffin batter or cake batter and I suspect that's what contributed to the major malfunction.

If you'd like the dog treat recipes or any other bake sale recipe, post a comment with an email address or other contact info and I'll pass them along.

Mother's Day Bake Sale 3

Paw prints on the "Doggie Bags." It's not extremely original but still seemed very appropriate.

So my plan was to load these bags with a combo of both types of treats. I thought I'd use these clever little printed cards with Molly and Tilghman's photos on them to remind folks the treats are all natural and contain no preservatives so they should be enjoyed quickly or frozen for later, etc.

My plans seldom ever go according to plan. . .

Mother's Day Bake Sale 2

I opted for two types of dog treats. One was a banana carrot muffin. The other treat was a cheesy biscuit. I can't take credit for either recipe. I located both online. I opted for these two treats because they seemed relatively simple to prepare. I was surprised to see how many dog treats require yeast and a more involved baking process.

Mother's Day Bake Sale 1

Every year on Mother's Day weekend, our block has a bake sale. We use the proceeds to help fund our summer block party. Unfortunately, in years past I've been unable to participate because we have been out of town. This year everything worked out. I have a tendency to over-commit but it typically works out.

I made an ambitious list:
Lemon Chamomile Shortbread
Sugar-crusted Raspberry Muffins
Chocolate Chocolate Chip Cookies
and. . .
DOG TREATS!

I figured the folks in our neighborhood are pretty wild about their pets so perhaps homemade dog treats would be a good item.

You should understand I don't find baking that enjoyable. It's much too precise for my skill set. I can typically crank out something average however. So in order to set my goods apart I went with something I'm much better at: Presentation.

Here you see some of the packaging for Molly's Muffins and Tilghman's Treats. These never actually made it to the bake sale unfortunately. . .