Cracked Cauldron Spillings

Drool.

Not bakery equipment, catalogs filled with luscious cinnamon rolls, sweet, sticky baklava, cheesecakes, fruitcakes, pound cakes, petit fours, shortbreads, galettes, nut breads, bars, and other yummies too delicious to name or you'll need to replace your keyboard just like me.

After yesterday's shocker on expenses and what we'd need to earn to cover them, I'm glutinously looking at such fare, trying to decide what we must have, and what we'd like to have. Everything is so yummy, how can we decide?

I know we'll have bread. And cookies. And soup. But I want to have cute little German style porcupines, and charming little maeuschen, and Hoeckelheimer Baerentaschen, and petit fours and cinnamon rolls that will curl your toes in pleasure. Not to mention fancy little pastries of all sorts, bite-sized fruit tarts dipped in chocolate, pastry encased truffles, fruit calzones, tiny little Fairy Cakes, individual cheesecakes, Elven Nibblers, Wizard Wands, and more. And offer bread dips - hot cheesy dips, chilled marinara dips, Italian olive oil dips, spicy pesto dips, sweet fruity dips. And fresh made fruit jams and jellies and butters.

I stumbled onto some gorgeous extra fragrant red plums yesterday and spent the evening making some of the most flavorful plum butter ever: thick, rich, fragrant, enhanced with just a touch of cinnamon and star anise and tarragon. I tell you, this batch of plum butter will become legendary. I don't expect all those jars to last out the weekend.

I want to let our future customers at the Cracked Cauldron enjoy such taste delights on fresh bread.

But, given how expensive it looks like start-up will be, that is something we will just have to look forward to expanding into as time and finances allow.

Just like the meads and fruit wines will have to wait, but we already knew about that. A liquor license is just too far out of our reach for at least the next 5-8 years.

So. Bread. Soup. Cookies. Beverages.

That's still a large set of offerings. Bread alone is almost limitless: white, low-carb wheat, wheat, rye, pumpernickel, sourdough white, sourdough tomato, sourdough rye, gluten-free, salt-free, buns and rolls of all sorts just to start with.

Cookies: chocolate chip, snickerdoodle, chocolate macadamia, oatmeal, peanut butter, nut corners, sandies, linzer torten, shortbreads, jumbles, thumbprints, merry makers, lebkucken, pffernuesse, gingerbread, sugar, sugar-free, salt-free, gluten free, bars...

And soups. I know the common ones are Atkins style hi-pro beef, rich and hearty beef, and chicken noodle, but then there are chowders, bisques, bouilliabaise, chilled soups, southwestern chicken, chili, pea soup, navy bean soup, many bean soup, onion soups, creamy onion soup, cream soups of all sorts, carrot soup, Forest Stew, and so many more.

Beverages: coffee plain and flavored, hot and cold milk, juices, herbal teas, fruit spritzers, sodas,

Once we are past the opening phase and starting to relax a bit, we can introduce more menu items.

But, darn, there's so much delicious stuff. Scones. Muffins. Cakes. Pastries. Hand pies. Whole pies.

Now, run along and get some munchies. I know I will.