Ruby Snap- Tasting Party

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A few weeks ago (before the craziness of my blog mess) I had the amazing opportunity of heading to Ruby Snap after hours with some other amazing bloggers to learn more about the company AND try some cookies. Now let me start with this preface: I’m a bit of a snob when it comes to food, especially baked goods. I admit it! I like to bake from scratch, if it comes in a box it’s not going in my mouth. I heard it best expressed a few weeks ago. I recently heard someone say “there’s a finite amount of things that you’ll eat in your life, a limited amount of bites you’ll actually put in your mouth. And every single bite you take is one less that you’ll take in your lifetime. Lets make each one of those bites count, let’s not let them go to waste.” That totally expressed how I feel about food. I love food, I love GOOD food. But why bother eating just to eat.

Anyway, I was excited to go out with other women and have a fun evening, but didn’t have hight expectations for the cookies themselves.  Bakery food always looks pretty, but tends to be dry, without much flavor.  Oh my holy heavens was I wrong. These cookies were AMAZING, moist, fresh, delicious AND gorgeous. And I mean that. Absolutely incredible. I don’t know that I want to bother making cookies when Ruby Snap is so close to me. I’ll have to create a cookie column in my monthly budget now. I am OH so serious about this. I have been dreaming about these cookies ever since. My only complaint about the night is that I got so full I couldn’t try every cookie, oh and then when we were all scrambling to bag up the extra’s I didn’t move fast enough and missed out on some of my favorites!

picture taken from Melissa of I still love you

The evening started with Dianne of Whatever Dee Dee wants and I heart Salt Lake (our evenings host with Ruby Snap) handing all of us these totally adorable and amazing name tags. SO cute! It was great to catch up with some of my favorite people that I hadn’t seen in a while. Then Tami, the store owner, came out and started talking. That alone was worth coming out for the evening. I loved listening to her amazing story. From deciding she wanted a change in her life (she was an architect before), starting a business during a recession (without a loan- amazing), having her original business name taken away (from a bigger company- she called it a backhanded compliment, that she was clearly doing well enough to be taken as a threat from the BIG boys) and throughout it all having and keeping an AMAZING attitude. She calls it all her “happiness project”. She’s CHOOSING to to be happy, to look at the positive side, to choose a happy life.

picture taken from I heart Salt Lake

It totally spoke to me. I have a pretty topsy turvy life (thus my name).  The last few years especially, between my husband losing two jobs, the kids and himself being diagnosed with Aspergers and dealing with what that means.  Then moving in with my in laws, followed by depression and suicidal thoughts from not only my husband but one of my children as well.   And all the time trying to not only be a good mother and wife (and daughter and sister) but to take care of myself as well. It get’s a bit crazy at times. Dare I say stressful? Sometimes scary, but while I can’t control very much in my life I CAN control how I react to what happens. I can control my own emotions. I do feel it’s a choice. And while I sometimes fall prey to that first initial reaction to events, frustration, stress and even anger my goal is to choose happiness. To choose to focus on the good in life, because the good is there. I can’t control the fact that my children have a neurological disorder, but I CAN control if I focus on the negatives or the positives to the situation, because there is ALWAYS a positive side to things. Anyway Tami’s story was inspiring.

And not only was her business story wonderful to listen to, but her view on food was so refreshing! She feels the same way I do about food. She says “If it isn’t wonderful, it doesn’t belong in your mouth!” A woman after my own heart! And then she talked about how she creates her cookies and her recipes. That is one thing I wish I did better, I’m great at following recipes and then changing them to fit my taste, but coming up with something completely from scratch is unusual for me. And the experimenting she does while creating, the flavor combinations she puts together… AMAZING! She works with a lot of fruits, nuts, chocolate and spices. They use fresh ingredients and they don’t EVER have day old cookies (thus why we all HAD to take the rest of the cookies home after the taste testing was over- darn)!

picture taken from I heart Salt Lake

We even got to go into the back and play with some dough and mix-in’s/toppings! It was so much fun! She had this GREAT thick dough and the mixture of different mix ins was incredible. Not at all what I would have imediatly thought of for cookies! My favorite? The sweet sunflower seeds! I am SO putting them into a cookie. I want to be braver and more experimental with my cooking and baking It was delicious and completely inspiring, not at all what I was expecting form my evening and I am so SO glad I was invited and able to go!

All the cookies are named after women with a pinup theme (as Tami said, back when sexy was strong, empowered and didn’t have to be all about showing everything off!). My favorites off the menu were, Lilly (Lemon sugar cookies with lemonheads an lemon glaze!), Penelope (peanut butter dipped in chocolate- AMAZING), Ricki (coconut dough with coconut, almonds and chocolate!) and’s Billie Ann’s (May’s flavor of the month,  a Carrot cake based cookie with curry and this amazing coconut milk frosting)

picture taken from Melissa of I still love you

Some good news for you guys? She not only makes amazing cookies she also sells her dough so you can have warm fresh baked cookies at home! Even better? She SHIPS!!! So you don’t have to be local to fall in love with these cookies. In addition to the regular menu she also has a new monthly cookie. April’s cookie is Evia- Vanilla dough with amarzipan center with pears and pinenuts! Also for you locals? She usually has a fun cookie that isn’t on the menu for you to come try! Follow Ruby Snap on twitter or FB and recieve news! Last weekend they made a special cookie just for two days, the Scarlett, a red velvet cookie that sold out within hours, they had to make a ton more batches and I STILL didn’t get any!

Check out some of the other reviews from the evening!
I heart Salt Lake
The Coterie Blog
I still love you
Living the Scream

Feel free to share my projects!