Pebbly beach fruit squares

Stuffed with dried fuit, and baked into a warm pastry crust, these cookies are something special. Use any dried fruit of your choice, raisins, cherries, cranberries, apricots, ginger, dates, or prunes.

By Sarah Murphy-Kangas,?In Praise of Leftovers / February 28, 2013

Sure, cookies aren't the healthiest snack, but sometimes a recipe like this one makes them worth it.

In Praise of Leftovers

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For those of you aspiring to eat less sugar and more kale, I hear you. I'm with you. But on a cookie-baking roll. Forgive me.

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In Praise of Leftovers

Sarah Murphy-Kangas is a cook, writer, mother, teacher, and group facilitator. She lives with her family in Seattle, Washington. She started her blog, In Praise of Leftovers, as a way to share her kitchen exploits with friends and family and further explore her obsession with food. Her favorite challenge is to make something out of nothing.

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Alice Medrich's "Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy Melt-in-your-Mouth Cookies" aren't helping matters. I haven't come across a baker that gets cookies like she does. As you know, I'm a cookie person. Just by looking, I'm able to tell a great cookie from an okay one, and a passable one from a don't-waste-your-calories one. And I'm also aware that cookies baked in most home ovens often don't turn out like the ones you might get at your favorite bakery. If you stick with Alice, she'll help you.

I could say a lot more about cookies and even my philosophy about having them sitting around the house. (The short version is I allow myself one when they are warm and about two more over the course of the batch/days. The rest go in the kids lunches or are given away as gifts.)?

For Alice Medrich's pebbly beach fruit squares I had to read these directions carefully to visualize how these cookies are formed, but I?found the dough easy to work with and didn't experience any problems. You can use any dried fruit, and she instructs to soak it in water, fruit juice, or wine to soften it. But only for 20 minutes. I soaked my dried cranberries in orange juice. Yum. And I used lemon zest and just mixed the softened butter and sugar with a spoon. Anything to avoid getting out the mixer. The kids and I pronounced these divine.?

P.S. Alice is big on refrigerating your dough, which develops the flavor of the cookies, makes them less prone to spread in the oven, and makes your dough easier to work with. This dough requires 2 hours of refrigeration.

Makes 32 2-1/2-inch squares.

1-1/2 cups plus 2 tablespoons flour

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 tablespoon finely grated lemon zest or 1 teaspoon cinnamon or anise

1 cup moist dried fruit (raisins, cherries, cranberries, apricots, candied ginger, dates, prunes)?

1/4 cup turbinado or other coarse sugar

Combine the flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl and mix together thoroughly.

With a large spoon in a medium mixing bowl or with a mixer, beat the butter with the granulated sugar until smooth and well-blended but not fluffy. Add the egg, vanilla, and lemon zest and beat until smooth. Add the flour mixture and mix until completely incorporated.

Divide the dough in half and form each into a rectangle. Wrap the patties in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least two hours or overnight.?

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F., and position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven.

Remove the dough from the refrigerator and let sit for 15 minutes to soften slightly. On a sheet of parchment paper or plastic wrap, roll one piece of dough into a rectangle about 8-inches by 16-inches. With?the short side facing you, scatter half the dried fruit on the bottom half of the dough. Fold of top half of the dough over the fruit, using the paper as a handle if it's sticking. Peel the paper from the top of the dough. Dust the top of the dough lightly with flour. Flip the dough onto a lightly floured cutting board and peel off the remaining paper. Sprinkle with half the coarse sugar and pat lightly to make sure the sugar adheres. Use a heavy knife to trim the edges. Cut into 4 strips and cut each strip into 4 pieces to make 16 squares. Place cookies 2-inches apart on parchment-lined or greased cookie sheets. Repeat with the remaining dough, fruit, and sugar.

Bake for about 12 minutes, or until the edges are lightly browned. Rotate the pans from top to bottom and from front to back halfway through the baking time to ensure even baking. Cool cookies completely before stacking or storing.

The Christian Science Monitor has assembled a diverse group of food bloggers. Our guest bloggers are not employed or directed by The Monitor and the views expressed are the bloggers' own and they are responsible for the content of their blogs and their recipes. All readers are free to make ingredient substitutions to satisfy their dietary preferences, including not using wine (or substituting cooking wine) when a recipe calls for it. To contact us about a blogger, click here.

Source: http://rss.csmonitor.com/~r/feeds/csm/~3/ZOZ4NkQlHY4/Pebbly-beach-fruit-squares

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'Last Exorcism: Part II' Aims To Free Horror From 'Bad Name'

'Horror gets a bad name because a lot of the people who make it don't care,' Eli Roth says.
By Kevin P. Sullivan

Ashley Bell in "The Last Exorcism Part II"
Photo: CBS Films

Source: http://www.mtv.com/news/articles/1702831/last-exorcism-part-ii-eli-roth-secrets.jhtml

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Lead Generation With LinkedIn | Social Media Examiner

By Michael Stelzner
Published March 1, 2013

Do you use LinkedIn for business?

Are you wondering how you can use LinkedIn to generate quality leads?

To learn how to use LinkedIn to attract leads and build networking relationships, I interview Stephanie Sammons for this episode of the Social Media Marketing podcast.

More About This Show

The Social Media Marketing podcast is a show from Social Media Examiner.

It?s designed to help busy marketers and business owners discover what works with social media marketing.

The show format is on-demand talk radio (also known as podcasting).

In this episode, I interview Stephanie Sammons, who blogs at Build Online Influence?and?is the CEO of Wired Advisor?a firm that helps those in the financial industry. She also writes exclusively about LinkedIn for Social Media Examiner.

Stephanie shares her LinkedIn knowledge, tips and experiences when it comes to social networking for your company.

You?ll learn about the tools and techniques that will help you attract leads and connect with business professionals.

Share your feedback, read the show notes and get the links mentioned in this episode below!

Listen Now

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

You can also subscribe via iTunes, RSS, Stitcher or Blackberry.

Here are some of the things you?ll discover in this show:

LinkedIn for Business

Why LinkedIn is so important for business professionals seeking leads

Stephanie explains how most people think of Facebook as a personal web, whereas LinkedIn is a professional web.

LinkedIn is the largest professional network for working people. It doesn?t matter if you?re an employee or a business owner, a freelancer or a marketer within a company.

There are over 200 million active and engaged members on LinkedIn.

People typically visit LinkedIn with a purpose to make connections, gain insights about their industry and anything that can help them get smarter. They also use LinkedIn to network.

In Stephanie?s mind, it?s the purest form of business networking online.

Listen to the show to find out how LinkedIn has evolved from just being a place to look for a job.

LinkedIn tools to help generate leads

You?ll discover that it?s not just about the awesome tools and features that LinkedIn has, it?s also about how you use them.

Stephanie recommends having a relationship mentality when on LinkedIn and to position yourself as a thought leader. Look where you are building influence with your network and niche. It?s the right thing to do when it comes to attracting leads and people for your business. The smarter you are about marketing, the less people realize you are marketing to them.

Your main goal is to aim to be consistently visible and valuable. Studies have shown that it takes someone 7 exposures to you before they really start to pay attention, listen and determine whether it makes sense to take the next step.

Stephanie looks at LinkedIn as an opportunity to position herself as a resource within her niche using the various tools.

For example, LinkedIn Today?is a great way to quickly find content that is relevant to your target market and be able to share it on LinkedIn. You?ll find out the benefits of using these rich status updates to stay top of mind.

LinkedIn today is a great way to find relevant content for you to share.

It?s really important to keep your LinkedIn profile up-to-date. The more people see you on LinkedIn, the more they are likely to come and check out your profile to learn more about you. And if that person is relevant and potentially interested in your business, they may click through to your blog or website and take the relationship from there.

Another great LinkedIn tool to consider is Groups. If you spend time in group discussions, you have the opportunity to connect with mutual group members whom you might not necessarily know. As you get to know some of the members in the group, you can send them an invitation to connect with you.

Stephanie goes into greater detail about how many LinkedIn Groups you can join and how adding value to the conversation can lead to potential clients and customers. You?ll also discover why you should only concentrate on 3 or 5 groups at a time.

Listen to the show to find out the benefits for Social Media Examiner of creating a private group on LinkedIn when running online conferences.

How a marketer or salesperson should use LinkedIn to find leads

First of all, it?s important to build a rich?personal profile on LinkedIn. You need your prospective clients and customers to be able to understand what you do without using any fancy terminology. Be very clear in what you do, whom you help and how you can help.

Stephanie Sammons' LinkedIn profile.

A lead generation process that works really well is:

• Build a great personal profile.
• Activate that profile so you begin to share interesting, valuable, helpful content with your network.
• Be consistently visible and stay top of mind.

It?s not about selling. You have to educate and provide great information.

It?s a personal decision whom you connect with on LinkedIn and how you generate leads. It all depends on your business situation and if you want to make your network as big or small as possible.

Stephanie prefers to work on the depth and breadth of her network. She has the belief that the more connections you have, the more opportunity there is for visibility and more business opportunities you can create for yourself. You?re going to show up in more LinkedIn searches.

You?ll hear Stephanie give an example of how her network facilitated a valuable relationship for someone else.

Listen to the show to learn about how promoting your blog, ebook or webinar can work on LinkedIn.

The process of growing your network

If your goal is to generate business and leads on LinkedIn,?you need to think about growing your connections. There are many different ways to connect, from meeting people offline to connecting with them on Facebook or Twitter. Think about peers in your industry, clients, prospective clients, community leaders, etc.?anybody you may know and have a good reason to be connected with.

Stephanie shares her rules for LinkedIn when it comes to making connections.

Listen to the show to hear what you need to do when meeting people at a trade show, event or?conference, to take it to the next level on LinkedIn.

The time commitment for getting the most out of LinkedIn

Once you know your way around the network, Stephanie feels you only need to spend 10 minutes a day to make a good impact on your network.

It?s about having a focus and a purpose when you go in.

Listen to the show to find out more about why it?s important to engage in high-impact activities.

How to use LinkedIn to reach someone in a big company

Stephanie describes why she loves LinkedIn?s feature called?InMail. LinkedIn has a strong integration with email inboxes, which include frequent notifications.

You?ll also discover the reason behind members trusting emails from LinkedIn. Open rates for InMail on LinkedIn are greater than open rates for typical email marketing collateral. InMail gives you the ability to send a direct message to any member of LinkedIn, regardless of whether you are connected to them. The response rates on these are high.

But remember, you?ve got to have a good reason to connect. It can?t be just a sales pitch.

InMail is a great way to send a direct message to anyone on LinkedIn.

Listen to the show to hear the best approach when writing direct messages to other LinkedIn members.

What to avoid on LinkedIn

You need to be careful when you grow your connections, as LinkedIn will stop showing publicly if you have more than 500 connections. So you need to be careful about being too active. If many of your connections have fewer connections within their network, then all they are going to see is you when they log into LinkedIn.

You have to be thoughtful in the way you promote your own content.

Listen to the show to hear why it?s so important to have your profile looking good and up-to-date.

Stephanie?s Top Tip

You?ll hear Stephanie explain why Company Pages are becoming more important and how they are the identity for your business on LinkedIn, not your personal identity.

LinkedIn has a Self-Service Ads program that Stephanie has been experimenting with. It?s a great way to grow your group through running ads to grow followers for your Company Page. Not only is it inexpensive, it?s also easy to administer and test. Stephanie has already seen results from this.

LinkedIn's Self-Service Ads program is a great way to grow your group.

You?ll find out why LinkedIn members are receptive to ads as long as they are relevant.

Listen to the show to discover why a LinkedIn Share button on your site is a must.

This Week?s Social Media Question

Curtis Moe at SmokeHouse Podcast?asked, ?My podcast has always been a hobby and I don?t want to do much else with it. But what do you think about teaming up with a blogger? This way I won?t have to do the website and I can just focus on doing the podcast, which I enjoy doing.?

SmokeHouse Podcast.

Curtis, here is what you need to do.

Teaming up with people who have strengths where you have weaknesses is always a wise move. In my book?Launch,?there is an entire chapter about working with outside experts or other people who have a competency.

In your particular case, as someone who has an expertise in podcasting, it makes a lot of sense to work with a blogger who has an existing audience.

We?ve seen other people in our industry do this. For example, Brian Clark from Copyblogger?has a podcast called Internet Marketing for Smart People Radio. The show?is not actually produced by him, it?s hosted and produced by Robert Bruce. Brian appears on the show now and again.

It makes a lot of sense to collaborate and leverage the strengths of both of you together.

Listen to the show to hear more of Mike?s advice for Curtis.

Call in?and leave your social media?related questions for us and we may include them in a future show.

Other Show Mentions

Social Media Marketing World is Social Media Examiner?s latest mega-conference?taking place at the waterfront San Diego Marriott Marquis & Marina in San Diego, California on April 7-9, 2013.

As you?d expect, Social Media Examiner recruited the biggest and best names in the world of social media marketing for this conference. Only the best for you! Be sure to check it out.

Stephanie?will be one of the presenters, along with over 50 others, who are some of the biggest names in the world in social media marketing.

There will be extensive networking?opportunities?you?ll make priceless professional connections because we built this event to include networking after keynotes and lunch, and catered evening events at the historic?San Diego Natural History Museum?and aboard the?largest private yacht?in Southern California.

Key takeaways mentioned in this episode:

Ways to subscribe to the Social Media Marketing podcast:

What do you think? What are your thoughts on using LinkedIn for lead generation? Please leave your comments below.

Tags: lead generation, linkedin, linkedin company page, linkedin groups, linkedin networking, linkedin profile, michael stelzner, podcast, social media marketing podcast, stephanie sammons

Source: http://www.socialmediaexaminer.com/lead-generation-with-linkedin/

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