Thanksgiving Day Baking Challenge!

It's been a REAL long time since I blogged..doesn't mean I haven't been cooking.  Time, life, you name it has gotten the best of me and well not much time to blog.

Anyway..I was on one of my sites and saw a Thanksgiving Day baking challenge and figured I would do it in hopes I would kick start this blog up again.

I submitted a recipe from Ina Garten - Pumpkin Roulade.  It is delicious!! I'm not a fan of anything pumpkin...but this is amazing! I have tweaked it over the years to make it more to my liking. The recipe I got was for a Pumpkin Whoopie Pie from Christine's Kitchen Chronicles!

When I first looked at the recipe I saw two things that raised a red flag 'cloves' and 'maple' - I'm not a fan of either..but again, I'm not a fan of Fall type flavors - pumpkin, cloves, ginger, maple, sweet potato, cranberries, etc... So I immediately thought - do I really need the cloves and what can I use instead of maple? Vanilla..Cinnamon..Brown Sugar???

I decided to follow the recipe as is figuring I'm not the only person who is going to eat them right?  The only difference was that I used a cookie scooper since it was the only thing I had with the quick release mechanism.  So this recipe yielded about 30 'small' whoopie pies and by small I mean a very healthy 'small'.
I thought the clove would be overpowering, but it wasn't.  The combination of the spice from the pumpkin whoopie pie and the sweet maple cinnamon cream was perfect.  The flavors worked very well with each other.  Since I had so many of these little guys I brought some to work and gave some to my neighbors.  They all came back with rave reviews.

They were very easy to make and held up very good.  I made them on Tuesday and put them together on Wednesday. I refrigerated them and they were enjoyed on Thanksgiving Day!!!

Thank you for the recipe..I will be adding it to my Thanksgiving Day recipe files!

Morrrres....

My daughter came up to me the other day and said "Mommy, can we have Morrrres"  So I asked her more of what and she replied "No, Morrrres, you know when you smoosh it together and eat it?".  Took me a minute but I figured out she was saying S'mores.  Now I don't even remember the last time we made s'mores or how she even knew what it was.  But...I figured hey - lets go with it!

So I looked in the cupboard and I had marshmallows (the kids love the mini ones as a treat) and I had chocolate chips..but no graham crackers.  I did have Ritz Crackers though.  I figured she wouldn't know the difference.

So, I took about 12 Ritz Crackers, topped them with 1 mini-marshmallow and 2 chocolate chips.  I popped them in the toaster oven and set it to toast light.  About a minute later I took them out and placed another Ritz Cracker on top, smooshed it down and Viola instant "Morrrres!".  The kids devoured them up in no time..and to be quite honest - they were yummy!

Valentine's Day Krispie Hearts!

I just had to share these adorable Rice Krispie hearts that my daughter & I made today.  She LOVES to help me in the kitchen and even has her own aprons and kitchen utensils.  I am always finding ways to let her help me make dinner or make a special treat. Well tomorrow the Valentine's Queen is coming to visit our house.  The Queen leaves a little treat for kids on Valentine's Day (just another way for us to bribe them into behaving!). So of course we just had to make a treat for her when she arrived.

I figured I would make the Rice Krispie treats into hearts and then dip them in chocolate.  My daughter could then decorate to her hearts delight!

I doubled the recipe to yield 16 small hearts and lots of left over pieces!

• 6 Tbsp. butter
• 2 10oz. packages of large marshmallows or 8 cups of mini-marshmallows
• 12 cups of Rice Krispies

1. Melt butter over low heat
2. Once butter is completely melted, add in marshmallows
3. Stir until marshmallows have completed melted
4. Add Rice Krispies 

• I buttered 2 9/12 inch aluminum trays 
• I then split the mixture into the two pans
• Grease your hands using butter flavored cooking spray or plan butter and pat the mixture down into the pan so it is even
• Let it sit and cool for at least a half hour
• Using a heart shaped cookie cutter, cut into the rice krispie treats
• I was able to get 8 hearts out of each tray
• Lay the hearts on waxed or parchment paper

Chocolate Dip 

• 8 ounces milk chocolate (I used chocolate chips)
• 1 Tbsp. shortening (ie crisco)

1. Over a double broiler on LOW heat (or you can place metal bowl into a small saucepan) combine chocolate and shortening
2. Stir until completely melted

I covered half of my hearts then let my daughter sprinkle them with various decorations.  Set back on wax paper to cool

Apricot Scones with Mock Clotted Cream

I love Tea...wait, let me clarify, I love the food that is served at Tea.  Those delicate Cucumber Sandwiches, the light and delicious quiches, the Scones, the fragrant teas, the Scones...wait did I say Scones twice?  Yes!   I REALLY love scones.  Or maybe it's the mock clotted cream that I smother my scones in..but either way, I love them.

I had gone to Tea not to long ago with two of my girlfriends and had an apricot scone.  I made a mental note to come home and find a recipe for them.  So I searched and came across one from MyRecipes.com .  I was lucky enough to have all the ingredients on hand.  Now the problem is that this recipe yields 12....I've already eaten 3 and have tucked the rest away.  I will bring them into the office...I promise I will.

Here is a direct link to the recipe.

• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1/4 cup chilled butter cut into pieces
• 1/2 cup finely chopped dried apricots (I put a tiny bit of flour in the bowl I put them in so they wouldn't stick together)
• 1/2 cup low-fat buttermilk
• 2 large eggs
• Cooking Spray
• 2 tsp. sugar
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Combine flour & the next 4 ingredients (flour through salt)
3. Cut in butter with a pastry blender or 2 knives until the mixture resembles coarse meal )I just used my kitchen aid mixer)
4. Stir in the apricots
5. Combine the buttermilk and eggs, stirring with a whisk
6. Add to flour mixture, stirring just until moist (dough will be sticky)
7. Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface; knead lightly 4 times
8. Pat dough into a 9-inch circle on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray
9. Cut dough into 12 wedges, cutting into but not through the dough
10. Combine 2 tsp. sugar and the cinnamon, sprinkle over dough
11. Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes or until golden
12. Serve warm

Mock Clotted Cream

Now this was a little harder to come by...there are a TON of recipes for it online.  From what I've been told true clotted cream is more on the bitter/sour side like sour cream.  The Mock Clotted Cream I've had has always been sweet, like whipped cream.  I really had nothing to go by...so I combined a few different recipes and what I came up with was pretty good.  This uses sour cream although I did see some recipes that called for cream cheese (I assume that would yeild a sweeter cream)

• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• 3 Tbsp. confectioner's sugar (I would probably use 1 more Tbsp. next time)

1. Combine sour cream and vanilla in a small bowl
2. In a mixing bowl whip the heavy cream until it starts to form peaks
3. Fold the sour cream mixture into the heavy cream gently
4. Sprinkle in the confectioner's sugar
5. Serve alongside scone...my kids also loved dipping fresh strawberries in it!

Aunt Janet's Coffee Cake

I was so excited when Janet said I could make and blog her recipe for Coffee Cake.  Janet married my cousin a little over a year ago. She is not my aunt..but my kids call her Aunt Janet, my aunt - her mother in law, calls her Janetta and my mother calls her Jen or Janetta.  Who knew when Aunt Janet joined the family we would gain a family baker.  Not one family gathering goes by without some homemade dessert, cookie, pie, etc...from Aunt Janet. This coffee cake is phenomenal!  I suggested that Aunt Janet add a banana to this..but she quickly nixed that idea.  I had banana's..but stuck with the original recipe, this time.

Cinnamon Mixture

• 1/2 cup Mini chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup Chopped walnuts
• 2 tsp. Cinnamon
• 1/2 cup Sugar

Cake

• 2 sticks of butter, softened
• 1 1/2 cups Sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 pint sour cream
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 3 cups flour
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 3 tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. In small bowl, combine all the ingredients for the Cinnamon Mixture and set aside
3. In medium bowl, combine flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda - stir to mix
4. In large bowl or Kitchen Aide mixer, cream butter
5. Add 1 1/2 cups sugar to the butter
6. Add eggs, one at a time making sure each is incorporated
7. Add Vanilla
8. Add sour cream - alternating with flour mixture (so a little sour cream, a little flour, then some more sour cream, then flour, continue till you have added them both)
9. Pour half dough in a greased tube pan (I did not have a tube pan so I used a well greased bundt pan)
10. Sprinkle 1/2 your cinnamon mixture on top
11. Pour the other half of the dough on top (I did this in smaller spoonfuls and then spread it - the dough is thick and a little sticky)
12. Top with remaining cinnamon mixture
13. Bake for 1 hour or until toothpick comes out clean