Candy Corn Cookies

 

 

I saw these cute candy corn cookies on pinterest and decided to give them a try.  Anyone else look at pinterest?  Great place to get ideas about cooking, decorating, entertaining, style, etc.  Also, if you want to feel like you are really uncreative and put pressure on yourself to do something Martha Stewartish, check out pinterest.

 

Anyways, you can basically use any shortbread cookie recipe.  Divide the dough into 3 even portions and use your food coloring to make the different candy corn colors.  Use a lot of food coloring, I didn't use enough and my candy corn cookies were pretty light.

 

Press the dough into layers and then refrigerate.  I left mine in overnight.

 

Oh yeah, I had a little helper.

 

Here is the dough brick ready to be cut.

 

So the little cookies were tiny, bitesize really.  They took forever to cut up.  When I make these again I will either double the recipe or use a smaller pan to make thicker cookies.

 

The recipe I called said to coat these in sugar.  Totally not necessary. 

 

These guys bake pretty fast.

 

Enjoy!

Tortellini Soup

1 package of frozen tortellini
1 box of chicken stock or a few cans
2 handfuls of fresh spinach (or use frozen)
1 can diced tomatoes
italian seasonings
1/4c diced onion
2 cloves minced garlic
1/4c diced carrots
1/4 lb italian sausage (cooked)
1 egg
1/4 cup parmesan cheese
olive oil or butter
salt and pepper

Heat the oil or butter in a saucepan.  Add onion and carrots, saute until soft. (If you have raw sausage you could cook with the carrots and onions, but I like to cook separately so i don't have all that sausage grease in the soup.)  Add garlic and italian spices for a minute or so.  Add container of chicken broth and tomatoes and bring to a slow boil.  Add tortellini.  While that is cooking, mix parmesan cheese and egg together.  Just before the pasta is done, add the cooked sausage, egg mixture and handful of spinach.  Turn off heat, stir and let sit for a few minutes while the spinach and egg to cook.  Add salt and fresh pepper to taste.

Of course the kids wouldn't eat this.  Andrew said, "It have parts!" But Kevin loved it.

Valentines Day Project

Because I like to make life just a little bit harder than it needs to be these days, I decided we needed to make Grace's Valentine's Day treats.  I kept seeing these pretzel treats on pinterest and thought they would be fun to try.  So we did.

You need pretzels, candy melts (picked these up at Michaels) and M&Ms.  You could also use hershey's kisses instead of the candy melts. 

 

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.  Spread a layer of pretzels on a baking sheet and put one candy melt on each pretzel.

Put the baking sheet in the oven for 90 seconds.  I left mine in about 10 seconds too long and some of the candy melted through the pretzel.  Not a big deal, but I just had to pry them off the cookie sheet after they were set.  As soon as they come out of the oven, put one M&M on each pretzel.  You have to work fast.  So be sure to have your M&Ms ready.

 

By the way, check out the creepy M&M on the bag for this Valentine's Day.  

After the M&Ms are all on, you need to put them somewhere cold for the candy to set. 

We packaged these up in clear candy bags and tied with a cute red ribbon.  Hope Grace's class likes them!

Mexican Chocolate Cake

Maggie gave me this recipe, and I love it! It is more involved than just opening up a box of cake mix, but well worth it. In fact, this is the first time I made this recipe and didn't realize after a few minutes of baking that I forgot to add an ingredient and needed to pull the cake out of the oven to stir it in.  I think I have ADD or whatever it is called.

From what I can tell, this is from a cookbook called "Wild Game".  Don't worry, the cake does not contain any wild game....or any game for that matter. 

Preheat over to 400 degrees.

Grease 15x10x2 pan.

CAKE
8 T unsalted butter
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
2 c all purpose flour
2 c sugar
1/2 c buttermilk
2 lg eggs
1t baking soda
1 t vanilla extract
1 t ground cinnamon
1 t powerdered instant espresso or regular coffee
1/2 t salt
3/4 chopped nuts (optional)

1. In saucepan combine butter, cocao and 1 C water over moderate heat. Bring to boil. Remove from heat.

2. In large bowl sift together flour and sugar.

3. Add melted cocoa to flour & sugar and beat until well blended.

 

4. Continue beating while adding buttermilk, eggs, baking soda, vanilla, cinnamon, coffee, & salt.


5. Fold in nuts.

6. Pour it in the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes. Cake will be moist. Note: I had to bake mine a bit longer.

ICING

3 1/2 c powdered sugar
8 T unsalted butter (melted)
1/4 c unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 c plus 2 T milk
1 t vanilla extract
1 t powdered instant espresso or regular coffee
1 t ground cinnamon

1. Combine all ingredients.

2. Eat a big spoonful to be sure it is sweet and buttery enough. 

3. After cake has cooled, spread the icing on top.

After you taste this cake you will all want Maggie's email so you can send her a thank you note.  Please email me and I will hook you up.

Enjoy!

Ginger Snaps

This recipe is from my Grandma Pat.  It is a family favorite.

Ingredients:

2/3 cup butter

1/2 cup white sugar (you will need extra for topping)

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 egg

4 tablespoon molasses

1 teaspoon vanilla (my addition, not necessary)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon cloves

1 teaspoon ginger

2 cups flour

Combine the dry ingredients in one bowl.  In another bowl combine the butter, sugar, egg, vanilla, molasses...you know the routine.  Then combine the two and mix.  It will look like this. 

Put it in the fridge to chill for an hour or more.

Then roll pieces into little balls and roll in granulated sugar.

Bake in a 350 degree oven for 8 minutes or so. 

Watch closely and pull them out when the top starts cracking a little bit.

Delicious!

Sunday Dinner

Last Sunday we had my parents, Mark and Maura over for a family dinner.  We usually head over to my parents house for a the big meal, but I thought I would cook for once.  Although they brought the turkey, stuffing and dessert, so I guess I didn't do that much cooking. 

I made Roasted Tomato Basil soup that tasted pretty good.  Not great.  But I topped it with these babies. 

Ever use old bread to make croutons?  It is really easy and really, really good.  Just cut up the bread (This time I used kaiser rolls which worked really well.  They are lighter I guess.) and coat in a mixture of butter, olive oil and garlic.  Then toast them in the oven.  You can even put some parmesan cheese on them.  Because in Wisconsin we try to put cheese on everything.  Who am I kidding?  I cannot blame my love of cheese on Wisconsin.  Anyways, these are great on salads, soups or just by themselves.  Seriously, try to eat just one. 

I also made a salad. 

Notice that the heirloom tomatoes.  See? 

Aren't they pretty?

And my dad brought these fancy rice krispie treats...with jelly beans!  He is a culinary master.  Jelly beans on rice krispie treats, who would have thought?

The kids had a ball hanging with there grandparents. 

Grace loved being super fancy.

And Andrew tolerated being dressed up like Elton John.



Frosting Review

Its no secret that I am a huge frosting fan.  And I am a fan of the The Pioneer Woman.  So when she gave her endorsement of this frosting recipe, (which is called "That's the Best Frosting I've Ever Had") I had to give it a try. 

Step 1: Combine 5T flour and 1 cup of milk in a saucepan.  Whisk over low heat until it thickens.

*Note I had to do this step twice because I didn't have the attention span to stand there and whisk for 5 minutes.  I still got distracted during the second batch but decided a few little lumps would be fine.  I don't think it made a difference. 

2. Set this mixture aside and let cool.  COMPLETELY.

3. In a mixer combine 1 cup butter, 1 cup granulated sugar and a teaspoon of vanilla.  Whip it for a long time.

4. Then combine the 2 together and whip for a very long time.  When you think it is done, whip it longer.

6. Have your little helper put the frosting and sprinkles on cupcakes.  And you are done.

In comparing this to my favorite frosting recipe (mentioned in this post), this one comes up short.  It takes more time, it is more complicated to make and really just doesn't taste as good.  But try it out.  If you want to be disappointed.  Just kidding.

Sweet Stuff: Cooking Light Magazine

Full of really great ideas and info on healthy food and cooking.