Oatmeal Scotchies with Brown Butter Glaze

My mom asked me to make cookies for the nurses at the hospice who took really great care of my mom's great aunt while she was dying. My mom went to the hospital every night for a few weeks to sit with her aunt and while she was there, she formed many relationships with everyone there. My mom is someone who can start up a conversation with anyone, anywhere. She is such a great woman and she has the biggest heart out of anyone I know (and I am not just saying that because she is my mom!) She truly is an amazing person.

I decided to make Nestle's oatmeal scotchies recipe which is on the back of their butterscotch chip bag and I drizzled a brown butter glaze on top. These were very good. They were crispy on the edges and soft and chewy on the inside. The only thing I would have liked better is if they were a little bit thicker. These cookies were pretty thin and I like my cookies to be on the thicker side, but they still tasted great. The glaze was a perfect topping and was very simple to make.

Nestle's Oatmeal Scotchies

-1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

-1 tsp. baking soda

-1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

-1/2 tsp. salt

-1 cup butter or margarine, softened

-3/4 granulated sugar

-3/4 cup packed brown sugar

-2 large eggs

-1 tsp. vanilla extract or grated peel of 1 orange, (I used vanilla)

-3 cups quick or old-fashioned oats, (I used a mixture of both because that's what I had)

-1 2/3 cups (11-oz. pkg.) Nestle Toll House Butterscotch Flavored Morsels

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt in small bowl. Beat butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar, eggs and vanilla in large mixer bowl. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in oats and morsels. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets.

Bake 7-8 minutes for chewy cookies; 9-10 minutes for crispy cookies. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely. Makes about 4 dozen cookies.

Brown Butter Glaze:

-3 tablespoons butter

-2 cups sifted powdered sugar

-1/4 cup milk

-1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:

Melt and stir butter in a saucepan over medium until it browns. Remove from heat and beat in the powdered sugar, milk, and vanilla (add more milk if needed to get the right consistency.) Drizzle over cooled cookies.

Surprise Chocolate Cupcakes with a Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting

We were celebrating my cousin's 21st birthday this weekend...a couple months late....his birthday was in January, but, I love any occasion to bake something so I didn't care that it wasn't actually his birthday! I asked him what kind of dessert he wanted and he said that he liked any kind of cake and that he didn't really care what I made. His favorite candy are reesee's peanut butter cups so I decided to make chocolate surprise cupcakes with a peanut butter cream cheese frosting. I used a Hershey's chocolate cake recipe that I use for basically every chocolate cake or cupcake recipe I make. I swear by this recipe so try it out! It is the most delicious and moist chocolate cake and cupcake recipe that I have ever made and it is very easy to put together. Everyone raves about how moist the cake is whenever I make it. The peanut butter cream cheese frosting makes this cupcake...it is so tasty! Everyone loved these cupcakes so give them a try!

What you will need:

-1 chocolate cake recipe (recipe following)

-1 recipe for peanut butter cream cheese frosting (recipe following)

-24 mini reesee's peanut butter cups plus about 8 roughly chopped reese's peanut butter cups

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake recipe (Hershey's Best-Loved recipes)

-2 cups sugar

-1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

-3/4 cup HERSHEY'S cocoa

-1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

-1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

-1 teaspoon salt

-2 eggs

-1 cup milk

-1/2 cup vegetable oil

-2 teaspoons vanilla extract

-1 cup boiling water

Directions:

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees F. Line cupcake pans with 24 cupcake liners.

2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer for 2 minutes. Stir in water. (Batter will be thin.) Pour batter evenly into cupcake pans. ( I filled mine 3/4 full and got 24 cupcakes.)

3. Bake 22-25 minutes. Cool on a wire rack for about 10 minutes and carefully remove cupcakes from cupcake pan.

4. While still slightly warm, scoop out a small circle in the middle each cupcake ( I used a apple corer and it worked out perfectly) and place a mini reese's peanut butter cup inside of the warm cupcake.

The cupcakes will look like this! The reese's will melt just a little bit. (Sorry I don't have a picture of a cupcake with just a scooped out center...I didn't think about it until now!)

6. Let the cupcakes cool completely and then frost with the peanut butter cream cheese frosting and top each cupcake evenly with the chopped reesee's peanut butter cups.

Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting: ( This cream cheese recipe is my Grandma's that she uses on her carrot cake and I am not sure where she got it from and then I just added peanut butter to it!)

Ingredients:

-1 stick unsalted butter, softened

-1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened

-1 (1 lb. box) powdered sugar

-1 teaspoon vanilla

-2/3 cup peanut butter

Directions:

1. Beat the butter and cream cheese together until light and fluffly.

2. Slowly beat in the powdered sugar.

3. Add the vanilla and peanut butter and mix until combined.

Enjoy!!!

Broccoli Cheddar Soup

Today was a chilly, rainy day.....umm hello it's almost April, where are you spring?! I am so very ready for it to be warm, sunny, and to be able to wear flip flops and shorts! Since it was a yucky day out I felt like something warm for dinner so I looked through some of my cooking magzines at pages that I had marked and came across this one: a copy cat recipe for Panera's broccoli cheddar soup. I love Panera's broccoli cheddar soup and decided to try it out.

This was absolutely delicious and it definitely hit the spot. It was creamy, cheesy, and it warmed me up! My family really enjoyed it as well and I will definitely make this again. It was pretty simple to make and really, really yummy and I just served it with some asiago cheese bread from our local supermarket bakery instead of in bread bowls.

Almost-Famous Broccoli-Cheddar Soup (Food Network magazine)

Active: 45 min.

Total: 1 hr. 10 min. Serves: 4

-6 tablespoons unsalted butter

-1 small onion, chopped

-1/4 cup all-purpose flour

-2 cups half & half

-3 cups low-sodium chicken broth

-2 bay leaves

-1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

-Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper

-4 7 inch sourdough bread boules (round loaves)

-4 cups broccoli florets, (about 1 head)

-1 large carrot, diced

-2 & 1/2 cups (about 8 ounces) grated sharp white and yellow cheddar cheese ( I used half white cheddar and half yellow cheddar) , plus more for garnish

Directions:

1) Melt the butter in a large dutch oven or pot over medium heat. Add the onion and cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Whisk in the flour and cook until golden, 3 to 4 minutes, then gradually whisk in the half & half until smooth. Add the chicken broth, bay leaves, and nutmeg, then season with salt and pepper and bring to a simmer. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, uncovered, until thickened, about 20 minutes.

2) Meanwhile, prepare bread bowls: Using a sharp knife, cut a circle into the top of each loaf, leaving a 1-inch border all around. Remove the bread top, then hollow out the middle with a fork or your fingers, leaving a thick bread shell.

3) Add the broccoli and carrot to the broth mixture and simmer until tender, about 20 minutes. Discard the bay leaves. Puree the soup in batches in a blender or until smooth; you'll still have flecks of carrot and broccoli. Return to the pot. (Or puree the soup in the pot with an immersion blender.)

4) Add the cheese to the soup and whisk over medium heat until melted. Add up to 3/4 cup water if soup is too thick. Ladle into the bread bowls and garnish with cheese.

Enjoy!

Cupcake Pebbles Cereal Cupcakes

While I was grocery shopping the other day I happend stumble upon a new cereal, Post Cupcake Pebbles! I haven't had fruity pebbles or chocolate pebbles in a long time, but, I just had to buy a box of the cupcake pebbles. I love cake batter flavor, my favorite ice cream from Maggie Moo's and Coldstone is cake batter, so, I knew I had to try this cereal. I had a bowl of this cereal for breakfast and it was really yummy, it tasted just like cupcake batter!

I happened to notice that there was a cupcake pebbles giant cupcake recipe on the side of the box and I decided I would try it since the cereal was so yummy! I figured it would just be a simple and fun dessert to take over to my Aunt's daycare kids.

The recipe is for a giant cupcake cake, but, I just made 12 regular size cupcakes and I had some mini foil heart shaped tins that I decided to use as well.

I probably wouldn't make these again, the cereal inside the cupcakes just got chewy and no one knew what the chewy things inside were (which is kind of what I thought would happen). But, overall, they were cute and the kids enjoyed them and I will definitely eat the cereal for breakfast!

Ingredients:

-4 cups pebbles cereal, divided
-1 box yellow cake mix, plus required cake ingredients (I used a box of white cake mix)

-2 (16 oz.) containers canned vanilla frosting

Decorations: mini pretzal sticks, chocolate sticks, licorice or rolled cookies. About 30-60 pieces each, depending on thickness.

Food coloring

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour two 9 inch or 8 inch round cake pans. Place 2 cups of cupcake pebbles cereal in small bowl. Set aside. Prepare cake mix as directed on package and fold in 2 cups of cereal. Divide batter equally between two cake pans. Bake 25-35 minutes for 9 inch pans or 30-40 for 8 inch pans or until the top springs back when touched lightly and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow cakes to cool 10 minutes in pans. Invert cakes on cooling racks and cool completely. Once cooled, the cupcake is ready to assemble. Place one cake layer on plate and frost top evenly with 1/2 can of frosting. Sprinkle with 1 cup cereal. Top with second cake layer. Frost sides of cupcake with 1/2 can of frosting-heavier at the top edge to create a slightly flared effect. Adhere decorations around sides of cake, close to each other. Trim as necessary to resemble a cupcake liner. Tint remaining frosting with desired coloring and spread on top to resemble giant cupcake. Sprinkle top with remaining 1 cup of cereal right before serving.

*Instead of making a giant cupcake I made regular cupcakes and mini heart shaped cakes and I used a white cake mix and only 1 can of vanilla frosting. I decorated with sprinkles instead of the cereal because I didn't want the cereal to get soggy if they weren't eaten right away!

The Baked Brownie

A while back I was watching The Best Thing I Ever Ate on the Food Network channel and saw the salted caramel brownie from Baked in New York and I wanted one so bad! Too bad I don't live anywhere near there! I was just about drooling over it....it looked so gooey, caramely, and fudgey. So, I finally went out and got the Baked New Frontiers in Baking Cookbook and I love it! There are so many different recipes in it. If you don't have it I would definitely reccomend it!

I made the baked brownie recipe because they didn't have the salted caramel one in cookbook and I have to say it was really, really good. It was dense, fudgey, and very chocolately....just the way I like my brownies. I don't like cakey brownies at all and this brownie definitely isn't cakey. Everyone who likes coffee really enjoyed these. I sent some to work with my dad and some of his co-workers didn't like the coffee flavor in the brownies. Next time, I might leave the espresso powder out and see how they are.

But, if you enjoy a coffe flavor and very moist and fudgey brownies then you should really give these a try! I hope you enjoy!

The Baked Brownie (from Baked New Frontiers in Baking)

-1&1/4 cups all-purpose flour

-1 teaspoon salt

-2 tablespoons dark unsweetened cocoa powder

-11 ounces dark chocolate (60-72% cacao), coarsely chopped (I used 60% ghiradelli chocolate chips)

-1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cut into 1-inch cubes

-1 teaspoon instant espresso powder

-1 1/2 cups granulated sugar

-1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

-5 large eggs, at room temperature

-2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1. Preheat oven to 350 degress F. Butter the sides and bottom of a 9x13 inch glass or light colored metal baking pan. ( I just used cooking spray to grease the pan and I used a metal pan.)

2. In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, salt, and cocoa powder together.

3. Put the chocolate, butter, and instant espresso powder in a large bowl and set it over a saucepan of simmering water, stirring occasionally, until the chocolate and butter are completely melted and smooth. Turn off the heat, but keep the bowl over the water and add the sugars. Whisk until completely combined, then remove the bowl from the pan. THe mixture should be room temperature.

4. Add 3 eggs to the chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. Add the remaining eggs and whisk until combined. Add the vanilla and stir until combined. Do not overbeat the batter at this stage or they will be cakey.

5. Sprinkle the flour mixture over the chocolate mixture. Using a spatula, fold the flour mixture into th chocolate until just a bit of the flour mixture is visible.

6. Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth the top. Bake in the center of oven for 30 minutes (I did mine for 26 minutes because I like mine really fudgey and they came out perfect), rotating pan halfway through the baking time, until a toothpick inserted in the center of the brownies comes out with a few mosit crumbs. Let the brownies cool completely.

Pizza Panini

Tonight I decided to make pizza panini's! We had leftover pizza toppings and sauce from earlier in the week. It was something quick and easy to put together and yummy too! You can put on any of your favorite pizza toppings.

This is what I used:

-Crusty garlic rolls

-pepperoni

-sausage

-olives

-pizza sauce

-parmesan cheese

-fresh mozzarella

1. Cut rolls in half and pull out some of the inside of the bread.

2. Layer the bottom half of the roll with desired toppings, then the sauce, sprinkle with parmesan cheese and mozzarella cheese and then top with the other half of the roll. Grill on a panini press, a George Foreman grill (that's what I did because I don't have a panini press), or in a pan on the stove over medium heat pressed down with something heavy. Serve with extra pizza sauce warmed or ranch dressing if desired.

Happy St. Patty's Day!

So, here is it, my first post ever! I have been wanting to start a blog for a while, since the first time I came across one a few months ago! I love finding other people's blogs and reading all of their delicious recipes and seeing all of the beautiful and yummy pictures! So, I finally decided to start a blog of my own....I just need to work on the picture taking, they are not the best pictures ever, but, with time I am sure I will get better.

I decided to make something for St. Patricks day and I chose Mint Filled Brownie Cupcakes from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes cookbook that my wonderful Aunt got me for my birthday which was on Monday!

These brownie cupcakes were very yummy, dense, fudgey, chocolatey, and minty and I added Hershey's "perfectly chocolate" chocolate frosting on top which was delicious! Make sure not to overbake these.....I usually like to underbake my brownies a bit because I like them very fudgey!

Mint Filled Brownie Cupcakes from Martha Stewart

-8 ounces semisweet or bittersweet chocolate, coarsely chopped (I used all semi-sweet)

-1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into pieces, room temperature

-1 cup sugar

-3/4 tespoon salt

-3 large eggs

-1/2 cup all-purpose flour

-1/4 cup unsweetened Dutch-process cocoa powder, sifted

-12 small chocolate peppermint patties, (mini York Peppermint Patties is what I used and I needed 15 because I made 12 mini cupcakes and cut them into quarters)

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Farenheit. Line a standard muffin tin with paper liners. Place chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl set over (not in) a pan of simmering water. Stir occasionally just until melted, 4-5 minutes.

2. Remove bowl from heat. Whisk in sugar and salt until mixture is smooth; whisk in eggs to combine. Gently whisk in flour and cocoa just until smooth (don't evermix).

3. Spoon 1 heaping tablespoon of batter into each lined cup. Place 1 peppermint patty on top, gently pressing into batter. Top with 2 tablespoons batter, covering patty completely (I only topped mine with 1 heaping tablespoon of batter and I also made 12 mini brownie cupcakes, and I used a quarter of a mint patty and they all turned out very well!). Bake, rotating tin halfway through, until cake tester inserted halfway in centers (above mint patty) come out with only a few moist crumbs attached, about 35 minutes ( I only baked mine for 25 minutes, since I used less batter and I cooked the mini ones for about 10-12 minutes). Transfer tin to a wire rack and cool completely before removing. Frost with HERSHEY's chocolate frosting and top with green sprinkles if desired.

For the Hershey's Chocolate Frosting:

Makes about 2 cups

-1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine (I used butter)

-2/3 cup HERSHEY's cocoa

-3 cups powdered sugar

-1/3 cup of milk

-1 teaspoon vanilla

1. Melt butter. Stir in cocoa. Alternately add powdered sugar and milk, beating to spreading consistency.

2. Add small amount of additional milk, if needed. Stir in vanilla.