Maple Bacon

Eric fell in love with brown sugar bacon awhile back and we have been trying to figure out how to cook it.  We finally mastered it and it is time to share it with the world!  Be careful not to overcook the bacon because when you pull it out of the oven it hardens up as the brown sugar cools down.  

Brown Sugar Bacon

Bacon - 8-12 pieces

Brown sugar - about 1 t. per slice of bacon

Cooking spray

Preheat oven to 450 degrees.  Spray cookie sheet with cooking spray and lay out bacon on sheet.  Top each slice of bacon with brown sugar and pop in oven.  Bake for 15-25 minutes depending on how crispy you like your bacon.  After 15 minutes check the bacon every 2 minutes so it doesn't burn!  Remove from oven and place on plate or serving tray so as it cools it doesn't stick to the cookie sheet.

Enjoy!!

Cloud Frosting

This is my go to frosting.  I am not a huge fan of loads of butter in my frosting so this fits me perfectly.  I love cream cheese and this frosting is smooth and not too overbearing.  Because of that it goes with pretty much everything!!  The base is awesome and I love mixing it up by adding coconut extract, chocolate, or any fruit.  The possibilities are endless people!  I especially love this frosting with homemade devil's food oreos. They are so quick, easy and irresistible. 

Photo credit and original cloud recipe by your cup of cake

Cloud Frosting

Ingredients:
8 oz cream cheese
1 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract, optional
1 pint heavy whipping cream


Add vanilla and heavy whipping cream and beat until stiff peaks form. Then beat cream cheese and powdered sugar until smooth. 


Homemade Oreo Cookies:

Ingredients:1 box Devil's Food Cake Mix
2 eggs
1/2 cup oil

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Mix all ingredients together and then place on cookie sheet.  Bake for 7-9 minutes.  Let cool completely and then add delicious cloud frosting between two cookies.  mmm!

Lemon Fudge Brownies

I normally don't like to taint my chocolate with fruit but I was beyond happy with the results!  This is a knockoff version of the lemon brownies served at Pizzeria Limone and they were awesome!  The lemon, ganache, and brownie were all the perfect consistency and nothing overpowered the other too much. Make these already and enjoy!

Lemon Fudge Brownies

Brownie:
1 C Vegetable Oil
2 C white sugar
4 Eggs
2 t. vanilla
2/3 C cocoa powder
1 C flour
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. baking powder

Lemon Buttercream:

• 3/4 C butter, room temperature
• 1 1/2 t. fresh lemon zest
• 2 -2 1/2 C powdered sugar
• 1 T. fresh lemon juice
• 1 T. heavy cream
• 1/2 t. vanilla extract
• 1/4 t. lemon extract

Ganache:

12 oz. semi sweet chocolate chips

1 1/2 C heavy whipping cream

Brownies:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).Spray a 9x13 pan.

In a large bowl, heat oil up in microwave for 30 seconds.  Stir in sugar, eggs, and 2 teaspoon vanilla. Beat in cocoa, flour, salt, and baking powder. Spread batter into prepared pan.  Bake for 25-30 minutes.

Lemon Buttercream:

• Whip butter with lemon zest on medium-high speed until very pale and fluffy (it should be nearly white.) Mix in 1 cup powdered sugar, then blend in lemon juice, cream, vanilla extract and lemon extract. Add remaining 1 to 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, then whip mixture until very fluffy, about 4 - 5 minutes longer.  

Ganache:

Add chocolate chips and cream to medium pot and stir until chocolate is mixed and incorporated.  Remove from heat and let cool slightly.

Assembly:

Put brownies in freezer straight from oven.  Once cool, add lemon buttercream and stick back in the freezer for about 10 minutes.  Top with cooled ganache and keep in fridge until time to serve.  mmmmm.... 

Mud Cake

So the name of this cake isn't so appealing but get out your crock pot and get ready to indulge.  This cake is the quick and painless version of molten lava cake.  No worrying about overcooking or undercooking and you pretty much dump everything into the crockpot and enjoy!

I use one bowl for the cake and then use it again for the filling without worrying about washing it out in between since everything is going in the pot at the same time.  You can use regular or dark cocoa and any type of chocolate chips depending on the flavor you are going for.  Try it already!!

Photo source: Grandmother's Kitchen

Mud Cake
1 C. flour
2 t. baking powder
6 T. butter
1/2 C. chocolate chips
2/3 C. sugar
1/3 C. cocoa powder
1 T. vanilla
1/4 t. salt
1/2 C. milk
1 egg yolk

Molten Filling
1/3 C. sugar
1/2 C. brown sugar
1 1/2 C. hot water
1/3 C. coca powder

Spray crock pot with cooking spray.  In large microwaveable bowl, melt butter and chocolate chips.  Mix well.  Add sugar, cocoa, vanilla, salt, milk and egg yolk and mix.  Add flour and baking powder and mix thoroughly.  Pour batter into crock pot and spread out evenly.
Stir together all molten filling ingredients in bowl and pour over batter in crock pot.
Cover and cook on high for about 2 hours.  Check after 1 and 1/2 hours to make sure it isn't finished already.  Cool slightly and serve with ice cream or whipped cream!

Cutler's Peanut Butter Cookies

If you have never been to Cutler's Cookies before than you have never really lived.  They have the best sandwiches and the cookies are stuff dreams are made of.  Anytime I am remotely close to Bountiful I have to stop and grab a cookie or dozen.  Awhile ago I stumbled up their blog and they have some of their cookie recipes posted!  This one is my favorite.  Peanut butter, chocolate, and love is what these are made out of.  The dough itself doesn't have peanut butter in it but don't let that fool you.  They are packed with flavor and amazing so go make them already!!

Peanut Butter Cookies

1 cup butter, room temperature (I soften mine in the microwave and it works great too)
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 eggs
3 1/4 cups cake flour (I use all purpose flour and just add a little less than 3 1/4 cups)
1 bag Reese's Peanut Butter chips

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees and place rack in center of oven.
Cream together butter, sugars, salt, baking soda and powder.  Add vanilla and eggs. Mix well.
Add flour and peanut butter chips. Mix just until flour and chips are blended together.
Using a cookie scoop or ice cream scoop, or just a large spoon, scoop into 2 inch balls and place on a parchment lined cookie sheet about 4 inches apart. 
Bake for about 12 minutes, or until set.


Peanut Butter Frosting 

1/2 cup butter, soft-room temperature
3 cups powdered sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter (not natural)
milk to thin to proper consistency (whole milk is best)

Cream together room-temperature butter and powdered sugar. Add peanut butter and beat until smooth. Add milk a tablespoon at time, just until frosting is smooth and creamy. Set aside.

Chocolate Frosting

1 cup butter or 1/2 and 1/2 blend butter/margarine
4-6 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa (or less if you like a lighter cocoa frosting)
1 tablespoon vanilla
1/4 to 1/3 cup milk

Cream butter and 4 cups powdered sugar. Add cocoa and vanilla. Add milk a tablespoon at a time until frosting is smooth. If needed, add more powdered sugar.

After cookies are cooled, frost with peanut butter frosting. Then frost on top of the peanut butter frosting with the chocolate frosting. When spreading the chocolate frosting on top of the peanut butter frosting, be very gentle and leave a small space between the edge of the peanut butter frosting and the chocolate frosting for a layered frosting look.

Pictures and original recipe found: http://cutlerscookies.blogspot.com/2013/02/peanut-butter-cookies.html

Apple Pie Cookies

I love coffee cake...well, I love crumb topping.  I found a recipe for coffee cake cookies and knew I had to try them.  My only problem was that my husband really didn't want me to make them.  I couldn't figure it out....they were crumbly, they had sugar....they looked good.  Finally I realized he thought coffee cake and therefore coffee cake cookies had coffee in it.  In my church we follow the word of wisdom which includes, among other things, not drinking coffee.  My husband couldn't figure out why I was okay making desserts with coffee in them if we didn't drink it.  Once I explained you are just suppose to eat them with coffee and the dessert was coffee free he was a little more on board, especially after I told him I would call them crumb cookies instead.  :)

The original recipe was so much fun to make and I just had to put my own little twist on it.  I added pie filling and viola!  Apple pie cookies were born!  The pie filling was just what the cookie needed.  An awesome punch of flavor, with the buttery cookie and touch of cinnamon.   It is just like a bite size pie but better since it is a cookie!  Once again, sorry for the awful pics....someday I will get a better camera and learn how to make food look as good as it tastes!!

Apple Pie Cookies

Makes about 20 large cookies

Crumb Topping:

1/2 Cup butter, softened

1/3 Cup brown sugar

1/3 Cup granulated sugar

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon 

1/2 tsp salt

1 Cup flour

Mix all ingredients and set aside in fridge

Cookies:

1 Cup butter, softened

1 Cup brown sugar

1/2 Cup granulated sugar

1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

3 Cups flour

Pie filling - Any type of pie will work

Powdered sugar

Preheat oven to  350 degrees.  Use a non stick cookie sheet or spray your cookie sheet pan.

For the cookies:

Mix together butter and sugars until smooth.  Add cinnamon, eggs, and vanilla and mix until light and fluffy.  Then mix in baking soda, salt, and flour until just combined.

Scoop out cookies using a cookie scoop (3 Tbsp) size or use a large spoon.  Make sure the dough is in a ball if you use a normal spoon.  I put 8 cookies per sheet.  Make a fairly deep indent into each cookie.  I use a smaller cookie scoop to do this but a small spoon or your fingers would work great too.  Make the hole big enough to get all that delicious filling and crumb top on there.  For any chunky pie fillings cut up into smaller pieces before you fill the cookie.  Spoon the pie filling into the cookie and top with about 1 Tbsp of crumb topping.  Press the crumb topping down into the pie filling and don't be afraid to pack it in there!

Bake cookies for 10-12 minutes or until the edges start to get golden.

Let cookies cool for a few minutes and dust with powdered sugar.  Transfer to a cooling rack or your counter.   They taste the best slightly warm....mmmm... enjoy!

Bunco Brownies

I have a confession to make.  I am not the best at following recipes.  I either change the ingredients or I just don't read what the instructions tell me to do.  Sometimes, this is disastrous...like that one time I made lasagna with avocado filling...gross.  Sometimes wonderful food is born.  Below is a prime example of this. I added more peanut butter than I was supposed to and the struesel filling turned into a peanut butter cookie topping instead.  I hope you like these as much as I did! 

These brownies went so fast I didn't have time to get a good pic

Bunco Brownies

Recipe Source: Modified from A Cook's Quest

These brownies make a 9x13 pan.  If you want to do a 9x9 pan, just half the recipe.  

2 brownie boxes, prepared according to the box.

Topping:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup light brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 cup  peanut butter
1/4 cup melted butter
1/4 tsp. salt until blended and crumbly. 


Combine the above ingredients until a soft dough forms.

Pour brownie batter into greased 9x13 pan.  Take pieces of the peanut butter dough and cover brownie batter with it. (It is okay if all the brownie isn't covered.  The brownie that seeps through has a really good texture!)  Bake at 350 degrees 45-50 minutes.

Enjoy!