Miniature Chocolate Cream Pies with a Peanut Butter Pretzel Crust.

Plum Bread Pudding with Carmel Sauce

Last night I got into bed at twelve with a pack of Necco and I though to myself "I"ll look at some food blogs for ten minutes, while I eat a couple of Necco wafers and then I'll go to bed." A whole pack of Necco wafers and an hour and half later I was still surfing food blogs. And although this was not good for my sleep schedule and my teeth I got a TON of great ideas for baking. So the night was over all a success. Although I probably now have a cavity. Oh well.
The first thing I decided to make was a plum bread pudding with carmel sauce. So it actually contains prunes... But no one likes prunes in there food. So we'll just call it plum bread pudding and keep that little bit of information between us, ya hear?

This recipe is adapted from http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/12/make-this-cake-today-trust-me. This is my new favorite food blog and if you haven't read it yet I suggest you DO IT NOW! Because you will not only laugh your butt off but you will gain a lot of great recipes. I will even understand if you never read my food blog again because mine is so inferior to hers.
I also made a peach compote to go along with the bread pudding by just boiling peaches with sugar and cinnamon until they reached a syrupy state.

This recipe was supposed to make a cake but I made mine into a sort of bread pudding because I slightly undercooked it and over beat the ingredients! This was intentional. I promise :)

Plum Bread Pudding with Carmel Sauce

Ingredients

• FOR THE PUDDING:
• 1 cup Prunes
• 1 cup Sugar
• 3 whole Eggs
• 1 cup Canola Oil
• 1-½ cup Flour, Sifted
• 1 teaspoon Baking Soda
• 1 teaspoon Nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon Allspice
• 1 teaspoon Cinnamon
• 1 cup Buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract
• _____
• FOR THE ICING:
• 1 cup Sugar
• ½ cups Buttermilk
• ½ teaspoons Baking Soda
• 1 Tablespoon White Corn Syrup
• ¼ cups Butter
• ½ teaspoons Vanilla

Preparation Instructions

Preheat oven to 320 degrees.

Cover prunes with water. Bring to a boil and cook until soft and mashable, about eight minutes. Remove from heat, drain water, and mash on a plate. Set aside.

Mix together oil, sugar, and eggs. In a separate bowl, sift together dry ingredients. Combine wet and dry ingredients, add buttermilk and vanilla and stir gently until just combined. Throw in the mashed prunes and stir gently to combine. 

Pour batter into buttered baking dish and bake for 30 minutes.

While bread pudding has five minutes remaining, make the icing:
Combine all icing ingredients in a medium saucepan over medium heat and bring to a slow boil. Boil without stirring for 5 to 7 minutes, or until icing starts to turn dark. Icing should be carmel in color and easily pourable.

Remove bread pudding from oven and prick holes in the pudding using a fork. Pour on icing immediately and although the sauce to soak into the bread pudding.

Peanut butter banana cream pie with cookie crust.

I decided to make a peanut butter cream pie with a chocolate chip cookie crust because I had left over cookies that I needed to use up. Unfortunately I am not as posed as I obviously come of as on this blog. I sometimes, okay fine often, burn my cookies. My mom usually burns at least one thing in the oven everyday (even though she is a fantastic cook) so it must run in the family. To my dismay when I made those Ghirardelli cookies I happened to burn one pan. So sue me. Anyways, I absolutely HATE wasting food so I decided to use those burnt cookies in my next recipe. By the way I am going to be including the recipes in all of my posts from here on out!


Chocolate Chip Cookie Crust:
About 15 chocolate chip cookies (they should be hard not soft)
4 tbs butter
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
So I put all of my burned cookies into the Cuisinart to begin. I blended them until the cookies turned into fine crumbs. I then added the rest of the ingredients and blended until combined. Next, I pressed the mixture into the bottom of a greased pie pan and stuck it in the oven for ten minutes on 350 degrees.

Peanut Butter Cream Filling:
1 cup heaving whipping cream
2 tbs powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 package cream cheese
3/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup milk
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1 Banana

Beat whipping cream until stiff peaks form. Do not over beat because the whipped cream will turn buttery. Add powdered sugar and vanilla and beat until combined. Set aside. In another bowl beat peanut butter and softened cream cheese until light and airy. Add milk and powered sugar and beat until smooth. Fold in the whipped cream. Cover the bottom of the pie crust with a thin layer of the filling and then stick on sliced bananas. Pour the rest of the filling over it and chill for four hours or overnight. Enjoy!!

Berry boy bait with lemon curd and cream cheese

A couple of nights ago I had an indescribable meal at Beatrice and Woodsley. This is one of my favorite restaurants in Denver and the food never fails to surprise and delight me! For dessert at Beatrice and Woodsley we had a white chocolate blueberry souffle with lemon curd and cream cheese, I decided to do an adaptation of this recipe because it was so wonderful.

The next day I made a “blueberry boy bait” cake adapted from the food blog: momofukufor2.com. You can get the original recipe with this link http://momofukufor2.com/2010/07/blueberry-boy-bait-recipe/

Instead of using only blueberries, I also added a half cup of blackberries which was my biggest change from the recipe. I also turned the cake upside down so that the cinnamon sugar was facing down. I then spread lemon curd on top. Next I blended 1 package of cream cheese with 1/4 cup powdered sugar and spread that on top. This was a lovely combination with the berry cake so I was over all thrilled with the result.

I think the name boy bait definitely embodies this cake because my brother and my dad have not stopped eating the cake for two days :)

Garbage Cookies

I am going to make a bold statement and say that making these cookies was the most fun I’ve ever had. Wow. Bold. I know. BUT SO TRUE! These cookies not only taste amazing but also hep you clean out some space in your cabinets! So what’s not to love?!

For these cookies I just used a chocolate chip cookie base.

First preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Combine 1 cup butter with 1/2 cup brown sugar, 1/4 cup granulated sugar, 1 egg and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until smooth, fluffy and light in color. 

In a separate bow combine 2 cups four, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda and 1/4 teaspoon salt.

Combine flour mixture and butter mixture.

Now comes the fun part! Gather any random food items you have in cabinet and make pour them all into a bowl. I went CRAZY and used Luna bars, Oreos, Nuts, Chewy bars, Vegan macaroons (why do we own these?!), Pretzels, Chocolate bars, Junior Mints, Twix bars, trail mix, carmel corn, Le Petit Ecolier cookies and SO MUCH MORE! Then I crushed it all up and mixed it all together so that all the wonderful add ins would start to blend together. Then I added them to the cookie dough. I tripled the recipe because of all the crazy add ins I wanted to use. However, the cookie dough can hold a lot! So even if you have a lot of add ins you could just make one batch of cookie dough and the dough could hold it. Did that make any sense? It made sense in my head…. Anyways! Mix the add ins with the cookie dough by hand. Once they are fully incorporated roll the cookie dough into balls and place on a greased pan.

The baking time varies based on amount of add ons but I would say it takes from 8 to 12 minutes. Watch the cookies carefully as the baking time will vary.

I hope you have as much fun baking these cookies as I did. Although this is probably impossible because I was so thoroughly enjoying myself!

Double chocolate loaf cake

I love making quick breads even though I shouldn’t be having gluten. Quick breads are easy to make and a total crowd pleaser. It was eaten in half a day by my family so I didn’t even have a chance to break my no gluten rule. I also adapted this recipe from www.bakingobsession.com

Double Chocolate loaf cake



Ingredients:

• 1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
• ¾ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 ¼ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp baking soda
• ½ tsp salt

• ¼ cup freshly made coffee
• 2 tsp pure vanilla extract

• 1 stick unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 cup fine granulated sugar
• 8 oz whole fat ricotta cheese, at room temperature 
• 3 large eggs

• 1 cup white chocolate chunks
• ½ cup (3 oz) coarsely chopped chocolate

Preparation:
Center an oven rack and preheat the oven to 350F. Line an 8×4-inch loaf pan with parchment paper.
Sift the flour, cocoa, baking powder, soda, and salt onto a sheet of parchment paper or into a bowl. In another small bowl or a cup, combine the coffee and vanilla extract.
In a large bowl, beat the butter with an electric mixer for a few seconds, until creamy. Gradually add the sugar and beat until light and fluffy, 6 to 7 minutes. Add the ricotta and beat well to combine. With the mixer on medium, add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Reduce the speed to low and add the dry ingredients in three additions alternating with the espresso, starting and ending with the dry ingredients. Stir in both the white chocolate and the milk chocolate.
Transfer the batter into the prepared loaf pan, smooth the top and bake for about 1 hr. to 1 hr. 10 min.

Coconut jam bars and pine nut bars

I also adapted these cookie bars from the food blog: www.bakingobsession.com

Coconut jam bars

Ingredients:

• 1 cup unsweetened flaked coconut, divided
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon Kosher salt
• 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) cold unsalted butter, cut into pieces
• 1 3/4 cups old-fashioned or quick oats
• 1/2 cup strawberry jam and 1/4 cup grape jam

Preparation:

Center an oven rack and preheat the oven to 375°F. Line a 9 x 13 jelly roll pan with parchment paper extending the parchment on the long sides for easier removal the cookies from the pan.

Spread 1/2 cup coconut evenly on a baking sheet and toast stirring until golden, about 8 minutes, then cool.
In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugars, and salt, then add the butter and cut with a pastry blender or your fingers until a dough begins to form. Then add and knead in the oats and toasted coconut until combined well.
Reserve 3/4 cup of the dough, then press the remainder evenly into the bottom of the prepared pan (do not pack it very tightly) and spread the jam over it. Crumble the reserved dough evenly over the jam, then sprinkle with the remaining 1/2 cup (untoasted) coconut.
Bake in the middle of the oven until golden, about 25 minutes, then cool completely in the pan on a rack.

Pine nut bars
For the crust:

• 1 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tbsp fine granulated sugar
• ½ tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp ground coriander
• ¼ tsp kosher salt
• 1 stick (¼ -lb; ½ cup) chilled unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch chunks
• 1 large egg
• ½ tsp pure vanilla extract

For the filling:

• 1/3 cup honey
• ¼ cup packed light brown sugar
• ¼ tsp kosher salt
• ½ stick (4 tbsp) chilled unsalted butter, cut into tablespoon portions
• 1 ½ cups pine nuts, lightly toasted

Make the crust:
Center an oven rack and preheat the oven to 375F. Spray a 9-inch square pan with oil and line the pan with parchment paper (the bottom and the sides). Make sure the parchment is well adhered to the pan. Set aside.
In a bowl of the food processor, pulse together the flour, sugar, baking soda, coriander, and salt until combined. Add the chilled butter chunks and pulse until the mixture resembles a coarse meal. In a small bowl, lightly whisk the egg and vanilla, then drip through the processor tube while pulsing. Continue to pulse until moist crumbs form, do not overprocess. Transfer the dough onto a lightly floured surface and fold it over a couple of times to distribute the butter.
Press the dough into the bottom of the prepared pan, prick with a fork and freeze until firm, for about 15 minutes.  Then bake the crust until it’s light golden brown, about 20 minutes.
Make the filling, bake :
While the crust is baking, make the filling. Combine the honey, brown sugar, and salt in a medium heavy saucepan. Heat over medium heat, stirring, until the sugar dissolves and the mixture comes to a boil. Boil, without stirring, for 2 minutes. Then add the butter and boil, now stirring, for another minute. Remove from the heat and stir in the pine nuts until the nuts are coated with the honey mixture.
Pour the filling over the just baked and still hot crust and slide back into the oven. Bake until the filling is bubbling and caramelized, for about 15 minutes.

Carmel bars

I adapted these carmel bars from the food blog: www.bakingobsession.com 

They don’t have any peaches in them but I think the carmel flavor would taste amazing with the peaches. I plan to make a variation of these bars with peaches in them next time.

For the crust

• 14 tbsp (1 ¾ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
• ½ cup sugar
• ¼ tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour

For the filling:

• 5 tbsp unsalted butter
• 1 tbsp light corn syrup
• One 14-oz can sweetened condensed milk
• Set a rack in the lowest level of the oven and preheat to 350F. Line a 9×13-inch buttered pan with parchment paper, butter the paper. Set aside.
• Beat the butter with sugar and salt together with an electric mixer until soft and light, 2 to 3 minutes. Beat in the vanilla. Beat in the flour, scraping the bowl, until the dough is smooth.
  Scrape three-quarters of the dough into the prepared pan. Press the dough down evenly, without excessive compressing. Chill the dough-lined pan. Set the remaining dough aside.
  For the filling, bring the butter, corn syrup, and sweetened condensed milk to a simmer in a medium saucepan, stirring often. Allow the mixture to boil gently until it starts to thicken and becomes a very light caramel color. Transfer the filling into a stainless steel bowl and cool it to room temperature, stirring occasionally.
  
  
  
  Remove the dough-lined pan from the refrigerator and spread the filling over the dough. Crumble the remaining dough over the filling.
  
  
  
  

Hello!

This is my first post! I am still trying to figure blogs out. I have another blog at www.jr-food.tumblr.com but I thought having more than one could only help me! So with this blog I am basically recording my own original recipes and my adaptation of other recipes. Let me know what you think!