Christmas Candy Corn and Oreo Bark

Who doesn't love candy bark? One of the most often searched and viewed recipes on my blog is my Halloween Candy Corn Bark. When I saw Holiday Candy Corn at Michael's I had to buy it to create a Christmas version.

This is all you need to make some tasty Christmas cookie and candy corn bark. If you like salty with your sweet, toss in some pretzels in this mix too. That's the great thing about bark...completely customizable.

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Double Chocolate Chunk Cookies

I must share these wonderful cookies with you.

No picture can possibly capture their deliciousness.

No matter how hard I try.

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Butter Pecan Pumpkin Cake...The One Fall Cake You Need To Make

If you make no other Fall sweet treat with pumpkin, you need it to be this one. If you're not a baker you can still do this very simple three ingredient cake. I promise. You can even eat it without frosting. It's incredibly moist and delicious. The pumpkin flavor is subtle; it just tastes like you're eating Fall.

Here's all you need for the cake: Betty Crocker Butter Pecan cake mix, canned pumpkin and three eggs.

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Easy Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

The cookies are entirely too simple, perfect for fall and completely adaptable to your tastes. They can be made with only a handful of ingredients...ingredients you very well may have lurking in your pantry right now. Great for Halloween or Thanksgiving get-togethers or just for this afternoon.

All you need is cake mix, canned pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling), chocolate chips, cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger. I'm a big fan of Betty Crocker cake mixes. I always stock up when they're on sale.

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Boba Fett Pizza and Darth Vader Brownies

I'm woefully behind on blog postings. I have photos upon photos taunting me to publish them with black and white words surrounding them on this blog but alas that part of blogging takes time I've not been giving it. Many things seem out of place to post after such a long time and give me more hesitation. Then last night I had an epiphany that I shouldn't care! I should just share. If it's a Christmas post in July so be it. After all don't we often find blogs and scroll through them out of time? And with the beauty that is Pinterest we can now pin those things we want to recall in the proper season. Are you a Pinterest addict? I'm in love. You can see my pins here and if you need an invitation to join the fun send me a message.

So without further ado I'll get the ball rolling with the Star Wars Day, May the Fourth Be with You! This one seems mildly appropriate to post today since my city is a buzz with DragonCon this weekend. I first became aware of Star Wars day only last year thanks to facebook.

In 2010 I  whipped up a Han Solo in white chocolate carbonite, three Yoda colored vanilla lollipops and a large Darth Vader shaped rice crispy treat. Darth isn't chocolate rice crispies. He's the regular with added food coloring for the dark lord. This year I couldn't repeat my goodies so I decide to use my Vader pan to make brownies!

But not any brownies, Double Choclate Oreo Brownies! If we're going on the dark side we need to go all the way. I gathered the above ingredients and got cracking.

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The Wizarding Week of Harry Potter

My oldest son loves Harry Potter. This is him decked out in his Quidditch robe at Dragon*Con last year. He's loved Harry since he was barely two years old. His early affection can be blamed on HBO's constant running of The Sorcerer's Stone. It captivated him. We took him to see The Chamber of Secrets in the theater and it may very well have been his first movie theater experience. When Hagrid returns to the dining room cheers in the final scene my little boy stood up and cried because he knew the movie was ending.

Fast forward five years when Thing One is 8 years old he began reading the Harry Potter books. He had never seen any movies beyond those first two in all the years between. When he began the books his Harry Pottter love was reborn with an unquenching thirst. He voraciously read the books from the library. And soon wanted to own them all. 

Here he is with one of his favorite birthday presents on his ninth birthday, the remaining six books he could keep. Once he had completed reading the series we rented the Prisoner of Azkabam through the Half-Blood Prince for him to watch. He already knew disappointment from a book converted to film but was satisfied with the adaptation of Harry Potter.

The second Harry Potter Thing One ever saw in a movie theater was the first he actually remembers: The Deathly Hallows, Part One. He was over joyed and immediately a year long conversation began about seeing the final film. And during this year his Harry Potter love manifested in new ways.


His closet shrine for instance.

With a shelf dedicated to all thing Harry Potter.

His painted pumpkin for last Halloween was an homage to Harry Potter.

His Halloween costume last year even came with a request to cut his shaggy locks shorter and spray his hair dark.

And more recently our Museum of Natural History hosted a Wizards and Witches Weekend and he committed again to a costume as a Hogwarts student.

So as the date grew close for the end of Harry Potter in cinema we discussed the idea of a Harry Potter viewing party complete with Harry Potter snacks. I made a grave error in this discussion forgetting each film is approximately two and a half hours long. No one would come to a party to watch over 21 hours of videos. Oy! How would I tell my dear boy his party could not happen? Then I had another idea I pitched first to my man. A Wizarding Week of Harry Potter! We'd determine what day his father would be taking him to see the new movie then count back seven days and show one movie and serve one themed snack per day. My man was on board and I presented it to Thing One. He was sold!

Well, today is the day my man takes my biggest little man to see the end of Harry Potter. I imagine this may be a tad bitttersweet for him but I'm glad to have wrapped the event around some fabulous memories. Here's how his Wizarding Week went....

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Star Wars Rice Crispy Treats

Thing One had Rice Krispies for breakfast this morning. The sight of the box made Thing Two about bounce off the floor with the idea to make rice crispy treats...shaped like the Millennium Falcon and TIE Fighter. Thing Two would be the one with the Star Wars bedroom and Death Star birthday cake, in case you hadn't connected the dots.

He then promptly ran to the cabinet and retrieved this lovely box my man gave me for Christmas.

Inside it has Millennium Falcon and TIE Fighter sandwich cutters. I heart it but...

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The Best Steak I Never Ate

Tuesday was my man's birthday. A nice dinner date out plus a babysitter for three kids over multiple hours ran a little steep. Especially when my man knows I'm a vegetarian that can cook a mean steak. This was more affordable option plus it allowed him to eat steak in pajama pants and enjoy a fat slice of the homemade cake...win all around.

Do you want to see the steak? Prepare to drool, carnivores...

That's her, the steak I served my man alongside spicy sweet potato fries and steamed brocolli. This is one of his top ways he likes me to make his filet. It's drizzled with chimichurri and topped with avocado-tomatillo salsa. The sauce and salsa are fabulous. I put them over my fake vegetarian meat and want to lick the plate. I doubled the salsa recipe so there's a heaping bowl left to be scooped up on tortilla chips during the Super Bowl on Sunday.

Here's how you can make the same beautiful steak, the hunky Tyler Florence taught this vegetarian straight off the telly.

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Duo of Cupcakes: Part Two, PB Blossom Cupcakes

The cookies were done now it was time to try and pull off baking them inside a cupcake for my friend. I follow Bake It in a Cake on facebook and I'm constantly fascinated by the creations. Before I ever discovered BIIAC I had already thought baking sweet surprises inside cupcakes sounded awesome. And I tried to create my own Buckeye Cupcake for my dad's birthday. I need to return to that creation and perfect it. I also have a dream in my head to create a cupcake with a truffle inside that is inspired off Baileys Coffee.

I digress. The task at hand is to bake my Peanut Butter Blossoms inside a vanilla cupcake. I used the cake and frosting recipe here. I didn't change a thing and I was very pleased with the result. Very.

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Duo of Cupcakes: Part One, Peanut Butter Blossoms

Yesterday was my friend's birthday. My friend loves cupcakes and peanut butter and I like to bake so I wanted to make her something special. Something she couldn't find in Atlanta on her annual birthday cupcake hunt. I saw these crazy cupcakes and knew I had to try and create them. The first step was baking the Peanut Butter Blossom cookies. I didn't want to use store-bought cookie dough because it tends to be too soft and thin. I needed these to holdup inside the cupcake. Bake It in a Cake linked to a cookie recipe but since I have not abandoned my quest to bake everything in the Martha Stewart Baking Handbook, I thought I'd check for a peanut butter cookie there first. No luck. The book only has a Peanut Butter Sandwich cookie. Not what I need. However, I stayed true to Martha and found a recipe on her website for Peanut Butter Surprise Cookies. They used mini Reese's cups and if I had any I would've done that too. Can you just imagine? But alas, I only had chocolate kisses. The comments on Martha's cookie indicated these would have a brownie like consistency. That sounded just right.

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Vegetable Barley Casserole

I adore this recipe. It's adapted from Weight Watchers. I can't get my picky eater to give it a try; mixed up foods are a big no no. However, Thing Two loves it. He helped me make it for dinner Saturday night and we thought we should share it on the blog. It's really that good. So good in fact the news at the end of this post still makes me feel terrible loss.

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I Scream, You Scream, We All Scream for SNOW CREAM!

I've lived my entire life in Atlanta and that means I've not seen much snow. We had a couple of noticeable days in the early 80s when I was a kid. And one of my favorite memories from those days is not missing school but of my mom making snow cream. I still remember the large pale yellow Tupperware bowl she'd take outside to scoop up the snow. So this past week when we had over 5 inches of powdery snow fall I knew I had to make snow cream for my kids.

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Second Annual Open House Thanksgiving

For the second year we've done Thanksgiving a little untraditionally. Instead of sitting down to a meal with guests at a specific time. We've created a Thanksgiving Open House Party. We put out food from 9am until the last person leaves, this year that was around 11pm. I was so happily preoccupied with cooking, eating and chatting with friends and family I neglected taking hardly any pictures at all. But I'm blessed to report we had more than 35 people come share part of their day with us.

For the second year I roasted a large maple-brined, bacon-butter rubbed, bacon-wrapped turkey.

I was able to snap a picture of my man slicing her, with the grain. Ooops.

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Straight to Your Butt(er) Cookies

My man was out of town last weekend and my wonderful neighbors invited the kids and I to come over for dinner cooked on their new green egg. When I asked what I could bring she suggested something sweet. After a week on my own with the little ones I didn't have much energy to bake come Saturday morning. Step in this simple, yet delish sounding recipe for Gooey "Butt"er Cookies I saw last week in my facebook feed from My Effing Cookbook blog. The ingredient list was short: yellow cake mix, stick of butter, block of cream cheese, spoon of vanilla and an egg. I had all that. The directions were easy: mix all, chill a few hours, scoop, roll into balls, and bake a dozen minutes. It was a win-win.

You can find the recipe for her cookies here. Be warned she's fabulously irreverent and full of peppery language. She also tells you in real world terms how things should be. My favorite from this recipe would have to be her description to determine when the cream cheese is softened: "Take your index finger, poke the fattest part of your thigh and that’s how soft the cream cheese should be."

Here's the resulting plate of butter cookies. They were so yummy. I baked a lot more than the tiny amount on this little plate. These were just the only survivors left after dinner to snap a picture of.

I think I may try to see what happens if I bake them using a chocolate cake mix next time. And yes, there will be a next time. And a next. And a next...

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Candy Corn Brownies

The candy corn must be gone by the end of October. I thought baking some of them in brownies would be a festive and yummy thing to do. The kids were obviously in full support of this plan. I did regular candy corn on top of mini brownie muffins and caramel candy corn on top of a pan of brownies. While I do have several brownie recipes from scratch, these were from a box. But not just any box, Ghirardelli Double Chocolate Brownie mix.  Love this brownie mix! If you've never tried it you need to change that. It's so tasty on its own but if you have Heath toffee bits, you should throw a handful in the brownie batter for a truly mouth altering experience. But I digress; this is about candy corn!

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Soup's On: Roasted Fall Vegetable Soup

I created this soup on a whim. I'd read about a pumpkin soup that used peanut butter last week. Peanut butter? My curiosity was piqued. However, the recipe was in Polish and it involved apples, not something I wanted in my soup. I thought maybe I could make my own pumpkin soup with peanut butter, no apples. So when I was standing in the produce section of my market a few days later, surrounded by fall's bounty, an idea clicked. I would roast the vegetables then add peanut butter! And I didn't want just pumpkin since I'm not a huge fan; I wanted other veggies. 

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Baking Martha's Marble Cake with White Chocolate Glaze

Another baked good off the list from efforts to bake every recipe in Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook. Number 6 out of 173 was not a random pick from a friend but a custom order. My dad had me bring the book over so he could choose his recipe; he picked two. He wanted Marble Cake with White Chocolate Glaze for his birthday cake and come Christmas I'll be making him Baking Soda Biscuits.

But first came the marble cake and my previously mentioned frustration with the Baking Handbook. A hard to find ingredient not being called out as such. The culprit? Dutch-processed cocoa. This is my third recipe from Martha's book involving cocoa powder. All three specified Dutch-processed cocoa. I used natural unsweetened cocoa in both the One Bowl Chocolate Cupcakes and the icing on the Black and White Cookies. For my dad, I decided to see if I could track down the correct cocoa. I could not find it at Kroger, Publix or Ingles. I did track down a box at Whole Foods...for TEN DOLLARS. Yep, this cocoa costs twice as much as natural baking cocoa. 

Not all Dutch-processed cocoas will say such on their label. The ingredients always tell the tale. Natural will only list cocoa. Dutch-process will list cocoa and either say Dutch processed, like above, or simply alkali. That's what your looking for: alkali.

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Soup's On: Taco Soup

This is the essential soup in my household. I make a large pot every week to keep in the fridge. It's a tasty, filling, low calorie, high fiber meal. It's portable to be taken on picnics and hikes. It's even good cold. I've served this to satisfied friends when they've come over for lunch; my middle child asks for it along with a veggie burger almost daily. When we go on playdates and pack lunches, Thing Two does not want a sandwich; he want's this soup. And it's super simple and fast to make from pantry items. The recipe has been modified from a version of Taco Soup my Weight Watchers leader gave me several years ago. One cup of soup has approximately 100 calories, less than 1 gram of fat and 6 grams of fiber. If you're a Weight Watcher member like myself, that's only 1 point per cup.

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Chewy Peanut Butter-Chocolate Chip Brownies

I love brownies. Seriously. Love. Brownies. I could give up all other desserts in favor of brownies. The only way I do not like a brownie is with nuts. Do not do that to a brownie. It is an offense to the chocolate perfection. I know this; the brownies speak to me. The brownies also spoke to me when I first saw the Ultimate Edge Brownie Pan. They told me to buy it. The told me if I bought it they would bake. I resisted their cry until the day my neighbor shared she too had been hearing the voice of the brownie. We decided to co-own the best little brownie pan that ever was. 

This past weekend I realized I'd been holding the brownie pan of awesomeness hostage too long and needed to send it next door for a few months. But before I let the pan go I had to make one more batch. Why I didn't turn to Martha's Baking Handbook, I do not know. Instead I made these...

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Baking Martha's Black and White Cookies

Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook Black and White Cookies

Prior to my adventure to bake recipe number 5 out of 173 in Martha Stewart's Baking Handbook, my knowledge of the Black and White Cookie was limited to the Seinfeld episode. I see this cookie occasionally in glass bakery cases and recall Jerry's assertion to "look to the cookie" for racial harmony. 

“You see, Elaine, the key to eating a black and white cookie is that you wanna get some black and some white in each bite. Nothing mixes better than vanilla and chocolate. And yet still somehow racial harmony eludes us. If people would only look to the cookie, all our problems would be solved.”

Sadly it seems this New York specialty cookie was born not to show us how everyone can get along but as a way for local bakeries to use their leftover cake batter for extra profit. A little extra flour was tossed in with the batter and a cookie was made. Regardless of why this cookie exists, I'm glad I got to know it. Cake never tasted better as a cookie.

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