Lemon Cookie Cups

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Lemon cookie cups

I admit that this recipe is very simple and very store bought. That being said, they are also very good. I think people often think that cake mixes, or store bought items are "cheating". Well I say that's just silly. We all cut corners all the time; I don't raise or butcher my own chicken, do you? I am a busy woman and I think mixes can be great and convenient and very original if you know how to use them. That's my two cents on that though. By all means though, if you have a recipe you love and have the time for in place of whatever mixes I use, go for it. Baking and cooking have basic rules and ratios that make things work, but creating something new is all about trying new combinations and variations.

So anyway, I made these for a friend who loves lemon, and was entertaining guests. They are simple and small enough to be out out as something to serve with appetizers or other snacks without it being a full blown dessert. I adapted 'cake mix cookies' for this recipe.

Ingredients:
1 box lemon cake mix (any brand)
2 eggs
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 can lemon frosting (or whipped topping)

you'll need a mini muffin tin and liners.

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line mini muffin tin  with liners.
2. Mix cake mix with eggs, and oil. Spoon cake mix into mini muffin tins. The dough will be thick- think cookie dough consistency. cups should only be about half full (so about 1/2 inch balls of the dough).
3. Bake cookie dough in muffin tins for about 12-15 minutes. Do not overcook these, but be sure they have cooked long enough or you will not have a solid cookie cup to put the frosting into.
4. When the cookies have baked and are still warm, they will look like mini muffins rather than cookies, use your thumb (be careful, they are hot!) or a cooking utensil to push the middles of the cookies down. this will be where you put your frosting.
5. Allow cookie cups to cool in baking tin a few minutes and them remove, setting them on a wire rack to cool completely.
6. Once totally cooled, put a dollop of frosting into the center of each cookie cup. I did this by putting the frosting into a plastic sandwich bag and cutting the bag to create a piping bag.
7. Chill until ready to serve to ensure the frosting does not lose its shape.

Other ideas? fill the cookie cups with lemon pie filling, strawberry jam, cream cheese frosting, or cool whip and top with lemon zest and powdered sugar. Be creative!

Enjoy!

White Chocolate Brownies

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White Chocolate Brownies

Honestly, I don't consider myself a lover of brownies. I love bars though, and if there is a brownie that is similar to a bar, I love it. I think it stems from always having overcooked and dried out brownies from a box at bake sales and other events as a kid. Anyway, I have never really got into the brownie. I saw this recipe though and was fascinated. I love dark chocolate, but white chocolate? A white chocolate brownie? Intriguing. Chocolate is chocolate though, white or dark, so I decided to give this a try. Maybe this would be the recipe to change my view of brownies.

All in all I thought it was pretty darn good. Everyone else thought they were pretty darn good too. Be sure not to cook them too long of they will be drier and have less of a "white chocolate" flavor.

Also- I was baking for a crowd and doubled the recipe and it doubles very easily.






Ingredients:
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
8 ounces white chocolate
2 eggs
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 tablespoon vanilla
1 cup flour
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 8x8 baking dish (or 9x13 if you are doubling the recipe) with parchment paper. You can also grease and flour the pan if you like, but I had chancing brownies sticking to the bottom of the pan. 
2. Beat eggs, and sugar until well mixed and slightly thick and fluffy. 
3. Melt half of the chocolate chips and the butter. I did this in the microwave- being sure to do this very slowly because white chocolate burns even more quickly than milk or dark chocolate. Stir frequently and only heat enough to melt the chocolate chips. Once the white chocolate melts, stir in the rest of the white chocolate and stir until completely smooth and melted. 
4. Add the white chocolate and butter mixture to the egg and sugar mixture. Add in the flour and vanilla. Stir until well incorporated. Add in semisweet chocolate chips.
5. Pour batter into prepared baking dish. The batter will be a little bit firm and may require a spatula to evenly spread in the pan. 
6. Bake for about 35-40 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from the center and the top is slightly browned. 
7. Allow to cool completely before cutting. 

Enjoy!

sweet and salty butterscotch bars

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Sweet and Salty Butterscotch Bars

As my blog is titled, I am an experimental baker. I could probably find a version of what I would like to make somewhere on the web, but who's to say their recipe is better than something I could come up with, and who has the time for endless web searches anyway? I sure don't. Plus, its more fun to come up with something on my own. So thats what this recipe is. It is a creation which I threw together and may or may not be very similar to something someone else has made. I have no idea however since I didn't go searching the web for something like this.

Anyway, I wanted to make something, and I was too lazy to go out in the cold and wind and rain to get other ingredients. That limited me to what I had on hand. which was quite a bit to be honest, but again.. I was feeling lazy. So I wanted something relatively simple. I ended up going with bars because everyone loves bars, and because you make one batch and you're done. Easy!

Note that when making these you want the cookie base to cook through without over baking but it still needs to be firm enough to be the base for the bars. this is a fine line, but use your best judgement. this is one of the few times i'd say to error on the side of over baking because if you under bake the bars, those in the middle will end up doughy and not be able to be picked up or support the next layer. which ends up being very upsetting. and then you're left with a bunch of bars that can't be picked up properly from the pan and require a fork just to get them out of the pan, so then you just start eating bites of the bars with a fork, and then you eat the whole pan. Then you're fat, you have no bars, and you are still upset they didn't turn out. I have obviously been through this before; take my advice and bake them a few more minutes if you're unsure if they are done.

Ingredients:
1 box double chocolate chunk cookie mix. (I used a chocolate cookie with chocolate chunks in it)
-all ingredients required for that particular mix
1 large jar jet puff marshmallow creme
1 bag butterscotch chips
about 24 pretzels (I used squares, but circles would work)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (or whatever your particular mix says to use)
2. line a 9x13 inch baking dish with parchment paper. press the cookie mix into the bottom of the pan until even. note: the layer will appear very thin. trust me-it will rise when it bakes and it will be ok. it gets better. trust. bake the cookie layer about 20-25 minutes or until the edges pull away from the side of the dish and the middle is soft set and a tooth pick comes out clean.
3. Allow the cookie layer to cool; while that cools, warm (do not melt) the marshmallow creme. spread the creme over the cookie layer.
4. In a separate dish, microwave the butterscotch chips for 45 seconds, stir, and then repeat microwaving for 15 seconds and stirring until all chips are melted. pour melted butterscotch chips over the marshmallow layer.
5. Press a pretzel on top of what would be an individual bar (i.e. 4 rows with 6 pretzels each). you could also use chopped up pretzels on top and have a more liberal amount of pretzels.
6. Cool bars in the refrigerator. Cut into individual squares.

Enjoy!

Milk Chocolate Chip Cookies

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Chocolate Chip Cookies

Who doesn't love a good chocolate chip cookie? I am constantly on the search for good cookie recipes. Cookies in general are great. They are shareable, convenient, fun, delicious, and the dough usually is pretty good too. I will say that I have made some bad chocolate chip cookies in my day. It drives me nuts when the dough is really thin and the cookie spreads so much that the cookie is a flattened translucent looking patty. I am also so inconsolably upset when that happens. This recipe does NOT do that. and it makes a pretty good cookie.


Original Recipe: http://www.browneyedbaker.com/2008/06/21/thick-and-chewy-chocolate-chip-cookies/

Ingredients:
2 cups plus 2 tablespoons  flour

1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled until warm
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 large egg plus 1 egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1-1 1/2 cups semisweet or milk chocolate chips. milk chocolate chips will result in a sweeter cookie overall. 

Directions: 

1. preheat oven to 325 degrees. line a baking sheet with parchment paper. 

2. Mix dry ingredients expect sugar together- baking soda, salt, flour

3. Mix wet ingredients-butter, egg, vanilla, etc with sugars. beat with a hand mixer until mixed. Add dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. 

4. Stir in chocolate chips of your choice. 

5. Form 1.5 inch balls of dough. place on pan evenly and bake for 15-20 minutes. DO NOT OVER BAKE! 

The trick to a chewy cookie- which is my favorite kind, is to take them out when the edges brown and the middle is sort of soft set. Take the cookies out when you see this and then allow the cookies to sit on the baking sheet for a few minutes after removal from the oven so that the bottoms can continue to cook enough to create a cookie that is solid enough to be picked up but that won't be hard all the way through. 

Note that this recipe doubles well- thats what I did. and if you double the recipe, you're able to freeze extra dough and then thaw and bake it later...OR eat it in ice cream.. I'm not judging. 

Enjoy!

Caramel Apple Cider Cookies

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Caramel Apple Cider Cookies

I have been working. A lot. This is my excuse for not blogging my baking lately. I have been baking but I have been so wound up in getting my baked goods out of the house -so I don't stuff my face with them, that I havent done adequate blogging. Not a good excuse- but the truth.


So anyway, when I finally got around to baking and even better- actually blogging about it this was the result: deliciousness. I wanted to make something "autumnal" cause well.. it's autumn. I love the fall. The smells, the flavors, the scarfs and football. Really and truely, the only thing I dislike about the fall is that it means winter is that much closer. I'm a summer baby, and me and winter are not on good terms. Never have been, never will be. The fall however is a perfect time to embrace the chill and the flavors of the season. In this case, its apples. Apple cider is warm and comforting and a classic.

These cookies are really simple to make but are packed with fall flavor. Feel free to play around with the amount of cinnamon, cider mix, caramel, really its up to you. Enjoy the season, enjoy the apples and enjoy the cookies!

Original Recipe: http://www.the-girl-who-ate-everything.com/2011/11/caramel-apple-cider-cookies.html

Ingredients:
1 cup crisco (butter flavor) - or you can use 1 cup of butter (2 sticks)
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (7.4 oz) box Alpine Spiced Apple Cider Instant Original Drink Mix (10 packets)
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1 (14 ounce) bag of Kraft chewy caramels (I didnt need all of them)

Directions:
1. preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
2. Beat together crisco, sugar, eggs, salt, vanilla, and stir in the 10 packets of cider mix.
3. Add in the remaining ingredients- not the caramel though!
4. Once ingredients are well mixed, take 1" balls of the dough and form into "patty" shape. Place an unwrapped caramel in the middle and wrap the dough around the caramel on all sides. An alternative method is to form a ball with the dough and press your thumb into the dough  making a large hole, and placing the caramel inside and then enclosing the dough around the caramel. Either method will yield the same results. Essentially you want to get the caramel in the middle of a ball of dough. The balls of dough will appear large, but do not spread much.
5. Bake at 350 degrees for about 15 minutes. smaller cookies with less dough will need less time than this. I dont recommend using too much dough or you will end up with a cookie that has caramel in the middle but a lot of excess 'cookie' around the edges and will get bites without caramel stuffing. ya know what I'm saying? If you use too much dough, you'll know what I'm saying. Bake the cookies until the edges begin to brown. the middles may look slightly undone. These cookies do not brown very much so a brown cookie is a burnt cookie.
6. Remove the cookies from the oven and allow to cool on the baking sheet in order to ensure that the bottom is not too soft and you won't lose your chunk of caramel. --this is when using enough dough comes in handy: using too LITTLE dough can result in the caramel 'leaking through' the dough and onto your baking sheet.
7. Allow cookies to complete cooling on wax paper or cooling rack.

These are awesome as is, or you can really make them visually appealing by melting caramel over the tops (or dipping the bottoms ?!), or sprinkling with cinnamon (although they have quite a bit of flavor).

Hopefully you enjoy the season as much as I do.


Enjoy!!

Frosted Peanut Butter Cereal Bars

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Peanut Butter + Cocoa Krispies

So this recipe is similar to a previous post for Peanut Butter Rice Krispie Treats, but this one is a little different- both with the cereal, and the more traditional marshmallow aspect. Oh and the spectacular peanut butter frosting. Last minute I had to pull together a dessert for a BBQ. It was a family thing, so I wanted something kid friendly and fast. what is more classic than the peanut butter and chocolate combo? In my opinion its a fairly kid friendly choice, and rice krispie treats are quick. Use whatever plain (or only lightly sweetened) cereal you have on hand. I had cheerios and I wanted to finish up my cocoa krispies, grab some peanut butter, and your set. If you have frosting on hand, you can make a peanut butter frosting topping to go on top- which was ALMOST too much. But I don't think you can have too much peanut butter. Therefore I loved it. Any everyone else thought they were pretty darn good too.

Ingredients:

6 cups cereal (I used 3 cups cocoa krispies + 3 cups cheerios)
1 package marshmallows
3/4 cup peanut butter (I always end up using about 3/4 of the jar- which im sure is more than called for but I love peanut butter and I hate when you pour it over the cereal and realize you dont have enough pb/mallow to cover it all)
3 Tbs butter
1 Tbs vanilla

peanut butter topping (optional):
1 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup cream cheese frosting - or vanilla if you prefer
Mini chocolate chips for garnish (or mini peanut butter cups or peanuts)

Directions:
1. Line a 9x 13 inch baking dish with wax paper or foil and set aside
2. In a large sauce pan melt marshmallows, 3/4 cup peanut butter, vanilla and butter. stir repeatedly until smooth.
3. Quickly stir in cereal(s) of choice, and gently toss until coated. Dump cereal mixture into the lined baking dish. allow to cool
4. In a medium sized bowl, mix the 1 cup peanut butter with the 1/2 cup frosting. the mixture will be thick. Spread the frosting over the cooled bars. Sprinkle with chocolate chips or other topping of choice.
5. Cut the bars into squares.

Enjoy!

Churro Chex Mix

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Churro Chex Mix

Ingredients:
12 cups rice Chex cereal
1 package cinnamon chips1/2 cup butter or margarine1 cups powdered sugar1/2 granulated sugar3 teaspoons cinnamon


Directions:
1. In a large bowl put all your chex cereal. I mixed half rice chex and half wheat. whatever you have is fine, and I'm sure this would work with other cereal as well such as rice krispies or plain cheerios. 
2. place sugar, powdered sugar, and cinnamon in a bowl, mix and set aside.

3. In a microwave safe dish, melt the butter and cinnamon chips on high for 45 seconds and then every 15, stirring in between. microwaving chocolate chips (in this case cinnamon) is risky business because you can easily burn the chocolate if they aren't stirred repeatedly. 
4. pour the melted butter/cinnamon chip mixture over the cereal and gently stir until all the cereal is coated. 
5. while the cereal is still warm, sprinkle the sugar and cinnamon mixture over the cereal, and continue to stir until coated. spread on a baking sheet lined with wax paper to cool. store in an airtight container.

Enjoy!