Snickers Cake

I went to a cake auction fundraiser this past Friday and I signed up to bring a cake. Last year I went to this fundraiser and I brought a cake but I went for looks. I brought a beach themed cake with what looked like water and sand on top. Then I had teddy grahams lying out on fruit by the foot and teddy grahams in inner tubes (watermelon rings.) Then I had palm trees and little drink umbrellas on the side. It turned out pretty awesome.

This year I wanted to make more of an adult cake. I decided to make a snickers cake. I used the recipe from Brown Eyed Baker to make this cake. The only thing I changed was the chocolate cake recipe. I used a simple chocolate cake recipe from Nellie Bellie.

Ingredients for the chocolate cake:

1. 3/4 cup soft butter
2. 3 eggs at room temperature
3. 2 c. all-purpose flour
4. 3/4 cup cocoa
5. 1 tsp baking soda
6. 3/4 tsp baking powder
7. 1/2 tsp salt
8. 2 cup sugar
9. 2 tsp vanilla
10. 1 1/2 cup milk

 

Directions:

1. Using three 8 inch pans, grease bottom of pans. preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Beat butter for 30 seconds or so. slowly add sugar.
3. Add eggs 1 at a time beating after each one. Beat in vanilla.
4. Add dry ingredients beating after each addition.
5. Add 1/2 of the milk, beat. Then add the other 1/2. Beat just until everything is combined nicely.
6. Spread batter evenly into pans.
7. Bake for 30-35 minutes for round pans. Watch it though! a knife coming out clean from the center means it is done.

 

Now the snickers part of the cake:

 

There are four main parts

 

First,

The Nougat Filling

Ingredients:

4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 cup granulated sugar
¼ cup evaporated milk
1½ cups marshmallow fluff
¼ cup creamy peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1½ cups salted peanuts, roughly chopped

 

Directions:

Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add the sugar and evaporated milk, stirring until dissolved, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and cook for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Remove the pan from heat and add the marshmallow fluff, peanut butter, and vanilla extract, stirring until completely smooth. Fold in the peanuts. Let the nougat mixture cool to room temperature before using it in the cake. You can do this leaving it at room temperature or you can pop it into the refrigerator to speed up the process. Be sure to give a stir occasionally as it cools.

 I think this nougat filling is what makes this cake taste so good. I ate a couple spoonfuls out of the pan.

 

Second,

Salted Caramel Buttercream Frosting

Ingredients:

½ cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
¼ cup salted caramel sauce
2 cups powdered sugar

 

Directions:

Beat together the butter and cream cheese on medium-high speed for 5 minutes. Pour in the salted caramel and beat until combined. Reduce the speed to medium-low and slowly add the powdered sugar, a little at a time, until it has all been incorporated. Increase the speed to medium-high and beat for an additional two to three minutes, until light and fluffy.

 

Third,

Assemble the Cake

 If your cakes baked up uneven or have domed on top, level off the tops. Place one cake layer on a serving plate. Cover with half of the nougat filling and then spread a couple spoonfuls of the salted caramel sauce over top to evenly cover the nougat filling. (When I spread the nougat filling on, I pushed it all the way out to the sides of the cake, but when I put the next layer on, it pushed the nougat filling out and down to the bottom. I would recommend not pushing the nougat filling all the way out to the side. The weight of the layers will push it out to the side.)Top with a second cake layer and cover with the remaining nougat filling and top with caramel sauce. Place the final cake layer on top face-down. Frost the cake with the salted caramel frosting, finishing it as smoothly as possible. Refrigerate the cake for at least 1 hour, until the frosting is set.

 

Fourth,

Chocolate Ganache

Ingredients:

8 ounces milk chocolate, finely chopped
4 ounces (½ cup) heavy cream

 

Directions:

While the cake chills, make the chocolate ganache. Place the chocolate in a medium bowl; set aside. Place the cream in a small saucepan over medium heat and warm until it just comes to a boil. Pour the cream over the chopped chocolate and let sit for 2 minutes. Begin whisking the mixture in the center, gradually working your way outward until the ganache is completely smooth. Set aside to cool, whisking occasionally, until it has thickened slightly, yet still a pourable consistency.

 

Transfer the ganache to a 2-cup measuring cup. Slowly pour the chocolate ganache into the center of the cake, letting it push itself outward and flow over the sides of the cake. Refrigerate the cake for at least 30 minutes, giving the ganache a chance to set up. To finish garnishing, drizzle some additional salted caramel sauce over the top and side of the cake, and top with chopped peanuts. Keep the cake refrigerated, removing it from the refrigerator about 20 minutes prior to serving.

 

 

 

Jackson's First Birthday

My baby turned one! I can hardly believe it. He is getting so big! Actually he's not that big according to the charts, but he sure is big to  me! Our wedding anniversary happens to be on the same day as our little guys birthday and for the second year in a row, we haven't done much to celebrate. But, we did have a big party for Jackson so I guess that's celebration enough. We had lots of friends come and support. It was perfect. Luckily the weather cooled off just in time because we had been having 97 degree days here with no air conditioning. Let me tell you, our apartment was hot! It ended up being a little bit overcast for the party so we were able to leave the back door open so that people could sit out on the deck.

 I made Jackson's "Birthday Suit" onesie. It was pretty simple. I ironed on the words "Birthday Suit." Then I sewed a little bow tie with Velcro on the back and stuck it on.

I have been wanting to make a tiered cake for a while. Mostly because I just wanted to see if I could do it. So, I decided Jackson's birthday would be the perfect time. My cake does look like a Charlie Brown cake. I am well aware of that. I am almost embarrassed to put up a picture of it, but we all have to start somewhere right? I did it, it may be leaning sideways, but I did it. The cake itself tasted yummy though so don't judge it by its looks.

 Here is Jackson's little smash cake. I put some white star sprinkles on it to give it a little decoration.

The smash cake part was so much fun, even though it was a pain to clean up. He somehow flung frosting all over the kitchen. But he sure did look cute!

Here is our family picture. Jackson was trying to touch me with his frosting fingers and he succeeded.
I had blue frosting all over the side of my shirt.

 Here is Jackson getting cleaned up by dad in the kitchen sink.

Yes, he's trying to grab my camera lens cap with his frosting fingers.

Jackson also officially started walking on his actual birthday. He is a rock star!



I used a recipe from Baking Vintage. I knew I wanted a white cake with cream cheese frosting and when I came across this buttermilk recipe, I thought I would try it. Don't let "folding in the egg whites" instruction scare you. It was really simple.

Ingredients:
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 cups granulated sugar
3 cups cake flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla
6 egg whites

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350˚F. Line two 8-inch cake pans with parchment paper, then grease with unsalted butter.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes. In a medium bowl, whisk together cake flour, baking soda, salt and cream of tartar to remove any lumps. In a liquid measuring cup, combine buttermilk and vanilla. With the mixture on a low speed, alternate adding the flour mixture with the buttermilk. Beat the batter until smooth.

In a clean separate mixing bowl, beat egg whites until stiff peaks form. Working swiftly, fold the stiff egg whites into the cake bake in three additions. Pour into the buttered cake pans.

Bake for 30-40 minutes or until a cake tester inserted into the middle of the cakes comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pans for one hour, remove from pan and allow to cool fully before frosting with the icing of your choice.

Makes 2 8-inch round cakes

With a double batch I made,

two-8inch cakes,
two 6-inch cakes and
two-4 inch cakes

One of the 6-inch cakes I didn't use and one of the 4-inch cakes I used to make Jackson's smash cake with.

I used a cream cheese frosting recipe from Dessert Now, Dinner Later

Ingredients:
 8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp pure vanilla extract

Directions:
Place cream cheese in a mixing bowl, beat until smooth.
Gradually add the butter 2 tbsp at a time and continue beating until smooth and well blended
Add powdered sugar and vanilla. Using a hand mixer, mix until combined.

Scones with Buttermilk Syrup

I try to make every Friday night date night. Rarely do we actually go out on a date but I still try to find small ways to make it still feel like it's a date. Sometimes we walk to get ice cream before putting the baby to bed. Sometimes I'll pick up a Redbox to watch. And other times, Tyrone and I lay out pretty much all the blankets we have on the living room floor and we watch The Office all night. We call this concoction of piled blankets, Mega Bed. We are growing kind of fond of it. It's becoming the new weekend tradition.

Anyway, going out on an actual date on Friday night is hard because Tyrone is so exhausted from the week. He tries to stay up but he usually ends up crashing early. This past Friday I thought I would do something special for date night and make scones with homemade buttermilk syrup.

By the time the dough had risen Tyrone was dead asleep on the couch. I ate hot scones with buttermilk syrup all by myself and I had no shame eating seconds. 

I got the recipe for the scones from Make-it-do

Ingredients:

1 cup warm water

1 cup warm milk

1 Tbsp. dry active yeast

3 Tbsp. granulated sugar

1/4 cup melted butter, cooled

1 Tbsp. salt

5 – 6 cups bread flour

Vegetable oil for deep frying

Directions: 

Combine warm water and warm milk.  Stir in the sugar.  Add dry active yeast and stir lightly.  Allow yeast to activate, about 10 minutes.  In a stand mixer, fitted with a bread hook, add milk mixture and melted cooled butter.  Add the salt.  Start the mixer and add the flour one cup at a time until the dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl.  Dough should be slightly sticky but workable.  Cover the dough in the bowl with a towel.  Set in a warm place and allow raise until double.
Pour your oil in a large pan (with sides deep enough to fully immerse the scones) or a deep fryer and heat slowly over medium to medium high heat.  While the oil is heating, roll the dough out onto the counter, without flour, into a large rectangle about 1/2 inch thick. I have tiled counter tops so I sprayed a large cutting board with Pam and rolled the dough out on there.  You may choose to butter the counter lightly.  Using a pizza cutter, cut into squares or triangles.
Heat oil to between 350 – 400 degrees and cook scones until golden brown. It is important that the oil is hot enough. The first couple I made the oil wasn't quite hot enough and it ends up taking longer to cook meanwhile soaking up the oil. They come out soggy. I tossed those ones out. Serve immediately. They taste the best when hot!

I put the scones on a paper towel to soak up a little bit of the oil before I ate them.

I got the buttermilk syrup recipe from Banner boutique

Buttermilk Syrup

Ingredients:

1 cup sugar 

1stick butter 

1/2 cup buttermilk 

2 tbs light corn syrup

Bring these 4 ingredients to a slow boil for 4-5 minutes then take the pan off the heat and add in 1 teaspoon vanilla and 1/4 teaspoon baking soda

I  made the syrup at the last minute because it is so easy and quick.

I don't think I've ever had homemade buttermilk syrup before and it is dang delicious!! 4 ingredients all mixed together will change your life. Anything you topped with syrup will forever be changed. Pancakes, waffles, French toast will now and forever be topped with this delicious buttermilk syrup. 

M&M Chocolate Chip Cookies

These cookies don't need much of a description. All you really need to know is that they are delicious. I've never made M&M cookies before and I used a recipe which called for vanilla pudding so I wasn't sure how they were going to turn out. But, they were amazing. I made them when my husband was out of town which was a bad idea. I ate way too many by myself and I had no one else in the house to blame it on. I did give some away which makes me feel a little better but I think I'm going to make these again soon. I got the recipe from Picky Palate.

Ingredients:

• 1 stick/1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1-1/2 cups all purpose flour
• 3 tablespoons instant vanilla pudding mix
  
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 3/4 cup mini chocolate chips- I used regular
• 1 or 1-1/2 cups mini M&M's

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. In a large mixing bowl cream your butter and sugars until well combined. Add your egg and vanilla mixing to combine. Add your flour, pudding mix, baking soda and salt, stirring to combine. Add chips and M&M’s stirring to combine.

 3. With a medium cookie scoop, place dough 1 inch apart from each other. Bake for 10-12 minutes until cooked through. Let cool on cookie sheet for 10 minutes before transferring to cooling rack. Enjoy!

I ate one...

Makes 2 dozen cookies

Spray Painted Sugar Cookies

I know Valentine's day is long gone but I was asked to make heart shaped sugar cookies for a church activity last week. I was kind of excited because I bought some fun Wilton heart shaped cookie cutters a few years ago and I still haven't used them. This gave me the perfect reason to test them out. They were awesome. They came in a 4 pack of different sizes and two of the edges were straight and two of them had "squiggly" edges. I don't really know how to describe them. You can see the different outlines of the hearts in the pictures.

I also bought these awesome Wilton color mist cans a little while ago and I have only used them once. They look awesome. Everyone kept asking me how I got the cookies to look like that. It is really easy to use. Just make sure to keep the can about a foot away when you spray the cookies or they'll be splotchy and the color will run. You also want to put the cookies on a cookie sheet when you do it.

The recipe and frosting I used came from In Katrina's Kitchen

This recipe was awesome because I made the dough and baked the cookies all within an hour. It's a great recipe to work with when you are crunched for time and everyone said that they were delicious. I made 30 cookies and I only came home with 6.

The sugar cookies and frosting both call for almond extract which I didn't have. They tasted great without it but maybe next time I'll try it.

Ingredients:
1 Cup butter, softened
1 Cup granulated white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 cups all purpose flour

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350° F.
2. In the bowl of your mixer cream butter and sugar until smooth.
3. Beat in extracts and eggs.
4. In a separate bowl combine baking powder with flour and add a little at a time to the wet ingredients. The dough will be very stiff. If it becomes too stiff for your mixer turn out the dough onto a counter top surface. Wet your hands and finish off kneading the dough by hand.
5. DO NOT CHILL THE DOUGH. Divide into workable batches, roll out onto a floured surface and cut. You want these cookies to be on the thicker side (closer to 1/4 inch rather than 1/8).
6. Bake at 350 for 6-8 minutes. Let cool on the cookie sheet until firm enough to transfer to a cooling rack.

I used her butter cream frosting recipe found here. It was the best cookie frosting I've ever worked with. It was the perfect consistency of soft but not too soft. I was able to stack the cookies without the frosting sticking to the other cookies. I will warn you though that this recipe makes a ton! I have enough frosting for probably another 6 dozen cookies. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it all.


Butter cream frosting
Ingredients:

• 2 Cups shortening
• 1 Tablespoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon almond extract 
• 8 Cups powdered sugar
• 1/8 Cup heavy cream (more or less to desired consistency) (I didn't have any so I used 2% milk)
•  food coloring, if desired  

Directions:
      1. In the bowl of your mixer beat shortening until smooth and creamy.
      2. Mix in vanilla (and almond extract if using).
      3. Add powdered sugar (1 cup at a time) until combined, then add  cream & mix until smooth and                    spreading consistency. Adjust cream to desired frosting thickness
      4. Add a few drops of color, if desired.

Beach Kit Kat cake

I have a whole board on pinterest of cakes I like. I want to try and make most of them someday but 99% of them are probably way out of my league. The boy scouts were doing  fundraiser at our church and they were having a cake auction. I decided to sign up to bring a cake. It would at least give me a good reason to try and make one of the many cakes I pinned, right? I decided to copy a cake from Lovely Party Things.

The only thing I did differently from her cake was that I used crushed graham crackers instead of brown sugar for the beach part on top. I just kept thinking that a slice of cake with brown sugar on top probably wouldn't taste all that good. Anyway, other than that, it was really easy to go off of. I made a chocolate cake from a box and then made home made vanilla frosting with blue food coloring added in.

I  made two round cakes with frosting in between and frosting on top. Then, I put Kit Kats around the outside of the cake and secured them with ribbon. I can't remember how many Kit Kats I needed, but I know that I started with 6 Kit Kat bars and it was only about half the cake. I want to say I used about 10. It's much more than you would think. I broke the Kit Kat bars into pairs before putting them on.

Then I put the crushed graham crackers on half of the cake. In the graham crackers I put two palm tree "models." I went to Michael's and got plastic palm trees in the models section. The lady at the store said I wouldn't want to use them because they will have fuzzy stuff on them that wouldn't be safe for food, but I looked at them and they were completely plastic. So, I just cleaned them with soap and water before I used them in the cake. I had to cut a little bit of the cake out and put the palm trees in a little bit of a hole because they kept tipping over. I filled the hole in with frosting and graham cracker crumbs.

The rest was pretty simple. Teddy Grahams on Fruit by the Foot and Teddy Grahams in Peach candy rings.


The kids loved the cake. It was auctioned off at $40. I'll take it. It was a fun night. We bid on a vanilla cake with butter cream frosting that was delicious. I was very impressed with how many amazing cakes were there. I better take some cake decorating classes before next year.

Banana Cream Dessert Shooters

I was trying to figure out a fun simple dessert to make for Valentine's day. I was thinking about doing a cake or a pie but there is no way that my husband and I could eat it by ourselves. So, I was looking on Pinterest, where everyone goes to get ideas, right? I came across a chocolate dessert shooter, but I didn't have any of the ingredients. As I was looking in my cupboard I found that I had a banana cream pudding box and I went from there to create my own simple dessert shooter.

Makes 8 servings

Ingredients:
1 box banana cream pudding and pie filling
milk- for pudding mix
vanilla wafers
1/2 cup heavy whipping cream or defrosted cool whip

You will want to make this dessert in some sort of see through cup. I didn't have any small glass cups so I went to Smart and Final and I bought a bag of plastic wine glasses. I think they made the dessert look really fancy. 

Directions:
Follow the instructions on the box to make the pudding. Let it set.

Take a a handful of vanilla wafers and place them in a plastic zip lock bag. I like to double up the bag in case the first one tears.

Get all of the air out of the bags and then use a rolling pin to create vanilla wafer crumbs. If you are using heavy whipping cream, pour about 1/2 cup into a large bowl. Beat on high until the whipping cream becomes stiff.

Then, you are ready to layer. First, place pudding into the cup, then vanilla wafer crumbs, then whipping cream, then vanilla wafer crumbs, pudding, and whipping cream. After the first time it becomes simple. To top it off place a vanilla wafer on top.Easy enough right? It was the perfect single serve dessert to top off our Valentine's day.

The day after Valentine's day my little family drove to the sand dunes to meet up with my parents. Since this dessert made 8, I took the other 6 with me to give to my parents and friends that were going to be there. They loved them.

We also had a blast enjoying the sand dunes! Jackson has now officially been introduced. He loved the sound of the cars starting their engines. He's got a pretty cool grandpa.

What better place to finish off Valentine's weekend than the place where Tyrone first told me he loved me? It only seems fitting.

My Valentine's

If you are wondering, yes. I am wearing a Harry Potter shirt. I am not ashamed.

Peanut Butter Bars

Last week one of our good friends came over to meet our new bundle of joy and she brought us some peanut butter bars. My husband is obsessed with peanut butter and these were so delicious! We ate them all in just a few days. Last night he wanted some more so I found a recipe online and we made some. They are so easy and delicious! This is my new go to dessert recipe. It only took about 10 mins to make and then about  40-50 minutes to set in the fridge. No baking necessary. Awesome, right? I love that all of the ingredients are things that I usually have on hand too. Five ingredients is all you need for a delicious peanut buttery goodness treat!

I got the recipe from JensFavoriteCookies

Ingredients:

1 1/4 cups peanut butter

1 cup butter

2 cups powdered sugar

2 cups crushed graham crackers

1 1/2 cups chocolate chips 

Directions:

1. In a bowl melt 1 cup butter with 1 cup peanut butter until melted. Add the graham cracker crumbs and powdered sugar to the melted butter and peanut butter mixture. Spread mixture evenly in a 9x13 pan. 

2. Melt the chocolate chips with 1/4 cup peanut butter in the microwave 30 seconds at a time until melted, stirring in between. In my microwave it only took one minute to completely melt the chocolate and peanut butter. 

3. Pour chocolate mixture over the bars, spreading evenly over the top. 

4. Chill 40-50 minutes until the chocolate sets.

Cinnamon Raisin Bread

Tyrone has been out of town a lot lately and our home feels so lonely without him. Now, there are countless things that I should be doing. With him being gone you would think I'd get a lot accomplished but that hasn't seemed to be the case. Last week he was out of town 5 days for work and the whole week I just lounged around the house relaxed and didn't do a whole lot. Tyrone left out of town again a few days ago to go on a trip with some of his college buddies and the first night he was gone I was on Facebook and his friend's wife, Ellen, said that with her husband gone she had already cleaned the whole house! She was my inspiration. I decided it was time to be productive. I first cleaned the house and organized quite a few things for the baby. Yesterday I worked half a day and ran errands. Then today I baked homemade cinnamon raisin bread. I feel like that's much better than last time he went out of town. Plus, I worked on Saturday and I'm working on the holiday tomorrow so that's got to count for something right?

Now, as I mentioned on my birthday post, Tyrone got me a Bosch mixer for my birthday a few weeks ago and I absolutely love it! Baking bread is much simpler now and it isn't nearly as big of a task as it used to be. I came across a recipe that makes three loaves of cinnamon raisin bread which is perfect because for one, I only have 3 loaf pans and secondly, I have two friends I wanted to take loafs to and then that leaves me with a loaf for Tyrone and I. Using this recipe in the Bosch is awesome because its bigger than a kitchen aid mixer and it can handle a lot of dough. With the kitchen aid mixer, once you add most of the flour you might have to knead it on the table to make it smooth at the end because the mixing bowl will be too full.

Here is the recipe from Super Glue Mom

Ingredients:

• 1½ cups milk
• 1 cup warm water (between 110-115 degrees)
• 5 teaspoons active dry yeast
• 3 eggs
• ½ cup white sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• ½ cup unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup raisins
• 9 cups all-purpose flour + more for kneading
• 2 tablespoons milk
• 1 cup white sugar
• 3 tablespoons ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons butter, melted (approx.)
• 3 9×5 inch loaf pans
  
  Instructions:
• Warm milk (in the microwave or stovetop) to a luke-warm temperature (120-125 degrees).
• Dissolve yeast in warm water and set aside until yeast is frothy, about 10 minutes or so.
• In the bowl of your stand mixer (or a large bowl) add in eggs, sugar, butter salt and raisins. Next, add milk and yeast mixture as well as the water.
• Add the flour gradually to make a dough. (Mine only took just over 8 cups. I would start with 8 and slowly add up to 9 as needed. In the mixer I watch for when the dough starts to pull away from the sides of the bowl leaving the sides of the bowl clean.)
• On a lightly floured surface, knead the dough for a few minutes until smooth. I usually finish my dough on the counter since my stand mixer is not a huge one and it tends to overfill. (Because I had the Bosch mixer I was able to use the dough hook and just knead it with the hook in the bowl for a few minutes until the dough was smooth.)
• Place dough in a large, buttered, mixing bowl and turn to grease the surface of the dough.
• Cover with a warm, damp cloth and let rise. I usually turn my oven on for a couple of minutes while I am mixing the ingredients, turn oven off and let my dough rise in there. It’s warm enough but not hot that it will cook it. (It has been so hot here lately that my dough doubled in size without using the oven in only 40 minutes.)
• Allow to rise until doubled, usually about 1½ hours.

• Roll out on a lightly floured surface into a large rectangle ½ inch thick.

• Moisten the dough with 2 tablespoons milk and rub all over the dough with your hands.

• Mix together 1 cup of sugar and 3 tablespoons cinnamon and sprinkle mixture evenly on top of the moistened dough.
• Roll up tightly (the long way). The roll should be about 3 inches in diameter.

• Cut into thirds, and tuck under ends and pinch bottom together. (I use thread to cut the loaves into three even pieces. This is the same technique I use when cutting cinnamon rolls. (I also cut off the very ends of the long rolls to make the ends look better and fit into the pan easier.)
• Place loaves into 3 well greased 9 x 5 inch pans and lightly grease tops of loaves.

• Let rise in warm place, uncovered, again for about an hour.

• Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until loaves are lightly browned and sound hollow when tapped.
• Remove from oven and let cool on rack. Take melted butter and spread over tops of loaves (totally optional).
• After about 20 minutes, lay loaves on their sides and remove from pans. Allow loaves to cool before slicing.

• I bake all 3 loaves at once, cool and slice. I freeze 2 of them for later use.

Funnel Cakes for the Whole Family

My mother in law gave me a funnel cake kit last year for the fourth of July and I kept telling myself I need to try it but I never did. I finally decided this year that we should have a big funnel cake party with our friends and neighbors. I figured that would be more fun than making funnel cakes for just the two of us anyway.

I decided to send out an invite for funnel cakes but it took a lot more planning and figuring out than I thought. We have a small one bedroom apartment and so we can only invite a small number of people over. We decided that if we made them downstairs in the courtyard of our apartment we could invite a lot more. That's what we ended up doing and it was perfect. The weather was great and we started at 6pm so that friends with kids could come before it got too late.

The chefs.

our toppings table

We were trying to figure out how to cook funnel cakes outside and at first I thought we could just do it on the grill but then we realized that it won't stay hot enough to keep the oil at the right temperature. We decided to use outdoor stoves. We borrowed one from our neighbor and then we bought one at Sports Chalet for only $29.99. It will be awesome to have next time we go camping. It even comes with a little carrying case.

With the funnel cake kit we got, it came with a metal ring, to make the funnel cake in, a pitcher, and some funnel cake mix. The pitcher for pouring the batter works awesome. I would recommend getting one. I also bought a small 4.5 inch metal cookie cutter so that we could make small funnel cakes for the kids. I used a small clear plastic ketchup bottle and poured the batter out of that. They turned out great. They were the perfect size for the kids.

My husbands funnel cake. With how big my belly looks here you would think I already ate one.

Now on to the recipe. I tried a few before I found this one and this was definitely the best! I got this recipe from Taylor takes a taste

You will need a deep frying pan with oil filling the ring up about half way. When you pour your batter into the ring, pour it in a circle around the outside twice and then pour the batter crisscross all directions to keep the funnel cake together.  Cook for about 30 seconds on each side. The funnel cake should be a golden brown. Then add whatever toppings you'd like.

We quintupled the recipe. This much batter fed 26 of us, 14 adults and 12 kids, with many people having seconds.

Dry ingredients
1 1/2 cups AP Flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 cup powdered sugar

Wet ingredients
1 1/3 cup milk
1/4 tsp lemon zest (I omitted this)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 egg

Toppings:
powdered sugar
whip cream
chocolate syrup
cut up strawberries

Cinnamon Rolls

Cinnamon rolls are one of my favorite desserts/ breakfasts! Every time I go on a trip I cross my fingers that the airport will have a Cinnabon.

Growing up, my older brother took a homec class and one of the things they made was homemade cinnamon rolls. He liked them so much that he decided to try to make them at home and then for the rest of his life he has been asked to make his cinnamon rolls, which he doesn't really do anymore because he has an awesome wife that just does it for him. Our family still uses the original recipe that he got in Jr High though. It is the best homemade cinnamon roll I have ever had. My recipe is now almost yellow looking it's getting so old. Today I'm going to share the recipe with you. Now the recipe is broken into three days, because it took the students three one hour periods to make the cinnamon rolls. For your sake, I will break it down into three big steps if you would like to make them over a period of days or you can just go on to the next step if you want to finish them in one day.

Ingredients for the dough:
1 TBS active dry yeast
1 cup warm water (105-110 degrees)
1/3 cup margarine- softened
1/2 cup sugar
1 TSP salt
4 cups flour
2 eggs

Directions: Heat milk for 1 minute in the microwave. (This will depend on your microwave. You want the water warm but not too hot. If the water is too hot it will kill the yeast if its too cold, it won't activate the yeast. I test the milk temperature with my finger and make sure it is warm. Pour yeast into milk and stir to dissolve.

Add the margarine and half of the flour mixture (sugar, salt and flour) and mix on low speed with the paddle attachment if using a kitchen aid mixer. Add the eggs and the remaining flour mixture. Continue to mix until all flour is incorporated and dough ball starts to form.

Form dough into ball with floured hands and place in a plastic bag if continuing the rest of the process the next day. If continuing on, place dough in a large greased bowl, cover and let rise in a warm place for about an hour or until dough is double in size. (I usually give it about 2 to 3 hours to double in size but each climate will be a little bit different.)

This is my doubled in size dough- say that 10 times fast

Forming the rolls

filling:
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
2 TBSP cinnamon

1/3 cup softened margarine

Directions: Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface. Roll the dough flat until it is approximately 21 inches long and 16 inches wide. ( a large rectangle) The dough should be about 1/4 inch thick.

For the filling, spread the softened margarine evenly over the surface of the dough, and then sprinkle the cinnamon and sugar mixture evenly over the surface.

Working carefully from the long side of the rectangle, roll the dough into a long roll.

 

Cut the rolled dough with thread into 2 inch slices and place evenly spaced in a lightly greased baking pan. If continuing on the next day, cover and refrigerate over night. If continuing on, place in a warm place for at least 30  minutes to allow rolls to rise. (I usually give this rising process about an hour.)

This is what your rolls should look like once they have risen. They should be about the height of the pan and they should all be touching.

Onto baking the rolls!
Directions: preheat oven to 400 degrees. Bake the rolls for about 15 to 20 minutes or until light brown. While the rolls bake, combine the icing ingredients. Beat well until fluffy. When rolls come out of the oven coat generously with icing.

Icing:
4 TBSP (1/2 stick) margarine, softened
1/2 TSP vanilla
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup (2 oz) cream cheese, softened