Happy Easter

Happy Easter! Hope you are having a wonderful holiday full of family and friends!

I am so fortunate to have you!

Happy Day after Valentine's! I know most people are ready to move on to the next holiday and swap out their red for green, but I have one more idea to share. Put it in the idea pot for next year because it is CUTE. Don't take my word for it though, just look:



Isn't it adorable? I got the idea at Eighteen25, only they did it for teachers for the first day of school. I book marked it months ago and had been eagerly waiting for the time to come when I could make it my own.



This can be an incredibly simple gift, make a cute tag, throw the cookies in the box, bam you're done. I like to make things hard though. I made the cookies from scratch. I even tried two different recipies! I also made my own 'fortunes.' Only instead of fortune's I did reasons I was fortunate to have them in my life. I also dipped the finished cookies in chocolate and decorated them with sprinkles. Fun, but time consuming!

As I said, I used two different recipies. If you are going to do this yourself (it's not terribly hard, but does require a little practice), you need to decide what is important to you. The one recipie tasted like a regular fortune cookie, and looked nice when it was done. The second recipie was much better tasting than a regular fortune cookie, but didn't fold as nicely (the cookie would tear/crack). So you need to make a chocie there. Since I was giving them as gifts and was giving lots of them I didn't have time to fool around with the cookies so I used the first recipie. Still tasty, and since they never had the second recipie, they don't know what they're missing anyway!

The tastier recipie I found at Haniela's. I didn't have the cake and cookie emulsion, so I used 1/2 t vanilla and 1/2 t. almond instead

The easier to fold recipie I found at About.com

I found a great video on how to fold them here

I would HIGHLY recommend wearing thin cotton gloves (I bought mine at CVS). You fold the cookies while they are hot, and doing it with out the gloves was no fun, I had to go buy some gloves.

And for funsies, here is an adorable idea I saw someone had for halloween

I hope you had a lovely holiday, and that you put this idea away for a time when you need to tell someone how fortunate you are to have them in your life.

Easy but impressive decorated sugar cookies

While I have always enjoyed baking, it is when I started decorating sugar cookies that I discovered how pretty you can make desserts. It actually started two years ago when I made large plain pink sugar cookie hearts for my friends and wrote their names on them for a little V-day gift. They were delicious, beautiful, and didn't really take a ton of skill, just patience. The cookies I made this year for Valentines are the same way:



To make these cookies all you need are:
1) Heart shaped cut out cookies (I used a chocolate cookie I ended up not loving, use whatever recipie you like. It will work best if the cookies have a flat surface on top when they finish baking, nothing that rises too much)
2) 20 second royal icing (I use Wilton's recipie and add a little vanilla. Then you want to run a spatula through it and count the time till the surface is smooth again. It should take about 20 seconds. Add a little powder sugar if it takes less than 20 seconds and a little water if it takes more than 20 seconds)
3) A squeeze bottle like these Wilton ones
4) A ruler
5) A toothpick, or clean needle, or knife

The first thing you want to do is to take your cookie and draw a grid on it. I used the ruler to keep my lines straight and evenly spaced, but you could probably just wing it too. I used a toothpick to draw the lines in the cookie, but would recommend a clean needle or knife since I had to keep using new toothpicks



Once you finish scoring all your cookies (a nice activity to do while watching tv), brush the cookies off well (since you'll have little crumbs from scoring them) and grab your squeeze bottle filled with 20 second icing. Pick a square and outline it, then color it in, all with the same icing. 20 second icing is a good consistency that won't spread much.





I used the toothpick you see in the picture to pop any air bubbles that there are in the icing. Now you want to start filling in squares! I found it best to do every other row first like this:



This gave the corners a chance to dry a little so they didn't run into each other. Next you want to keep filling in squares but none that touch length wise, only corners, until your cookie looks like this. You can see a couple places where the corners ran together and don't look as sharp. Doing every other row helps get rid of that.:



Then put it aside and start your next cookie. After an hour or two you can go back to the first cookie and fill in the rest of the squares, the result is cookies that look like these:



Yes, it is a little time consuming, I would say it took me about 10 minutes to decorate each cookie from start to finish (not including drying time), but it's easy and pretty! I hope you'll give it a try sometime!

Rose Meringue Cookies

I made meringues for the first time since my Baked Alaska disaster last week,and was succesful. It was really a practice session for these beautiful cookies. If I couldn't make regular meringues, there was no way I could make roses. But I could, and I did! Look:

They turned out great, especially for my first time trying it! I first saw the idea at Haniela's Blog. I unfortunately didn't have the tip size I wanted on hand so the rose buds aren't quite what I was looking for but they still turned out well. I also tried to do an open rose, but the meringue wasn't stiff enough to hold the shape so they ended up looking a little flat. I'll try the recipie again sometime to see if I can improve. The closed roses weren't hard to do, they just took a little practice, and with the right tip they'll look much better than mine! Here's the recipie I used:

<3 Meringues <3

4 large egg whites
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon meringue powder
pinch of salt
1 t Vanilla extract
desired food coloring

Preheat oven to 180*

Directions:
1) Use a whisk to combine the egg whites, pinch of salt, sugar and meringue powder in a heat proof bowl.
2) Set the bowl over a pan of simmering water (the bowl should not touch the water and whisk constantly, until sugar dissolves and the mixture is hot to the touch, about 6-8 minutes or so.
4) Remove the bowl from the double broiler and beat with mixer gradually from low to high until stiff peaks form. About 8-10 minutes.
5) Add the flavorings and mix for a minute or so to incorporate the extract. Then add the food coloring and beat till the meringue is no longer streaky
5) Make roses!
6) Bake in a 180* oven on a baking sheet for 2.5-3 hours, or until dried through. Baking times will vary depending on the size of the rose. Leave them in the oven to cool.

Now, if you want to make them look like roses you will need:
A piping bag
A wilton tip # 125 (I used a much smaller one, but would recommend this one!)
parchment paper cut into 1" squares
a flower nail (or you can use a meat themometer with a flat surface)

Wilton has a written tutorial available here that looks more like my roses, and Haniela has a video tutorial here with, I think, more realistic looking roses.

Give it a try if you want to try something new that looks pretty and tastes good too!

One last thing, that box they're in? It's a paper plate! I made it in less than 5 minutes when I realized I didn't have a cute way to give them to my friend, Heather, who I was meeting for dinner. I saw the idea at Sarah Hearts, she has a great video tutorial there. I made a few changes by rubber stamping hearts on the top of the plate before I started, and since I didn't have any washi tape I just used regular scoth tape and tied a ribbon around the box to make it a little fancier.

I was extreamly pleased with how it all turned out. It would make a fantastic Valentine, Mother's Day, or really any day present. Hopefully you'll give it a try!

Shared at Blue Cricket Design

Red Velvet Cheesecake Cookies

It's that time of the year again, when everything turns pink or red, and love is in the air. Or hate, if you're one of those people... I'm talking about Valentines Day! Whether you love it, or hate it, it's a great baking time of the year! Great sweets in happy colors with hearts galore. I love it! To kick off Valentines Day bake-a-palooza I made these amazing Red Velvet Cheesecake Cookies. I stumbled across them over at Two Peas and their Pod at Christmas time and have been waiting for Valentines to make them!

They're so pretty! And Red! Perfect for the holiday, and the best part? They're easy! They were inspired by the Red Velvet Cheesecake at The Cheesecake Factory, but my brother Ben (8) said they tasted more like a brownie (he also had some great ideas for making them into a brownie pie). Of course, the best part is the surprise in the middle, yum, cheesecake.

So if you want to make a treat that wows but doesn't take tons of effort, these are a definite winner.

<3 Red Velvet Cheesecake Cookies <3

*I made 11 large cookies, but you could make smaller ones*

For the cookies:

1 box red velvet cake mix (I used Duncan Hines)

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 large eggs

1/2 cup canola oil

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the cheesecake filling:

4 oz cream cheese, at room temperature

2 cups powdered sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the white chocolate drizzle:

1 1/2 cups white chocolate chips, melted

Directions:

1. To make cookies, in a large bowl combine cake mix and flour. Whisk until clumps disappear(at least most). In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix together cake mix, flour, eggs, oil and vanilla extract. Mix until smooth. Wrap the dough in plastic wrap. The dough will be oily. Refrigerate for at least two hours.

2. To make the cheesecake filling, using a mixer, combine cream cheese, powdered sugar, and vanilla extract. Mix until smooth. Using a teaspoon, scoop out cheesecake filling and place on a plate. Continue scooping out cheesecake filling into teaspoon balls until you have 11. Place plate in the freezer and freeze for at least two hours.

3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. To assemble the cookies, take about 1/4 cup of red velvet cookie dough and flatten in your hands. Place a teaspoon of cheesecake filling in the center and wrap the cookie dough around the filling. Gently roll into a ball and place on prepared baking sheet. Scoop onto lightly greased or parchment lined baking sheets. Only bake 3 cookies at a time. The cookies are large and will spread. Bake for 11-13 minutes or until the cookies begin to crackle. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for 5 minutes. Remove from baking sheet to a wire cooling rack and cool completely.

4. Melt the white chocolate chips in a microwave safe bowl or over a double-boiler. Drizzle the white chocolate over the cooled cookies. Let the cookies set until the chocolate hardens. Serve and enjoy!

Shared at Lady Behind the Curtain and at Creations by Kara and 733

My Cup Runneth Over - I Made Meringue Cookies!

My first baking project for my blog was a success! Hurray! To understand my excitement, a background story: When I was in college I tried to make Baked Alaska. I'd had it before, helped my mom make it, and was (in my opinion) a competent baker. No problem, right? WRONG! I don't know what I did wrong with the meringue (I'm guessing several things) but it never got hard, so it didn't form a protective layer between the ovens heat and the ice cream. I'm sure you can imagine what a mess it made. A BIG one, if you can't. I decided to wait a while to try meringue again, and four years later I gave it a second whirl!

Voila!

Now that I know that I can make meringues I plan on making them prettier. Hopefully next week I'll have a creative meringue idea for you.

Before I got started I looked up some meringue tips, and learned some interesting things about meringue. Did you know there are three kinds? French, Swiss and Italian?

"There are 3 types of meringue, the one made most commonly at home is French meringue which is made by whisking sugar into beaten egg whites. Swiss meringue is made by beating egg whites and sugar together over a pan of hot water until the sugar has dissolved, then beating until the mixture reaches stiff peaks. Italian meringue is made by whisking a hot sugar syrup into beaten egg whites - it is the most difficult to make but is popular with bakers and caterers as it tends to hold its volume well." - From Nigella.com

Some tips I found and followed were:

1) Eggs - Should be fresh, but at least 3-4 days old
2) Separating eggs - It's easiest when they're cold, so do it then. Make sure there is NO YOLK in the egg whites, the meringues don't like it. After they're separated let the whites sit out till they're room temp, about half an hour.
3) Meringue will not work if there is any grease in the bowl so use a glass or stainless steel bowl and make sure it is clean and dry! (a couple places recommended spritzing it with lemon juice and then drying it out)

Once I had all the tips I gave it a whirl! I used Haniela's recipe:

<3 Meringues <3

4 large egg whites
3/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon meringue powder
pinch of salt
1 t Vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 180*

1) Use a whisk to combine the egg whites, pinch of salt, sugar and meringue powder in a heat proof bowl.
2) Set the bowl over a pan of simmering water (the bowl should not touch the water). 3) Whisk constantly, until sugar dissolves and the mixture is hot to the touch, about 6-8 minutes or so.
4) Remove the bowl from the double broiler and beat with mixer gradually from low to high until stiff peaks form. About 8-10 minutes.
5) Add the flavorings and mix for a minute or so to incorporate the extract.
6) On a baking sheet lined with parchment paper drop spoonfuls of the meringue. They won't spread so they can be close to each other, but not touching.
7) Bake for 2.5-3 hours, or until dried through. Baking times will vary depending on the size of the meringue. Leave them in the oven to cool.
8) Enjoy!

6 out of 6 people who had these cookies thought they were good, I hope you do to!