I've been trying new recipes over that past month and a half, but haven't blogged about them yet. I wanted to put all of them together in one blog for your enjoyment.
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| Giant Peanut Butter Cup |
Do you ever get a random craving for something and you don't know why? Or you get obsessed, at least for a little while, with one particular type of food? Well, that food has been peanut butter cups for me for the last couple of months. Plus peanut butter in general, I suppose. So, when I saw this recipe from Tasty to make a Giant Peanut Butter Cup, I just knew I had to check it out.
Giant Peanut Butter Cup (from https://tasty.co/recipe/giant-peanut-butter-cup)
Ingredients:
2 cups creamy peanut butter
2 cups powdered sugar, sifted
8 tablespoons butter, softened
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| A slice of a giant peanut butter cookie |
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| Hocus Pocus themed rice krispies treats |
Procedure:
1) Cover a 9x11 baking sheet with parchment paper.
2) Prepare rice krispies treats by melting together butter and marshmallows on the stovetop over low heat.
3) Stir in cereal and spread over baking sheet. Allow Rice Krispies treats to set for a couple hours.
4) Cut treats into squares using a square cookie cutter.
5) Melt chocolate chip in a microwave safe bowl, stirring every 30 seconds.
6) Dip rice krispies treats into chocolate, shake off excess, and place back on parchment paper covered baking sheet.
7) Add candy eyeball to the center right side of the square. Allow chocolate to set before decorating.
8) Use black icing to add detail, like the snake and stitches on the book. Allow icing to set before serving.
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| Okay, so I'm not a decorating queen... |
These came out tasting really good (very rich, filling, and chocolatey). I found out a few things, however. One: I'm not a professional decorator. As much as I'd like to be, I couldn't quite get things to look the way I wanted them. Two: Chocolate is hard to evenly distribute amongst Rice Krispies treats. The first one got the most chocolate, with the sixth one getting hardly any chocolate at all. I have about half a dozen more of just leftover Rice Krispies treats that didn't have any chocolate, as I had run out. Three: Candy eye balls and black icing is surprisingly really difficult to find around Halloween. Four: How have I never made Rice Krispies treats before this? They're so easy and so delicious! Five: If you leave the Rice Krispies treats out and tell your housemates that they can help themselves, they disappear very very quickly!
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| Carrot Cake Pancakes |
Okay, this next one is technically not a dessert but is based upon one, so I'm including it in this list. If you know me, you know that I love carrot cake. When I saw this recipe (also from Tasty), I knew I had to try it!
Carrot Cake Pancakes (from https://tasty.co/recipe/carrot-cake-pancakes)
Ingredients:
¼ cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 ¾ teaspoons McCormick® Ground Cinnamon
¼ teaspoon McCormick® allspice
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups buttermilk
1 stick unsalted butter, melted
2 large eggs
1 ½ cups carrot
5 tablespoons unsalted butter
¼ cup walnuts, chopped
10 tablespoons cream cheese
10 teaspoons maple syrup
Procedure:
1) In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, salt, cinnamon, allspice, baking powder, and baking soda.
2) In a medium bowl or liquid measuring cup, whisk together the buttermilk, melted butter, and eggs.
3) Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and fold with a rubber spatula until just combined. 4. Gently fold in the grated carrots.
4) Let the batter rest for 15-30 minutes at room temperature.
5) Melt 1 tablespoon butter in a medium skillet over medium-low heat. Once the butter is bubbling add ⅓ cup (75 g) of batter to the pan. Cook for 2-3 minutes, until bubbles start to appear on the surface. Flip the pancake over and cook for another 1-2 minutes, until golden brown and cooked through. Repeat with the remaining batter, adding more butter as needed. As you cook the pancakes, keep them warm in a low oven or cover with foil.
6) Serve the pancakes with a pat of cream cheese, a drizzle of maple syrup, and a sprinkling of walnuts.
The verdict? Maybe not as good as I might like. Part of that was that I didn't have any buttermilk, so used buttermilk powder with whole milk instead. I think my buttermilk powder has gone bad, if such a thing is possible, as the pancakes had a slightly off? extra tangy? taste to them. Also, I ran out of regular flour so substituted in some whole wheat flour, but that was okay. The cream cheese topping was a little out of place. I think it would have been better either being skipped all together or made into something like cream cheese frosting. It was tasty, though...
