Chocolate Walnut Pie Bars

Super sweet! That is an appropriate description for this tasty treat.We started out with bars cut to the size you see, but after our first round of dessert we cut them in fourths. Yep, they were that sweet. They sure were yummy though. Enjoy!  

Chocolate Walnut Pie Bars
Crust:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup packed brown sugar

Filling:
3 eggs
3/4 cup light corn syrup
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 cups coarsely chopped walnut

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan.

Beat flour, butter, and brown sugar in small mixer bowl until crumbly. Press onto bottom of prepared pan. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned.

Beat together eggs, corn syrup, granulated sugar, butter and vanilla in large mixer bowl. Stir in morsels and walnuts; pour over hot crust.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until center is set. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into bars.

Makes 3 dozen bars

Zucchini Bread Galore

Doesn't this picture look great! This is one day's worth of baking, minus a dozen muffins that were eaten before this photo was taken. Not only that but all of those delectable baked goods came from one squash and one zucchini (similar in size to the two in the picture). I love monster squash and zucchini from my garden!

I used my basic zucchini bread recipe and just added different extras to the mix. Some of the batches have just raisins, some just nuts, some raisins and nuts. All but the dozen muffins went into the freezer so we are ready to go with zucchini bread for the next few months! So much easier to freeze the baked bread than to freeze the shredded zucchini.

Zucchini Bread 3 cups shredded zucchini (about 3 medium)
1 2/3 cups sugar
2/3 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla
4 eggs
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup coarsely chopped nuts
1/2 cup raisins

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease bottoms only of loaf pans. Mix zucchini, sugar, oil, vanilla, and eggs in large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients. Pour into pans. Bake 50-60 minutes (25-30 minutes for mini loaves, 20-25 minutes for muffins) or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes. Loosen sides of loaves; remove from pans. Cool completely before slicing. Wrap tightly and store at room temperature up to 4 days or refrigerate up to 10 days.

Makes 2 loaves

Bacon Cheddar Potato Soup

Besides baking the potato this soup was a pretty quick fix. Somewhat bland, but it works for a quick meal. Not a whole lot to say about it. Enjoy!

Bacon Cheddar Potato Soup
2 cups skim milk
2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, baked
1/3 cup cheddar cheese, shredded + some for garnish
1/4 small onion, sliced, sauteed
1/2 teaspoon dried dill weed
1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 ounces turkey bacon, cooked, crumbled

Place milk, potatoes, cheese, onion, dill, rosemary, and salt in a stockpot. Heat thoroughly and break up potatoes. Add crumbled turkey bacon. Serve with shredded cheese garnish.

Birthday Bones

Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Najia, happy birthday to you! Our beloved puppy dog turned 7 years old today. In her honor I baked my very first batch of dog bones. Call me lazy because these were some of the easiest things out there and I have been putting it off for years.

I can't really give you a thumbs up or down because, well, my dog doesn't have thumbs and she also doesn't have a very discerning palate. While she doesn't eat "people food" she does hoover up anything she can find on the ground when we are camping, out walking, or just about anywhere. I think she is pretty willing to eat just about anything.

These bones are great in that they only require 4 ingredients and there is a lot of flexibility even within that. If you go to the source website you can see that there are many variations that people have made and they have all turned out well. Again, what dog is going to turn up their nose at food being offered to them, definitely not mine.

I used whole wheat pastry flour (because that's what I had in the cupboard), crunchy peanut butter (maybe you can see the peanuts in the bone), and almond milk (because that's all the milk I had in my fridge). At first I was a bit worried as I was scooping the peanut butter into the measuring cup. As my peanut butter jar became more empty I started to wonder if this really was a cheaper way of doing things. I finally convinced myself that our dog would take the place of our son as the fourth peanut butter consumer in our family since our son does not like peanut butter and it would work itself out. After cutting out 84 little dog bones and one bigger bone I decided that the one cup of peanut butter is definitely worth the sacrifice.

From our dog to yours, enjoy!

Birthday Bones
Source: All Recipes

2 cups whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 cup unsalted natural peanut butter
1 cup skim milk

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Grease cookie sheets or line with parchment paper. 

Stir together the flour and baking powder; set aside. In a medium bowl, mix together the peanut butter and milk. Stir in the flour mixture until well blended. 

Turn out dough onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth. Roll out to 1/4 inch thickness and cut into shapes using cookie cutters. Place 2 inches apart onto the prepared cookie sheets. 

Bake for 8 minutes in the preheated oven, or until lightly brown. Remove from cookie sheets to cool on wire racks. 

Note: Baking time is dependent on size and thickness of dog bones. 

Bushels of Apples Sugar Cookies

What better way to mark the start of the school year than with a bushel of apples. Or maybe I should say a batch of apples . . . sugar cookies that is. These cookies were made in honor of me going back into the classroom after an almost 5 year break and my son starting preschool.

All but one was either green or yellow, with just one red apple to complete the trio. I had planned to divide the cookies evenly into red, green, and yellow but after adding too much red food coloring for my taste and conscience I decided that all but one would be green or yellow. They turned out quite nicely, beautiful thick icing evenly coating the apple and a bit of glitter dust to finish it off. They were a hit at work and already have me thinking about what other cookies I am going to be baking this school year. Enjoy!

Note: This is the same recipe I have used for all but one of my sugar cookies. It is the best ever. Not overly sweet and the royal icing is a great compliment for decorating but doesn't add to the taste.
 
Sugar Cookies
Source: Treats

1 cup butter, room temperature
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla extract and mix until egg is completely incorporated. Add flour, baking powder, and salt; mix until no trace of dry ingredients remain.

Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface to about 1/4" thickness and cut shapes using cookie cutters.

Bake for about 10 minutes or until bottoms are golden brown.

Royal Icing
4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup meringue powder
slightly less than a 1/2 cup of water
food coloring

Mix powdered sugar and meringue powder until well blended. Add water and mix until you get the consistency that you want. Add food coloring to achieve your desired color. Use pastry bags with #1 and #3 tips or plastic squeeze bottles to decorate.

For outlining: consistency should be like glue paste
For flooding: add enough water so that when you lift a spoonful of icing it runs back into the bowl and blends into the other icing in about 2 to 3 seconds

Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookies

I have to admit that when I was flipping through the Better Home and Garden magazine while waiting for my son's appointment at the pediatrician I was either really  hungry or these cookies looked way better than they came out in my kitchen. Not that they were bad, but I wouldn't say that they were stellar either. Pretty much your average run of the mill chocolate chip cookie with some dried cherries thrown in. (You can see I added a few white chocolate chips as well as semi-sweet but that didn't do much for it.) I do have to say that one of the positives is that they seem to freeze well. We had a few fresh out of the oven and then threw the rest in a bag in the freezer where they still sit today waiting for us to get in the mood for chocolate chip cookies once again. Enjoy!

Cherry Chocolate Chip Cookies
Source: Better Homes and Gardens

1 cup butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 12 oz package semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup snipped dried cherries

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large mixing bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add sugars, baking soda, and salt. Beat until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally. Beat in eggs and vanilla until combined. Beat in as much of the flour as you can with the mixer. Stir in any remaining flour. Stir in chocolate chips and cherries.

Drop dough by tablespoons 2 inches apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 9 minutes. Transfer to racks. Cool.

Makes 6 dozen

Cinnamon-Pecan Bread

I really didn't intend to make another loaf of swirl bread. In fact, until I started making it I didn't even realize that it would be a swirl bread. For some reason I thought when I saw this recipe in a magazine (without the picture, I guess) I was thinking it was going to be a quick bread. Never mind that yeast is listed as an ingredient. I guess I just wasn't paying close attention.

I made three different batches of swirl bread within a pretty short timeframe and this was the one that we liked least. It ended up being pretty dry. The powdered sugar glaze added to the bread but it still couldn't make up for the dryness and lack of flavor. I will pick one of the other two recipes when I make swirl bread again, but if you decide to try it, enjoy!

Cinnamon-Pecan Bread
Source: Better Homes and Gardens

2 cups all-purpose flour or bread flour
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
1/2 cup milk
1/4 cup butter, cut up
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
2 tablespoons butter, melted
3 tablespoons sugar
1-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 cup chopped pecans
-----
3/4 cup powdered sugar
2 to 3 teaspoons milk

In a mixing bowl, combine 1 cup of the flour and the yeast. In a saucepan, heat and stir milk, the 1/4 cup butter, the 2 tablespoons sugar and the salt until warm (120 degree F to 130 degree F) and butter almost melts. Add to flour mixture. Then, add the egg. Beat with an electric mixer on low speed for 30 seconds, scraping the sides of the bowl constantly. Beat on high speed for 3 minutes.

Using a wooden spoon, stir in as much of the remaining flour as you can. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead in enough remaining flour to make a moderately soft dough that's smooth and elastic (3 to 5 minutes total). Shape into a smooth ball.


Place dough in a lightly greased bowl, turning once to grease surface. Cover and let rise in a warm place until doubled (1 to 1-1/4 hours). Punch dough down.

On a well-floured surface, roll out the dough to form a 12-inch square. Brush the dough with 2 tablespoons melted butter. Combine the 3 tablespoons sugar and the cinnamon; sprinkle over the butter. Sprinkle with pecans.

Roll up, jelly-roll style. Pinch the seams and the ends to seal. Place, seam side down, on a greased baking sheet. Let rise in a warm place until almost doubled (about 30 to 45 minutes).

Bake at 350 degrees for about 20 to 25 minutes or until done. Remove to wire rack to cool. Prepare Powdered Sugar Glaze in a bowl to drizzling consistency. Drizzle over bread. Makes 1 loaf.