Homemade Peppermint Oreos

I love homemade oreos.  I love peppermint and chocolate.  When I saw the concept for these I just had to try it.

Original recipe for Chocolate Peppermint Bark Whoppie Pies at Mary Cooked A Little Lamb.



I made this recipe and had some issues with the cookies.  Not sure if the issues came from doubling the recipe or from the high altitude that I live in, I suspect it had a bit to do with both, but while I LOVED the filling, I won't be using the recipe for the cookie again, especially while I have a recipe I already love that works well.  I also didn't love the peppermint bark the pie/oreo was dipped in, while it looks fantastic, I felt it made the cookie too hard to eat.  Next time I am going to either add crushed peppermint candy canes to the filling, or overfill the center and roll the edges in the crushed candy cane.  So I have written some adaptations and think these will be superb.

Homemade Oreo:  (From my Aggie Oreos)

1 Devil’s Food Cake mixes
2 eggs
1/4 cup shortening

Mix all together until wet and sticky. Form into little balls and place on greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 8 minutes. Cool 1 minute before removing from sheet.

Peppermint filling: (From Mary's original recipe)

1/2 cup butter, room temp

1 8-oz. pkg cream cheese, room temp

3 1/2 oz. marshmallow cream/fluff

1/2 teaspoon peppermint extract (I actually felt like it could use more peppermint, so I dashed a bit more)

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Pinch of salt

Beat together butter and cream cheese until creamy.  Add marshmallow (this is 1/2 of a regular jar), peppermint, and salt.  Mix until smooth.  After cookies are cool, fill with peppermint marshmallow filling.

Lunch Lady Peanut-Butter Bars

If you are a child of the 80's and 90's I hope you had the chance to eat these during school lunch.  I think they were served on fish stick days.  Nevertheless they are delicious and actually fairly simple to make.  Hooray for pinterest and people who know Lunch Ladies.  This is their recipe.  I doubled it to make 2 jelly roll pans (11x15). This was a great amount to serve a crowd and I hear they freeze well.  Here is my adapted recipe:

3 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

1 1/2 cups butter

1 1/2 cups white sugar

1 1/2 cups brown sugar

3 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter

4 eggs

3 cups quick rolled oats

 

In the mixer, cream together butter, sugars, peanut butter, eggs, and vanilla until fluffy.  Add in salt and baking soda.  Slowly incorporate flour.  Mix in oats.

 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease jelly roll pans and dump half of the mixture onto each pan.  Dough is sticky so either spray grease your hand or a piece of wax paper and spread mixture towards edges.  Dough will fill in as it bakes.  Bake for approximately 15 minutes until browned. Allow to cool.

 

 

 

Frosting:

1 cup butter

6-7 cups  powdered sugar

4 Tbsp cocoa powder

1/2 cup milk

2 tsp vanilla

Melt the butter in a sauce pan. Add milk and cocoa and stir constantly over medium heat until it comes to a boil.  Remove from heat and add vanilla.  Stir in powdered sugar until desired thickness and taste.  Remember that as the butter cools the frosting will naturally thicken.  Spread over cooled bars.

 

Cookie Salad

I have made this twice the spring already.  Cookie salad is easy, delicious, and a fun change from other fruit and side salads. Also it doubles as dessert.  We enjoyed this salad today for a family Easter dinner along with Resurrection Potatoes (What we call Mormon Funeral Potatoes during the Easter season), ham, glazed carrots, Cottage Cheese Jello salad, and awesome cupcakes.

6 oz of vanilla instant pudding (2 small boxes)
2 cups buttermilk
16 oz cool whip
2 lbs strawberries
4 bananas
11 oz can of mandarin oranges
1 package of Keebler Fudge Stripe cookies

Stir together vanilla pudding packets and buttermilk.
Add cool whip.
Chop or slice strawberries, slice bananas, and drain mandarin oranges. 
Stir fruit into vanilla pudding and cool whip mixture. 
Crumble up all of the fudge stripe cookies.  Stir in 3 rows worth of cookies, and top with last row of cookie crumbs.

*For a fun tropical version, use Samoa Girl Scout cookies and replace strawberries with 1-2 cans of pineapple tidbits.  Also double mandarin oranges.

Banana Cake

I had some leftover bananas and wasn't in the mood for banana bread so I had to give this cake a try.  AWESOME.

2/3 cup sugar

1/2 cup sour cream (I used fat-free)

1 egg

1 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened

2 large or 3 medium ripe bananas, mashed

1 tsp vanilla 

1 cup flour

1/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

 

Cream together sugar, sour cream, butter, egg.  Add bananas and vanilla, mix well.  Stir in salt, baking soda, and flour.  Pour into a greased 8x8 or 9x13 pan (I made mine a 9x13 pan it was a lot thinner but I was feeding a lot of people, still delicious but if you want a thicker cake use an 8x8 pan or double the recipe for a 9x13).  Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes until lightly browned.

 

I frosted my cake with a Brown-sugar glaze...

 

3 Tbsp butter, melted
3 Tbsp  brown sugar
2 Tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 – 2 cups powdered sugar

 

Blend together melted butter, brown sugar, milk, and vanilla.  Stir in powdered sugar until desired consistency.  Spread over warm cake and serve.

Monster Truffles

These were rediculous and easy to make.  You can make Oreo Truffles a million different ways roll by rolling them in chocolate or white chocolate and roll in any type of topping.

For these I used:

1 package reduced-fat oreos
1 package Cream cheese
candy melts
sprinkles
eye-ball sprinkles

1.  Crush package of oreos and mix together with softened cream cheese.

2.  Melt candy melts according to package directions. 
3.  Roll oreo mixture into balls and roll in melted coating, using 2 forks or spoons to roll and cover.
4.  Decorate with sprinkles before they harden.
5.  Place on wax-paper covered cookie sheet to set.

(lucky for me the monsters can be lumpy because I can't ever get these smooth!!)

 

Oatmeal Chip cookies.

Oatmeal Chip Cookies

1 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 cups oats
3/4 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup butterscotch chips

Cream butter and sugar.  Mix in eggs and vanilla.  Sift in baking soda, salt, cinnamon.  Stir in flour and oats.  Add chocolate and butterscotch chips.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Lightly grease large cookie sheet.  Roll dough into balls, just smaller than golf balls.  Bake for 9 minutes.  Transfer to cooling rack and cool.  Makes 3 dozen large cookies.

Scotcharoos

This is the only dessert that I can literally eat an entire pan of.  Reminds me of the Special K cookies my grandma and mom make and my friend Leslie and her mom.  If you like peanut butter and chococlate butterscotch you will not regret this recipe:

1 cup white sugar
1 cup karo syrup
1 cup peanut butter
6 cups Special K cereal (cornflakes or rice krispies also work)
1 cup butterscotch chips
1 cup milk chocolate chips

1.  Pour cereal into a bowl and grease a 9x13 in pan.
2.  Measure out peanut butter into a 1 cup measuring cup and set aside.
3.  In a medium saucepan bring white sugar and karo to a boil, stirring continously.  Remove from heat when clear and sugar has dissolved.
4.  Mix in peanut butter and stir until melted in.
5.  Pour cereal mixture into pan.  It will be hot and if you spray grease a piece of wax paper you can use that to press cereal until in pan evenly.
6.  Melt chocolate chips with butterscotch chips in microwave in 30 second intervals, stirring well in between until smooth. 
7.  Pour over cereal in pan.
8.  Allow to cool completely (the hard step)
9.  Cut into bars and enjoy!

Tastes like fall...

Some recipes I have made recently that taste a bit like fall:

Orange-Cran Chicken Salad  (recipe adapted from the Our Best Bites cookbook)

2 cups chopped cooked and cooled chicken breast (2 chicken breasts or 1 can chicken.  I think at Thanksgiving left over turkey would be perfecto for this recipe as well.)
1/2 cup chopped celery
3 chopped green onions
grated orange peel zest (from 1 medium orange )
1/2 cup craisins
1/2 cup mayo
1/4 cup jellied cranberry sauce
1 tsp grainy dijon mustard
juice from 1/2 half orange (i just cut the orange I grated in half and gave 1/2 a big squeeze)
pecans (optional)
rolls

Mix together chicken, celery, green onions, orange zest, and craisins.  In a seperate bowl whisk together mayo, cranberry, mustard, and orange juice.  Pour mayo mixture over chicken mixture and stir to coat.  Refridgerate for at least an hour.  Add chopped pecans if desired and serve sandwiched in rolls. Serves 12 rolls.

Oatmeal Raisin Chocolate Chip Cookies (recipe adapted from the 1976 Betty Crocker's Cookbook)

3/4 cup shortening (I know shortening is bad...I'm over it)
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup water
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp ground cloves
1/2 cup raisins
1 cup chocolate chips
3 cups rolled oats

Mix together shortening, sugars, egg, water, and vanilla.  Add salt, cinnamon, baking soda, cloves.  Add flour.  Add oats.  Stir in raisins and chocolate chips.  Form into balls and space 1 in apart. Bake at 350 degrees for 13 minutes on a greased pan.  Allow to sit on baking sheet for 2 minutes after baking to set.  Cool on cooling rack.  Makes 30 large cookies  (These cookies are crisp and chewey.  You need the raisins to balance the sugar).

Tagalongs

It's girl scout cookie time and instead of buying some Camille and I decided to make our own.  She whipped up some Tagalongs and I made some Samoas which I have posted about before.

Tagalongs (Peanut Butter Patties)

1 cup butter, softened

1/2 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 tbsp milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream together butter and sugar. Mix in flour, baking powder and salt.  Add vanilla and milk. Roll dough into a log and refridgerate until firm.  Slice into cookies.  Bake cookies for 11-13 minutes, until bottoms and the edges are lightly browned and cookies are set.  Immediately after removing cookies from the oven, use a small spoon to make a depression in the center of each cookie.  Cool for a few minutes on the baking sheet then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.  Fill with filling:

Filling:
1 1/2 cups creamy peanut butter
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1-2 cups chocolate chips

In a small bowl, whisk together peanut butter, confectioners’ sugar, salt and vanilla. When the mixture has come together, heat it in the microwave for 30 seconds until it is soft. Spoon on top of cooked cookies.  Chill cookies with filling for 20-30 minutes, or until the peanut butter is firm.  Melt chocolate chips and dip chilled cookies into chocolate, let excess drip off, and place on a sheet of parchment paper to let the chocolate set up.

Harry Potter Party Food 2010-Sweet dishes

So many sweet dishes to be had. 

1.  Snitch Cake--  For Harry's birthday, Mrs. Weasley made a floating snitch cake.  While mine can't fly I thought it turned out pretty fun.  All I did was use Wilton's Sports ball cake pan.  I made a chocolate cake with vanilla frosting colored a pale yellow then dusted with gold shimmer.  For the wings I used thin skewer sticks and glued on vellum cut into a wing shape.

2.  Pumpkin Pasties--

Pie crust**
1 cup canned pureed pumpkin
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp cloves
1/4 tsp ginger
dash of nutmeg

Combine the filling ingredients in a mixing bowl and stir well.
* For the pie crust you can use a large premade unbaked one and cut into small rounds, make your own dough, or as we have begun to do, go to a Mexican market and buy premade and cut uncooked baking empanada rounds.  These are perfect and extremely easy to use. 
Spoon equal amounts of filling into center of each round.  Fold over and seal edge with egg-white wash and crimp edge with a fork.  Cut 3 slits into top.  Brush tops with remaining egg-white wash and bake on an ungreased cookie sheet at 350 for 25-30 minutes until golden (or whatever pie dough calls for).  Cool and serve.

3.  Mad-eyes (Oreo truffles)-- Annicka made these tasty and rich little guys.  They are super good and can be decorated any which way.  We just did them as Mad-eyes in honor of his death in Harry Potter 7.

1 package Oreo cookies, finely crushed.
1 (8oz) package cream cheese
toppings of choice

Crush oreos in a ziploc bag with a rolling pin or in a food processor.  Mix together cream cheese and Oreo crumbs and form into balls.  Dip in melted chocolate or white chocolate as we did.  Refrigerate at least 1 hour until firm.  If you want to sprinkle with cookie crumbs, sprinkles, etc. do that before refrigeration.

4.  Butterbeer-- This is Kellie's wonderful recipe.  This one serves 2-4 people but it is easy to make a bunch and then just add cream soda to each serving.  When we make a big batch wekeep it warm and just pour about 1/8-1/4 cup of the creamy mix into a cup and pour over with (unheated) cream soda.


1/4 cup sweetened condensed milk
1/4 cup butterscotch topping
2 tablespoons whipped butter (room temp)
1 1/2 cup vanilla cream soda

Combine condensed milk, butterscotch topping and butter. Heat mixture until butter has melted and incorporated into mixture. Heat cream soda and add mixture, stir thoroughly

5.  Polyjuice Potion Punch--  This is the easy Mormon sherbert punch.  I just used a carton of Raspberry sherbet with 1 L. of regular 7 up and 1 of diet 7 up. if foams and fizzles.

6.  Treacle Fudge--  This I made as more of a novelty item for a British flair to the party.  Not my personal favorite.

1/2 cup evaporated milk
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 tsp salt
4 oz unsweetened chocolate
2 Tbsp. butter
1/3 cup treacle or molasses

In a large bowl mix milk, brown sugar, and salt.  In a saucepan melt chocolate and butter together.  Remove from heat and add molassess.  Add the chocolate mixture to the milk mixture and pour into a pan to cool.  Cut into squares and serve.

Drinking our butterbeers.

Samoan Bars

These are a homemade version of the Girl Scout cookie...pretty darn tasty!

Cookie:
1/2 cup sugar
3/4 cup butter
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1/4 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9 x 13 pan. Cream together Butter and Sugar until fluffy. Mix in egg. salt, and vanilla. Stir in flour making a crumbly mixture. Press into pan and bake until light brown 20-25 minutes. Cool on wire rack in pan until completely cool.

Coconut-Caramel Center:
3 cups shredded coconut
14 oz of Caramels (I use 1 bag of Caramel bites because they melt faster)
1/4 tsp salt
3 and 1/2 TBSP milk
1 bag chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Spread coconut onto a baking sheet and toast in oven until lightly browned for about 10-15 minutes stirring every 2-5 minutes. Cool.

In a pot melt caramel with salt and milk. When smooth remove from heat and stir in coconut. Spread over cooled cookie base (This is more difficult than it looks. I spooned coconut onto base and then pressed with a greased piece of wax paper to pread evenly. Caramel is still hot so wear oven mitt when pressing with paper).

Allow to cool completely. Melt Chocolate chips (I melt Chocolate chips by putting them into a tupperware container and microwaving for 30 seconds at a time, stirring with a knife in between, until melted. Ususally takes 1 to 1.5 minutes).

Cut into bars and remove from pan. Dip the bottom of each bar into chocolate (Easiest just to turn bar over and spread on chocolate with a knife or spoon). Place on wax paper. Take remaining chocolate and drizzle over the top of bars. I cooled my bars on wax paper and a baking sheet in the freezer for 10 minutes, until the chocolate had hardened.

SO good! While they are time consuming because everything needs melted/baked, and then cooled...they are worth it!

Cadbury Cookies

Tis the time of year when Cadbury shows up in America. I love their chocolate and Cadbury mini eggs are no exception. Camille found this recipe and we decided to check it out... Cadbury Mini egg Cookies.

The only change we made is that since we had eaten 1/2 the bag at the movies (Alice in Wonderland) last night we added a handful of white chocolate chips and a handful of butterscotch chips for fun.

enjoy!

Christmas treats

2 super easy Christmas treats I have made this week for neighbor gifts.

Ting-a-lings (aka Haystacks)

1 cup butterscotch chips
1-2 cups chowmein noodles
1/2-1 cup peanuts

Melt butterscotch chips in microwave or double-boiler. And pour over chowmein and peanut mix. Spoon onto wax paper for individual "cookies".


Chocolate & Peanut-butter Truffles

1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup evaporated milk

Melt chocolate chips in microwave or double-boiler. Stir in peanut butter, then stir in evaporated milk until smooth. Refridgerate for at least 1 hour (overnight worked best for me). spoon and form into little balls. Roll each ball in powdered sugar, cocoa powder, sprinkles, or coconut.

Maple Leaf Cookies

Today was all things Canada... so what is more appropriate then Maple Leaf Cookies!?!

Maple Leaf Cookies

3 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup butter

1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg yolk
3/4 cup maple syrup -pure real grade a is better!

Directions per Martha:
Sift flour and salt into a medium bowl. Beat butter and granulated and brown sugars with a mixer on medium-high speed until pale and creamy, about 3 minutes. Reduce speed to medium-low, and add yolk, then 1/2 cup maple syrup, beating well after each addition. Add flour mixture, and beat until just incorporated. Shape into 2 disks, wrap each in plastic, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Roll out 1 disk of dough to 1/4-inch thickness on a sheet of lightly floured parchment. Place parchment with dough on baking sheet. Freeze until firm, about 15 minutes. Coat baking sheets with cooking spray. Cut out cookies from frozen dough using a 3 1/2-inch maple-leaf-shaped cutter, and space 1 inch apart on sheets. Roll and cut scraps once. Freeze cookies until firm, about 15 minutes.

Bake cookies until edges begin to turn golden, 14 to 16 minutes. Transfer parchment with cookies to wire racks, and let cool for 5 minutes. Brush cookies with 2 tablespoons maple syrup, and sprinkle with 1/2 the sanding sugar. Let cool. Repeat with remaining dough, maple syrup, and sugar. (Cookies will keep for up to 2 days.)

To read about my adventures in Canada and getting searched at the border, go here.

Special K Cookies

Continuing the mother's day theme...This is the recipe we use from my Mom's Mom, Grandma Vernice Allen, the most.

Special K Cookies

1 cup karo syrup
1 cup sugar
1 cup peanut butter
6 cups Special K cereal

1. Bring karo syrup and sugar to a boil until sugar is dissolved.
2. Remove from heat and mix in peanut butter.
3. Pour over cereal and mix well.
4. Spoon cereal into cookies on wax paper and cool.

This is obviously extremely similar to Scotcharoos. I enjoy this recipe because they are cookies, so less messy, and sometimes the chocolate/butterscotch top is overwhelming.

St. Patty's Ideas

Some (17 to be exact) fun ideas for St. Patrick's Day...

1. Make these or have kids make these to give to other people.

2. Make a fruit Pizza in the shape of a rainbow...I envision it was a giant rainbow shaped sugar cookie, frosted in delightful cream cheese frosting with rows of fruit filling in the colors...Strawberries, mandarin oranges, pineapple, kiwi, blueberries, blackberries... and then you make 3-6 round sugar cookies, topped in the same good frosting, and sprinkled with coconut to arrange as a cloud. I am going to make this, and then I will post a picture. Here is a basic Fruit Pizza recipe.

3. attend a St. Patrick's day parade and sing an Irish drinking song.

4. Make a pot full of gold candy for a fun treat and decoration

5. check out a local concert featuring bagpipes (yes I know they are Scottish) and/or Irish step dancing

6. hide cute leprechaun pics and shamrocks for kids to search for and win prizes about

7. learn more about what St. Patrick's day is all about...

8. Obviously you can dye just about any food green... Easy ones are Green eggs and Ham for breakfast, mashed potatoes, green drinks, green bread. For Green snack Ideas go here.

9. Or make something more traditionally Irish. All-recipes has a great list of Irish food ideas and recipes. Or check out this list.

10. Wear GREEN. easy.

11. Go here for other kid friendly St. Patty's themed crafts.

12. Watch a movie...like "Darby O'gill and the little people" or "Riverdance"

13. Mint is good. super good. Stephanie's Kitchen featured this AMAZING looking cookie/brownie...

14. Learn a Gaelic game.

15. Learn some Gaelic language.

16. Eat some lucky charms

17. Try to catch a leprechaun or find a 4 leaf clover just for the heck of it!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Brownie Bars...

So I have seen this recipe on the back of the Betty Crocker cookie dough packages. Then I stumbled across this entry about the bars on Bakerella. I was sold, her pictures made it look so good!! So to see her entry check it out here: Delicious Chocolate Cookie Dough Bars. I was also intrigued by her article because she used Ganache instead of frosting. I'd heard of ganache many times but never really understood how to do it. This article: Ganache How to clears up a lot of questions...

So basically the recipe is actually pretty simple. Just mix up a bow of Brownies and pour in your 9x13 pan. Then you mix up the cookie dough and drop it in spoonfuls into the brownie mix. Bake, cool, and then frost! Simple, and scrumptious. (I don't know if I've ever used that word...)

Photo borrowed from Bakerella.

All things aggies

I just finished up with a "weekend o' aggie athletics" and wanted to share some of my favorite aggie basketball game treats:

Basketball Cookies

Mix and Set aside:
2 1/4 cup flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt

Combine and beat until creamy:
1 cup shortening
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs

Mix all ingredients well and stir in 6 oz milk chocolate chips (and/or 6 oz semi-sweet chocolate chips), 6 oz butterscotch chips, 6 oz white chocolate chips. Spoon into 1 Tbsp. balls 2/3 inches apart on a cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 10 min.

Watch the Aggies play ball and enjoy!

(Story behind the cookies: Toni lived downstairs from some bball players. They were all good friends and those boys didn't like many treats so we invented these cookies. They are so good no one can resist. We made them for all of our basketball related roadtrips!)

Aggie Oreo's

2 Devil’s Food Cake mixes
4 eggs
½ cup shortening

Mix all together until wet and sticky. Form into little balls and place on greased cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 8 minutes. Cool 1 minute before removing from sheet.

Aggie blue-light frosting:

2 packages cream cheese, softened
4+ cups powdered sugar
1 stick margarine
Aggie Blue food coloring

Mix and sandwich between 2 cookies.

(Story behind the cookies: I made them my freshman year with my friend Brittney, we made them for everything changing the color of the frosting per holiday, and aggie was of course my favorite.)

Latest aggie page just for fun...