red velvet cake

Here's a recipe from a cookbook (thanks sally for that correction) my mom bought me for my birthday ... well I picked it out, she gave me the $$. ;)
There are some really excellent recipes in here that I want to try.
Here's what you need: ( I made a 1/2 recipe because I just needed a small cake)
1/2 cup softened unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 egg yolks
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
3TB red food coloring
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp salt
2 1/4 cups sifted cake flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp white vinegar


Preheat oven to 350º, prepare pans with butter or baking spray OR parchment paper

First Cream butter and sugar in bowl using mixer for about 5 minutes.
then add egg yolks and beat again for 1 min
in another bowl stir cocoa, food coloring and vanilla extract..



add both flour and cocoa to butter mixture.. alternating with small amounts of the flour mixture, then cocoa mix.
in a third bowl combine buttermilk and salt and add this to the mix, mix well
Last in a 4th bowl, combine vinegar and soda, then slowly add to mix and blend until creamy. When fully mixed, pour into pan (if using full recipe, use 2 9 in rounds)
Bake for about 30 minutes, until insert toothpick and comes out clean.



Let cool.
If you are using full recipe slice both cake rounds into layers as shown below.


After cake is completely cool, you can Ice it. The icing recipe I used is one container of cool whip, one package of cream cheese and 1/2 cup of powdered sugar. Mix together and ice between the layers.



Then cover the whole cake. Once I find some raspberries I'll put them on top! Yummy??! we shall see!

Very good Cut Out Sugar cookie recipe

I got this from the butter crisco package.... =)

It worked really well for me when I made these pumpkin cut outs on Thurs!
PREHEAT oven to 375º

Here's the recipe:
1 stick crisco butter flavored (1 cup)
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
2 TB milk
1 TB vanilla
3 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp baking POWDER
1/2 tsp salt

beat crisco and sugar in bowl
beat in egg, milk and vanilla extract until well blended.
IN separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder and salt, then add flour mixture to cream mixture until well blended ( at a low speed is best as to not cover yourself in flour mixture) ;)

Can refrigerate for easier handling or take it like a champ as I did.. heh.

I just put the ball of dough between two layers of LIGHTLY floured wax paper and rolled it out to about 1/8 in thick.
then I cut it out, pulled the excess away and lifted each little pumpkin from the lightly floured wax paper, put it on the baking sheet, again covered with wax paper.. and baked for 7-ish minutes. The recipe card says 375º for 5-9 min, until edges brown.

Then I pull them off the sheet onto a cooling rack. I don't have a finished product without icing over it.. but here's what they looked like when I was done cooling icing and sprinkling:


Here's some other goodies I made:
AND here's the whole sweets spread. By the way we did have other things so as not to cause diabetic shock: pretzels, apples, cheese dip, peanut mix.

=)

BEST.... CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES.... EVER!!!!!!

I got this recipe from my friend from high school's blog!
You can find it here: http://barefoot-in-the-kitchen.blogspot.com/2008/10/ultimate-chocolate-chip-cookie.html

Let me just preface this by saying I have searched high and low for a good chocolate chip cookie recipe. I have just found one, thanks to the cooking sisters. I needed to find one with the perfect balance of chewy and crunchy... ad this is it!

Go to their site for the recipe and look below for pics!

brown sugar and butter flavored crisco..
cream together then add the rest of the stuff.
add chocolate chips and add by BIG spoonfuls 2 inches apart on the baking sheet.
MAKE SURE THEY ARE TWO inches apart!!! Otherwise you'll be in trouble.

look how delicious!

Blueberry Scones

I got this recipe from the "Baking in America" book Steph got me for Christmas last year.

Here's what you need:

2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup sugar
8 TB butter
1 1/2 cups frozen or fresh (NOT THAWED) blueberries
1 1/4 cups buttermilk


Here's what you do:

preheat oven 350º
line baking sheet with parchment paper
cut butter into 1 TB size slices (HAVE TO DO THIS!!!)

Then put flour, baking soda, salt and 4 TB of sugar in a bowl.

Add the butter pieces and use a pastry blender or 2 knives (pastry blender is MUCH MUCH easier).. Then with your hands it says to work the butter into Large Flakes (make sure the dough is cold.. if you have to put it in the fridge for a while, do so)...
This is the best I could do.




Then add Blueberries and toss to coat evenly.


Then pour everything but 1 TB buttermilk in and FOLD GENTLY with a rubber spatula until the dry stuff is moist stuff. You will have a thick dough.



Scrape it out onto a lightly floured surface and dust with flour.



Then form it into an 8-in circle


Spread the remaining buttermilk over the top.


Sprinkle 4 TB sugar over the top. YUM.


Then take a knife and cut into quarters, then in half again to have 8 wedges.


Then transfer to baking sheet and bake 25 minutes until golden-ish.


Then move them to a cooling rack..

YUMMY YUMMY in my Tummy!
****EDIT*****
After eating one of these post warmth, I'd say that they need to be baked a little longer... or for the same amount of time at a higher temperature. I like my scones to be drier than these are.
I'll try them again sometime and then repost.

I made impromptu biscotti! Oh no...... OH YES!!!!!!

So I got a wild hair and decided to make biscotti. Since I was busy I decided to go a less traditional route and it was fantastically easy and yum yum.
Here's what you need:


1/4 caramel or chocolate sauce
1/2 cup butter melted
1 cup flour
1 chocolate cake mix
1 TB Vanilla extract
1-2TB milk (to make proper consistency
2 eggs
IGNORE THE HAZELNUTS unless you want to put them in.. (I didn't, since it was my first shot at Biscot!!)

THEN: add dry ingredients... then wet ones. ya know.. the usual.
CARAMEL!! yum

MIX IT
Flatten it! (specifically into a 12x1x3 inch log)

bake it! 350º 30-35 minutesTHEN turn the oven down to 300, take it out and slice it (with a serrated knife) into 3/4 inch portions.. you can go smaller if you choose... like 1/2 inch
see!
oooooh yummm
then flip em on their side, bake 10 more minutes, flip em on the other sides and bake em 10 more!
let them cool a little
Drizzle with melted chocolate (I used Hershey's special dark)
Dip them in coffee, tea or milk. Delectable!