individual peanut butter cheesecake

I was sitting at home on my day off yesterday wondering what I should bake. I have some raspberries I wanted to use but I tend to use fruit a lot in my baking so I figured I would try something different. I came across a recipe for peanut butter cheesecake and I knew that would be a hit. 


fills a 12 cup regular size muffin tin
or 24 cup mini muffin tin

Ingredients

For the Crust:
1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
4 tablespoons sugar
1/4 cup butter, melted
couple dashes salt

For the Filling:

2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3 tablespoons flour
2 eggs

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. and line your muffin tin with cupcake cups.

2. In a bowl mix graham cracker crumbs, melted butter, sugar, and salt until combined. Scoop heaping tablespoons into the bottom of each cup and use the spoon to press down the crust.

3. In a stand mixer beat cream cheese until smooth. Add sugar, vanilla, and peanut butter and mix until smooth.

4. While mixer is still going add the flower and eggs one at a time until creamy and completely mixed

5. Scoop peanut butter mix into a piping bag or lunch bag and cut the tip off. squeeze mixture into the cups until almost full.

6. Bake for 20 minutes or until the centers are set. Cool on cooling rack and eat at room temperature or refrigerate and serve later.

giant m&m cookies

I am starting this 3 day diet today which is supposed to help you lose weight and is actually healthy. Hopefully by the third day I will be a little slimmer (: Of course since I cant eat any sweets for the next couple of days it is the only thing I am thinking about and, on top of that ,one of the guys at work brought in a ton of M&M's for me to bake with. My boyfriend has been wanting some M&M cookies so I figured now would be the best time. I will just have to enjoy baking them and not eating them. 


makes approx. 1 dozen large cookies


Ingredients

2 cups and 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 sticks butter, melted and cooled
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg and 1 egg yolk at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla
1 cup M&M's


Directions
1. Preheat oven to 325 F. and grease a cookie sheet.
2. Mix flour an baking soda in a bowl and set aside.
3. In another bowl mix the butter and sugars until combined. Add the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla and stir together.
4. Gradually mix the flour mixture with the butter mixture until dough forms. It might look crumbly at first but it will come together.
5. Fold in M&M's.
6. Divide dough (1/4 cup for large cookies and 2 tablespoons for small) Leave about 2 inches between large cookies.
7. Bake for 12-15 minutes for large cookies and 8-12 for small (until edges are slightly brown).

chocolate cake

Today is my grandmas birthday dinner and I wanted to do something special for her so I thought it would be great to make her birthday cake. I wanted to do something everyone would enjoy and I ended up choosing a chocolate cake with a cream cheese frosting and strawberries.


My family loves chocolate and fruit so I thought this would be a great combination. 


makes two 8-9 inch rounds
frosting makes 2 cups


Ingredients (cake)

1 1/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder ( I used Ghirardelli)
2 1/2 cups sugar
2 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/4 teaspoons salt
2 large eggs plus 1 large egg yolk
1 1/4 cups warm water
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour


Cream Cheese Frosting
4 oz cream cheese at room temp
1/2 stick (4 Tablespoons) butter at room temp
1/2 Tablespoon vanilla
1 1/2-2 cups powdered sugar


Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 F. making sure the baking rack is in the middle of the oven.
2. Prep your cake pans by cutting out a piece of parchment or wax paper to line the bottom of the pan. Grease the pans, place the parchment or wax paper in the bottom of the pan and lightly grease again. Set the pans aside.
3. Using a fine mesh strainer, sift together the cocoa, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into a large bowl.
4. Add the eggs, yolk, warm water, buttermilk, oil and vanilla. 
5. Mix on low speed (with a handheld mixer or in the bowl of an electric stand mixer) until smooth, about 3 minutes.
6. Divide the batter evenly between the prepared pans. 
7. Bake the cakes for about 32-35 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out clean or with moist crumbs. Do not overbake.  
8. Remove the pans from the oven and set the pans on a wire rack to cool for 15 minutes. Gently run a thin knife around the edges of the pans and unmold the cakes, removing the parchment paper liners from the bottom of the cakes. Let them cool completely, top sides ups, on a wire rack.


Cream Cheese Frosting

1. Place the cream cheese in the bowl of your mixer. Beat on medium-high until completely smooth, 3-4 minutes. 

2. Add the butter and continue to cream until fluffy.

3. Add vanilla extract. 
4. Slowly add powdered sugar (1/4 cup at a time) until desired consistency is reached.


I quartered the strawberries and placed them on top of each of the cakes and to add a little something else I drizzled chocolate syrup on top of the strawberries.

BlogThis!

brown sugar cookies

My boyfriends family is having a bbq this weekend and I wanted to bring something for dessert. I wanted to bring something easy to eat since there will be a lot of people and I didn't want to make a mess so I decided on brown sugar cookies. These cookies are amazing! They have the perfect amount of brown sugar and are so soft. And to top it off I put a browned butter glaze on top. So good!



makes approx. 3 dozen


Ingredients

2/3 cup butter, softened
1 1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla 
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup sour cream

Browned Butter Glaze 
1/4 cup butter
1 1/2 cup powdered sugar
2 Tablespoons milk

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Blend together butter and brown sugar.
3. One at a time add the eggs and blend well.
4. Add vanilla and beat until light. 
5. In a separate bowl stir together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
6. Add flour mixture to butter mixture alternately with sour cream and mix well. 
7. Drop tablespoonfuls onto lightly greased baking sheets. Bake for 8 minutes. Remove to a wire rack and cool.  
8. Frost with Browned Butter Glaze.


For the Brown Butter Glaze
1. Melt butter in a saucepan over medium heat until it turns golden. Watch carefully as this will happen quickly.
2. Remove from heat and stir in powdered sugar and milk (add more powdered to make glaze thinker if necessary/wanted).
3. Drizzle over cookies.

chocolate chip coconut cookies

Today I am stuck without a car (its in the shop today because of the accident yesterday) and without butter. I cant stand sitting at home and not baking so I decided to make some cookies without butter. I know, I know.. that buttery taste wont be there but the flavor from the chocolate and coconut will still be good!

makes approx. 2 dozen cookies


Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flower
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups chocolate chips
1/3 cup shredded coconut


Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Mix flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside
3. Whisk together sugar, brown sugar, oil, egg, and vanilla. Add flour mixture to oil mixture and stir just until blended. Stir in chocolate chips and coconut
4. Scoop up dough and shape into 1 inch balls. Space them about 2 inches apart onto 2 ungreased cookie sheets (if dough seems dry, press them down a little bit)
5. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Let cool for a few minutes on cookie sheets then move to cooling rack.

lemon brownies

Today has been a very hectic day! On my way to work this morning I got into a car accident :( someone ran into my car and took off.  A hit and run. Luckily I didn't get hurt and I know that person has some bad karma coming for them. I was a little shaken up for awhile and I just wanted to go home and bake. Baking makes everything better! Since I still had several lemons left after making the strawberry lemon scones I decided to make some lemon brownies. I made these a couple months back and sent them off to a friend for a gift. They were a huge success! These are perfect for when you want the texture of a brownie without the chocolate (some crazy people out there don't enjoy chocolate as much as the rest of us).  


makes enough for a 9x13 pan
1/2 recipe fits an 8x8 pan


Ingredients

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 cup (2 sticks) butter at room temperature

4 eggs

juice from 1/2 lemon

zest from 1 lemon

Topping

1 cup powdered sugar

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

additional lemon zest for garnish

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. and line a 9x13 inch baking pan with parchment paper or grease.

2. Stir together flour, sugar, and salt and add butter.

3. Stir together eggs, lemon juice, and lemon zest.

4. Mix the egg and lemon mixture into the dry ingredients and pour into the prepared pan.

5. Bake for 30 minutes or until set. Let cool on rack.

6. When brownies are cool, prepare the topping by combining ingredients and drizzle over the brownies. Add extra lemon zest for topping if desired.

Excuse the horrible picture. I was in a rush.

strawberry lemon scones

One of the women I work with brought in a ton of lemons from a lemon tree she has in her backyard and I knew I had to make something with them. These lemons are HUGE and I couldn't let them go to waste! 

I also happened to have some strawberries left over from some strawberry muffins I had made earlier this week and wanted to use them before it was too late. After looking over some recipes I decided to make some strawberry lemon scones. Yum!


makes 6-8 scones


Ingredients 
1 cup diced strawberries
zest of one large lemon
6 Tablespoons sugar
2 cups of all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking Powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons butter slightly softened and cubed
2/3 cup half-and-half


Topping
2-3 Tablespoons of sugar



Directions
1. Preheat oven to 400 F. Lightly grease a cookie sheet.
2. In a medium bowl carefully toss the strawberries with 1 Tbs. of sugar and set aside.
3. In a large bowl combine the sugar and the lemon zest. Rub the zest into the sugar with your fingers (this will bring out the fragrance of the lemon zest). 
4. Stir the flour, baking powder, and salt in to the lemon sugar mixture. Add butter and, using a pastry cutter or your fingertips, blend the butter into the dry ingredients. 
5. Add the half & half and stir just to incorporate (try not to overwork the dough) Carefully fold in the berries.
6. Turn onto a lightly floured surface and knead a few times to incorporate dry ingredients. Be gentle so you don't break up the berries and don't overwork the dough. Sprinkle dough with flour if it gets sticky.
7. Pat the dough into a circle 3/4 inch thick. If any berries stick out push them into dough. Cut circle into 6-8 wedges and transfer wedges to the cookie sheet (leaving at least 1/2 inch of space between them)
8. Sprinkle each scone with the 2-3 tablespoons of sugar.
9. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until the tops are just starting to turn brown and spring back when lightly touched (keep checking scones for color)