Cookie Turkey

My son's birthday is close to Thanksgiving so we thought it would be fun to send turkey treats for his school class. I saw the idea at Ourbestbites .
They would make a cute place card for Thanksgiving and be a great project for the kids while dinner is cooking!

What you will need:
Double stuffed Oreos
Whoppers
Candy Corns
Mini Peanut butter Cups
Black sprinkles (for pupil)
Yellow Icing
Brown Icing
Red Icing
For step by step instructions click here Ourbestbites.

Farmers Birthday Cake

I have two boys with birthdays in November. This is the cake I made for my 2 year old this year. He loved it! Birthdays around here aren't a real big production so this is just one way we celebrate is with a fun cake. I found this idea at family fun. It was fun to make and fairly simple. Of course mine isn't as cute as the one at family fun but my kids thought it was great! Click here for the instructions :Familyfun.

Eye Balls

Eye Balls (Oreo Truffles)

Last weekend Eric & I went to a Halloween party and I took these eye balls for treats. I forgot to take a picture, so this is from the Family Fun website. They used doughnut holes dipped in white chocolate for theirs, which is the easy route if you are short on time. I made mine with the Oreo Truffles recipe I posted some time ago. I used mini M&M's for the pupils just to add a little color. Have a Happy Halloween!

Reuben Sandwich-Pressure Cooker

Happy St. Patrick's Day! At our house we have the tradition of making Reuben sandwiches on or around the 17th, depending on work schedules. In the past I have always cooked my corned beef on the stove for hours till it becomes tender. This year I cooked it in my pressure cooker. Who knew, ok maybe all of you. I found this to be a great technique for cooking corned beef.

It was simple. Put your 3lbs corned beef in the cooker, cover meat with water and add the seasoning packet that comes with it. Secure the lid and bring to pressure (15lbs) and cook for 1 hour and 15 min.

This is our take on the Reuben sandwich. My mother cans her own sauerkraut and so kindly shares so that makes this even better.

Reuben Sandwich

3 lbs Corned Beef

Sauerkraut

Thousand Island Dressing

Swiss cheese

Rye bread

butter

Butter one side of the pieces of rye bread. Place sliced or shredded corned beef on the non buttered side of the bread, then layer Swiss cheese, then the sauerkraut. On the other piece of bread, on the non-buttered side spread some thousand island dressing and place the bread on the top of the sauerkraut. Cook on a panini grill, fry pan, or griddle, a waffle iron is kind of fun if you don't mind a greasy mess to clean up. Cover with a pan lid to help the cheese melt. Cook on both sides till browned and crisp.

Ice Cream Cake

My son isn't a big fan of cake, but loves ice cream. So this year for his birthday I thought I would try my hand at an ice cream cake. He thought it was a great idea. He was born on Groundhogs Day so when I saw groundhog cupcakes at Family Fun.com I had to try it!

Ice cream Cake
1 batch Kat's Brownies
2- 1 qt. ice creams (I used Tin Roof Sunday & Death By Chocolate)
Crushed Oreos
Hot Fudge Sauce

Cool whip Frosting
1 (8 oz.) Cream Cheese
1 c Powder Sugar
1 tsp vanilla
24 oz cool whip
(I had alot of frosting left over if you want to 1/2 the recipe)

First I mixed up a batch of Kat's Brownies. I baked them in two 9 in. spring form pans.
Let them cool then I placed them in the freezer for a couple hours. Remove brownies from the freezer and the ice cream (15 min or until very soft). On one of the pans of Brownies spread enough of the cooled fudge sauce to cover the top. Sprinkle a a good layer of crushed Oreos on top of the fudge sauce. (If you are not pressed for time freeze again) Spread a different flavor of ice cream over each pan of brownies. (To the top of the pan, it won't use all of the ice cream). Place back in the freezer till frozen again.

Make the Cool whip frosting by mixing in all the ingredients with a hand mixer.
Remove pans from freezer. Let ice cream soften just a bit and run a knife around the edge of the pan and then remove the side of the pan. Invert one of the cakes to set on top of the other, so ice cream is on ice cream. Give them a little press so they will stick together. I placed my cake on a lazy susan to make the frosting process a little bit easier. Once frosted place back in the freezer. Remove from freezer about 10 min prior to serving. Warm up the additional hot fudge sauce if desired.

Not to pretty of a picture since I forgot to take the picture till it was quite soft.


I made these cupcakes for my son to share with his class at school. They were a hit! For instructions to make the groundhogs click here Family Fun.

Caramel & Chocolate Covered Pretzels

I wanted to do something fun for Valentines this year. The boys and Eric loved them, my boys went to bed with tummy aches from eating to much sugar throughout the day. Don't worry they were healed & wanted more the next day!

Caramel & Chocolate Covered Pretzels
1 bag 160z. Snyder's Pretzels (Rods or Olde Tyme shape work the best)
1 batch of Caramel (click here to get caramel recipe)
White Almond Bark
Chocolate Almond Bark

Dip pretzels in the caramel then place on a buttered cookie sheet to cool. Once cooled dip in melted almond bark. After the almond bark has hardened, cut the corner of a zip lock bag and put some of the melted almond bark inside to drizzle (or swizzle as my son calls it) across the top of the pretzel.
You could add all kinds of toppings while the almond bark is still wet: sprinkles, mini chocolate chips, crushed candy cane, etc.

One batch of caramel will come close to covering the whole bag of pretzels.

4th of July Cookies

This week I was incharge of the "Activity Day" for the girls in my ward. I thought with the 4th of July right around the corner we would talk about why we celebrate it and how blessed we are to live in this great country! They each learned how to fold the flag. We wrote letters on paper stars (familyfun.com/fold and snip stars) to send to the young man from our ward serving in Iraq. For treats we had these festive cookies. I adapted the recipe from Taste of Home's "Ultimate Cookie Collection"

4th of July Cookies

1 c butter, softened

1 1/2 c sugar

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

2 1/2 c flour

1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

2 tsp almond extract, divided

red food coloring

blue food coloring

1/2 c flaked coconut, finely chopped

1. Line a 9-in.x 5-in. x 3-in. loaf pan with waxed paper; set aside. In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Beat in egg and vanilla. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt; gradually add to creamed mixture and mix well.

2. Divied dough into thirds. Add 1 tsp almond extract and red food coloring to one portion; spread evenly into prepared pan. Add coconut to second portion; spread evenly over first layer. Add 1 tsp almond extract and blue food coloring to third portion; spread evenly over second layer. Cover with foil; freeze for 4 hours or over night (I only did 1 1/2 hours and it worked fine)

3. Unwrap loaf and cunt in half lengthwise. Cut each portion widthwise into 1/4-in. slices. Place 2-in. apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake at 350 for 12-14 min. or until edges are lightly browned. Remove to wire racks to cool.

Yields: 3 1/2 dozen.

April Fools Cupcakes

My six year old was looking forward to April Fools Day this year. He was sure he was going to get me good. So I thought I had better come up with something to pull on him. I found this idea at Family Fun. They had some really cute ideas. My boys thought I was crazy when I called them to eat and they saw a cupcake and carrots for dinner. They each at three! They thought it was great and wanted to go give cupcakes to grandma and grandpa.


April Fools Cupcakes

Meat Loaf
1 pound lean ground beef
1/2 cup seasoned bread crumbs
1 cup grated Monterey Jack cheese
3 tablespoons ketchup
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon celery salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper

Potato Frosting
3 cups mashed potatoes
Food coloring
1. Heat the oven to 375 degrees. Line 12 muffin tin cups with foil bake cups. 2. In a large bowl, mix together all of the meat loaf ingredients until well combined. Divide the mixture evenly among the lined cups (the liners should be about three quarters full). 3. Place the filled muffin tins on cookie sheets and bake the cupcakes for about 15 minutes or until cooked through. 4. Divide the mashed potatoes among three small bowls and stir a few drops of food coloring into each batch to create blue, yellow, and pink pastel frostings. Spread a generous dollop on each cupcake. Makes 12 cupcakes.
-Notes-
I added cream cheese to my mashed potatoes