The thing is, pound cake can be a little too crazy decadent. The pound cakes of yore would actually sweat butter, if you know what I’m saying. But how else to get a lovely pound-ish cake without the butter?
Brown sugar to the rescue! Thanks to the higher moisture content of my favorite sugar choice, this cake can be made with healthy canola oil and still be the perfect cake to dip in fondue or leave plain. Sounds like a winner to me!
We need some winning right now. Twice a year, ants come into my house and get way too comfy. All the ant spray in the world can’t ultimately stop the little buggers.
One thing that weirds me out about ants is that they crawl in and out through electrical sockets. On an intellectual level, I realize they can’t get electrocuted that way. Still, it makes me mad that they can do it. And that I can’t chase them in there and kill them.
Don’t get me wrong: I’m not hugely bloodthirsty or anything. But when I see ants all over the place, I get this bizarre urge to take them all out. It’s my house, dangit. Get out!
Thanks to the ants, I also had to clean out my baking cabinet and throw away anything that might tempt them that was open. Bye bye, chocolate chips. Bye bye, sugary sprinkles. Oh, the pain.
Luckily, I have cake to distract me. Isn’t that always the case?
This is a one-bowl recipe with no crazy creaming or pyrotechnics. Just plain old mix and serve! Plus, this recipe will yield two regular loaves or one gigantic one. That’s pretty neat!
Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve got some ants to go deal with. Let’s hope the freeze comes soon!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Coat two medium or one large loaf pan with cooking spray. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, combine the eggs and both sugars until smooth. Add the milk, oil, vanilla, and almond extract. Stir until blended. Set aside.
- In a small bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the mixture to the wet ingredients and stir until fully combined.
- Pour the batter into the prepared pan(s). Bake for 65-75 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. About 30 minutes into baking time, place a foil tent over the loaf pan(s) to prevent the top from cooking before the center.
- Cool completely. Store covered.
Okay, that’s my life. I admit it. I have an ongoing love affair with brown sugar that is never going to end. Last week, we accidentally ran out of brown sugar, and I thought I was going to sit on the kitchen floor and cry. No baker worth her salt (or sugar, in this case) can do without the good stuff.
To apologize to brown sugar everywhere and make amends, I made these blondies. Blondies are the quintessential ode to brown sugar, a bar cookie packed with caramelized goodness. Plus, these are filled with butterscotch chips. That’s the life, baby!
I’m going to keep this post relatively short because my resources are stretched a little thin these days. Too much to do, and absolutely not enough time to do it all in. I’m sure you can relate, especially if you’re a woman. You know, because we can supposedly do everything.
So here’s me reaching out to you parents out there about kids fighting. It’s gotten really bad lately between my two older children, and I’m not sure what to do. No matter what we do, the two of them wind up going at it. It’s unrelenting, and I’m at the end of my rope. They literally fight about everything. If one of them says that it’s time for breakfast, the other one will be contradictory and insist that it’s too early, late, or whatever. It doesn’t matter, as long as they can argue about it. And this just goes on all day long.
Short of resorting to losing my mind, screaming at the top of my lungs, shipping them off to boarding school or a combination of the three, I need help. How do you handle kids who seem to fight all the time? Seasoned moms, I’m asking you for tips. Help me! Please. Consider it your act of kindness for this week.
The thing is, I often feel like a terrible mother. I’m easily distracted, often busy, and have a lot of my own going on. It’s tough to give my kids all the attention they need, and even though I see my brood more than most working moms see theirs, I feel that their fighting is somehow my fault. If I’m not engaging with them constantly and directly, then it all falls apart. Mom guilt sucks.
If there’s one thing I feel less guilty about, it’s how I feed them. They do pretty well in that department. After all, I’m the mom with the goodies!
The big appeal of this recipe is that it’s made in one bowl very quickly. The blondie base is my favorite, and you can adapt it however you like. So if butterscotch chips aren’t your bag, try something else!
Okay, I’m gonna go pay attention to my kids now before my house becomes a war zone. Send help!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Line an 8-inch square pan with foil, leaving enough to overhang the sides, and coat in cooking spray.
- In a medium-sized bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
- Take a larger bowl and mix the brown sugar, melted butter, eggs and vanilla until just blended. Add the dry ingredients gradually and mix until incorporated. Fold in the butterscotch chips.
- Spread the batter in the prepared pan. Bake for 30-35 minutes until the edges are browned. The middle will jiggle slightly, but it will harden as the bars cool. Do not overbake.
- Cut into squares and store in an airtight container.
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I guess it makes sense. After all, I’m the dessert girl. But every now and then, could I bring a bottle of tequila instead? Sharing is caring, ya know.
Oh, well. When I’m asked last-minute to bring a dessert somewhere, an old faithful recipe is the one to save me every time. No, I’m not talking about passing off slice and bake as my own, though that’s tempting. I’m talking about an easy bar cookie. These blondies are chewy, thick, easily customized and, most important, fast.
With all the stuff that gets thrown at us, we need easy solutions. After my flu drama of last week, I woke up with pinkeye a few days ago. On a scale of 1-10 of gross ailments that can inflict a human being with 10 being the highest, I’d rate pinkeye about a 5. On the one hand, it’s pretty yucky. On the other hand, I’ve seen much worse. Mainly on TV in zombie movies, but in real life as well.
While we’re on the subject, I’m not down with this whole zombie trend that seems to be stretching into oblivion. I had just gotten used to vegetarian vampires when zombie stuff started popping up everywhere. It’s been a few years now and people are still obsessed. When is there going to be a cute kitten and rainbow trend? Can someone get behind that?
See, I’m a very visual person, and I have a somewhat photographic memory. Once I see an image, it gets burned into my brain for all time. If it’s a scary image, I can’t drive it out of my head. That’s why I avoid horror movies, the evening news, and medical shows on TV. I really don’t want to be lying in the dark with disturbing images doing a loop in my head.
Maybe that’s the reason dessert is so appealing to me. It tastes good, sure, but it’s also a feast for the eyes. I always take a moment to appreciate how beautiful my blondie is before I eat it. That is the opposite of being scared senseless by a zombie.
The base here is easy to make. I had a video, but my camera died during filming. Saddest story ever. So you have to imagine seeing that, and also understand that you can put in any old thing you’d like. Well, mix-ins, that is. I wouldn’t be dumping wine in there. Drink it on the side!
Nothing is more convenient than having a bunch of go-to recipes for when people assume you want to make dessert on short notice. That way you can rise to the occasion. Also, you can keep the bottle of tequila at home and enjoy it as you bake. Just don’t watch The Walking Dead at the same time!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Line an 8 x 8 pan with foil, leaving enough to overhang the sides, and coat in cooking spray.
- In a medium-sized bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
- Take a larger bowl and mix the brown sugar, melted butter, eggs and vanilla until just blended. Add the dry ingredients gradually and mix until incorporated. Fold in the mix-ins.
- Spread the batter in the prepared pan.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes until the edges are browned. The middle might jiggle slightly, but it will harden as the bars cool. Do not overbake. Cut into squares with a sharp knife and store in an airtight container
Cinnamon is one of those dark horses. I forget about it for weeks, sometimes months, at a time. And then without warning, I eat a dessert with cinnamon, and wham! I can’t stop.
When I tried Hannah Max cinnamon sugar cookie chips for the first time to decide how to bake with them, I had to slap my own hand to stop it from reaching back into the bag. The cinnamon sugar flavor is more addictive than I expected. It’s always fun when life runs contrary to expectation in a good way!
That’s how I got married, actually. When I started dating Kenny, I didn’t really expect it to last for very long. See, he was super cute and a lot of fun, but I’d known him since college when he was a bit rough around the edges and perpetually playing ping-pong. It’s pretty much all he ever did.
So imagine my surprise when on our first date, we actually had a serious conversation. And he was kinder than I’d ever realized, ready to start the next stage of his life with marriage and kids and all that. In other words, he had grown up. I hadn’t expected that at all. In my mind, he was still playing ping-pong with stale rolls from the dining hall because he couldn’t find the ball.
Pleasant surprises are the best kind. They sneak up on you and make you wonder if you really do know as much as you think you know.
Cinnamon desserts are in that place for me. I bake them with almost an internal shrug, thinking that somebody will really like it, but not me. After I’ve managed to mainline several helpings of whatever it is, I’ll finally admit that I really love cinnamon more than I expected to.
This cake is ridiculously good. It’s almost a blondie because of a higher brown sugar content to a lower flour ratio. The inclusion of eggs and baking powder makes it rise to cake-like proportions, however, and the cinnamon sugar topping is made of cookie chips.
I cannot say enough about this topping. Some of it floats on the top while the rest of it sinks into the batter at various points, giving the cake a through-and-through cookie chip quotient. With the (sorry if you hate this word) moist cake base balancing the crunchy cookie chips, it’s hard to imagine breakfast getting any better.
If you don’t think much about cinnamon, you’ll have to rethink your internal musings. Cinnamon sugar cookie chips are too addictive to ignore, and put into this cake, they take on a whole new amazing form. Maybe cookie chips on coffee cake isn’t what you’d expect, but it’s a glorious surprise. And those are the best kind!
A product for this post was provided by Hannah Max Cookie Chips. All opinions are my own.
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Coat a 9 x 13-inch pan with cooking spray. Set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer, combine all the cake ingredients and mix until smooth.
- Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 20 minutes.
- While the cake is baking, make the crumb topping. In a bowl, combine the topping ingredients and use your fingers to make crumbs.
- Spread the crumb mixture evenly over the cake and bake for 35 additional minutes.
- Cool and cut into squares.
Have you noticed? Seriously, it’s not typically my bag. When you’re addicted to chocolate and peanut butter, fruit falls by the wayside. At least, it does in baked goods.
Now fruit on its own, raw, is a different animal entirely. And my number one favorite fruit of all time is the white nectarine. When perfectly ripe, it’s sweet and juicy and better than anything. I hate to do anything to them but eat them as they are. But every now and then, you get a less than amazing batch. Actually, more than that. So that’s when you bake them into cake!
While pineapple upside-down cakes have never been a thing for me, I am a big fan of using other fruit. Pineapples can be saved for pureed, frosty drinks on tropical islands. You dig?
Man, it’s been a while since I’ve been to a tropical island. The last time was June of 2007. Kenny and I went to St. Lucia and he got completely addicted to pineapple daiquiris. He kept sipping and sipping, and then he suggested we have a baby. And the rest is history. It also explains why we haven’t taken a big vacation since 2007.
See, I’m terrified of going on a plane with three small children. I see parents doing it (or bragging about doing it), their car seats strapped to their backs and endless luggage piled around them. Nope. Not for me. I fully admit to being a wuss when it comes to kids and travel, so I’m happy to wait a few more years for a pineapple daiquiri to come back into Kenny’s life.
In the meantime, I’ll just have to get my warm-weather fix here in our nation’s capital. It’s plenty hot here, and there’ s fruit. So there you have it.
This cake is pretty easy to make with no mixer required. And you don’t have to peel the nectarines, nor do they have to be ripe. So really, there’s no excuse for you not to jump on this bandwagon now, especially because it’s a delicious place to be.
Some upside-down cakes are made partly in a skillet, but I didn’t go that route because not everyone has skillets they can put into the oven. Can you tell I’m terrified of fire, even on behalf of everyone else? Instead, melted butter and brown sugar are mixed in the bottom of a cake pan, topped with the sliced fruit, and then covered in batter. Yes, my kids helped me with this one. It’s that simple.
And it’s a fantastic company dessert. I rarely have dinner gatherings these days, but I had one the night I made this, and it went over very well. Especially with vanilla ice cream on top. People had seconds. I had thirds after everyone left!
There’s some amazing fruit around this time of year, but if it disappoints, stop eating it and turn it into cake. It’ll make a great picnic dessert, and everyone will be so impressed! You can use their compliments to hold you over until your next tropical vacation. Hope it’s soon!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Coat a 9-inch round cake pan with cooking spray.
- Pour the melted butter into the cake pan. Evenly sprinkle the brown sugar over the melted butter. Cover with the nectarine slices, being sure to get the fruit to cover as much as the bottom of the pan as possible. Set aside.
- In a bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.
- Combine the melted butter with the two sugars and mix until incorporated. Add the egg, yogurt, milk, lime juice and vanilla, stirring until completely smooth. Add the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
- Pour the batter on top of the fruit topping. Bake for 30-35 minutes until browned on top and set. You can test the cake with a toothpick to see if it's done.
- Cool for about 15 minutes. Invert carefully onto a plate.
- Serve at whatever temperature you desire, cut into wedges. Store covered. The cake is best on day one.
I’m starting off the week with my all-time favorite fudge recipe. This one knocks my socks off every single time, and I make it only once a year. Otherwise, well, I’d never eat anything else.
The flavors in this fudge are incredibly complex and complementary. The process starts with caramelizing smoked almonds (I know!) in butter and brown sugar. By themselves, they’re dynamite. In fudge, I can only describe the effect as mind-blowing.
To really set off the smoky caramel of the almonds, I use Ghirardelli dark chocolate chips as the fudge base. This is not the kind of fudge a 2 year-old will go for, most of the time. I’ll do something lighter and more colorful later this week for that! But this fudge is the perfect dish to bring to a grown-up holiday party. Because the only thing better than eating this fudge is doing so with a glass of champagne in your other hand.
Other than caramelizing the almonds, which is a very easy process, the fudge base for this is made in the microwave. So not only is this an impressive recipe, but it also takes a lot less time than a dish of this caliber would ordinarily cost you. That means you have more time to eat fudge and watch sappy holiday movies. Who wants to stand over a stovetop with a candy thermometer? Not me. Never me!
It’s only the first day of Fudge Week, so there’s more holiday joy to come. Stay tuned for more fun from my bloggy friend Gayle and me, as well as a couple of ideas for how to wrap and present fudge as a gift. We’re here to serve!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Line an 8 x 8 square pan with aluminum foil, letting the foil hang over the sides, and coat with cooking spray. Set aside.
- In a medium nonstick skillet, melt the butter. Add the brown sugar and stir. When the mixture becomes bubbly, stir for one more minute. Remove from the heat and stir in the smoked almonds. Spread the hot almonds out on a big plate or piece of waxed paper to cool.
- Make the fudge. In a microwave-safe bowl, heat the chocolate chips with the condensed milk for 2 minutes. Remove from the microwave and stir until smooth.
- Mix the caramelized almonds into the chocolate mixture and pour into the prepared pan, evening out the top. Sprinkle with sea salt.
- Chill for 2 hours until firm. Remove from the refrigerator and let the fudge come to room temperature. Cut into small squares with a sharp knife and store in an airtight container.
There are times when life gets a little intense, friends. This is one of those times. It’s been a rough month, and reading the newspaper really doesn’t help. I don’t understand how people can watch the news before they go to bed. Do they want to have nightmares? Lie awake in their beds imagining worst-case scenarios?
Every day, I skim headlines. When they’re not too bad I feel a vague sense of satisfaction. But when (as has been the case for the past few weeks) I see a lot of scary and disturbing stuff, I retreat into my kitchen to bake. And the worse the headline, the more crazy I go with the food. That’s why these peanut butter bars are so intense.
Nestle has been selling these amazing filled chocolate chips. They have lots of flavors: mint, cherry, caramel, and of course, peanut butter. So these bars are chock-full of the PB-filled chips and peanut butter chips as well. Why hold back?
These are kind of a blondie-peanut butter bar hybrid. Blondies are characterized by their intense levels of brown sugar. If you’ve ever had brown sugar with peanut butter, you know what I’m talking about when I say that I had to dump an entire cup of brown sugar in this and eschew (yes, I’m an English teacher, I use big words) any granulated sugar. It made for a chewier, denser bar. Brown sugar all the way!
If you don’t like peanut butter, avoid these at all cost. There’s no place for you here! Don’t you know me by now?
Seriously, enjoy these. But not while watching the news. Avoid the news! Instead, watch reruns of Gilmore Girls while you chow down. It will feel so much better.
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Line an 8-by-8-inch baking pan with aluminum foil and spray with cooking spray. Set aside.
- Combine the melted butter with the egg, brown sugar and vanilla. Stir in the peanut butter. Add the flour, baking soda, and salt, mixing until just incorporated.
- Fold in the filled chocolate chips and peanut butter chips. Pour batter out into the prepared pan and spread it out evenly.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until center is just set and golden.
- Allow bars to cool completely. Cut into squares and store in an airtight container.
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What eventually happens is that the front drawer in my freezer is full of goodies: M & Ms, chocolate chips, butterscotch chips, peanut butter chips. If it’s got chocolate, it’s in there! So every now and then I have to get rid of whatever is in there and then replenish gradually. It’s the circle of life.
Last night, I was staring into my freezer and I had a sudden hankering for blondies. Really thick, chewy blondies with lots of goodies mixed in. I grabbed the bags in my freezer, made up a batch of my favorite blondies, and threw all the candy in there.
It was kind of therapeutic, actually. What better way to spend an evening than freely tossing candy into batter and eating some along the way while dancing to guilty pleasure music? I can’t think of anything more fun. Especially when the blondies came out of the oven and I got to eat them!
They were all that was promised. Thick. Full of stuff. Sinfully irresistible, rivaling any bakery blondie I’ve ever had, and then some. Wow, that came out totally arrogant-sounding. Oh well. If I couldn’t bake, I wouldn’t be doing this whole blogging thing.
The lesson here, my friends, is to use up what you have from time to time. Chocolate does go bad, so it’s vital to bake with it before that happens. You can’t just let it languish for months in your cabinets. Then when you try it and it’s all chalky, you’ll just be lost in the sadness.
If you have different mix-ins at home, use those. I’ll list what I used in the recipe, but that’s just me. It’s important to realize that you can put your own mark on these blondies! Just make sure that the candy you put in is your favorite. Then everyone wins!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350. Line an 8 x 8 pan with foil, leaving enough to overhang the sides, and coat in cooking spray.
- In a medium-sized bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
- Take a larger bowl and mix the brown sugar, melted butter, eggs and vanilla until just blended. Add the dry ingredients gradually and mix until incorporated. Fold in the candy.
- Spread the batter in the prepared pan.
- Bake for 30-35 minutes until the edges are browned. The middle might jiggle slightly, but it will harden as the bars cool. Do not overbake. Cut into squares with a sharp knife and store in an airtight container
Well, folks, them days are over. And thank heaven they are, because dessert is being pushed farther than ever before, all because of food blogging. How can anyone possibly object? We’re baking as fast as genius food manufacturers are developing newer products.
Like Nestlé’s pumpkin spice-flavored morsels. I saw them at Target and bought 4 bags. I had to play with them! And the first recipe they yielded is this caramelized pecan and pumpkin spice fudge.
The only thing better than a nut is a caramelized nut. And making them is so easy! When you’re done, you have a wonderful salty and sweet confection, perfect for creating a crunch in your fudge.
This microwave fudge recipe is no-fail and absolutely my most favorite recipe ever. It takes little to no effort or time to produce, and when you’ve let the fudge chill in the pan for a few hours, you’re all set to go!
The pumpkin chips produce a softer fudge, so be aware. But if you’d like it to be harder, just chill it longer. The refrigerator works wonders!
And your life will be endlessly awesome once you make this recipe! There will be plenty of chocolate fudge in life, so take a break for its pumpkin sister! She’s spicy in all the right ways!
Ingredients
Instructions
- Put the butter in a skillet over medium heat. Melt the butter and add the brown sugar, stirring until the sugar becomes bubbly and frothy. Immediately turn off the heat and add the pecans, stirring to coat.
- Spread the pecans in one layer on a piece of aluminum foil, being careful not to burn yourself. Allow them to cool.
- Take an 8 x 8 pan and line with waxed or parchment paper, using enough to let the paper hang over the sides of the pan.
- While the pecans are cooling, make the fudge. Heat the pumpkin spice chips and the condensed milk in a microwave-safe bowl for 1 and 1/2 minutes. Remove the bowl from the microwave and stir until the mixture is completely smooth.
- Fold in the caramelized pecans.
- Pour the fudge into the lined pan and spread it out as evenly as you can.
- Chill for 2-3 hours until completely firm and set. Remove from the refrigerator and let the fudge come to room temperature.
- Lift the fudge out of the pan using the overhanging lining. Cut into squares with a sharp knife.. Store in an airtight container.
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As much as I love meeting everyone, it’s an exhausting day. Most teachers go to work, teach all day, and then just stay for the event. We can be there for way too long, and it’s tiring. So this year, I brought these cookies in to boost morale among my colleagues!
With all the caramel and butterscotch, these soft cookies were an instant hit. Somebody had brought a tray of assorted Costco cookies into the office, too. Guess which ones disappeared first?
No, silly, not the Costco cookies. These caramel cookies were gone! Even people who aren’t the biggest butterscotch fans (yes, they exist) ate these. People kept commenting on the soft texture of the cookie. Like I always say, texture trumps everything, even taste. I’d eat soft-baked cookies in any flavor, all day long.
Like many of the softer cookie recipes circulating these days, this recipe includes cornstarch. It does wonders in creating that soft yet chewy quality. The caramel bits melt into the cookie and enhance the texture even more, while the butterscotch chips add the tiniest bit of crunch. It’s sensational.
Just remember, as always, to chill your dough. Otherwise, the cookies will spread and not be thick and puffy. You’re going for pillowy, not flat!
If you don’t have work friends to cheer up on a rough day, bake these for anyone. They’ll be an instant hit!
Ingredients:
- 2 cups flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons cornstarch
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter, melted
- 1 and 1/4 cups firmly packed brown sugar
- 1 egg at room temperature
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 1/2 cup caramel bits (Kraft)
- 1/2 cup butterscotch chips
Instructions:
In a bowl, combine the dry ingredients (except the brown sugar) in a bowl and set aside.
Mix the melted butter and brown sugar until smooth. Add the egg and vanilla and stir again. Pour in the dry mixture and combine until all ingredients are incorporated. Fold in the caramel bits and butterscotch chips.
Cover the bowl and refrigerate for several hours or preferably overnight.
When you’re ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350. Form tall mounds of dough (about 2 tablespoons) and place them 2 inches apart on the baking sheet. Bake for 8-10 minutes. Do not overbake.
Allow to cool completely on baking sheets. Remove and store in an airtight container.
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