Single Lady Cupcake

Posted on December 30, 2011 by Casey

Sometimes all ~~your hips~~ you need is one.

Keepin’ it short and sweet today…super busy around here!! I know, this cupcake is Christmas-y, but I made it a week or two ago before Christmas. I swear it made sense back then! Anyways it is a VERY delicious treat to enjoy any time of the day. Have a wonderful day and enjoy this quick and [supposedly] healthy cupcake!

Single Lady Chocolate Cupcake

(adapted from Chocolate Covered Katie)

2 teaspoon cocoa powder (I used Hershey’s Special Dark)

1 Tablespoon olive oil (or melted butter)

3 Tablespoon flour

1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

pinch of salt

2 packets of sweetener or 1 Tablespoon sugar

1 Tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon water (or milk)

Preheat the oven to 330 degrees F. Grease a single muffin cup in a muffin tin or line a muffin cup. Or you can use a silicon muffin cup like I did.
Mix all the ingredients together.
Bake in preheated oven for 12-14 minutes. Let cool and frost if you have some extra frosting laying around. I used some leftover mint buttercream. YUM! I also added a few Christmas-y non-perils.

Random Fact of the Day: The average shoe size of a gorilla is 17 (US).

imabonehead: Blissfully Delicious – Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting (blissfullydelicious.com)
imabonehead: Blissfully Delicious – Devil’s Food Cupcakes with Dark Chocolate Frosting (blissfullydelicious.com)
Avocado Cupcakes (epicureanvegan.com)

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream

Posted on December 28, 2011 by Casey

Raise your hand if you think the price of vanilla beans is outrageous!

Raise your hand if you have no idea how much vanilla beans cost!

Okay, so a little while ago I definitely would have been raising my hand to the second one. But then I decided that I want to make real vanilla bean ice cream. So I strolled right on in to the local Jewel, looked at the spices, extracts, and such. Found the vanilla beans. Then nearly fainted.

WHAT THE HECK!?

2 stinking vanilla beans for $15!?! Who do they think I am?? Well…I bought them anyways. And you know what? I had some pretty freaking good ice cream in a fabulous cake.

Okay, so as you have probably noticed….there are no stinking pictures. And let me tell you, I’m pretty upset about that. I just looked into the freezer to scoop some up and take pictures but then could not find it. Then I looked into the sink and saw the empty container. Must be pretty good, right? Well, at least I got to try it in an ice cream cake I will be posting about later . It was delicious then and I’m sure it would taste incredible by itself, as well. Here’s a preview of the cake with just the vanilla bean layer. Let me tell you, this is nothing close though to what the final cake actually looked like but I don’t want to spoil that post for ya!

These pictures aren’t really doing me any justice over here, but I swear you could see the vanilla beans and everything!

Vanilla Bean Ice Cream

(from Annie’s Eats)

2 cups heavy cream (used separately)
1 cup milk (I used skim, it’s all we have but whole milk will work better)
¾ cup sugar
Pinch of salt
1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise
1 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine 1 cup of the cream with the sugar and salt in a medium saucepan. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the pan and drop in the vanilla pod. Heat over medium-high heat, stirring occasionally, until the sugar is dissolved. Remove the mixture from the heat and stir in the remaining 1 cup of cream, the milk and the vanilla.
Cover and refrigerate until the mixture is well chilled. Remove the vanilla bean before churning. Freeze in an ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions.

So many variations of vanilla… (ask.metafilter.com)
Very Wearable Vanilla Scents (bellasugar.com)
Meyer Lemon and Vanilla Bean Marmalade (earthoceanskyredux.com)

SRC Post!-Brown Sugar Bars

Posted on December 26, 2011 by Casey

Hey all!! I hope everyone had a very merry Christmas or happy Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or whatever else you have been celebrating lately!

As most of you probably already know, I am in the Secret Recipe Club. If you do not know much about it, I recommend looking here! It’s a super fun way to discover new blogging buddies and get your own blog out there a little bit! I know I really have had a ton of fun with it so far, not only looking at the blogs I have been assigned, but also looking at the amazing list of the rest of the bloggers.

Anyways, the blog that I was assigned for this month was Sarah’s blog, called Fanatical Sharing of Recipes. Just after reading the first sentence in Sarah’s “about” page, I gained a huge amount of respect for her. She is a 23 year old mom to two and an army wife. Wow! I can not even imagine how difficult that must be, but hey at least shes got some pretty darn tasty recipes to deal with the lemons she’s been given in her life.

I finally decided to try her Brown Sugar Chewies. To be honest, I had mixed feelings going into this one. For those of you who have read my blog a little before, you have probably notice I’m more of a chocolate kind of gal.

However, these bars are totally amazing! No chocolate and I love them. I repeat: no chocolate… They kind of remind me of a pecan pie. But in bar form, without a crust. They’re just totally delicious and super easy. Give them a try and stop over by Sarah’s blog and say hi!

Brown Sugar Chewies

(from the wonderful Sarah)

1/4 cup butter

1 cup brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
3/4 cup flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
1/4 cup chopped pecans
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting-if desired

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F and grease an 8 x 8 pan.
Melt butter in a small saucepan, but make sure it is big enough that you will be able to fit the rest of the ingredients in there.
Once butter is melted, turn off the heat and add in the brown sugar and stir until it is smooth. Stir in egg. Mix in vanilla and pecans.
Spread batter into prepared pan. The dough may seem hard to spread or it might not seem like enough to fit the pan, but don’t worry, it should be a fairly thin layer. Bake in preheated oven for 20-23 minutes.
Let bars cool and dust with powdered sugar, if desired.

Have a Happy New Year everyone!!!

Random Fact of the Day: There are 80,658,175,170,943,878,571,660,636,856,403,766,975,289,505,440,883,277,824,000,000,000,000 ways to shuffle a deck of cards!

Tiger Butter-First SRC post! (mybeautifuldisasters.wordpress.com)
Round 2 of SRC! Flourless Chocolate Cake (mybeautifuldisasters.wordpress.com)
imabonehead: Mexican Wedding Cookies | Jo Cooks (jocooks.com)

Merry Christmas!

Posted on December 25, 2011 by Casey

Merry Christmas!

I hope you all have a wonderful day today. Enjoy and appreciate your family no matter how much they may drive you crazy, you know you will always have them and they will always have you. Remember what is important today and enjoy your company, food, and the gift of your life that you have been given!

(from left : My brother-Jack, my mom, my doggy-Harry!!, my sister-Brooke, ME , my dad)

Christmas Treat Recipes Wrap-Up

Posted on December 22, 2011 by Casey

I hope you all have enjoyed my recipes that I’ve shared with you the past couple weeks to get ready for the big day! These treats will certainly add a special element to any dessert platter, for Christmas or any time of the year. Just click on the picture and the post will come up! Happy baking

P.S. Sorry about the small font for the cookies and cream fudge and cake roll links, I have it as the same size font but it’s not showing up that way!! Grr…technology.