This post has been sponsored by Betty Crocker. I was compensated with a giftcard for writing, however all opinions listed are my own.
Around here, you will always find me and my daughter creating some kind of birthday cake recipe. If you look through my recipe archives, you will find exactly that — tons of cake recipes. It just seems to be what I do best. Here are 5 of my favorite easy birthday cake recipes that you can recreate at your home.
My daughter loves to make cake pops. We have never ventured to be as creative as the original Cake Pop maker — Bakerella, but, we have tried our fair share at making them. The first few times were epic fail, but then we finally learned how to make cake pops the right way.
This month for the Improv Cooking Challenge, we were given Bacon and Eggs to work with. Now — there are SO many things you can make with bacon and eggs because they are two versatile ingredients. I chose to find a way to incorporate them into a sweet recipe instead of a savory one, so I created Bacon Chocolate Chip Cookies.
If you have ever had salty and sweet in the same bite and fell head over heels in love, then you will LOVE this cookie recipe. The key is getting your bacon good and crispy without overcooking it.
- 1 egg
- 1 stick butter (room temp.)
- 1 box of chocolate chunk cookie mix
- 8-10 slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Place two sheets of paper towel on a microwave safe plate. Place 4 strips of bacon on top of the paper towel thencover your bacon strips with one more layer of paper towels. Microwave for 3-5 minutes. Be sure to check your bacon periodically as all microwave ovens vary.
- Bacon must be crisp, not chewy. Repeat with remaining strips and set aside to cool.
- Mix room temperature butter and egg until combined and then add the cookie mix.
- Chop your bacon strips. Try to get them all the same size. If you do not, no worries. Big chunks of bacon make for delicious bites of cookies
- Gently fold the bacon into cookie dough.
- Scoop cookies out onto a baking sheet in 1 inch proportions (or bigger if you want bigger cookies).
- Bake for 12-15 minutes or until just golden around the edges. Cool on a cookie rack and then enjoy!
- Beware — you will eat more than one!
I am now in cookie heaven! Be sure to check out all the other amazing recipes in the Improv Cooking Challenge.
Yesterday was one of my friend’s 21st birthday. He asked me if I knew how to make homemade samoas because it is his all time favorite Girl Scout cookie. I told him YES!, so Kayla and I made him a batch
These cookies are a bit time consuming to make, but SO worth it.
- 1 cup butter, soft
- ½ cup sugar
- 2 cups all purpose flour
- ¼ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp milk
- 3 cups sweetened shredded coconut
- 12-oz chewy caramels
- ¼ tsp salt
- 3 tbsp milk
- 1 bag of semi sweet chocolate chips
- Preheat oven to 350F.In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Mix in flour, baking powder and salt at a low speed, followed by the vanilla and milk, adding in the milk as needed to make the dough come together without being sticky. The dough should come together into a soft, not-too-sticky ball. Add in a bit of extra flour if your dough is very sticky.
- Roll the dough in batches out between pieces of wax paper to about ¼-inch thickness (or slightly less) and use a 1½-inch cookie cutter to make rounds. Place on a baking sheet and cut a smaller center hole. Repeat with remaining dough.
- Bake cookies for 10-12 minutes, until bottoms are lightly browned and cookies are set. Cool for a few minutes on the baking sheet then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.
- Toast coconut over medium heat on your stove top until golden. Cool, stirring occasionally. Be careful, coconut burns easily! Set aside.
- Unwrap the caramels and place in a large microwave-safe bowl with milk and salt. Cook on high for 3-4 minutes, stopping to stir a few times to help the caramel melt. When smooth, fold in toasted coconut with a spatula.
- Using a small offset spatula or spoon, spread topping on cooled cookies, using about 2-3 tsp per cookie. Reheat caramel for a few seconds in the microwave if it gets too firm to work with. Spread mixture onto the cookie by teaspoonfuls with an offset spatula.
- While topping sets up, melt chocolate in a small bowl. Heat on high in the microwave in 45 second intervals, stirring thoroughly to prevent scorching. Dip the base of each cookie into the chocolate and place on a clean piece of parchment paper. Transfer all remaining chocolate (or melt a bit of additional chocolate, if necessary) into a piping bag or a ziplock bag with the tiny corner snipped off and drizzle finished cookies with chocolate.
- Let chocolate set completely before storing in an airtight container.
There were a couple of things I learned while making these that I thought I would share with you, just in case you have the same problem when you make them.
- Make sure not to roll your cookies out too thin. I rolled mine almost too thin and they were breaking when I was transferring them to the cooling rack.
- Don’t press too hard when adding your caramel and coconut mixture to the top. The cookies will break.
- When spreading your chocolate, only snip a teeny tiny corner off so you get the right sized stripes
So — there you have it! Homemade samoas. What copy cat foods have you made recently?
Today is reveal day for the Behind the Curtain Dessert Challenge. We were given the ingredients this month of caramel and pretzels. I have TONS of recipes on my site for caramel and pretzels, but they were in cookie form. I decided to spend some time looking around and I found a yummy recipe from Martha Stewart for Caramel Popcorn and Pretzel Bars — the perfect recipe for this challenge.
- Nonstick cooking spray
- 12 cups plain popped popcorn (from ½ cup kernels or 2 microwave packages)
- 4 cups coarsely chopped small salted pretzels (7.5 ounces)
- 2 cups sugar
- Coarse salt
- ⅔ cup heavy cream
- 2 cups miniature marshmallows
- ½ cup of peanuts
- Coat a 9-by-13-inch baking dish with cooking spray. In a large bowl, toss together popcorn, peanuts, and pretzels. In a medium saucepan, bring sugar, ½ teaspoon salt, and ½ cup water to a boil over medium-high. Boil, undisturbed, until mixture is amber in color, 8 to 12 minutes. Remove pan from heat and slowly pour in cream (mixture will sputter). Immediately add marshmallows; stir until melted.
- Pour caramel mixture over popcorn and pretzels and quickly stir with a rubber spatula to coat. Transfer mixture to dish and use a piece of wax paper coated with cooking spray to press evenly into dish. Sprinkle with coarse salt. Let cool completely before cutting into 12 bars.
NOTE! Be sure to cook your caramel mixture UNDISTURBED! The first time I made this it was an epic fail because I missed that little word and stirred my sugar mixture constantly. Needless to say I had a HOT mess on my hands.
See what others are making on this challenge by checking out the links below!
What yummy caramel and pretzel recipes have you made recently?
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A couple of weeks ago, we had a bake sale at church. My daughter found a recipe in one of my cookbooks called Desserts in Jars. It basically was a cookie mix with all of the dry ingredients added. A note was attached to the side with the list of wet ingredients and how to bake them. This really makes for an adorable gift to give someone.
She made up a couple for our bake sale. My pastor’s wife bought one set and made them that afternoon and talked about how delicious they were, so I bought the other box to make for us at home. They turned out DELICIOUS!
Here is the recipe in it’s entirety for you to make at home. You will definitely want more of these cookies.
- 2 sticks of Butter (salted) Softened
- ½ cup White Sugar
- 1-1/2 cup Brown Sugar, Packed
- 2 whole Large Eggs
- 1 Tablespoon Vanilla Extract
- 1-1/2 cup All-purpose Flour
- ½ teaspoon Baking Soda
- 1 teaspoon Baking Powder
- 2 teaspoons Kosher Salt
- 1-1/2 cup QUICK Oats
- ½ cup M & M’S
- ½ cup Pecans, Chopped
- ¾ cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 2-1/4 cups Rice Krispies
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
- Cream butter with sugars until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla and beat.
- Combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, and kosher salt. Add to mixing bowl and mix till combined. After that, add in remaining ingredients in whatever quantity you prefer.
- Add Rice Crispies at the very end, mixing until just combined. Be careful not overmix!
- Use a cookie scoop to scoop balls of dough onto a cookie sheet. Bake until golden brown, then allow to cool on a rack.
What is the best cookie you have ever made?
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Today is BEHIND THE CURTAIN DESSERT CHALLENGEÂ REVEAL DAY! For this month’s reveal, our challenge was to make a dessert using almond paste and pastry of some sort. I chose to make Lemon and Almond Cupcakes.
What is the Behind the Curtain Dessert Challenge?
Every month we are assigned two ingredients (this month it was Almond Paste and Pastry)Â we are to take those two ingredients and create or find a recipe using the chosen ingredients.
Does this sound like fun to you? Need more traffic to your website or want to meet new friends? Then this is the party for you! THIS IS A BLOG HOP so EVERYONE gets to be the host. HERE is more information on how it works.
Back to my yummy recipe
These cupcakes turned out SO good. I had never baked with almond paste before, but I now know, I will be baking with this substance a lot more in the coming months.
- 1-7 oz box Almond Paste, grated
- 1 cup sugar
- 3 eggs, room temperature
- 1 cup plain yogurt
- ¼ cup canola oil
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (2-3 large lemons)
- 2 teaspoons grated lemon rind (only yellow part)
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 2 cups of powdered sugar
- 1 stick of butter, room temperature
- 2 teaspoons of milk
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Place cupcake liners in muffins tins.
- In mixing bowl, mix Almond Paste and sugar until the texture of small crumbs. Add eggs one at a time beating well between each. Add yogurt, oil, lemon juice and rind. Beat until well combined.
- Sift flour and baking powder into almond mixture. Beat until mixed, scraping the bottom and sides of bowl. Spoon batter into liners, a bit more than ½ full.
- Bake cupcakes in center of oven, 20-25 minutes or until tops are nicely rounded and toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean. Start testing at 20 minutes. Cool tins on wire racks for 5 minutes.
- Then, transfer cupcakes to wire rack and cool completely.
- To make icing, mix together powdered sugar, butter, and milk. If you want a thicker icing, add more powdered sugar. For a thinner icing, add more milk.
See what other bloggers are making
Here are the other bloggers in the challenge. Check out their almond paste and pastry desserts
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Awhile back Kayla and I were looking for a new recipe to make. We stumbled upon this one for Dr. Pepper Cookies. Of course we both squealed with delight, because Dr. Pepper is her all time favorite drink, and my hubby likes it too, so I was willing to make the cookies just for them.
These cookies really are delicious and honestly, I am not a Dr. Pepper fan — and I loved these. They don’t even have a really strong taste of Dr. Pepper, just a hint of it.
I will tell you that these cookies do harden after a while, so you will want to heat them in the microwave to soften them again when you go to eat them.
If you have leftover batter laying around, then you can do like my daughter and pretty much just use the remaining batter to make one HUGE cookie for her daddy
Here’s the recipe. Hope you enjoy it! We did .
- ¾ cup margarine
- ⅓ cup brown sugar, packed
- ⅛ tsp salt
- ¼ cup Dr. Pepper soda
- 2-1/4 cups cake flour
- 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
- 1 tsp vanilla
- 2 cups powdered sugar
- 2 tablespoons of Dr. Pepper Soda
- Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
- Cream margarine and sugar; beat until fluffy. Add flour and salt alternately with Dr. Pepper. Add vanilla, pecans and chocolate chips. Shape into balls, place on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes and the remove the cookies and allow them to cool.
- To make the glaze, add 2 cups of powdered sugar and 1-2 tbsp Dr Pepper Soda and drizzle over cookies. You can also dunk them in the cookie.
What new cookies have you been making?
Lady Behind the Curtain is starting a new link up every month that is a dessert challenge. I am all for a challenge, especially if it involves food. Our challenge this month was to make a dessert using Cherries and Chocolate. That was a no brainer for me. I love ice cream, so I gathered my ingredients so I could make some homemade Chocolate Cherry Ice cream.
- 2¼ c. whole milk
- 1 c. sugar
- 6 egg yolks
- ⅔ c. cherry juice from the bag of frozen cherries
- ⅔ c. half and half
- 1½ c. (thawed) frozen cherries, roughly chopped
- 1 c. bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped
- Heat the milk and pinch of salt in a 2 qt. saucepan over medium-high heat until scalded. In a separate bowl, beat the sugar and egg yolks together until thick and smooth.
- Whisk a little of the hot milk into the sugar and yolk mixture to temper the eggs, and then very slowly add the rest, whisking continuously. Pour the egg, milk and sugar mixture back into the pan, and cook over medium- high heat, stirring continuously with a wooden spoon, until the custard thickens and coats the back of a spoon (about 5-7minutes).
- Pour the custard mixture into a bowl and allow it to cool at room temperature before placing in the refrigerator.
- When the custard is completely chilled, stir in the half and half and the cherry juice, reserving the cherries. Refrigerate overnight.
- Freeze custard in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s instructions. Add the cherries and chocolate pieces when the ice cream is frozen to a soft consistency. Transfer to a container and continue freezing in the freezer for 4-5 hours before serving.
I have been using my ice cream maker more and more. I love experimenting and making new flavors.
What would be your favorite flavor of homemade ice cream?
Check out the other bloggers in the dessert challenge!
I love making pies, but what I used to do all the time is buy my pie crust — that was until I found out how incredibly easy it is to make your own pie crust from scratch. I have a recipe for a Double Crust Pie Pastry which comes in handy if you are making covered pies like my yummy Apple Pie, Blackberry Pie, or Peach Pie.
- 2 cups of all purpose flour
- ¾ teaspoon of salt
- ⅔ cup of shortening
- 6 tablespoons of water
- Combine flour and salt.
- Cut in shortening until crumbly.
- Add water, mixing dough with hands until a ball forms.
- Divide the dough in half, wrap, and refrigerate for an hour.
- Take dough, sprinkle flour on a surface and roll out to fit the pie plate.
You can also use this pie crust recipe for single pie crusts like my Chocolate Pie, Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie, Chess Pie, and Pecan Pie. You just take half the dough and freeze it for the next time you need a pie crust.
I will tell you that when you make this — do not sub out the shortening for butter. I tried that once because I did not have any shortening on hand. The problem came when it was time to eat it. The crust was hard as a rock, so just use the shortening!
What favorite pie could you make tonight and try out this recipe?
Hi! I am Jen--a wife to the most amazing man ever and a homeschool mom to one teenager. I just graduated my oldest.
I have been blogging since 2007. I love to watch movies, spend time in the kitchen, crochet, dance, drink coffee, and lay on the beach. Between recipes, reviews, and hilarious life story moments you'll find many helpful posts on this blog. Welcome, pull up a chair and stay for a while!
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