Man Brittle

 The title for this post is Man Brittle for one reason only, all the men in my life LOVE bacon. They go absolutely nuts for it. Naturally if I tell them "Hey guys I made brittle." they don't care too much, but when I say "Hey guys I made a salted pecan brittle , with BACON!" They run into the kitchen and try to snatch it up before its cooled. Like I say in my posts, its always fun to experiment with new flavors and inventing different combinations. Brittle is no exception. I wanted to find a sweet treat that would be different and appeal to everyone. Even though its geared towards the dudes, women like it just as much because its got that combination of salty and sweet most of us love.
So, next time you host the super bowl party, or just want a snack for that extra special time a month, this is the perfect treat!Enjoy!

Uh-Oh! I'm out of butter!

I started making pancakes for my 4 and 6 year old daughters this morning. I had just finished making my batter and started heating up the pan when I realized "Oh-no! I'm out of butter!". If you didn't already know, butter is the key to those crispy buttery edges on perfect pancakes and help cook your batter to breakfast perfection. So what was my solution? I decided to make some of course! Now it may seem to some of you a crazy task to take on first thing in the morning and in the middle of trying to make breakfast, but making butter is one of the easiest things to make. I promise it only takes a few moments and tastes better than anything you'll buy in the store.

When I first made butter in the past, I used my hand mixer. If you have one, it'll do the job. This morning I used my standing mixer, well, because its new and I'm obsessed with it. I also used the whisk attachment instead of the paddle. Below are the pictures of the finished product and easy instructions on how to do it yourself!

Butter!

Fresh butter wrapped in waxed paper

A small pad on top of pancakes. Yum!

Butter

1 Pint Heavy Whipping Cream

Pour all of the heavy whipping cream into the mixing bowl. With whisk attachment, turn mixer on stir. Slowly bring mixer up to 6 or medium speed. Now, just leave it alone! In just a few moments you will notice the cream is going to start to thicken and then start to look like whipped cream. At this point if you wanted whipped cream you could add vanilla and sugar. But no no no, we want butter! It'll quickly turn from that fluffy pretty whipped cream and start to get thicker and get a slightly yellow color. Keep going you are almost there!!! Now comes the messy part! The butter will start to separate and you will have a lot of liquid in the bottom of the bowl and what looks like scrambled eggs. You have now made butter! Congratulations!
If you want your butter to last and not be bitter, you will pour out all the excess liquid. Squeeze the butter together under cold running water to rinse it of the excess liquid. Now you can either salt it, add herbs or fruit and be creative with it, or you can do what I did and use it immediately. Wrap up the butter in wax paper as shown above and twist both ends to keep it fresh in the fridge. The whole process should not take longer than 10 min! Enjoy :)

Easy Meringue Cookies

My daughter saw these beautiful meringue cookies on the cover of a magazine and insisted I make some for her birthday party. Its a carnival themed party so she wanted colorful cookies. An easy trick is to line the inside of your piping bag with gel food coloring. More coloring will make your meringue cookies more vibrant. Also patience and time is key. The meringue itself is quick and easy,but the time spent in the oven is when the patience comes in.

Vanilla Meringue Cookies

3 Egg Whites
1/4 tsp Cream of tartar
1 1/2 tsp Vanilla extract
1/4 C Granulated sugar
Pre-heat oven to 250o

In a large mixing bowl add egg whites, cream of tartar, and vanilla extract. Whisk until soft peaks form. Slowing add sugar one Tbsp at a time while whisking by hand or on high speed in standing mixer.Whisk until stiff peaks form and mixture is glossy. Line piping bag with colors of your choice. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper and pipe half dollar circles of meringue onto parchment paper. Bake for 45 min then turn oven off and leave cookies undisturbed for another 45 min. This step of leaving cookies in the oven allows the center to dry and not leave the cookie chewy. You can store cookies in an airtight container for up to 2 weeks.

Key Lime Pie- The Easy Way!

Well summer is officially here. Which means beaches, parks, bbq's, and summer parties. If you don't want to show up empty handed, here is a dessert that is not only super easy and tasty, but people will think it took a lot more work than it actually did. And who doesn't love pie?!

Key Lime Pie

1 graham cracker crust

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1/4 cup lime juice

5 egg yolks

Mix condensed milk, egg yolks, and lime juice in a bowl. Pour into crust and bake for 15-18 min at 350°. Once its cooled, top with easy home made whipped cream.

Whipped cream

1 1/2 Cups heavy cream

1/4 cup sugar

2 tsp. Vanilla extract

Whip cream til it starts to thicken. Add sugar and vanilla. Whip until cream is thickened. Top pie and refrigerate until ready to serve.

Enjoy!!

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Dessert Empanadas

The other day I was in one of my experimenting zones and just couldnt get empanadas out of my head. After making a variety of savory ones, which included beef and buffalo chicken, I wanted something sweet. Why not a dessert empanada?! I like to use the store bought Goya empanada discs. They are super easy to use. After making to different fillings, one of banana and chocolate, and the other with berries and cream cheese, I sealed and rolled the edges in. I then put an egg wash and sprinkled them with granulated sugar and put them in the oven. They were flaky and sweet, and sooooo just what I wanted :) Using the already made empanada discs leaves more time to concentrate on being creative with those fillings and baking them cuts a lot of fat. I hope you have as much fun with these as I did!

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Not Just Cupcakes Anymore!

So I have expanded (and no I don't mean from eating all these cupcakes)! I have ventured out into custom cookies. Now some people might be intimidated by the amount of time it can take to just do even a dozen, but I found it so much fun and creative.If you are going to do designs and get artsy then I would recommend starting with a really good sugar cookie base. Cupcakes defrtyinitely take less time to do but the cookies are just as rewarding! :) There are also endless possibilities! Enjoy :)

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