Mini Cinnamon and Sugar Muffins (Churro Bites)

My sister requested these for her bridal shower and later referred to them as "crack balls." They are fairly easy to make and very delicious. They're best right out of the oven and served hot, but still ridiculously tasty after they cool off.  I recommend making these for a party/potluck.


Mini Cinnamon and Sugar Muffins (aka Mini Churro Bites)
From: Erica's Sweet Tooth

Ingredients

For the Mini Muffins

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg
1/2 cup milk

For the Topping

1/4 cup butter, melted
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon


1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and spray a mini muffin pan with cooking spray.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

3.  In the bowl of a stand mixer, or using a hand mixer, beat together the sugar and butter on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla and beat until well combined.

4. With the mixer on low, alternate adding the flour mixture and the 1/2 cup of milk, starting and ending with the flour mixture. Mix until combined.

5. Use a small scoop to fill each muffin tin and bake for 15-18 minutes.

6. While the muffins are baking, melt butter in a pan and mix together the sugar and cinnamon (for the topping) in a small bowl. As soon as the muffins are done baking, remove them from the pan and roll each muffin in the butter and then the cinnamon sugar mixture until well coated.

Blueberry Muffins with Streusel Topping

I've mentioned this before, but I'm a great target for marketing companies and the like because when something is advertised as "the best," I am all ears. Or eyes.  The blog The Bitten Word claimed that these blueberry muffins were the best, so I had to find out for myself.

Conclusion: delicious; however I guess I can't say they're the best I've ever made because these were the first homemade blueberry muffins I've ever made. They are gooey and sweet. If your blueberries are on the tart side, add a little more sugar.

Note: This recipe makes about 12 large muffins. You can make them smaller to make about 18; just decrease the baking time to about 14 minutes. I burned mine the second time I made them when I went for 18 muffins. 

Blueberry Muffins
From: The Bitten Word

Ingredients

2 cups fresh blueberries
1 1/8 cups sugar, plus one teaspoon
2 1/2 cups flour
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
4 tablespoons butter, melted
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the streusel topping

3 tablespoons sugar
3 tablespoons dark brown sugar
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup, plus 3 tablespoons, flour
5 tablespoons butter, melted

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees and either fill a muffin tin with 12 baking cups, spray with non-stick cooking spray, or grease with butter.

2. Over medium heat, bring 1 cup of blueberries and 1 teaspoon of sugar to a simmer, stirring constantly, until berries have become mushy (you can mash them with a wooden spoon), and the mixture has reduced to about 1/4 cup. Transfer mix to a small bowl and let cool.

3. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, salt, and baking powder.

4. In medium-sized bowl (or in a mixer), whisk (or beat) the remaining sugar and the eggs until the mixture turns thick. Add the butter and vegetable oil and combine. Whisk in buttermilk and vanilla and combine. 

5. Fold the egg mixture into the flour mixture and add the remaining cup of blueberries. Stir until combined, it's okay to leave some clumps of flour.

6. Divide the batter into the muffin tins. Spoon about a teaspoon of the cooked berry mixture onto the top of each mound of batter, and swirl the mixture into the batter using a chopstick or skewer (use a figure eight motion).

7. Make the streusel topping by combining the sugar, dark brown sugar, salt, flour and melted butter; stir until clumps form.

8. Top each uncooked muffin with the streusel mixture and bake until muffin tops are golden and firm, about 17-19 minutes. Decrease the time to about 14 minutes if you're making smaller muffins.


Cooked berry mix: 

Batter up: 

Swirled:

Streusel: 

Goo! 

Cake Pops

I'm jumping on the cake pop train a little late, but it's a delicious train to be on and I'm never looking back.

A few notes: All but four of my cake pops had chocolate icing. I melted white chocolate chips as well, but they hardened very quickly after they melted, making it time consuming and difficult. The original recipe suggests using white chocolate bark, but I haven't tried this yet. Also - it is best to let the cake cool overnight before making the actual cake pops. You can also refrigerate/freeze the cake mix for up to three days before making the pops.

Cake Pops
(makes about 60 pops)

From: The Kitchn

Dark Chocolate Cake

2 cups sugar
1 3/4 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two 9-inch round cake pans.

2. Whisk together all of the dry ingredients, then add the eggs, milk, oil, and vanilla. Beat on medium speed for 2 minutes. (I just mixed this with a spoon and it was fine). Stir in the boiling water. The mixture will be very thin.

3. Pour batter equally into the two cake pans. Bake for 30-35 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cakes comes out clean. Let cool completely before decorating.

Making the Cake Pops
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
2 cups confectioner's sugar
4 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon milk
60+ lollipop sticks
12 ounces chocolate chips
12 ounces white chocolate bark
Sprinkles, sugars and other decorative candies

1. In a large bowl, beat together the cream cheese, confectioner's sugar, butter and milk.

2. Crumble the two cakes into crumbs and add into the cream cheese mixture.  Use a spoon and your hands to fully incorporate the crumbs into the cream cheese mix. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm.

3. Once the cake mixture is firm, roll the cake mix into balls and set on a baking sheet covered with wax or parchment paper. (Important: keep the cake balls in the freezer so that they stay very firm while you make the icing. You also will want to keep the majority of the cake balls in the freezer while you decorate a few at a time. Otherwise they start to soften and will fall apart/fall off the lollipop stick while you ice/decorate them).

4. Use a double boiler to melt the chocolate chips on the stove. Dip each cake pop, one at a time, in the melted chocolate until covered. You can use a rubber spatula to take off any excess chocolate. Roll the top of the lollipop stick in the melted chocolate (this helps "glue" the stick to the cake pop).  Press the lollipop stick into each cake ball. Add any kind of sprinkle or topping to the icing and place back on wax/parchment paper with the lollipop stick standing straight up. Let cool so that the icing hardens.



Dark chocolate cake. This was also a really great cake recipe in general.

Adding into the cream cheese mixture: 

Cake ball mix: 

Rolled into balls: 

 Homemade double boiler:

Decorations.  These all came from Whisk in Williamsburg, they have a great selection of reasonably priced cake decorations:

Pops!

Noodle Kugel with Cottage Cheese

The timeliness of this recipe is a little off, being that Passover has long since passed over us, but who says you can't eat noodle kugel all year 'round?

I had the hardest time finding full-fat, large-curd cottage cheese, so I ended up using 2% fat/large curd cottage cheese. Being that there are two whole sticks of butter in this recipe, I think it was probably for the best.

Noodle Kugel
From: Smitten Kitchen

Ingredients

1 pound wide egg noodles
8 eggs
2 cups sugar
2 sticks butter, melted
2 pounds large curd, full-fat cottage cheese (two 16oz containers ... math!)
2 teaspoons vanilla
Salt

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Bring a large pot of water to a boil and boil the noodles for about 5-7 minutes. Drain.

3. Meanwhile, in a large bowl or in an electric mixer, beat together eggs until fluffy.  Gradually add in the sugar, cottage cheese, butter, vanilla, and a pinch of salt.

4. Pour the mixture into a 9x13 oven safe dish. Bake the kugel for 1.5 hours (start checking it after an hour or so), until the kugel is set. The noodles on top will get pretty crispy!

Goat Cheese and Caramelized Onion Dip

Aside from the time it takes to caramelize the onions, this dip is pretty simple to make. If there is some left over, it's also very tasty as a sandwich topper.

Goat cheese and caramelized onion dip
Adapted from: We Are Not Martha

Ingredients

12oz goat cheese
6oz cream cheese
2 tablespoons butter
3 large sweet onions (Vidalia or other sweet onion), chopped
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
1/2 cup cane sugar (or brown sugar), plus more to taste

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Melt butter in a large saute pan and add chopped onions and sugar, mix together.  Over low-medium heat, stir the onions frequently so they don't burn and add a little more sugar until the onions start to turn golden.  It takes about 20+ minutes for the onions to caramelize. If the pan gets watery from the onions, you can drain it out and put it back on the stove.

3. In a bowl, mix together the cheeses and the balsamic vinegar. Spread the cheese on the bottom of a baking pan (I used a deep dish pie plate). When onions are caramelized, pour them on top of the cheese.

4. Bake for about 20-30 minutes, until warmed.

Martha Stewart Sugar Cookies

That sounds kind of funny, as if the cookies are shaped like Martha Stewart...but they're not. On another note though, while I was moving I found my sea creature cookie cutters! Can't wait to make lobster cookies.

These are from Martha's recipe for Ideal Sugar Cookies. I'm pretty sure this is my first Martha Stewart recipe, because a lot of times there is some ingredient in her recipes that I don't feel like looking for...like XYZ flour, bleached 5 times on Nantucket (exaggeration).

I made these back in April for the Habitat's second birthday. There are mostly H's for Habitat and 2's for their 2nd birthday, but I also sneaked in a few owls in there. Even though they said they're moving away from the owl logo, I now have owl cookie cutters from their birthday last year, so it was unavoidable. I couldn't make the actual party because I was going to Pittsburgh, so I brought a plate to Pittsburgh only to drop the entire plate on the street as soon as I got out of the car. Sad.

These were really easy to make! I like them thicker than the recipe calls for, so that they're a little softer, but it makes so much dough that you can play around with it. Actually, I think I may have doubled the recipe, but I'm sure you can still figure out how thick to cut them.

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
1 large egg, lightly beaten
2 tablespoons brandy, or milk
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1. Whisk together flour, salt, and baking powder in a medium bowl; set aside. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter and sugar; mix until light and fluffy. With mixer running, add egg, milk (or brandy), and vanilla; mix until well combined. With the mixer on low, slowly add reserved flour mixture. Mix until just combined.

2. Transfer dough to a work surface. Shape into 2 discs, cover with plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 1 hour.

3. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with nonstick baking mats or parchment paper; set aside.

4. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out dough to 1/8-inch thickness. Cut into desired shapes, and transfer to prepared baking sheets, leaving an inch in between. Leftover dough can be rolled and cut once more. Bake until lightly golden, about 10 minutes; do not allow to brown. Transfer to wire racks to cool.


Martha forgot to include in the directions: immediately put some of this into your mouth.

Roll it up and stick it in the fridge:

Roll it flat: