More Truffles!

I do love making truffles!  Or maybe I actually just love eating them and in order to eat them I first have to make them!  I made two varieties of truffles a couple of months ago and today I have two more. 

The green ones on the left are Mint Oreo Truffles the others are Peanut Butter Crunch Truffles.  The mint ones are made by combining one package of crushed Oreo's (always use double stuff!) with one package of softened cream cheese.  Form into balls and then dip in melted chocolate.  What makes these the most amazing truffles I have made to date are these:

If you can find these in the store, stock up, buy them out but tell me first!  I actually bought these last year and haven't seen them this year. I am going to try and find a perfectly minty alternative, so I have my fingers crossed I can make these again soon!
For the second variety, these are a bit different.  Start by combing equal portions of rice krispie cereal, peanut butter and powdered sugar with a little bit of melted butter.  I first melted my peanut butter just a bit so it would stir easier. 

When I was following the recipe, I didn't have enough peanut butter (my recipe had less peanut butter than the other two dry ingredients).  If I end up making these again, I will start with less cereal and powdered sugar so that my mixture has enough moisture to stick together. 

You can tell it looks a little crumbly.  I had started out using a spoon to stir, but it just wasn't cutting it so I switched to my hands and it made it much easier!  After it is all combined, form into balls.

I have found with all of my truffles that I prefer to freeze them, for at least 15 minutes or so, before dipping them.  Seems to help them hold together.  These get dipped in milk or semi-sweet chocolate.  You could garnish with some melted peanut butter or sprinkle with powdered sugar before the chocolate hardens, but I just ran out of time!
Both varieties are very yummy!  Once again proving that you can mix up just about anything and dip it in chocolate and you will have a winner!

Mint Oreo Truffles
1 package of double stuff Oreo's
1 8 oz package of cream cheese
1 12 oz package of green mint chips
1/3 C. of white chocolate
Vegetable Oil

1. Crush Oreo's and mix with melted cream cheese.  Form into balls and place in freezer for about 15 minutes.
2. Melt mint chips in double boiler and add oil to make the chocolate more liquid like.
3. Dip truffles in chocolate and place on baking sheet
4. Melt white chocolate and little bit more oil to drizzle on top.

Peanut Butter Crunch Truffles
2-3 C. rice krispies
2 C. peanut butter
2-3 C. powdered sugar
1/4 C. butter, melted

Mix all ingredients together, if need be, add up to 1 more cup of cereal and powdered sugar. Mix with hands for best results.  Form into balls and dip in melted chocolate.  Let harden in fridge and store in cool place.

Pumpkin Squares

So you should know, I am not a fan of pumpkin pie!  If someone gives me a slice and expects me to eat it then it had better have at least twice as much cool whip/whip cream on it!  Since it is tradition to eat pumpkin pie this time of year, or at least in the month of November, for the longest time I was kinda out of luck.  Years and years ago I was at a meeting, when at the end they passed out these squares that I was so impressed with I found the woman who had made them and got the recipe from her.  Since then, I have been making these and bringing them to my family Thanksgiving Dinner.  If you enjoy pumpkin pie, you will enjoy these.  If you have avoided pumpkin pie, like me, but enjoy a light pumpkin flavor, you will love these!  They are kinda like a pumpkin pie squeezed between two sweet crusts made up of a yellow cake mix. 

To start, mix your slightly softened butter with a portion of the yellow cake mix.  I have found that for this type of thing, if I grate the butter, it mixes easier, without getting it too soft.

Once it is mixed up you can press it into a 9x13 pan.

You are pretty much going to have to plan on using your fingers to get it in the corners and spread evenly.  While at times it may not seem like enough to fill the bottom, I promise it will.
Next, mix up the filling which consists of the pumpkin, evaporated milk, eggs, sugar and pumpkin pie seasoning.

Once that is all mixed up, pour that onto the crust.  Next take the remaining cake mix and butter and mix those up to create a mixture that you can sprinkle onto the pumpkin filling.

Go ahead and bake this for about 45 minutes at 350. 

It should be fairly set.  Let it cool before serving.  I forgot to get a picture of the individual squares, but trust me, these are good!  These can be made the night before you need them, just keep covered until you are ready to serve.
I have seen and tried different versions of this type of dessert.  I just love them and hope you love it too!

Pumpkin Squares

1 pkg yellow cake mix (divided)
1 1/2 cube butter, softened and divided
3 eggs
2 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 c. sugar, divided
2 c. pumpkin
2/3 c. evaporated milk

Crust:
1. Mix all but but 1 cup of cake mix with 1 of the eggs and 1 cube of butter.  Press into 9x13 pan.
Filling:
2. Mix pumpkin, 2 eggs, 3/4 c of the sugar, pumpkin pie spice and evaporated milk together and pour over crust.
Topping:
3. Mix remaining 1 cup of cake mix with remaining 1/4 cup of sugar and last 1/2 cube of butter.
4. Sprinkle topping over filling and bake at 350 for 30-40 minutes
5. Let cool and serve with whip cream.

Honey Sesame Chicken

It was my turn to host Sunday dinner yesterday, this is a crock pot meal and I knew it was exactly what I needed!  Based on the number of Christmas treats and goodies I needed to get made, I needed the fastest meal possible!  This ended up being very good, a little bit of sweet and a little bit of kick, moist and oh so easy! 

Most of the ingredients are fairly standard, maybe just need some fresh green onions and some sesame seeds (not pictured), but those you can get in bulk at Winco, since you only need a couple of tablespoons. 
So after your chicken is in the crock pot, you can turn it on low at this point if you wanted, mix almost everything else up in bowl.  Cutting up an onion was the longest step, so you can tell this goes pretty fast.  Once your sauce is mixed up, pour that over the chicken.  You will want to move, lift, shift around the chicken to make sure all the surfaces have at least some sauce on them.  Once that is done, put the lid on and let the crock pot magic begin!  You can do this on either high or low, depending on how quickly you need this.  My chicken was mostly thawed, you could put them in frozen if you had more time to let it cook.
When it is done cooking, should look like this:

Also, at this point, you should have some rice already cooking.  Take the chicken out to shred it up.  With the sauce in the crock pot, put some cornstarch and water in a small bowl and mix it up, add that to your sauce.  Turn your crock pot to high so the sauce will start to bubble and get thick.  Once that has happened I added my chicken back into the sauce for serving.  You could serve separately if you so desired.
To serve, place a spoonful onto your rice and garnish with sesame seeds and sliced green onions.

Enjoy!
Honey Sesame Chicken (in the crock pot)

4-6 chicken breasts
salt and pepper
1/3 C. diced onion
2 Cloves garlic, minced
1/2 C. honey
1/4 C. ketchup
1/2 C. soy sauce
2 Tbls olive oil
1/4 tsp red pepper flakes
4 tsp cornstarch
1/3 C. water
1-2 Tbls sesame seeds
3 green onions, chopped

Directions:
1. Place chicken in crock pot and lightly season all sides with salt and pepper.
2. In a medium bowl combine the onion, garlic, honey, ketchup, soy sauce and red pepper flakes.  Pour over chicken.  Cook on low for 3-4 hours or high for 2 hours.
3. Remove chicken to cutting board, leaving sauce.  Shred chicken, set aside.
4. In a small bowl dissolve the cornstarch in the water, add to crock pot.  Stir to combine with sauce.  Cover and cook on high for 10 minutes until sauce thickens.  Add the chicken back in before serving.
5. To serve, put a spoonful of meat and sauce onto rice and sprinkle with sesame seeds and green onions.

Coconut Banana Cream Pie

This past year I have really taken a more active interest in coconut and this one makes me glad I have!  Normally for anything in a pie plate or tin I just buy a graham cracker crust, I don't always have the patience of the desire to do much more than take the plastic top off my crust!  For anyone else that feels the same way about crusts, after trying this one you will be glad you put in the extra time!  What is nice, is that it really wasn't that difficult!
I was being a bit of a slacker, taking all of these pictures sure extends my baking time, so no ingredient picture today, sorry!  To start for this one, melt your butter in a frying pan and then add your coconut.  Stir to coat in butter and keep cooking and stirring until your coconut is nicely toasted.  Make sure you don't burn any of it.  Next, put that nice warm coconut in a pie plate.  I used the back of a spoon to press into the plate and up the sides so it looks like this:

Put that in the fridge so it can completely cool and harden up a bit.  Next you make the vanilla pudding, from scratch!  I haven't done this in years and years and years, but it isn't that hard.  If you were in a crunch for time, you could just use the instant kind.  Here is where I am going to admit that before starting I hadn't really read through the entire recipe or realized what was going on so I made it from scratch.  Had I actually realized that I was just making vanilla pudding, I think I would have gone the easy way out!  I'm glad I didn't as I thought it tasted great.  One of my flaws when cooking is that I don't always actually read through an entire recipe before I start, has created problems on more than one occasion! 
Anyway, back to the pudding.  You separate your eggs, keeping the yolks, combine those with some sugar, cornstartch and flour.  Once that is mixed up, gradually add some of the half and half.  Set that aside for a bit.
In a 3 qt sauce pan combine the rest of the half and half and sugar.  Once that is boiling, add in the egg mixture and cook, while stirring until it returns to a boil and thickens.  This took 3-5 minutes for me.  Remove from the heat and add the vanilla and the optional food coloring. 

At this point, the recipe I was following said to cover the mixture with plastic wrap to keep a skin from forming on your pudding.  I didn't know how I was supposed to do that and keep the plastic from melting, so as it cooled I would stir it up.  Seemed to work out just fine.  Once that is cooled, slice your bananas onto your crust.

Next pour your pudding on top.

Go ahead and put that in the fridge.  It will need to set up for at least 2 hours.  Now, if time were an issue, you could top this with cool whip or each slice with a dollop of whipped cream from the can.  If you have the time, I do recommend whipping up your whip cream fresh.  Put in a couple tablespoons of powdered sugar to give it a slight sweet flavor.  You could do the whip cream right before needing it or when you finish with the pie.  I prefer to wait so my whip cream is still fluffy and fresh. 

In a previous post I had mentioned a little trick to help the whip cream stay stable.  Before you start whipping, put 2 tablespoons of cold water in a small dish, add 1/2 teaspoon of unflavored gelatin, let it sit.  When the whipping cream has reached the soft peaks stage, add in the water/gelatin mixture.  I haven't tested it out over more than a day, but it will keep your whipped cream stable for at least that day.

This was so good, light and such a nice change to all the chocolate desserts I tend to make!  If you love coconut this is a must try.  This crust could be used in a variety of ways!

Lawry's Coconut Banana Cream Pie

Shell:
1/2 C. (1 stick) butter
3 C. sweetened flake coconut

1. Melt the butter in a skillet over medium heat, stir in coconut flakes until coated and lightly browned.  Press into pie plate.  Chill for at least 30 minutes.

Filling:
4 egg yolks
3/4 C. sugar, divided
3 Tbl cornstarch
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 C. flour
3 C. half and half, divided
2 tsp vanilla
Yellow food coloring (optional)
2 banana's
1 C. whipping cream
2 Tbl powdered sugar

1. Combine yolks, 1/4 cup of sugar, cornstarch, salt and flour in a small bowl.  Gradually add 1 cup of the half and half.
2. Combine the remaining 2 cups of half and half and 1/2 cup of sugar in a 3 quart saucepan and bring just to a boil over medium heat.  Add the egg mixture and cook and stir until the mixture returns to a boil and thickens, about 3 minutes.
3. Removed from the heat.  Stir in vanilla and 2 drops of food coloring.  Cover with plastic, or just stir ever 5 minutes of so while it cools down.
4. Slice the bananas into the pie shell.  Pour the filling into the shell.  Refrigerate
5. Before serving, whip up whipping cream and the powdered sugar until stiff peaks form.  Spoon or dollop onto pie.

Triple Chocolate Bundt Cake

Normally I am not a big basic cake fan, way too boring for my tastes!  I saw this recipe though and I was intrigued.  Years ago I knew a guy who would actually make a chocolate bundt cake and bring it to parties and it was so good.  It has been long enough, I don't know how close this one actually is, but it was still good and very moist.

Yes, you are seeing sour cream, helps to make it and keep it super moist.  Starting with the eggs and sour cream, get those mixed up real good.

Add the rest of the ingredients and once it is completely mixed together, pour into a well greased bundt pan.

Bake at 350 for about 45 minutes.  I could have probably taken it out just before that, so watch it and test it around 40 minutes. 
Invert onto a plate or cutting board and cut up.  Right before serving sprinkle with powdered sugar. 

As a note, you won't want to sprinkle the whole cake (sorry I forgot to take that picture!) or the individual slices to early as the sugar will soak in and make it a tad bit gummy. 
This is very easy and tasty.  Makes enough you could take it to small dinner parties.

Triple Chocolate Bundt Cake
 4 Eggs
3/4 C. sour cream
1/2 C. oil
1/2 C. water
1 small package of instant chocolate pudding
1 chocolate cake mix
1 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips

1. Pre-heat oven to 350.  Beat the eggs and the sour cream together until well combined. 
2. Add the remaining ingredients and mix well.  Pour/spoon into a greased bundt pan and bake for 40-45 minutes.  Let cool before inverting onto a plate/tray/cutting board.

Nutella Cheesecake Bars

You should already know that I love Nutella, you may not know that I also love cheesecake.  Cheesecakes are actually my all time favorite dessert, as long as it doesn't have cherries on it though!  Just not a fan of cooked or canned fruit.  So for this one, seemed an easy decision to give this one a try.  Plus it has an Oreo crust, what's not to love!

The ingredients are fairly basic.  It calls for real vanilla beans or just the vanilla extract.  When possible I try to use the beans, but they can be expensive and a bit of a pain!  So to start, crush your Oreo's and mix with melted butter.  The original recipe says to line the pan with parchment paper so it can lift out easily.  I have never been able to get the parchment paper to press into all the corners so I just skipped that step and put the crust straight into the pan.  I used a 9x9 but an 8x8 would be better since you would end up with thicker layers.  Bake the crust for about 10 minutes at 325.
While that is baking mix up the the rest of the ingredients, minus the Nutella and some of the heavy cream.  Divide it and put 2/3 of that mixture in a separate bowl.  With the remaining 1/3, add the Nutella and the rest of the heavy cream.  Mix until combined. 
When the crust is done and has cooled, layer it up by starting with the plain cream cheese mixture.

Next add the Nutella cream cheese mixture.

Bake this for about 35 minutes or so.  Whenever I bake a cheesecake I will do a water bath to keep the top from cracking.  Should look something like this when done.

Refrigerate for at least 3 hours before serving.  You could serve this with a hot fudge garnish or a dollop of sweetened whipping cream, or eat as is. 

No matter the way, it will taste good no matter what!

Nutella Cheesecake Bars
2 C. Oreo crumbs
1/2 stick butter, meltd
16 oz of cream cheese, room temperature
2 eggs, room temperature
1/2 C. sugar
1/4 C + 1 Tbls heavy cream
1 vanilla bean, halved and de-seeded (1 tsp of vanilla extract)
1/3 C. Nutella

1. Preheat oven to 325.  Combine crushed cookie crumbs and butter in pre-sprayed pan.  Press mixture evenly into the bottom.  Bake for 10-12 minutes.  Set aside to cool.
2. With hand mixer, combine cream cheese, eggs, sugar, 1/4 c. heavy cream and vanilla.  Mix until smooth.  Put 2/3 of the mixture in a different bowl and set aside.  Add Nutella and 1 Tbls of heavy cream to the remaining 1/3 cream cheese mixture.  Mix until smooth.
3. Once the crust is cool, pour the layer of the plain cream cheese mixture over the crust.  Be careful to not pull up the crust.  Next carefully spread the Nutella layer.  Bake for 35 minutes or until the center jiggles slightly.  Remove from oven and let cool.  Refrigerate for at least 3 hours. 

Nutella Muddy Buddies

I know I have been slacker lately and haven't posted, doesn't mean I haven't been baking and making yummy treats though!  I think everyone out there as has Muddy Buddies or Puppy Chow or any other name you call the treat that has you coating Chex cereal with chocolate and then tossing it in a bag of powdered sugar.  They are a treat from years ago but I still love them now and who can honestly resist these!  For anyone that loves Nutella, and everyone really should, this is a no-brainer!  Still simple, still amazing, still irresistible. 

You will want to make sure you have a very large bowl and might as well be sporting an apron cause the powdered sugar has a tendency to get everywhere!  I use a whole box of Chex cereal, about 12 cups.  Go ahead and put that in your bowl and then start melting your chocolate and butter.

I wait until the chocolate is all melted before adding the Nutella and then melting it a bit more.  From what I have gathered from making this more than once, Nutella doesn't get all melty and smooth like chocolate does, it almost causes the melted chocolate to seize up a bit, so be prepared to move fast!  Get the chocolate mixture poured over the cereal and get it stirred up so as to get everything coated. 

Once it is all coated, time for the tossing.  I put about a cup of powdered sugar in my gallon ziploc, then put in about half of the cereal mixture and add another cup or so of powdered sugar.  Start tossing it around and add more sugar as needed.

Once that bag full is done, put that into a bowl or container and do the rest.  Now the goal would be to get these to whatever event, party or get together these were designed for and not to just sit and eat all of them!  They are addicting!

Looking at this picture makes me think I can eat just that one little one and be done....but no, the power of these will pull you in!

Nutella Muddy Buddies

12 C. Chex cereal
1 1/4 C. chocolate chips (or melting chocolates)
1/2 C. Nutella
1/4 C. Butter
2 C. Powdered sugar (more as needed)

1. Place cereal in large bowl and set aside.
2. Put chocolate and butter in microwave safe bowl and microwave for 45 seconds.  Stir and continue to cook at 30 second intervals until chocolate is melted and smooth.
3. Stir in Nutella and microwave for 30 more seconds.  The mixture will be thickened so if need be, put back in microwave for 20 seconds more, just make sure it doesn't overcook. 
4. Pour mixture over the cereal and turn to coat completely. Once coated and there are no longer little pockets of either the chocolate mixture or cereal that doesn't have any chocolate coating spoon into a gallon ziploc bag with powdered sugar.  Toss around until all pieces are coated in the sugar.
5. Keep in an airtight container.

Cinnamon Bread Pudding

For some reason I have always loved the idea of bread pudding.  I'm not sure when the first time I first tried it, but I knew I would love it and I have loved every bread pudding and I ever tried!  My favorite is what the Grand America serves, which if you ever a chance to just sit in their lounge and order it, I would highly recommend doing so!  One day I'll make that, but this time around I went a bit more basic.

This is about as easy as it comes, for the basic pudding that is.  The sauce on the other hand...... I will be figuring something different out in the future!  The ingredient list isn't too crazy, might even have it all on hand.

I know this works even better with day old bread, so if you have some bread that is too stale to eat, time to make this one up!  First you break the bread into pieces and fill your pan.

The custard part will cause it to bake down a bit, so don't be afraid to really fill the dish.  If you are the type that only likes the crusty pieces, using the same amount of bread, spread it thinner in a larger dish.  Next up, mix up your milk, vanilla, sugar, eggs, cinnamon sugar and melted butter.   I actually had some whipping cream so I poured a little in to make it extra yummy!  You will want to either use a hand mixer or whisk it up really good.

Pour that all over the bread.  For this version I next sprinkled a generous amount of cinnamon sugar on top.

I love this combo so I was extra generous but I definitely didn't regret it!  You need to let this sit for at least 10 minutes so that moisture can soak back up into the bread, if your bread is dryer, I would let it sit for up to an hour before baking.  Just make sure you put it in the fridge!  Once ready, bake for about 40 minutes.  Keep an eye on it at the end so your bread reaches the desired level of crispiness you prefer.  I like mine nice and golden brown.
While that is baking you can work on your sauce.  Now this recipe came with a white chocolate sauce that combined melted white chocolate, butter, powdered sugar, cinnamon sugar, vanilla and sweetened condensed milk.  I had 3 attempts at this until I finally left the butter out and used about a Tbls of oil.  For some reason, my white chocolate didn't want to melt or blend nicely with the butter.  It also got too thick after adding the powdered sugar so I ended up using more sweetened condensed milk than it called for.  Next time I think I will leave out the powdered sugar and the butter and just go with the chocolate, vanilla, cinnamon sugar and sweetened condensed milk.

Despite my first 2 failures for the glaze and the issues with my third batch, it turned out so amazing!

My sister doesn't normally like bread pudding, since in her mind it is mushy bread, but she liked this one.  I will definitely be making this one again, especially on a cold day when I want a dessert that is also a comfort food!

Ingredients
Pudding:
1/2 loaf of white bread (can use any type of bread)
1 C. whole milk (I used 2% and then some cream)
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/2 C. sugar
2 eggs
1/4 stick butter, melted
Cinnamon sugar mixture
Glaze:
5 oz white chocolate
1 Tbl oil
1 1/2 Tbl water
1/4 tsp vanilla
1/2 C. sweetened condensed milk
1/8 C. cinnamon sugar

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350.  Spray 9x9 baking pan, break up bread into about 1" size pieces and place in pan.  Make the custard by combining milk, vanilla, sugar, eggs, butter and a healthy sprinkle of cinnamon sugar mixture.  Mix until combined and pour over the bread.  Let soak for at least 10 minutes.  Sprinkle liberally with cinnamon sugar mixture and bake for 40 minutes.

For the glaze, melt the white chocolate and oil over low heat, stirring frequently.  Once melted, add the water, vanilla and sweetened condensed milk.  Heat for a couple more minutes before adding the last of the cinnamon sugar mixture.

Spoon the warm pudding into small bowl and drizzle with warm glaze.  Enjoy!