Chocolate, and Vanilla Cupcakes.

          Halloween is approaching, and it's not a holiday without succulent treats , right?  I had asked my husband what he would like to have for a Halloween treat, he said cupcakes, I was a bit surprised, since he claims to not be a fan of sweets.  Speaking of my husband, he has been cooking with me lately, and I kind of love it! Usually if someone is in my kitchen, and all they do is loom around, looking at what I'm doing, they're usually just in my war path at that point. People often get kicked out of my kitchen, haha.
         Cakes don't happen often around here, usually just birthdays, the rest of the time,  we make cookies or brownies around here. I had to look up a vanilla cake recipe, and adjust it to the way I would like it.


Makes 2 Dozen






Ingredients :

3 Cups Flour
2 Cups Sugar
5.1 Oz Package Instant Vanilla Pudding, dry -one tablespoon  set aside for frosting*
3 Tsp Baking Powder
1 Tsp Salt
4 Eggs
1 1/4 Cup Milk
3 Tsp Vanilla
3/4 Cup Vegetable Oil
1/4 Cup Dark Cocoa Powder

Cupcake Papers
Frosting*

Directions:

 Preheat oven to 350º

1. In a Large bowl, put in flour, sugar, instant pudding mix, baking powder, and salt, mix thoroughly.

2. In a small bowl, add the the eggs, milk, vanilla, and oil, whisk until blended.

3. Slowly add wet ingredients to the bowl of dry ingredients, whisk until they have all just come together, if you  over-beat the batter, it will result in a chewy, less delicious cupcake. Batter will be very thick.

4. Line muffin tin with papers, fill each paper about 3/4 full with vanilla batter. At least 12 of them.

5.  Put  cocoa powder in bowl, and stir into remaining batter.

6. Bake Cupcakes for 20 minutes, or until toothpick is inserted, and comes out clean. Allow cupcakes to cool completely before frosting.  These freeze really well.

Vanilla!

Chocolate!

I made my own  butter cream frosting, for that you need

2 Sticks unsalted butter, softened.
3 - 4 Tablespoons Milk
1 Pound powdered sugar.
1 Tbsp Instant pudding.
3 Tsp Vanilla
Food Coloring if desired.

1. In a large bowl, place butter, pudding mix, milk, (coloring), and vanilla, whisk  until incorporated.
2. Slowly add powdered sugar, stirring gently, powdered sugar easily makes a mess.
3.  Take an electric hand mixer, and begin to further mix the frosting, turn to highest setting, mix until fluffy!

Use  a knife to  frost, or  get all fancy, and  place into a piping bag with a decorative tip.

Strawberry sauce to make it more spooky for Halloween.

We had cupcakes for breakfast.

Halloween Cookies

I made these bad boys last year for Halloween. They're based off of a "Lofthouse" cookie knock off recipe, but I used a ganache to top the cookies, because it's more fitting for Halloween. My kids couldn't get enough of them.

Ingredients:

Cookies:
6 Cups Flour
1 Tsp Baking Soda
1 Tsp Baking Powder
1 Cup (2 Sticks) Butter, softened.
2 Cups Sugar
3 Eggs
3 Tsp Vanilla
1/4 Tsp Salt
1 1/2 Cups Sour Cream
Food Coloring ( I used neon purple, and neon orange gel food coloring)

Ganache:
1 Cup Chocolate Chips
3 Tbsp Heavy Cream


Directions:

 1. In a large bowl, cream butter and sugar.
2. Add eggs, sour cream, and vanilla, mixed until well blended.
3. Slowly add the dry ingredients  into the  bowl, mixed until incorporated.
4.Divide dough in half, and mix a singular color into  dough. Such as adding purple into one mound of  dough, and orange into the other mound of dough .  Cover doughs in plastic wrap.
5. Refrigerate doughs for two hours .
6. Remove plastic wrap, and individually roll dough into 13x9 rectangle, place one sheet of dough onto the other, and roll length wise.
7.  Refrigerate rolled dough covered in plastic wrap  while oven preheats to 425º
8. Slice cookies to 1/4" thickness, you may need to reshape them back to circles, place on greased cookie sheets , make sure cookies are about  2 inches apart from each other.
9. Bake for 7 -9 minutes, until bottoms are slightly golden. You don't want to over cook these.  Let cookies cool completely.
10. Once Cookies are cooled, make the ganache, you do that by microwaving chips and cream in a glass bowl until smooth.
11. Spoon and smooth ganache over the cookies, allow to cool, and serve. 

Enjoy! I know I did.

Peanut Butter Cookies

I really wanted to make some cookies, but I was out of chocolate chips - a true tragedy. But alas, my children's addiction saved me. Peanut Butter!





Ingredients:

1 Stick Margarine, softened.
1/2 Cup  Brown Sugar
1/2 Cup  Sugar
1/2 Cup Peanut Butter
1 Egg
1 1/4 Cup Flour
3/4 Tsp Baking Soda
1/2 Tsp Baking Powder
1/4 Tsp Salt.


Directions:

Preheat oven to 375º

1. In a bowl, mix butter, and sugar until creamy. Add peanut butter and egg until smooth.
2. Slowly add dry ingredients into wet ingredients until incorporated.
3.  Spoon dough (tablespoon sized)  onto cookie sheet, about 1 inch apart from each other.
4. Using a fork, press dough balls down,  criss-crossing in the center to give the signature peanut butter cookie look.



5. Bake cookies 10 minutes, until slightly golden on the edges.



Enjoy!

Mini Pumpkin Oreo Cheesecake (for one)

 


    Two  awesome things combined, just in time for Fall.  It's also really easy to make, and you don't have to heat up the oven!    It's easy to make more for guests, as well.

:D     

Ingredients:

1 Tbsp Pumpkin Cream Cheese
1 Tbsp Lite Whipped Topping (Coolwhip)
1 Halloween Oreo
1 Cupcake Paper


Directions:
1. Place cupcake paper into a cupcake tin.
2. Place Oreo into bottom of cupcake paper.
3. Combine Coolwhip, and Pumpkin Cream cheese, mix until smooth.
4. Pour mixture over Oreo, tap tin against counter a few times to try and make sure the mixture has enveloped the Oreo.
5. Refrigerate one Hour.
6.  Place into freezer until hardened.

7. Remove paper from cheesecake, plate, and allow to thaw for 10 - 15 minutes.

Enjoy!

Perfect sized knife to cut this in half. Mwahahah.

Festive.