Showing posts with label Dessert. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Dessert. Show all posts

Buttercream Cookies

Are you ever in need of a fast, easy and spectacular sweet?! Who isn't, right?! HA...

Well, I have you covered... these are so easy, pretty quick (minus the refrigeration time), and my oh my... they are DELICIOUS! They literally will melt in your mouth... I'm dying for some while writing this... if we weren't leaving town I'd make them NOW.

A friend of mine made these for a baby shower a few years back and I've made them for every occasion under the sun since. Thanks to Frances and Andrea because without y'all I'd have never found these beauts!! They are so versatile - you can color the cookie itself, color the icing in between or leave it all white. No matter what you do they are delicious and adorable. I only have some finished product pictures, not step-by-step - but I promise I'll make them soon with step-by-step!!

Buttercream Cookies



Ingredients:

1 cup butter, softened
1/3 cup whipping cream
2 cups all-purpose flour
granulated sugar for coating
buttercream icing (recipe to follow)

Directions:

Mix butter, cream and flour thoroughly. If you wish to color you dough, do so now and mix thoroughly. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 375°. Pour about 1/2 cup sugar onto paper plate, set aside. Roll dough to 1/8" thick on a lightly floured board. Cut into small circles, flowers or any other small shape. No larger than 1 1/2". Gently coat each piece in sugar on both sides and place on cookie sheet. Using a toothpick, poke holes in the center of the cookie (this is really important). Bake 7-9 minutes or until slightly puffy and lightly golden.

Place a small dollop of icing on 1/2 the cookies and top with the remaining cookies to make a sandwich. This is most easily accomplished with the use of a piping bag and pretty much and tip!

Buttercream Icing

Ingredients:

2 sticks butter, softened *NO substitutions*
3 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla

Directions:

Whip butter with stand or hand mixer until creamy. Add in powered sugar slowly and at low speed. Whip until stiff peaks form. Add in milk and vanilla on low speed to avoid splatter then increase speed. Whip until creamy and light. If too thick, add milk slowly. If too thin, add more powdered sugar. Color as desired.



I tried to give you a closer look!

ENJOY!!!
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Pink and Green Cupcakes

We're headed to a diaper shower this evening and I made cupcakes to take with us. They are using the Penelope bedding from Pottery Barn Kids and it is so adorable! Pink, green, birds... need I say more?! I wanted to do some kind of decoration that followed along that theme but I was running out of time, so I decided to pipe white chocolate P's and add them to the cupcakes.



I didn't get any pictures of the piping from last night and I have to say, I ran into a few minor problems and that coupled with not enough chocolate, means I got 12 good P's. I started by melting the white chocolate and then dividing it in 1/2. If you plan to do a lot of this, I'd suggest mixing your color in but only using about 1/4-1/2 of your chocolate at a time - it dries quickly - and reheating as you go. You can't reheat in your piping bag if your tip is metal. You can only color white chocolate and almond bark with oil colors or powdered color, so make sure you prepare for this ahead of time. I purchased my colors from AGS here in San Antonio. The tiniest drop goes a long way, so start off extremely conservatively.

To make the P's I placed the chocolate in a piping bag with a #2 tip (would have preferred smaller but didn't have one). Beforehand, print out a template (or draw) the thing you'd like to create. In my case, I printed 8 P's, in the font of my choice, on a sheet of paper then placed a sheet of wax paper on top and went to town.



You will want a design that meets up at several points to strengthen the chocolate. I had several break... several.

The lady at AGS told me that my disco dust would stick after the chocolate dried - WRONG!!! I was panicked!! It did not stick. I used my finger to gently massage the letter with water, then brushed the disco dust on and that worked, but I wonder how much better they would look had I done it while it was wet...??





I made the cupcakes this morning in white liners and after they cooled, I made buttercream icing. Using a 2A Wilton tip (although a 1A would have been better) I applied the icing. To get this look, start in the center of the cupcake and gently push icing out of the tip in a small mound, keeping the tip submerged in icing. Then, gently drag the tip, still in the icing, around the cupcake. Leaving the tip in the icing gives the more seamless look. When you come to the end, slightly pull the tip to the side, still in the icing, to basically "tuck" the icing into itself. Pull gently downward to prevent a peak, but it happens!













For the P's, I placed the P on top - gently, so extremely fragile - and that was that!







For the sprinkles, I added sprinkles immediately after icing then added a small amount of Disco Dust for an added shimmer.



So you ice, you sprinkle, you dust you move to the next one. Don't ice them all and then expect your sprinkles to stick.
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Peeps! Peeps!! Peeps!!!

Whenever a party pops up at Reagan's school... I have a new go to item: Marshmallow Pops. Yup... marshmallow pops. They are EASY, yummy and pretty mess free for the teachers who have to clean up afterward. And all the kids and teachers seem to love them. Plus, they are so versatile... you can decorate them to match any holiday. Christmas, green and red; Valentine's, pink and red... so forth and so on.

So, it's Easter and I signed up to make marshmallow pops for Reagan's school. I figured I'd just get jimmies in pastels and go for it. And then I saw this... over at Gracious Home. Debby's daughter-in-law is a friend of mine from childhood and I LOVE her blog. She posts some beautiful ideas.

Well, after seeing Debby's post - marshmallow pops were for the birds!! Peeps it would be! I originally intended to do Peep Pops, and would have had I only had bunnies, but they had more colors in the birdies and they were so cute, I couldn't resist. But trying to do the birdies as a pop seemed a little daunting.

Here is a tutorial for decorating Peeps. From start to finish this took me about 25 minutes. So easy and so cute! Just a way to go an extra mile for your loved ones.

Easter Peeps - All Dressed Up


Ingredients:

Peeps
Almond Bark
Sprinkles

Directions:

First, start out by separating all of your Peeps. I can't tell you the last time I tried to eat a Peep, probably a few decades back... but I forgot how sticky they are! Wowzers... you get anything within an inch of those suckers and it will stick for life! So, separate and keep separated.



Warm your almond bark or white chocolate as directed.

Place the bottom of your Peep in the chocolate and make sure you get it coated well. DOn't mind my fat fingers...!!!



You will want to let the excess chocolate drip off and then also slide the back of the Peep along your bowl or tray. This will help you not end up with a bunch of chocolate hanging around the sides of your Peeps.




Immediately dip into your sprinkles. You can use anything... nonpareils, sanding sugar, dots... whatever you want. I used Rainbow Nonpareils.



Lay on foil or wax paper to dry. Depending on your chocolate, it will take anywhere from 10-45 minutes for them to fully dry, so just let them chill! :0)




Well - that's that! So easy - and so cute! Hope you all have a Happy Peepster!! ;)
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The Best Sugar Cookies EVER!!!

Years and years ago I came across the most brilliant sugar cookie recipe ever. It is almost a cross between a sugar cookie and a shortbread cookie. I've never made these and not had people ask for the recipe. And, I actually used to make them and sell them from my home. There is something about a sugar cookie that people just can not resist! And, they are so incredibly versatile... you can shape them into anything. They can be cute and playful, sleek and modern... you can serve them at a birthday party, for tea or give them as favors at a wedding. Everybody loves cookies, and when they look like these and taste like these... what's not to love?!



Sugar Cookies Ingredients:

1 cup butter, softened *you CANNOT substitute*
1/2 cup sugar
1 large egg
1 Tbsp vanilla
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder

Directions:

Using a stand or hand mixer, beat butter until fluffy.



Add in sugar and beat until blended on low. Increase speed to high and beat until light and creamy.



Resume low speed, add in vanilla and egg. Whip to smooth consistency.




Add baking powder and sift in flour, beat until chunky. Once chunky, increase speed to allow for large ball to form.


**I don't actually own a sifter... but I do have a mesh strainer - works JUST as well!! **

You will need to use your hands to finish combining and form into large ball.



Separate into 2 balls, flatten and cover each disc with plastic wrap. Refrigerate 1 hour or until firm.

Find a surface large enough to roll your dough out. I love to use our large wooden cutting board... it's raised, it's big enough and it stays floured well. You will need to flour your surface, your rolling pin and your cookie cutters.



Roll dough out to about 1/4" thickness.



Use cookie cutters of choice and cut as many as you can. Form a ball and re-roll as needed, flouring each time. Place cookies on cookie sheet and bake at 350° for 10-12 minutes or until lightly golden. Remove cookie sheet from over, allow to sit 2 minutes and then transfer cookies to wire rack to cool.

Once the cookies have cooled completely you can ice them. I've used several methods to ice cookies over the years, depending on the degree of difficulty I intend for the final design.

These cookies have a royal icing piping and filling:



These cookies have a buttercream icing piping and a sugar flood:



These cookies are the same as the last one, but I ask added more buttercream decoration:




You can find SO many tutorials out there for decorating cookies and I am by NO MEANS an expert. And trust me - YOU can do THIS! I'm not very artistic by hand, and I do an OK job with these. Just trust in yourself and try!!

Here are the different icing recipes...
Royal Icing:

4 cups powdered sugar
3 Tbsp meringue powder
6 Tbsp water

Mix all ingredients until smooth and creamy. If too thick, add water (1/4 tsp at a time, a little goes a LONG way!). If too runny, add powdered sugar.

Flood Icing:

4 cups powdered sugar
5 Tbsp water

Mix all ingredients until smooth and creamy. If too thick, add water (1/4 tsp at a time, a little goes a LONG way!). If too runny, add powdered sugar.

Buttercream icing:

2 sticks butter, softened *NO substitutions*
3 cups powdered sugar
2 Tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla

Whip butter with stand or hand mixer until creamy. Add in powered sugar slowly and at low speed. Whip until stiff peaks form. Add in milk and vanilla on low speed to avoid splatter then increase speed. Whip until creamy and light. If too thick, add milk slowly. If too thin, add more powdered sugar.

Happy Baking!!!
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Cake Balls

I'm sure by now you've seen the craze, eaten the craze, maybe even made the craze... but in case you're like me and you get to the craze ball late... here is some information about cake balls!



First bake a cake, any cake... white cake, chocolate cake, carrot cake, pick a cake. Bake as directed. Let the cake cool. Remove the cake from the pan and smush it into smithereens. I will admit, this is kinda a hard thing to do - take a perfectly good cake and obliterate it... but you can do it. I promise. And, you can eat some along the one and no one will be the wiser! Plus, if you need to let out some frustration... this is as good a way as any!

Now, the recipe I use calls for golden Oreo cookies. You could use regular Oreo cookies too. Or you don't have to use any cookies. You could use chocolate chips, peppermint, caramel...

I also put buttercream in my cake balls - you can use regular buttercream, flavor it with coffee creamer, use cream cheese icing...

Basically - the possibilities are endless. You can search to find great combinations and recipes.

I use the food processor to crumble 20 Golden Oreos then mix those in with the entire cake and 1 cup of buttercream icing. Mix, mix, mix... when you're done mixing, form into 1" balls. Place on a cookie sheet. A 9"x11" cake should make about 60 balls. Place them in the refrigerator to chill for about 20-30 minutes.

I coat mine with white Almond bark. I melt 1/2 the brick at a time according to package directions but I add 1 Tbsp Crisco to help keep it smooth and slick. Once it has melted, start dipping your cake balls into the bark.

The first time I made these, I tried to use toothpicks to dip the balls. They would fall off the toothpicks, and if they stayed on, they would have SO much excess bark on them... they weren't pretty! This time, I read somewhere to drop the ball into the bowl, then use two spoons to gently move the balls back and forth until the excess bark has come off. This leaves the ball with a nice smooth coating but helping eliminate extra bark.

Use sprinkles, jimmies or nonpareils to decorate immediately. The bark dries very quickly.

This isn't a recipe so much as a "this is how I did this..." kinda thing. Hope it inspires you to make some, they are delish!! I actually made this batch at the request of my brother-in-law - they are his fave!!

And if you needed more motivation to make these, here you go...!

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