Peach Strawberry Pop Tarts

Zach and I took the long way home from our Jersey Shore vacation and decided to drive the 20+ hours back to Miami with our lovely Ethel. Believe it or not, despite Ethel's diva nature, she is absolutely spectacular on long distance car trips. Of course, we have to stop a little more frequent with the pup in our care, but it is well worth it. Especially, when we stopped at a gas station about halfway through our Georgia drive and stumbled upon a precious peach and pecan stand. I couldn't help, but get my hands on some of the freshly picked peaches, and I made a friend too ;) When in Georgia...

Upon our return home, I decided to whip up some peach strawberry pop tarts for a special breakfast treat. The recipe below includes the use of Pillsbury Crescent dough sheets, but I only recommend using this type of pre-made dough if you intend on eating the tarts soon after baking and want a softer crust. For better keeping and long lasting crunchy pop tarts, I prefer making homemade dough like this recipe HERE. See all tart details below. Life sure is peachy! xo RCN

Ingredients - You will need the following for 1 dozen 6" tarts (dough + filling):

4 soft peeled peaches cut into small cubes

2 heaping cups of full strawberries then cut into small cubes + a few quartered for topping

3 Pillsbury Crescent Dough Sheets, each sheet cut into 8 equal size rectangles

Sprinkle of flour for cookie sheets and laying out dough

1 1/4 cup Sugar

3 tablespoons Raw Honey

1/4 teaspoon Cornstarch

1/4 teaspoon Cinnamon

1 1/2 tablespoons Lemon Juice

1 1/2 tablespoons Orange Juice

For the iced topping:

3/4 cup confectioners sugar

1 Tablespoon Milk

1/4 teaspoon of Vanilla Extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F. Roll out defrosted/thawed dough and cut each dough sheet into 8 equal sized rectangles. Lay dough rectangles onto floured cookie sheet, set aside. Combine chopped fruit (peaches peeled too) and all other ingredients into a medium size mixing bowl. Once combine spoon filling into center of half of the dough rectangles. Cover the filled rectangles with the remaining dough rectangles. Use a fork to pinch shut the edges of the overlapping dough. It's okay if some filling oozes out sides, it'll give them character. Bake for about 20 minutes +, until all edges start to brown. It's important that the dough appears hard at edges. This helps to insure the bottom of the tarts are fully baked. Remove and let cool. Lastly, combine in small bowl 3/4 cup confectioners sugar, 1 Tablespoon of milk and 1/4 teaspoon of Vanilla Extract. Place glaze mixture in ziplock bag and snip corner off bag. Squeeze icing gently across tops of tarts in zigzag formation. Top with fresh cut strawberries (quartered). Enjoy!

 

 

 

Cacti Cookies

I am overly obsessed with everything cactus. I decided to put together a small treat table for this upcoming Cinco de Mayo (tomorrow!) and went with cacti as my fiesta theme. Sugar cookies, are similar to my banana bread theory, in that you can't try too many recipes in order to get you to your absolute favorite. So this time around, I used Alton Brown's cookie recipe from Food Network. They are not very sweet, which is perfect, especially because I decided to dose them in green icing and sprinkles. I mean...how cute are these? Perfect for any summer fiesta! Ingredients and directions all below OR click HERE for link to original recipe. xo RCN

Cookie Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose flour, and some extra for rolling out dough 

3/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

1 cup sugar

1 egg, beaten

1 tablespoon milk

Baking Instructions:

Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. Place butter and sugar in large bowl of electric stand mixer with whisk attachment and beat until light in color. Add egg and milk and beat to combine. If dough and mixture clump towards center of whisk, take a second to pause your mixer and use a spatular to clear out the whisk, continue to mixing. Put mixer on low speed, gradually add flour, and beat until mixture pulls away from the side of the bowl. Divide the dough in half, wrap in waxed paper, and refrigerate for 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Sprinkle surface where you will roll out dough with flour. (Alton uses powdered sugar- this will make your cookie sweeter) Remove 1 wrapped pack of dough from refrigerator at a time, sprinkle rolling pin with flour (or powdered sugar), and roll out dough to 1/4-inch thick. Move the dough around and check underneath frequently to make sure it is not sticking. I use a silicon baking mat + a little flour and it works excellently! Cut into shape with cactus cookie cutters, place at least 1-inch apart on greased baking sheet and bake for 7 to 9 minutes or until cookies are just beginning to turn brown around the edges. Rotate cookie sheet halfway through baking time. Let sit on baking sheet for 2 minutes after removal from oven and then move to complete cooling on wire rack. 

Decoration Directions:

You will need a clean surface, wire cooling rack, paper towel, toothpicks, mini faux floral buds,  green cookie icing , and white sprinkles.

Snip off flower blooms from fake stems, leaving 1/4"-1/2" of wire on end (to stick into cactus arm). Set flowers aside. Set up cooling rack, and place paper towels underneath. Once cookies are cool, move to a clean surface. I reused my silicon baking mat. One at a time, place cookie on mat and begin covering top of cookie with green icing (follow directions on bottle as to how to warm up in microwave, etc.). Let the icing drip over the sides of cookie. Take a toothpick and continue to smooth out icing on surface and spread icing to sides and cover sides, as well. Take white sprinkles and lightly and sporadically sprinkle onto top of green icing. Take one bloom and fluff out the petals. Hold the little wire end and stick it directly into the cactus cookie arm. Using another toothpick, stick the toothpick under a corner edge of the cookie to lift it off surface. Once it is tilted up, grab cookie from underneath and transfer to a cooling rack to let excess icing drip off. Continue all steps until all cookies are decorated. After a few more minutes, transfer into air tight container. If possible, try to keep cookies in a single layer, or use a sheet of wax paper in between stacks.

 
Source: http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-b...

Shamrock Sundae

Forget about the shake. How about a few scoops of mint chip ice cream covered in chocolate sauce, marshmallows, and sprinkles. It doesn't take much, when it comes to ice cream, to make me happy. Keep it simple and enjoy a quick and easy festive sundae for St. Patty's. All the extra awesomeness, like green straws and sparkling clover trimmings make the dessert that much better, without too much of a fuss. To avoid sticking wire wrapped embellishments (like the one pictured above) directly into your food, slide the accessory into a straw first, then add to decorate. A sweet treat that looks as great as it tastes will impress the kids and maybe a husband, too. xo RCN

 

Banana Bread For Beau

Banana Bread is by far one of Zach's favorite baked goods. He doesn't have a big sweet tooth, but once the bananas in the kitchen begin to brown he always asks if I will, please, make Banana Bread. This time I planned on making the bananas turn, as I knew I would not be around for almost two weeks and wanted to leave Z with a few of his favorite foods and snacks.

I have baked many banana bread recipes, some with nuts, some with chocolate. I tend to love most of them, but I continue to try out new ones in search of what is the best. This time around I decided to try out a recipe from Food Network. Link HERE to go direct to site, or follow directions below. I recommend this banana bread - no burnt edges and moist in the center. Yum! xo RCN

 

Ingredients:

1 cup granulated sugar

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature

2 large eggs

3 ripe bananas

1 tablespoon milk

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Recipe will serve two paper loaf pans "around" size 3.5" wide by 7" long and 1.75" tall. Note: many loaf paper liners are greased, but if not then grease with butter or spray.

Cream the sugar and butter in a large mixing bowl until light and fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. 

Cut three 1/2" slices of banana from the center (widest circumference) of one banana and cut each slice into a heart shape, set aside (for decoration on top of bread). In a small bowl, mash the remaining bananas with a fork. Mix in the milk and cinnamon. In another bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. 

Add the banana mixture to the creamed mixture and stir until combined. Add dry ingredients, mixing just until flour disappears. 

Pour batter into prepared paper liners. Place filled paper loaf liners into metal loaf pans and place in heated oven. Bake 1 hour to 1 hour 10 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. About 3/4 ways through baking or ten minutes before removing bread from oven, place and press the three banana heart slices equidistant across top center of bread. Once bread is finished baking, remove liners from pan and set aside to cool.

 

Snowball Cookies All Winter Long

Valentine's Day is fast approaching. It is a sweet time of year, so what better to do, than make some sweets? One of my favorite Christmas cookies that my Mom makes is a Snowball Cookie. Wow, this year they tasted better than ever. Snowball Cookies really apply to all winter long, so I figured I would turn them into Valentine cookies since I L-OV-E them so much. With a little extra help from the sprinkle and dessert cabinet, I made these cookies look fab and fit for any Valentine's Day affair. They are very powdery, you may need some extra napkins! xo RCN

You will find a few versions of the recipe if you search online. This batch was made from the cookingclassy.com recipe. Ingredients and instructions below, or link to direct source HERE. Also...the super cute mini cupcake liners (Meri Meri, $2.99) and napkins ( Lady Jayne Ltd, $3.99) came from Homegoods.

INGREDIENTS

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp vanilla extract

2 Tbsp cornstarch

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup finely chopped Pecans (I used a little less than half a cup)

1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, for coating

DIRECTIONS

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Using an electric stand mixer fit with the paddle attachment, mix butter on medium speed until creamy, (about 20 seconds). Blend in 1/2 cup powdered sugar and salt. Mix in vanilla. Use a rubber spatula to scrape down edges of bowl before continuing to mix if dough is spread up towards the side of your bowl. Sprinkle cornstarch evenly around mixer bowl then with mixer set on low speed slowly add in flour and mix just until combined. Stir in Pecans. Scoop dough out 1 Tbsp at a time and roll into a ball. I shaped half of my dough into small hearts by splitting the 1 Tbsp into two pieces, rolling into cylinder shapes and then molding back together into a heart shape. Keep one end of each cylinder separate from one another and then press the other end of each cylinder together to form the point of the heart. They look cuter when they aren't perfect!

Place cookies onto ungreased baking sheets and bake in preheated oven for about 15 minutes, until bottom edges are lightly golden. Do not under bake, this recipe is meant to be more dry and cookies are not meant to be moist in the middle. The cookies will literally dissolve in your mouth, just like snow. Remove from oven and allow to cool for a few minutes. While cookies are still warm, pour 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar into a bowl and roll cookies in powdered sugar. Transfer to a wire rack to cool, then once cookies are cool, roll in powdered sugar once more. Coat until cookies are completely covered. Just after coating for second time, top with pink, red, white, and rainbow sprinkles. Cookies look great served inside mini Valentine themed cupcake liners .

 
Source: http://www.cookingclassy.com/snowball-cook...