Lovin' From the Oven

Chocolate Chip Toffee Walnut Cookies

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I baked a bunch for my boyfriend’s niece’s birthday party on Sunday, and these were one of the treats that I brought. They were delightful and turned out perfect! The adults loved them more than the kids, though (probably because of the walnuts). I think the combination of toffee and anything always turn out good, so you can’t go wrong with this recipe. These cookies are thick, chewy, and sturdy. I imagine that they’d be perfect for shipping across the states to someone, for they stack up well upon one another and can handle a lot of moving without breaking.

2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 large eggs
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup toffee bits
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Combine flour, baking soda and salt in small bowl. Beat butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and vanilla extract in large mixer bowl until creamy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Gradually beat in flour mixture. Stir in chocolate chips, toffee bits and nuts. Drop by rounded tablespoon onto ungreased baking sheets.
Bake for 9 to 11 minutes or until golden brown. Cool on baking sheets for 2 minutes; remove to wire racks to cool completely.
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Now, my boyfriend’s niece had a princess birthday party and absolutely LOVES all the Disney princesses. She was turning 3 this year, and I decided to do something fun and creative for her. I made her her own mini princess purse! At first, I bought a plain mini canvas tote and sketched some of the princesses on it. Hah, whoever knew that a baker was capable of other things than just baking, right?

This is how one side looked like after sketching, all free hand!
And a little bit of paint later…(Yes, I used an eyeliner brush. I find that they make the best paintbrushes and I don’t wear make up, so why not?)

Voila! Finished product of both sides. She loved it! I also got her a huge Disney princess puzzle kit thing.

For the paint, I used a bit of acrylic paint mixed with textile medium, which is really the greatest thing ever invented. That is also the only brand that I use, Ceramcoat. I’ve experimented with a lot of acrylic paints and always come back to that one. Anyways, medium textile turns any acrylic paint into fabric paint. It also saves you money because fabric paint is a lot more expensive to buy than acrylic paint.

If you want to buy a canvas tote bag, you can find one HERE.

Valentine’s Day Part Two: Malted Milk Cake & Frosting

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My boyfriend & I are some of the biggest fans of whoppers that you’ll find out there. Most people I know don’t like the malt taste, but I adore it! I can eat a box of whoppers all by myself. When I saw this recipe, I knew I had to try it. It’s a malt cake (I could barely taste it) with a chocolate malted frosting. Now, although I couldn’t taste the malt in the cake, the frosting definitely made up for it. It was DELICIOUS! My boyfriend says that the frosting just tastes like chocolate frosting, but what does he know.. 🙂 He doesn’t even like sweets!

I split the batter into a 9×13 pan and an 8×8 pan so that I would have a thinner layer to be able to stack upon one another and it worked out perfectly. I used cookie cutters to cut out the heart shape– TIP: Press the cookie cutter into your cake, LEAVE IT IN THERE, and then use a spatula to slide underneath the shape and cookie cutter. Lift gently, and then press out the cake onto parchment paper. Works like a charm! Don’t bother cutting the shape in the pan, removing the cookie cutter, and then trying to get it out. You’ll ruin the cake for sure!

1 cup softened butter
2 cups sugar
5 egg whites
3 cups sifted self-rising flour
1 cup whole milk
1/2 cup malted powder
2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour 2 (9-inch) cake pans.

Using an electric mixer, cream butter until fluffy. Add sugar and continue to cream well for 6 to 8 minutes. Add egg whites, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Whisk malt powder into milk. Add flour and milk mixture alternately to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Add vanilla and continue to beat until just mixed.

Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Level batter in each pan by holding pan 3 or 4 inches above counter, then dropping it flat onto counter. Do this several times to release air bubbles and assure you of a more level cake. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until done. Cool in pans 5 to 10 minutes. Invert cakes onto cooling racks. Cool completely.

Chocolate Malted Frosting
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup butter
6 T milk
1 cup malted powder
1 cup cocoa
1/2 tsp vanilla
3 1/4 cups powdered sugar

Mix milk and malted powder in electric mixer. Add cocoa and vanilla. Mix until a well blended (as in non-lumpy) paste. Add butter and shortening and cream. Add sugar and beat for 4-5 minutes.

For the writing on top, I used a candy decorating pen bought from Williams Sonoma, but you can find it HERE or HERE. They’re really easy to work with and make life so much simpler. No messy clean up! I probably should have tried piping out a bit before though before writing directly on the cake. Oh well!

OH! and just for kicks, this is what some of the Valentine’s Day cards that I sent out to people look like:
Everything made by hand! Homemade is the way to go. 🙂 The heart is an example of what my cricut machine that I got for Christmas can do. What the heck is a cricut machine anyway? Check out my previous post about it.
You can buy the smaller version or go all out and get the bigger version.

Valentine’s Day M&M Cookies

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Happy Valentine’s Day! I made a little box of goods for my boyfriend (which I still have yet to give him, so hopefully he doesn’t see this before then) filled with cookies and miniature heart cakes. How cute are these M&M’s? I love that M&M’s come in different colors for every holiday season. It makes themed baking so easy! I had a busy baking day today; I baked 4 different types of cookies (3 dozen of each), a cake, brownies, AND truffles! So I’m a bit exhausted and a bit sleep deprived. I had midterms this past week and had about 15 hours of sleep total for those 5 nights. Eeeek! But I was so relieved to be done with tests and finally have time to bake again, so I went a bit overboard. Oh well! Everything turned out cute, that’s all that matters.

These cookies are ok. There’s something a bit off about them, but I haven’t quite bit my finger on it. I prefer the Nestle Tollhouse recipe over this one, along with my ultimate favorite CCC recipe. It seems that even though I’ve found my favorite CCC recipe, I can’t but help and try new ones. Why? I have no idea. Well, enjoy!

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted & cooled
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup valentine’s m&m’s

directions
1. Adjust an oven rack to lower-middle position and heat the oven to 325 degrees. line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk the flour, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl.
2. In a large bowl, beat the melted butter and sugars together with an electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Beat in the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla until combined.
3. Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add the flour mixture until combined. Mix in the chips until incorporated.
4. Working with 2 tablespoons of dough at a time, roll the dough into even balls and lay them on the baking sheets, spaced about 2 inches apart. Stud the dough with the m&m’s.
5. Bake the cookies until the edges are set and beginning to brown but the centers are still soft and puffy, about 16 minutes. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for about 10 minutes, then serve warm or transfer to a wire rack and let cool completely.

Oh yeah! I managed to do a little blog-makeover the other day that seriously took me FOREVER redoing my gadgets and what not. What do you think?

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