The Most Heavenly Fudge Sauce You Will Ever Eat!

This is my sweet little Emma with her Curious George animal from school (each child gets to take George home for the weekend and then they write about it:) eating what one might coin,
"THE chocolate sauce to add ten pounds on you instantly". Ok, but in a good way, K? Really, it's that good. 'Nuff said.

Heavenly Fudge Sauce (recipe from my Dad)

1 oz. unsweetened chocolate


1/4 c. butter (well, or margarine, but I say butter)
1 1/2 c. confectioner's sugar
1/4 tsp. salt
1/3 c. evaporated milk
1 tsp. vanilla

Melt chocolate and butter in a saucepan. Whisk in sugar and salt alternately with milk; bring almost to a boil, stirring constantly. Pour into a bowl and let cool. This really soooooo yummy!!



Linking up to:

Tasty Tuesday
Tempt My Tummy Tuesday
Crockpot Wednesday

PW: That's The Best Frosting I've Ever Had!!!

My incredible, bright, beautiful first born has turned 9. *sigh*. Which, in case you didn't know, means she'll be twenty in a couple years. *sigh*. Truly, I know it's so cliche to say "my, where has the time gone???" But really, I would love to know. I was going through some old pics on the computer and can't believe it seemed like it was yesterday that we brought her home, not having a clue as to what we were supposed to do with her!

Her birthday was the 14th of March, and we celebrated her birthday with husband's family. Rachel isn't one for cake, as she doesn't like frosting. So I have tried several recipes for frosting with no winner so far. Saturday I was browsing the all wonderful Pioneer Woman's blog and found a recipe for frosting that looked intriguing. The title says it all, "That's The Best Frosting I've Ever Had". And let me tell you, it is!! Rachel raved about it and told me I have to keep that recipe. It's light, fluffy and has just the right sweetness (although licking all the frosting off the beaters still gave me a stomachache). The recipe is for white icing, so I added 1/4 C cocoa (per a suggestion from one of the comments) to make it chocolate. DELISH!!

Rachel's theme this year is animals, next week for her kid birthday party we are going to the local animal shelter to volunteer. For that cake, she wants a kitty. Now I just need to find a cute way to make a kitty out of a paper lunch bag. Any ideas? Instead of giving out treat bags, I will have a note in there that says we donated items to the shelter in their name. Who needs more crappy candy and poisoned toys anyway, right??!!

Baking Day!

Saturday we decided to do some of our Christmas baking. I mixed up some cookie dough in the morning, and the afternoon we got busy! I am pretty sure I had more dough on the floor than in cookie form, but hey, isn't that what it's all about??!! Of course it is, it's not about making a huuuuge mess of the kitchen, and spending hours cleaning it up.

It's all about the smiles you get as you make the mess:) And by the way, we used the cookie cutters that I got in my giveaway box from the all-wonderful Rachelle!!! We had so much fun using all the cookie cutters:) The first batch we rolled too thin, which made them crispy. The second batch I made today with the daycare kids (can you say CRAZY?? Honestly, WHO would choose to bake cookies with 9 children?? Hmmm???) was much better, I didn't roll it out so thin, therefore a much softer cookie. Yumm!

Soft Sugar Cookies

3 3/4 C all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1 C butter

1 1/2 C. sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla extract

Cream together the softened butter and sugar, add eggs one at a time, then vanilla. Combine flour, baking powder, salt, gradually add to the butter mixture. Shape into a large ball, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 2 hours. Roll out dough to 1/4 inch thickness, cut out with cookie cutters, bake at 400 degrees for 6-8 minutes.

Today I also managed to make some toffee, and peppermint biscotti! I will be posting both recipes this week. I cannot wait for tomorrow morning to enjoy the biscotti with my steamy mug of coffee:)

Linking up to:

Tasty Tuesday

Tempt My Tummy Tuesday

Pumpkin Pie

I love Thanksgiving, love the smells, the sights, the sounds. I thoroughly enjoy every part of it. This year it's just our family and my Mom and her husband, nice and quiet. However, my husband so rudely informed me not to make a boat load of food. Seriously??!! It's THANKSGIVING! It's all about having a ton of food and getting so stuffed it's hard to breathe:) So far I plan on making the turkey, potatoes and stuffing (thanks Donna!). Buuuuut, I found a really yummy recipe for a sweet potato casserole, and cranberry sauce, so I might attempt those too. Will anyone eat the casserole, probably not, but it's one of those things that needs to be on the table, right??!! This was my project for today (besides cleaning the house, finishing laundry and taking care of 7 children:): Pumpkin Pie!!! I stick with my good ole Martha Stewart recipe. It's so yummy and super easy!

Pumpkin Pie- Martha Stewart

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Crust- This crust I have always used, it came from an old cookbook.

1 1/5 C. all-purpose flour
1/2 shortening (I like to use lard)
1/2 tsp. salt
3-4 Tbl water

Mix flour, salt, cut in shortening until crumbly. Mix in water a Tbl at a time until right consistency.

Pie

1 Can solid pack pumpkin
3/4 C brown sugar
1 Tbl cornstarch
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 tsp cinnamon
3/4 tsp ginger
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
3 large eggs
1 can evaporated milk

Roll out crust, place in pie plate, whisk pie ingredients together, place in pie plate over crust. Reduce temperature to 325 degrees, bake 50-60 minutes. Mine seems to take a little over an hour to make. Now, my crust is not the one she shows, so remember that in the directions:)


I pray that each of you has a wonderful, safe and blessed Thanksgiving. I have so much to be thankful for, and I am also thankful to share my life with all my wonderful bloggy friends:)

Much love,

Pumpkin Cookies

Today was our daycare Halloween party which was fun, but also a lot of work and a lot of hyper little costumed kids screaming and crying because it took me 45 minutes to get them dressed only to have them rip them off right after I took pics. *sigh* Besides that, it was fun!

I made a pumpkin shaped pizza for lunch, played Halloween bingo and pin the nose on the Jack-O-Lantern. For prizes I made them all Halloween bookmarks, gotta love free printables online!! And for dessert, I found this FABULOUS recipe for Pumpkin Cookies that are really incredible. Very moist and flavorful, I made a normal cream cheese frosting to frost them with, and then let the kids frost them and add some Halloween sprinkles. What fun (and mess:) they had!!

Super Soft Pumpkin Cookies
1 C. Butter, softened
1 C. sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 C. canned pumpkin puree
2 C. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 pkg instant vanilla pudding

Preheat oven to 350 and grease cookie sheets. In a large mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar. Add egg and vanilla, stir in pumpkin puree. Combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and pudding; gradually add to pumpkin mixture. Using cookie scoop, or spoon, shape dough into balls and place two inches apart on cookie sheet. Bake for 12-15 minutes or until edges are golden brown.

For the cream cheese frosting, mix together 1/4 C softened butter, 1/2 pkg softened cream cheese, 1/4 tsp vanilla and 1 C. powdered sugar. Add enough milk to the right consistency.

Rachel said these would be perfect for breakfast, and I think she's right, would be better with a steaming hot cup of coffee??!! Have a wonderful and SAFE Halloween everyone!!

Glazed Apple Pie Squares

These AMAZING bars come from one of my Taste of Home magazines. The girls all helped make them, and they really are incredible!!!

2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour

1 tsp. salt

1 c. cold butter

1 egg separated

3-4 Tbl milk

1 c crushed cornflakes

9 cups thinly sliced peeled tart apples (I used Braeburn apples, about 7 medium sized)

1 c. plus 2 Tbl. sugar divided

2 tsp cinnamon, divided

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

Glaze:

1 c. confectioners sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1-2 Tbl. milk

Combine flour and salt; cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs (I had to use a little more like to get it to that consistency). In measuring cup, combine the egg yoke and enough milk to measure 1/3 c. Gradually add to the flour mixture, tossing with a fork until dough ball forms.

Divide dough in half. Roll one portion into a thin 15-in x 10-in. rectangle. Transfer to bottom of an ungreased 15x10x1 in baking pan. Sprinkle with cornflakes. In a large bowl, combine the apples, 1 c of sugar, 1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon and nutmeg; toss to coat. Spoon over crust.

Roll remaining dough into a thin 15x10 in rectangle; place over apple filling. beat egg white; brush over pastry. Combine remaining sugar and cinnamon; sprinkle over crust. bake at 350 for 45-50 minutes, or until golden brown.

For glaze, combine the confectioners sugar, vanilla, and enough milk to achieve a drizzling consistency. Drizzle over warm pastry. Cool completely on a wire rack.

*We actually had these for breakfast the next morning!*

365 Project and a Recipe:)

Ok I heard about this from another friend of mine and it's called the "365 project". Basically it's sort of a scrap booking thing, but not really (did that make ANY sense??!!). The goal is to take one picture everyday, and journal about it. So, my *goal* (asterisk being, that goal does not necessarily mean I will do this everyday. Just hoping!!) is to journal one picture everyday on here. So, I start today.

This is a lovely picture of our poor snowman:( His fate caught up with him this morning, at about 8:15. Yesterday the kids still played with him, and even got their picture taken sitting on his head. Unfortunately his torso and head fell off this morning. The kids were pretty bummed about it. Brad and the girls made him during Christmas vacation. However, Alayna was very excited to find one of his eyes on the ground. She thought we should save it....

Ok, here is the recipe for today. It came out of the St.Cloud Times Delish section of Wednesdays paper. I made it last Thursday, and it is extremely fantastic! Very, very moist.

Pumpkin Apple Bread

3 C flour

2 tsp. cinnamon

2 tsp. baking soda

1 1/2 tsp. salt

3 C sugar (I know, holy carp that's a lot of sugar, but remember it's two loaves)

1 (15 oz. can) pumpkin

4 eggs

1 C oil

1/2 C water

2 apples, chopped- Next time I think I'll put even more in

Combine flour, cinnamon, soda and salt, set aside. Mix together sugar and pumpkin. Add eggs, oil and water. Add dry ingredients. Fold in apples. Bake in greased bread pans (grease them REALLY well, one of my loaves got stuck) at 350 for 50-60 minutes or until a wooden toothpick comes out clean.

Enjoy!

Fall Has Arrived

You know that Fall has arrived when you see a big bag of apples on the counter. Unfortunately they are not from our tree, it didn't produce much this year. A co worker of Brad's sent home a big bag of apples from the trees. I have made two pies from them, and they are wonderful! I would like to make a couple more and then make some applesauce from the rest. The pie recipe I came up with a couple years ago by adding ingredients from different recipes. I really like the result, the crust is super flaky, and the pumpkin pie spice adds just enough *something* to the pie!

While I was making the pie, I gave the kids their own dough to play with. Kept them happy for at least an hour! I remember when my mom would make pies, my brother and I would get to make our own crust from the leftovers, I still have those little pie pans and now my kids get to do the same! I tried twice to get a picture, but for whatever reason my taped up camera isn't working. Grrrr.

For lunch I made homemade pizza. I used a half white/half wheat flour in my bread machine, and I had some leftover pizza sauce in the freezer from the last pizza I made. I just used hamburger and cheese, forgot to brown some sausage. The kids didn't mind, I only have two small pieces left! Tonight I'm not sure what we're having yet, as Brad is bowling, and we have an ice cream social at school tonight.

Ok, here is my apple pie recipe...

Crust: This is for an 8 or 9 inch double crust
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 c. shortening (I use lard)
6 Tbl water

Combine the flour and salt, cut in lard until crumbly. Add water as little bit at a time. divide in half

Filling:
Apples. Honestly, I'm not sure how many, I like to have a nice pile in the crust.
Over the apples pour 1/4 c honey
Mix together 1/2 c sugar, 1 Tbl. cinnamon, and 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice- sprinkle this over apples and honey.
Add 1/2 c water (or so) to the apples, spread crust over top, and cut slits. bake at 350 degrees for one hour.