Chocolate praline cake

I was in the mood for chocolate the other night (okay what night am I NOT in the mood for chocolate?) and saw this recipe in my cake mix doctor cookbook. It's super easy and while it may not look very pretty, it was seriously delicious.

1 stick butter
1/2 C heavy cream
1 C packed light brown sugar
3/4 C chopped pecans

1 box devils cake mix
1/2 C oil
3 large eggs

Sweetened cream for frosting
1 square semisweet chocolate for garnish

- preheat oven to 325, set aside 2 9 inch round cake pans
-Place butter, cream and brown sugar in small saucepan. Heat on low, stirring until butter is melted, 3 min.
-Pour mixture evenly into the cake pans and sprinkle evenly with chopped pecans.
-In mixing bowl put cake mix, water, oil and eggs. Blend on low for 1 minute, stop, scrape down sides and blend on medium for 2 more minutes
-Divide batter between the round pans pouring it over pecan mixture then smooth it out with spatula, put pans in oven side by side.
- Bake till they spring back 35-37 min. Remove from oven and let cool for a little before taking out of pan otherwise the caramel will spread everywhere.
-Prepare sweetened cream

Sweetened Cream
1 C heavy cream
1/4 C confectioners sugar

Place a clean, large mixing bowl and beaters in the freezer for a few minutes. Pour whipping cream into chilled bowl and beat on high till it has thickened, 1 1/2 min. Stop machine and add sugar. Beat on high until stiff peaks form, 1-2 min more.

Place one cake layer, praline side up on serving platter and spread half of the sweetened cream on top. Place second layer on, praline side up and frost with rest of sweetened cream. Sprinkle top with grated semi sweet chocolate.

Notes- I kept this in the fridge because I liked the cream to be cold. But it did mean that the caramel got more solid and was a bit harder to cut so I had to use a serrated knife. It's definitely a messy cake to serve but SO good.

Eye see you!

Our neighbors were hosting a Halloween party last Saturday and the invitation said to bring a "creepy treat" so I had to do some thinking to figure out what a "creepy treat" was but I came up with the perfect idea! Cake truffle eyeballs! They were just the basic Bakerella cake ball recipe then I used gummy lifesavers for the iris and then a upside down chocolate chip for the pupil. I put the lifesaver on immediately after dipping the ball in the almond bark so it would stick. Then I used red piping gel to draw the veins. I made the balls a bit bigger than usual so they would fit the lifesaver. I used on bag of lifesavers and that was enough for one batch, but I did need three of those little red gel tubes you get at the grocery store. Of course I had to use red velvet cake for the inside so it was red when you would bite into it. They were a big hit and I'll have to remember this for future Halloween parties.
Here's the link for the basic cake ball recipe.

Monkey Cupcakes!

I made these for Oliver's first birthday and they were perfect for him! I call him my monkey because he's always climbing on things and he's such a goof. These reminded me of banana bread but much fluffier and sweeter! Plus they're jumbo size so one cupcake really fills you up.

1 box yellow cake mix
1 1/2 C mashed bananans
1/2 C water
1/2 C veg. oil
3 large eggs
1 t. ground cinnamon
(I also like to add a splash of nutmeg)

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Place liners in 12 jumbo size cupcake cups. Mix cake mix, bananas, water, oil, eggs and cinnamon in bowl. Blend thirty seconds on low then 2 more minutes on medium. Spoon 1/2 C of batter (for the large cups) into each cup. Bake till golden and spring back when lightly pressed on. Let cool before frosting.

Cinnamon Cream cheese frosting

1 package (8 oz) cream cheese at room temp.
4 T stick butter at room temp.
3 C confectioner's sugar
1 t ground cinnamon (again I also add a dash of nutmeg)

Mix cream cheese and butter for 30 seconds. Add sugar a little at a time till well incorporated. Add cinnamon then increase speed to medium and blend till fluffy.


To decorate the monkeys frost whole cupcake first. Use two brown M&M's for the eyes and one in the middle and on it's side for the nose. With some brown piping frosting (you can buy it in a ready to pipe package at any store) pipe a half circle for the smile. Use a red M&M on each end of the smile. Use two mini oreos for the ears then use brown sprinkles around the edge for fur.

Christmas Candy

This year for our Christmas goodies I did the same peanut butter white chocolate fudge I did last year. I tried two new recipes though, peppermint truffles and turtles. I wanted to keep everything really simple and quick this year so all these were very easy recipes.




Easy Turtles
20 square pretzels
20 rolos
20 pecan halves

Preheat oven to 300 degrees. Arrange pretzels on cookie sheet and place one rolo on top of each pretzel. Bake in oven for 2-3 minutes (just till soft). Then gently push a pecan half on top of rolo.

I refrigerated these but I liked them better when I left them on the counter and they were soft.


Peppermint Truffles (courtesy of Heidi)
4oz cream cheese
1 t flavoring (I used peppermint this time but you can do others, like coconut, almond, etc.)
1 C melted chocolate chips (I used white)
3 C powdered sugar
1 package almond bark

Mix cream cheese and flavoring till smooth. Then add melted chocolate chips. Add powdered sugar till it reaches cookie dough consistency. I put the mixture in the freezer for about 10 minutes to harden it. Then you scoop the mixture into small balls and place on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper. I put them back in the freezer just for a few minutes while I melted the almond bark. Then dip the balls in the almond bark and set on wax paper to harden. I also sprinkled crushed candy canes while the bark was still wet. You could try different flavors combination too like I did coconut flavoring in chocolate almond bark with coconut on top and those were delicious!

Thanksgiving Pies

Chocolate candy crunch pie (courtesy of Kraft recipes)
2 C cold milk
2 boxes (4oz) chocolate pudding mix
1 Tub cool whip, thawed and divided
2 milk chocolate English toffee candy bars (I just got a bag of heath chips in the baking aisle)
1 Oreo pie crust
1 square semi-sweet baking chocolate, melted (I just used chocolate syrup)

Pour milk into large bowl. Add pudding mixes. Beat until well blended. Gently stir in 1 1/2 C whipped topping. Reserve some candy pieces for topping. Stir remaining candy into pudding mixture. Spoon into crust and top with remaining whipped topping. Sprinkle reserved candy pieces and drizzle with melted chocolate. Serve or refrigerate.

I made this the night before and refrigerated it all night and it still wasn't a very solid consistency but more like firm pudding. I'm guessing it had to do with the whip topping being too soft. I also ended up only using 3/4 of a bag of the heath chips and I was very liberal with the topping. But it was seriously delicious!


Double Layer cheesecake
2 (8oz) packs cream cheese, softened
3/4 C sugar
1 t vanilla
2 eggs
1 graham cracker crust (9 inch)
1/2 C pumpkin puree
1 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t nutmeg
whipped topping

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F (165 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, combine cream cheese, sugar and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Blend in eggs one at a time. Remove 1 cup of batter and spread into bottom of crust; set aside.
3. Add pumpkin, cinnamon and nutmeg to the remaining batter and stir gently until well blended. Carefully spread over the batter in the crust.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until center is almost set. Allow to cool, then refrigerate for 3 hours or overnight. Cover with whipped topping before serving.

You could also add some ground cloves or instead of using pumpkin puree just use pumpkin pie filling since it's already got the spices. I added a whole can of pumpkin because I didn't think the flavor was strong enough but then it wasn't as solid as cheesecake usually is so maybe just more spices, less pumpkin. I drizzled caramel on top and then whip cream. I was thinking next time I would also throw on some pecans or those heath chips. Enjoy!

Two for one!

I've been on a coconut kick lately and I found a recipe I loved for coconut cupcakes but I couldn't decide what kind of frosting would go best on it. So of course that meant I had to try different ones. I didn't get a photo of the first batch I did but they were pina colada cupcakes, coconut with pineapple butter cream frosting. The second batch I did were coconut with chocolate syrup frosting. Both were SO good but I think the chocolate ones were better. Then again, I could eat that chocolate syrup frosting straight and be happy.

Coconut Cupcakes
1 White cake mix
1 1/3 C coconut milk OR whole milk (I didn't have whole the second time so I used skim and that worked fine too)
2 T veg. oil
3 eggs
2 t coconut flavoring (I used 1 T b/c I think the flavoring I got wasn't very potent)

1)Heat oven to 350. Mix everything on low for 30 seconds, scrape down sides and mix on medium for 2 more minutes. Fill liners, bake for 20 minutes till light golden brown on top. Let cool fully before frosting.

Pineapple buttercream
1 stick butter
3 C powdered sugar
2-3 T pineapple juice (or flavoring)

Cream butter and juice then add sugar and mix till smooth

Chocolate Syrup Frosting
1 stick butter
1/2 C unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 C chocolate syrup
3 C powdered sugar
1 T milk
1 t vanilla

Mis butter, cocoa and syrup till blended. Add sugar, milk and vanilla till creamy.

Oh and I sprinkled coconut (flaked sweetened) for garnish

My favorite cookies

Okay I don't have any pictures of these because honestly they never last long enough for me to remember to take pictures. I looked for a long time for a great peanut butter cookie recipe and I finally found this one and it's been my go to cookie recipe for years now. I always end up adding chocolate chips because well, isn't peanut butter always better with some chocolate? I also love this recipe because it's super easy to remember and I can do the whole batch start to finish in probably 15 minutes. Plus these are the kind of cookies that are soft and gooey and stay soft for days. (Not that they'll last that long!)

Peanut Butter chocolate chip cookies
1/2 C butter (1 stick)
1/2 C brown sugar
1/2 C sugar
1/2 C peanut butter (I always use crunchy)
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t vanilla extract
1 egg
1 1/4 C flour
semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Cream butter and peanut butter in mixing bowl. Add brown sugar, sugar, baking soda, baking powder. Mix till combined. Add egg, vanilla, till blended well. Slowly add flour till mixed. Then add as many chocolate chips as your little heart desires. I use semisweet but milk chocolate chips work as well. Bake for 10-12 minutes. If you like yours to stay chewy then pull them out before they get brown all over.