Desserts

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Gritty and dirty meet tropical something

All this week we're going to be sampling a great collection of gummy treats, brought to us from our good friends at sugarfina.com. They told us that they have one of the most original collections of gummy treats in the world, we told them to prove it, they did. So sit back, and enjoy some fun gummy reviews. Our first review might seem like a basic gummy bear review, but it's not. Why not mix your favorite drink with your favorite gummy, what could possibly go wrong.Click here to read our Champagne gummy bear review.CC

What do you get when you mix Chex Mix and cupcakes? The perfect sweet and salty dessert! Cupcake Project developed this recipe that you can use nearly any type of Chex Mix for! She does mention to keep things balanced, make sure you use a frosting close to your Chex Mix of choice to play up the flavors. You can even get the Chex Mix flavor in each cupcake by substituting the crushed snack mix for some of the flour in the recipe. Check out the recipe here!

The times when I’m stoked about a salad are few and far between. This is one of them! Can I say stoked? I’ve probably used the word thrice in my life, the third being above. I’m trying it out for size. This salad… ugh. So good. I’ve rambled about my love for chopped salads for years on this little internet page. I don’t know what it is. The crunch of vegetables turns me off so maybe it’s just that everything is smaller and tiny and can be picked up in one spoon? I think what it really is though.. is that I can use tortilla chips to eat this salad. Now THAT is where it’s at. I’m so into it. The salad has so many of my favorite flavors going on – bacon, feta, avocado, corn – that I kept the dressing simple: just some olive oil and lime juice. Lots of salt and pepper too, but other than that, just pure flavor. Even a little arugula mixed in with my beloved butter lettuce for something extra. On top of needing the majority of my salads in chopped form, I sure as heck need as much texture (like, non-vegetable texture) that I can get. Enter bacon. And corn. And if you’re feeling frisky… maybe crumble some of those tortilla chips on top. Uh huh. Do it. BLT Chopped Salad with Corn, Feta + Avocado Yield: serves 2 Total Time: 25 minutes Ingredients: 2 cups butter lettuce, chopped 2 cups fresh arugula, chopped 1 pint grape tomatos, quartered 4 slices thick-cut bacon, fried and crumbled 1 cup sweet corn 1 avocado, chopped 4 ounces feta, crumbled 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil 1 lime, juiced 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon pepper Directions: As a note, to chop my lettuce I like to lay it out on a big cutting board and just continuously run my knife through it (in all different directions) until it's chopped as much as I like. In a large bowl, combine lettuce, arugula, tomatoes, corn and avocado. Add in salt, pepper, olive oil and lime juice then toss well to coat. Fold in bacon and feta then divide evenly amount 2 plates. Serve! Take that Monday. ©2012 How Sweet It Is

Ingredients (to make 4 Chocolate Mille Feuille) 12 square wonton wrappers 50g butter, melted 3 tbsp icing sugar 450ml cream 100g drinking chocolate powder 250g raspberries Chocolate Sauce Ingredients 100g dark chocolate, broken into pieces 150ml cream 2 tbs brown sugar 1 tsp vanilla extract Method To make the chocolate sauce… Place chocolate, cream, sugar and vanilla in a small saucepan. Stir over low heat until chocolate melts. Bring to a simmer. Simmer for 8-10 minutes or until it reduces and thickens. Pour into a heatproof jug and set aside. Preheat oven to 180°C (fan-forced 160°C). Place the wontons on two baking trays lined with non-stick baking paper. Brush the wontons with butter and sprinkle with icing sugar. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until golden. Allow to cool on trays. Using an electric mixer beat the cream and drinking chocolate until stiff peaks form. Set aside. Place a wonton onto serving plate. Spoon some of the chocolate cream on to the wonton and top with raspberries and then drizzle with chocolate sauce. Place another wonton on top and repeat two more times. Repeat process to create the other three mille feuille. Drizzle a generous amount of chocolate sauce over the top of each and enjoy! Tweet This The post Cheat’s Chocolate Mille Feuille appeared first on Chocablog.

Hello, sweet ones! Well, the first leg of my second book tour for The Secret Lives of Baked Goods: Sweet Stories & Recipes for America's Favorite Desserts, is now complete (remaining dates here! And a contest to win a copy HERE!). And oh, has it ever been sweet! Here's a mini review of who I saw, what I ate, and what magical things happened. SEATTLE: I arrived in Seattle on the day my book was officially released, May 7th. Woohoo! I basically went straight to the reading venue, which was the University Bookstore. The event was co-hosted by the Girl Scouts of Western Washington, who brought cookies and offered a sweet discount on the book for all girl scouts (including former girl scouts!). Why Girl Scouts? Well, the book tells the story of the cookies! It was a fun event--to say the least! The next morning...I woke up hungry. I went to the Wandering Goose Cafe, new since I left Seattle. Man, was this place wonderful. They prominently feature biscuits, one of my favorite foodstuffs. I got a biscuit, of course, and a few other items. The standout on this visit? The "Charlie Brown" cookie, a deep, dark chocolate cookie studded with peanut butter chips. Oh yum. I recorded a radio program next, with Rachel Belle. She is so cool! Next, I had an event at Book Larder where I demo'ed Better Than Sex Cake (it's in the book!). This was an awesome time. I saw many cake celebrities. One of the attendees? Dani of High 5 Pie. And she brought me some treats! Related: The next A.M., I started out with a cherry almond pie from High 5 Pie. and then I baked some Katharine Hepburn brownies (recipe's in the book) for an upcoming TV appearance in Portland. And then I headed to Portland! Even though it's kind of a silly flight because the security line is usually longer than the flight...I flew. With the brownies. Here are the brownies on my lap. They were so cradled and loved. PORTLAND: Once I arrived, I enjoyed some non-sweet food and hung out with my fella. Then, in the morning, I was on TV. Before my appearance, in the Green Room, I reviewed my book with Haley, the publicity all-star for my book. Then, I was on TV! You can watch the segment here. And here's a little behind the scenes look at the script. Look, here I am acting casual (not) in front of the tv station! Next was breakfast at Tasty N Sons (actually, if you want to get technical, Tasty N Alder). I got some prunes that were prepared with cheese. I know this doesn't sound like a glamorous food, but WOW! were they good! The prunes were nice and sweet but the cheese gave them a little savory saltiness. Speaking of salt...it was about time for a visit to the deservedly famous Salt and Straw! Have I mentioned they sell my artwork there? Now, it is a true fact that my artwork looks better when you gaze at it with a hefty scoop of Almond Brittle with Salted Ganache ice cream. Yes indeed. But you know, the world is not so bad with a milkshake, either, so we picked up one of those, too. In chocolate. Of course, nothing can warm you up for a doughnut snack better than ice cream, so we started heading on over to Tonalli's Donuts. But--uh oh--on the way we were distracted by Pine State Biscuits! We kept on walking, and I found a heart. This is a great opportunity to show you how cute the shoes are that I was wearing. Finally, to Tonalli's! Donut or Doughnut? Actually, the sign says both. Confusion aside, how could anything ever go wrong in a place like this? We got an old fashioned blueberry glazed, and a plain old fashioned. Very good stuff. Especially the blueberry. Not completely because of the flavor, but largely because of texture. The glaze kept it somewhat soft, whereas with the unglazed one, it got kind of crispy. Still very good, though. Later that evening, we had to try Ruby Jewel, which was near the hotel. I got one of their famous ice cream sandwiches with bourbon butter pecan ice cream between chocolate chip cookies. Trust me, there is nothing wrong with th

Kcal 190 Fat 9.0g (per bag) We've had some fantastic new products developed this year here in the UK confectionery market - Cadbury Dairy Milk Creations, Unilever's ice cream chocolates, the Kit Kat Chunky competition 2013 and the likes of Hotel Chocolat up to their usual tricks with their seasonal lines. What is the response from Mars UK? These all NEW Mars Mix would seem to be the answer. We found this 40.0g bag of Mars Mix sitting on shelf in Tesco priced at £0.60. For a bag smaller than your average chocolate bar we weren't impressed with the price, but in the name of covering everything for you guys we purchased a few bags to take back to the office. Aesthetically the product didn't look a all differentiated from any standard Mars branded product, a black, plastic packet material with red and gold lettering - we didn't expect anything different. Described on pack as ' 'milk chocolate with assorted centres' we were wondering how these were going to differ from the Mars Planets (Review from 2008 - HERE) that have been on the UK market for what seems like forever now. Opening the packet we greeted with small sized milk chocolate covered ball pieces that carried the usual sweet milk chocolate aromas of your everyday Mars bar. Taking handfuls at a time we carried out our taste test and much to our delight we were greeted with some very familiar sweet milk chocolate, buttery caramel and malty nougat flavours - Yummy!! To say we didn't enjoy these would be a lie ... we mostly did! Overall these Mars Mix were great - thumbs up for the taste test!! BUT ... and yes of course there is BUT .... (get ready for the rant...) ... how on earth can Mars substantiate that these are by any means NEW!? They've simply taken out the crispy pieces from the Mars Planets bags ... replaced the word 'Planets' with 'Mix' and slapped on a NEW sticker to entice people in. Thats not impressive - thats lazy innovation!! If someone hands you a bag of these of these don't despair - enjoy them by all means! Just dont go out your way to buy them if you want something different from the norm. A highly disappointing response to a market that is rife with some great new products. 7.1 out of 10

Chocolate Chip Confetti Cookies! Get in my mouth. Right now. It’s cookie time! Okay, anytime is cookie time in my book. How about you? I made these chocolate chip cookies using a few extras that I had on my counter. Leftover pecans from last weekend’s Hummingbird Cake that I chopped up. Pastel M&M’s leftover from Easter. These were hiding under a pile of different color candy melts I had on the counter or else they would have already been gone by now. E. Guittard semi-sweet chocolate wafers. I still had a box from the last time I made Jacques Torres’ Chocolate Chip Cookies. And now I don’t think I can make chocolate chip cookies with little baby morsels ever again. Okay, that’s not true. But seriously, try making chocolate chip cookies with these chocolate baking discs sometime. Holy yum. I picked mine up at Williams-Sonoma. Mix up the dough and add in the pecans. That is if you want. You can also leave them out. Add in some M&M’s. Any color combo you like. And stir in the chocolate. Dough it! Scoop them and bake them right up. Or coat the tops in confetti sprinkles for a little more fun. Chocolate Chip Confetti Cookies. It’s like a party in every bite. Chocolate Chip Confetti Cookies Servings: 2 dozen cookies Print recipe Ingredients 2 3/4 cup all purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 3/4 teaspoon salt 1 cup unsalted butter, softened 3/4 cup sugar 1 cup packed light brown sugar 2 teaspoons vanilla 2 eggs 3/4 cup pecans, finely chopped 1 1/2 cups M&M's 2 cups semisweet chocolate wafers – or morsels : ) Confetti sprinkles Sea salt Instructions Sift together flour, soda and salt with a wire whisk and set aside. In a mixer, cream butter and sugars together for about two minutes until light and fluffy. Add eggs and vanilla and mix until combined. On low, add flour mixture and mix until just combined. Stir in chopped pecans, M&M's and chocolate wafers. Chill dough for about 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line baking sheet with parchment paper. Scoop chilled dough with a 2-inch scoop. Gently press tops in a small dish of confetti sprinkles and place 2 inches apart on cookie sheet. Note: If using regular M&M's you can top with primary color confetti sprinkles to match. Sprinkle tops with sea salt if desired. Bake for about 16 minutes or until lightly brown. If using a smaller scoop, then bake for about 12-14 minutes. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool and repeat with remaining cookie dough. Enjoy warm with a big glass of milk. Source: Bakerella.com

[New for 2013] So, do you guys watch the celebrity apprentice? I remember the original season of the apprentice that actually use to teach us about teamwork, marketing, and business.... and I will admit to watching a large part of season 12, but overall I forget about it but I might watch it tonight.... Apparently the season is ending with an ice cream showdown, how cool is that? Which ever