Bootcamp Avocado-But-Still-Chocolate Brownies

We are having a Bootcamp girls get together night tomorrow. It's a pot luck which is fun. It's also like this weird contest women do to see who can make the best dish. Or maybe that's just me. It's a known fact anything with melted cheese will be in the running for at least top three. Meatballs, devilled eggs, and things stuffed with other things are always big hits. Unfortunately my appetizer skills are pretty minimal. I usually bring out a veggie, pita and hummus tray to shut my hungry friends up. Once the wine starts flowing they usually forget all about food anyways!

So my conundrum for pot lucks is what to bring! And the answer I usually select is baked goods. If it's an all girls party I invariably go to brownies. Bit*hes love brownies. (Lol too much? Sorry!)

I have this bad habit of wanting to put healthy things in my baking. It's mostly me trying to make the world a better place and also to try to justify the eating of brownies on a more regular basis. Today it was avocados I needed to stuff in my brownies. Avocados are super creamy and full of healthy days and antioxidants. They aren't just for guacamole, people! Here's how I made my treats...

Bootcamp Avocado-but-still-Chocolate Brownies
Ingredients
1 avocado, mashed
3/4 cup almond milk
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup cocoa powder
1tsp baking powder
1/2 Tsp salt
1 cup Hershey's mini kisses or chocolate chips

1. Preheat Oven to 350. Grease a 9x13 dish.
2. Beat avocado, almond milk and vanilla together until smooth. 
3. Add in dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
4. Add in chocolate chips.
5. Spread batter evenly in pan and bake for 26-30 minutes.

Avocado peanut butter chocolate frosting

Ingredients

1 avocado mashed

1/2 cup all natural peanut butter

2 cups icing sugar

1 Tsp vanilla

1/3 Tsp salt

1. Mix mashed avocado and peanut butter until creamy.
2. Add in icing sugar a little at a time and mix until smooth.
3. Add in vanilla and salt.
4. Frost brownies while they are still warm.
5. Top with chopped Reese peanut butter cups if so desired (who wouldn't desire that?).

Peanut Butter Blossoms Cookie Recipe

I love peanut butter. I love it with chocolate, I love it with banana, I even love it with bacon. I normally have a huge container of PB on hand, but apparently I'd gotten down to the bottom of it and only had PB scraps left in the jar. I didn't realize this until after I'd started getting ready to bake these. Rookie mistake, i know i know. Luckily I had a few nutella samples laying around, which added up to almost the amount of nutty butter I needed! Lucky for me, but unlucky for my cousin Laura who is severely allergic to hazelnuts and whom I tried to feed these to. These cookies are super yummy. Mine spread out a bit, I could've put the dough in the fridge to harden up, but this was my third batch of cookies and I was pooped.

Peanut Butter Blossoms (original recipe here)
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup lard
3/4 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup nutella
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1/4 cup milk
2 tsps vanilla
3 1/2 cups flour
2 tsps baking soda
1 tsp salt
1/2 cup white sugar (for rolling)
1/2 bag of mini Hershey kisses

1. Cream butters and sugar. Then add in wet ingredients a little at a time until smooth.
2. Add in dry ingredients until just combined. Don't over mix.
3. Roll into 3/4 inch balls, then roll in white sugar. If the dough is a bit too soft, throw in the fridge for a bit.
4. Bake in 375 degree oven for 10 to 12 minutes.
5. When the cookies come out, press a chocolate kiss in the middle of each one.

 

Chocolate Fig Cake with Chocolate Glaze

Fig fig fig. What a fun word. Oh what, you don't like it? Fig off then!

If dried figs are new to you, I can tell you that they are sweet and very seedy. They aren't my favorite dried fruit, but I have a Costco-sized bag of them that need to get used, so. I decided they would go fantastic with chocolate, because, well, everything goes with chocolate! I found a recipe here that looked really great, and with a few minor adjustments they turned out lovely.

One warning though, this cake is a million times better the next day. The flavors get a chance to meld together and the cake gets really fudgey.

Chocolate Fig Cake
2 cups flour
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup cocoa
10 dried figs (finely chopped)
1/2 cup oil
1/2 cup apple sauce
2 eggs
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tbsp vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1. Preheat over to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two round cake pans. 
2. Finely chop your figs and pour 1 cup of boiling water over them. Let them sit for 30 minutes. I mashed mine a bit with a fork. You could probably even puree them to make sure they are lump free.
3. Next, sift your dry ingredients together. Then mix in your wet, followed by the figs and water mixture. Pour into your cake pans and pop into oven for about 30 minutes.

Chocolate Glaze
2 cups chocolate chips
1/2 cup margarine

1. Microwave chocolate chips and margarine together and stir until smooth.
2. When your cakes are cooled, top with chocolate glaze. You can stack them or keep as individual cakes.

Homemade Potato Skins

Cheese, bacon, potato. What's not to love? Throw some green onions and a dollop of sour cream and you've got yourself a well rounded meal. Forget about the calories and just eat yourself happy!

I decided to make a double batch of potato skins because I had two dinner parties last weekend. Let me tell you, they got scarfed down in rapid succession. If I concentrate really hard I can still taste the cheesy bacony goodness.

I really don't even think this requires a recipe.. But here's a willy nilly instruction set...

Bake some russet potatoes and let them cool. Cut in half lengthwise and scoop out the middles, leaving about a 1/4 inch of potato. If you like them skinnier, scrape out more potato. Keep the skins in the fridge until you are ready to use them. If you want to make them ahead, pop them in the freezer in ziplock bags.

Preheat your oven to 400. Line a pan with tinfoil. Place the potatoes upside down, so that the skins are face up. Brush them with olive oil and sprinkle with coarse salt and pepper. Bake for about ten minutes until they are quite firm.

Take them out and flip them akin side down and sprinkle your favourite cheese in each one. Don't be skimpy, there is no such thing as too much cheese! FYI: I used a tex mex mix. Next sprinkle them with bacon. It's obviously best if you fry the bacon and crumble it up, but pre-made bacon bits will do the trick.

Put it all back in the oven for ten minutes or until the cheese is bubbly. Sprinkle them with chopped green onions and serve with sour cream or greek yogurt!

Fro Yo.

FroYo aka frozen yogurt, is one of my favorite treats. Growing up, my nanny Louisa, worked at Yogen Fruz, so we would often get spoiled with lots of delicious treats. Ever since I can remember, my go-to flavour has been berry. For the longest time I wouldn't pick the mixed berry option because I hated blueberries. I would order a mix of strawberry, blackberry and raspberry. It would always turn out a beautiful pinky purple colour, which I'm pretty sure makes it taste better. These days, it turns out that I actually love blueberries, so that problem is resolved and I now order mix berry in the interest of brevity.

This week I happened to have a full container of plain yogurt sitting around and tons of berries in my freezer. Jess was coming over for dinner, so I decided to make a batch of FroYo for her... and me... mostly me, actually!

The recipe is as follows - grab a container of yogurt, a whole bunch of berries and blend it all together a little at a time. I added some splenda to sweeten it, as the yogurt I used is really quite sour. Speaking of the yogurt I used, check it out below... it's Halal brand, I bought it on sale! Most of the writing on the package is not English, which was tricky but it was cheap, who was I to argue?

Once you have everything all blended and you've tasted 30 or so spoonfuls (for quality control) put the froyo in an air tight container and hide it in the freezer away from anyone who might be looking for it. Or pour it into a popsicle mold like I did, and enjoy a frozen treat on a stick... becuase everything tastes better on a stick!



 



Marbled Vanilla & Chocolate Cupcakes

A couple of birthdays crept up on me this week, of which I hadn't planned any baked goods for. I wasn't sure if the birthday girls were chocolate lovers or vanilla. My struggle with vanilla cake persists, but I refuse to give up so I decided to mask my vanilla cake shortcomings with a swirl of chocolate.

Following Easter holidays, I had quite a bit of chocolate lying around, including a giant Kinder Surprise and a solid milk chocolate Easter bunny. I decided to re-purpose a bit of both, becuase I'm clever like that. I melted the bunny down and added a bit of butter and icing sugar, which resulted in a delicious ganache-like frosting. However, within two minutes it had hardened back into a solid. Lucky for my cupcakes, I'm not that easily detered!

I put a dollop of rock hard chocolate frosting on each cupcake when they came out of the oven and let the cupcake melt the frosting into a glaze. Then I plopped a piece of broken Kinder Surprise on top. They look darling.

Marbled Cupcakes with Easter Bunny Glaze

3/4 cup butter
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsps baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsps cocoa powder

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Put liners in muffin tin.

Cream softened butter with sugar until light and fully. Add eggs one at a time (it's best if they are room temperature) and beat until smooth. Add milk and vanilla a little at a time, until the batter is fully incorporated. Mix in flour, baking powder and salt - one third at a time. Do not over mix.

In a separate bowl, take a cup of the batter and mix with cocoa powder.

Drop a spoonful of vanilla batter into each tin and top with a bit of chocoalte. Use a toothpick or knife to swirl the two batters together.

Bake for 20 minutes. Top with chocolate glaze as soon as the cupcakes come out of the oven. Use a knife to spread the frosting evenly as it melts. Top with a chunk of kinder surprise, or other Easter treat.

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins with Lemon Glaze

I've been having a rough week and have been working on shaking it off. I knew that baking something would make me feel better, and boy was I right. These little lemon poppy seed squares are moist, tender, tart and delicious. I ate one fresh out of the oven and almost decided to keep them all for myself. ALMOST. I then talked some sense into my self and divied them up between Work, Neighbours and Boyfriend. Behold:

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins with Lemon Glaze

Mix your dry together:

1 cup all purpose flour

1 cup whole wheat flour

3/4 cup white sugar

1/4 cup poppy seeds

2 tsps baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

zest of two lemons

dash of cinnamon

Mix your wet together:

2 eggs

3/4 cup greek yogurt

1/3 cup apple sauce

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1/4 cup lemon juice

1/2 tsp lemon extract

Then mix the wet and dry together until combined. Don't over mix or you will ruin everything.

Preheat oven to 375. Grease muffin tins. Bake muffins for 12 minutes or until they are lightly browned and spring back when you touch one. Use a toothpick to prick holes in the top of each mufin for the glaze to soak into.

Lemony Glaze

Juice of two lemons

1 cup of icing sugar

Mix the lemon juice and icing sugar together until smooth. Drizzle over the muffins when they have cooled. Or do it when they come hot out of the oven like i did and watch as your glaze runs right off the muffins and onto the counter.

that is all. easy peasy lemon squeezy! Behold:

Commissioned Baker

Laura From Work (LFW) agreed to cater a wedding for a friend of hers and asked if I would help with the baking. How could I say no? I actually, physically couldn't. Perhaps one day I will grow a back bone and learn to turn things down, but these days I'm a Yes girl. Unless it's in relation to eating Fish, then I can No the crap out of it.

After this adventure I realized that baking as work and baking for fun are two totally different things. When I bake for fun, I can mess around with the ingredients, let cat hair get in the goods and lick the spatula whenever I please. Work baking, not so much. Although I MIGHT have accidentally licked the spatula once or twice... might have! That is in no way a confession. I am a weak person. who can say no to spatulas covered in chocolate? If I ever meet that person i might light them on fire to make sure they aren't a witch, or perhaps stab them with a stake to make sure they aren't a vampire. No real, good human being in my association says no to chocolate. At this point, if you hate me because YOU don't like chocolate, you can leave. Go. go right now. check yourself into a mental health facility and figure your sh*t out. Then go eat a chunky KitKat bar and enjoy life. *rant over*

My baking assignment was this: 3 key lime pies, 3 batches of mini 2 heart cheesecakes (new york style) and 2 double layer chocolate cakes with butter cream icing.

The key lime pies turned out super amazingly delicious. I actually followed them up with a batch of mini key lime cheesecakes, topped with a key lime reduction sauce, but i still had more limes left so i made a batch of shortbread lime bars. This, of course, was after some limes had been appropriated as beer limes.

I made a double batch of the chocolate cake recipe and the first batch of cakes stuck to the pan which made them not usable. Apparently reading the directions helped. Step 1, line pan with waxed paper. Apparently greasing and flouring the pan is not sufficient. Oh well, those cakes are in my freezer and will be turned into cake balls at some later date - stay tuned. The other batches of cakes came perfectly.

Third- mini cheesecakes. 72 of them. that's 6 cupcake pans. LFW gave me 2 to use, I own 1 (which is blasphemous and which I will rectify soon by borrowing one of mommy's), and I broke into Cam's apartment and stole two more. Which is 5. So I made a TRIPLE batch of cheesecake batter, which is like 16 bars of cream cheese and a kajillion eggs and three tons of sugar. Deliciousness. Andddd time consuming. I had to pre-bake the mini crusts and let them cool, and fill each cup with filling and then put two dots of raspberry coulis onto each one and drag a toothpick through to make it look like 2 hearts, then i had to bake them in water baths and then chill them. A project and a half. They didn't even turn out that cute. Delicious yes, cute meh.

I made some bucks doing it and it was a neat project to undertake, so I guess it was worth it. My first commissioned baking assignment, and perhaps my last. Here are some pictures for your eyes to feast on:

Cinnamon Buns

Ever have a block of cream cheese burning a hole in your refrigerator? Wait a minute...I think "burning a hole" wasn't an apt phrase for the topic. Re-write.

Ever have a block of cream cheese screaming at you from the fridge USE ME! USE ME!? Last week I sure did! I pretty much only use cream cheese for one thing: frosting. It is the gravy of the baked goods realm. You can smother cream cheese frosting on anything and it will be delicious. Guarencheesed.

Cream cheese doesn't usually last long in my fridge before I scheme up an idea to use it. My latest baking adventure: cinnamon buns.

I really can't believe I've made it 25.5 years without attempting these. Its crossed my mind a million or so times, but I was always leery as I am super set against using yeast in baking. Too tricky for this girl.

But guess what! Cinnamon buns do not need to be made with yeast in order to be effectively delicious. A quick google search brought forth a great recipe off a foodie blog called IowaGirlEats. No yeast, basic ingredients and straight-forward, non fussy directions.

I doubled the batch with unusually great forethought and boy am I glad I did. The smell in my condo was unparalleled. They looked incredible. It took all my willpower to wait 2 whole days to eat one as they were made especially for our long weekend trip to Osoyoos. They were well received by the group.

Pretty sure these would give Cinnabon a run for their money. Also pretty sure I will get diabetes in short order if I keep making (and over eating) sugar laden treats like this.

Feast your eyes: 

 

smartie (pants) cookies

With my Halloween candy loot I decided to bake some cookies. I had to open 20 stupid small boxes of smarties to get enough for the recipe which was rather annoying. One box did manage to escape so I ate it after I was done with the cookies. No mercy. Smarties are delicious. I am not usually a fan of putting candy in cookies, but hey what's a girl to do with a drawer full of Halloween candy and two hours of free time?

Spookies!

6:06 AM Sunday morning, pouring rain. Sounds perfect for a sleep in, right? Wrong! Time for breakfast and baking. It's sugar cookie Sunday!

Once I put something on my baking to do list it haunts me and yells at me in my brain until I make it. Some items are on my To Do-one day in the future if I happen to have all the ingredients and a special occasion to fulfill-List and others are on my To Do-as soon as humanly possible as my brain will give me no rest until said recipe adventure has been tested-List. Trust me when I say it's a debilitating character trait. It's 6:30 on Sunday morning and I'm elbow deep in sugar cookies. I'm also face masking. Lucky I don't have a roommate, they would hate me. A white-clay faced, sweat panted baking monster who listens to Norah Jones on repeat for hours on end at the crack of dawn. I'd probably hate them for the very reason that they are not OK with that.

The SPOOKY cookie cutters that sara got me for my birthday after finding out the only shape i had was a circle. For a girl that bakes a lot i have an embarrassingly pitiful collection of cookie cutters. I decided the cookies, being Halloween themed should be called SPOOKIES. Spooky cookies. Get it? I used the sugar cookie recipe off the back of the Wiltons cookie cutter packaging. IMHO (that's geek speak for 'in my humble opinion') any brand recipes result in the best baked goods. Think Rice Krispie squares and Kraft peanut butter cookies, both recipes right off the package make delicious treats. I whipped up a batch and went to the gym then came home and decorated them. Viola! Halloweenified. Spooky right? Distributing to any suckers that'll take em.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN! May you rot your teeth with sweets and get your pants scared off you by a horror movie or two.