Frosted Cake Brownies

I grew up making these brownies with my mom and have no idea where the recipe came from. I LOVE chewy brownies, but these are not of the chewy variety. They are delicious, cake-like and perfect with a glass of milk.
What you need:
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 cup (1 cube) margarine or butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
vanilla
3/4 cup flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
dash salt
nuts (if desired)

Set oven to 350 degrees.

Mix together butter and sugar. Mix in eggs, then a splash of vanilla. Stir in Flour, baking powder and salt. Finally, mix in cocoa powder, then nuts if desired (may add these on top of icing instead).
Bake in greased 8X8 pan at 350 for 20 minutes.
Cool, then ice.

Icing:
powdered sugar (I use about 1/2 box)
cocoa powder (a few spoonfuls)
Water
Add water to get just to a pouring consistency. Pour over cooled brownies and let set. Cut and enjoy!
Cover any leftover brownies.

Chocolate Mints (mint patties)

I haven't made these in a few years, so I thought I'd make them this year. SO yummy.

Filling:
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup light corn syrup
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp mint flavoring
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Mix all together. Form little patties (I make them about 1 inch size) and place on wax paper. I recommend refrigerating them for a bit. It will make it easier to cover them with chocolate.

Topping:
1 pkg choco chips (I use semi-sweet. Milk or dark would be good too)
1/3 bar of paraffin wax

Melt chocolate chips and wax in double boiler (I just do it directly over the stove on REALLY low heat and stir constantly so it doesn't burn).
Dip each mint and let cool/harden.
You can cheat and just pour the chocolate over each mint, but it won't cover the bottom that way and it will not be as pretty.

Enjoy.

Easy Roll Sugar Cookies

It's christmas time!! Time to start making all of those christmas candies and cookies!! I have tried a LOT of sugar cookie recipes and have finally found my favorite one! This one is quick and easy and you don't have to refrigerate the dough! I always hated that part. And cold dough is not easy to work with.

1 cup butter (soften to room temp)
1 cup sugar
2 egg yolks
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp salt
3 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder

Mix all ingredients together (I usually only need to use about 2 1/2 cups flour, not the full 3). Roll to 1/8 inch thickness.
I have learned to put parchment paper down, put a ball of dough on it, then put a piece of saran wrap on top of that. No more flour mess on the counter and dough sticking to the rolling pin. If only my mom knew this trick, we probably would've made sugar cookies a lot more (and we already made them quite a bit, we just had a HUGE mess to clean up!).
Cut out the shapes you want (after you remove the saran wrap), then remove the dough from between your cookie shapes. Then, slide the parchment paper onto a cookie sheet.
Bake for 8-10 minutes.
Cool, then frost.

We'll be frosting ours in the morning and I will share a frosting recipe and some pictures!

Cherry Dump Cobbler

So I was craving cherry cobbler one day, so I bought a can of cherry pie filling. It had been sitting in my pantry for a few weeks, so I finally searched out a recipe and made one. I like cobbler to be a little sweeter and crumbly-er, but this one was still good, just a little more cake-like.

1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup milk
32 oz cherry pie filling
1/2 cup butter

Heat oven to 350 degrees.
Melt butter in 13X9 inch pan.
Mix flour, baking powder, salt, milk and sugar and pour into pan (this was a lot more watery than I expected it to be).
Add cherry pie filling to batter and spread evenly.
Bake 45 min to an hour.
Batter will form a crust on top.

YUM! I ate it directly from the pan.
My cherry pie filling was only 21 oz, so I used 2/3 of everything to make the recipe fit. I also used a 9X9 inch square pan.
Enjoy!