Friday Favorites for the Holidays (1st Edition)

Hi friends!

It's been quite some time since I posted my Friday Favorites on the blog. In fact, it's been just over two months since I presented you with Friday Favorites. Whoops! I just felt like I needed a break from it for a bit. But, with the holiday season upon us, I thought it might be fun to bring you some ideas for holiday treats over the next few weeks!

What prompted me to bring you holiday editions of Friday Favorites was a blog post by the Cookin' Canuck that I saw today. This recipe for chocolate covered marshmallow pops needed to be shared with others! It just looks like such a fun, easy homemade goodie for the holidays - one that both kids and adults can enjoy eating and creating!

(photo from Cookin' Canuck)

And I love the three different ideas for flavors - candy cane, heath bar, and coconut. They'd all be great for the holiday season but the candy cane idea is especially festive! You could easily do others too - maybe colored sprinkles or chopped nuts?

Another great holiday recipe is this one for peppermint snickerdoodles that I saw a couple weeks ago on Taste and Tell. I saved it to one of my boards on Pinterest so that I wouldn't forget it!

(photo from Taste and Tell)

Don't those look sooo good? I've made variations on snickerdoodles before (maple, pumpkin) but I don't know if I would have thought to make peppermint ones!!! Brilliant! Be sure to head on over to Taste and Tell to check out the ingredient list too. There are only 5 items required to make these delicious little gems!

Finally, brought to you by the always creative Real Simple, here are two fun ideas for dispensing ribbon (if you are one of those people who loves ribbon for gift wrapping or crafts!!).

Use a paper towel holder:

Use a wire hanger:

I just love simple yet useful ideas like this, don't you?!?

Happy holiday season, all. :) I hope to have more fun, easy, festive ideas and recipes for you over the course of the next few weeks!

Easy S'mores Bark

Hello hello! If you read my most recent Friday Favorites post that was a tribute to s'mores, you know that I had another s'mores recipe waiting in the wings, eagerly wanting to be shared with you...  Well, here it is! This is a fabulous, easy recipe that I promise you, you will love!

I made this for my frisbee teammate Madeleine's birthday last week. Last year for the team, I had made my s'mores cookies, and Madeleine really liked these cookies. So when deciding what to make for her birthday this year, I had the s'mores theme at the forefront of my mind. I had seen this s'mores bark over on Foodbuzz in the Daily Top 9 a few weeks ago, and this seemed to be the perfect occasion to try it out! The recipe is really quite simple. It would be a great one for kids to help make! It's from the blog, Amy's Cooking Adventures.

Ingredients:

-8 graham crackers, broken into quarters

-12 oz. semi-sweet chocolate (I used chocolate chips, but you could use the 1 oz. squares of chocolate too)

-2 cups mini marshmallows

-1 Hershey bar (1.55 oz.), broken into 12 pieces

Instructions:

Line a baking sheet with aluminum foil (must be foil - not wax paper or anything else!). Arrange all but two graham cracker quarters in a rectangle on the baking sheet. Melt the chocolate however you'd like (I microwaved my chips - you could use a double boiler too). After the chocolate is melted and smooth, spread it over the graham crackers, covering them completely and smoothing it with a spatula. If the chocolate goes over the edges or between the crackers a bit, no big deal! 

Next, quickly sprinkle the marshmallows over the chocolate. Put the tray in the fridge for 10 minutes or so to let the chocolate harden a little bit. Meanwhile, turn on the broiler in your oven. Remove the tray from the fridge and place it under the broiler. Leave the oven door open slightly the entire time it is cooking so that you can check on the roasty-toastyness (yes, that's a real term) of the marshmallows. They will roast quickly!! It will only need to broil for 1 or 2 minutes, most likely. When the marshmallows are lightly browned, remove the tray from the oven and quickly place the pieces of the Hershey bar into the marshmallows and chocolate. Crumble the remaining two quarters of graham crackers over top as well.

Return the tray to the fridge for an hour, or until the chocolate is hardened. Break the bark into pieces of your desired size with your hands. The pieces I broke off were uneven, which was totally okay. It was more fun that way actually! Refrigerate until ready to serve.

This was a big hit with our frisbee team! We gobbled up the s'mores bark in no time at all. I forgot to take my own pictures of the broken bark pieces, but a teammate snagged this pic:

A delicious, quick treat!

Enjoy your weekend, friends!

Chocolate Chip Sandwich Cookies with Marshmallow Creme Filling

Sometimes you just need a classic, homemade, delicious chocolate chip cookie. But sometimes you need more. Like a chocolate chip sandwich cookie with marshmallow creme filling. ;-)

This recipe is an old favorite for me...like as old as when I was first beginning to love to bake. My sister and I grew up baking in the kitchen with my mom very often, and eventually we started baking on our own (I don't remember what ages we were though!). But I do remember that this chocolate chip cookie with marshmallow creme filling recipe was one that we made growing up. So needless to say, it brings back great memories. :) The recipe is from the cookbook pictured below. I "stole" the book from my mom...shhhh, don't tell!

For the chocolate chip cookies in this recipe, you can use whatever recipe you'd prefer - your family's favorite, the traditional Toll House recipe, or whatever! This particular time around I used my boyfriend's mother's recipe, which you can read about here if you'd like. 

Marshmallow Creme Filling Ingredients:

-1 cup marshmallow creme (not fluff!)

-1/2 cup butter, softened

-1 and 2/3 cup powdered sugar

-1 tsp. vanilla extract

Mix the marshmallow creme and butter with an electric mixer in a medium bowl. Add the powdered sugar and vanilla, beating until smooth. 

To prepare the sandwich cookies, for each sandwich, choose two cookies that are roughly the same size.

 Spread some filling on the bottom cookie (I would estimate that I spread almost a tablespoon's worth of filling for each sandwich).

Put your second cookie on top of the filling, and voila, you have yourself an amazingly tasty chocolate chip sandwich cookie! It's best to put the sandwich cookies in the fridge so that the filling will set. I also stored my sandwich cookies in the fridge until serving them. They actually taste better cold, I think! Deeelicious.

 So simple and so good. I really don't have much more to say about these cookies. Bottom line = you gotta try 'em. :)

Surprise Cookies

Hi friends! Can you believe it's the LAST full week of May?! It's a bit difficult for me to believe... June is almost upon us!!! As I like to say, wowzers. ;-)

Anyway, enough babbling about how time flies. Onto more important matters like delicious, soft chocolate cookies topped with a toasty marshmallow and to-die-for chocolate frosting...

About a week ago, I baked a batch of these "surprise" cookies with my landlord's daughter (who is in 4th grade and is developing a love for baking! :)). Lilia and I had so much fun making these cookies together. She chose the recipe from my Martha Stewart Cookies book, and my, what a great choice it was!

Ingredients:

For the cookies:

-1 and 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

-3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch-process)

-1/2 tsp. baking soda

-1/2 tsp. salt

-1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature

-1 cup granulated sugar

-1 large egg

-1/2 cup whole milk

-1 tsp. vanilla extract

-about 15 large marshmallows, halved crosswise

For the frosting:

-3 cups confectioners' sugar

-6 Tbsp. unsalted butter, room temperature

-1/4 cup plus 1 and 1/2 tsp. unsweetened cocoa powder (not Dutch-process)

-1/4 cup plus 2 Tbsp. whole milk

-3/4 tsp. vanilla extract

Instructions:

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt into a bowl (we forgot to sift the dry ingredients, and the cookies turned out just fine!). Put the butter and sugar into the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Reduce speed to medium-low; mix in egg, milk, and vanilla. Mix in flour mixture, 1/2 cup at a time, until combined. Prepare the marshmallows by cutting them each in half.

Drop cookie dough by tablespoonfuls onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper, spacing them 2 inches apart. Bake, until slightly firm, about 8 to 10 minutes. The cookies will look slightly "crackled" when they're done. Immediately after removing them from the oven, press a marshmallow half on top of each cookie (tip - press the sticky half of the marshmallow down onto the cookie! it'll nicely stick on the cookie that way). Bake again until the marshmallows begin to melt, about 2 minutes more. Remove from cookie sheets, and let cool completely on wire racks.

Make the frosting; put confectioners' sugar in a medium bowl. Melt butter with the cocoa powder in a saucepan over medium-low heat, stirring occasionally. Add butter mixture to the confectioners' sugar. Whisk in the milk and vanilla. Spread about 1 tablespoon of frosting on top of each cookie to cover the marshmallow. Let stand until the frosting's set.

I stored my cookies in the fridge, but the cookbook says you can store them in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 2 days.

Here are the cookies right after they were removed from the oven and the marshmallows were slightly toasted. Mmmm.

The marshmallows quickly deflated though as they cooled...

But not to worry, they were then topped with a decadent chocolate frosting.

Lilia and I each enjoyed a cookie as a reward for our hard work. :)

Are you drooling yet?

I gave a couple cookies to Mike too, and he said he enjoyed one of them after warming it up in the microwave a bit to make it all ooey and gooey. Great idea!

I'm always sad when I'm down to my last bite of a tasty treat. :(  

Guess I'll just have to make another batch!