The Mommy and the Ivy

Showing posts with label Sweets. Show all posts

Summer may be drawing to a close (not that you'd know it by the temps here lately) but there's still time left to get Palisade Peaches and go to town on their drippy, sweet, goodness.

Now, these orange beauties are so yummy eaten as is, but I always buy more than I can get through. Pie is too much work in the summertime...but it's more humble sister, the gallette, I can pull off.

This recipe is honestly, so easy! Start with your favorite pie crust (and store bought is totally fine!), slice peaches up nice and thin and toss with some brown sugar and corn starch. Pile it all up pretty, or not, in the center of your pie crust, drizzle honey on your peaches, fold your pie crust edges over the peaches and add a quick egg wash and cinnamon sugar then bake.

I think ice cream is a must, but you can top it with whipped cream too. However you like it, make it soon, okay? Summer wont last forever!

Palisade Peach Gallette

Ingredients

1 premade pie crust (home made or store bought)

5 medium palisade peaches

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp corn starch

1/2 tsp cinnamon

3 tbsp honey

1 egg (for egg wash)

3 tbsp granulated sugar + 1 tsp cinnamon (optional topping on crust)

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2. Line a rimmed cookie sheet with parchment. Roll crust (if using home made) into a 10 inch circle.

3. Remove pits from peaches and slice thinly (about 8 slices per peach) and put in a bowl. Toss with brown sugar, cornstarch and cinnamon.

4. Add peach mixture to center of pie crust. You can be as fancy or as casual as you want here. I like to spiral them a little.

5. Drizzle honey over peach mixture. Fold the edges of the pie crust up and over the peaches, creating little pleats as you go.

6. In a small bowl, whisk egg with 1 tbsp water and then brush the egg wash over the pie crust edges. Combine cinnamon and sugar in small bowl and sprinkle over the crust.

7. Place sheet pan in preheated oven and bake for 30 minutes or until the edges are golden and the peach mixture is bubbly. Remove from oven and cool for about 10-15 minutes (if you can wait) and then slice and serve with a big scoop of ice cream.

Something about Back to School just makes me crave old fashioned treats. It's not even that I'm super nostalgic, but there's something so comforting about those snacks that you remember grabbing when you finished your school day and you were hangry.

Or maybe, like me (and now Ivy), you brown bagged it and someone who loved you snuck a fun treat into your lunch. My mom was the queen of treats and sweet notes to get me over that mid day hump. I've carried on the tradition, even if Ivy is all grown up. :)

These scotcharoos (or Special K bars if you're doing a search on the internet) are so easy and since they've got peanut butter in them, I'm gonna call them a protein pick me up for those mid day, gotta get homework done munchies. Of course, they've got a bunch of chocolate too, but you're only young once, right?

These bars are so easy to make and they're worth the effort. I've elevated them with a dark chocolate and sea salt, but you use the chocolate you like!

Ingredients:

1 cup peanut butter

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/4 cup granulate sugar

1/4 cup coconut oil

6 cups corn flakes

1 1/4 cup dark chocolate chips

Flaky Sea Salt (optional)

Milk Chocolate Shavings (optional)

Instructions:

1. Line a 9x13 pan with parchment paper

2. Place peanut butter, maple syrup, sugar and oil in pan and heat until sugar is dissolved.

3. Put cornflakes in a large bowl and pour the peanut butter mixture in slowly and mix the whole time util thoroughly coated.

4. Press cornflake/peanut butter mixture into prepared pan and put in refridgerator for 45 minutes.

5. Melt the dark chocolate (microwave or double boiler) and pour over cooled mixture in pan. I like to swirl it and make it pretty. Sprinkle on sea salt if using. Place back in the fridge for at least 2 hours.

6. Add some milk chocolate shavings if using and cut into squares. I like to wrap them in individual wax papers, bag in a ziplock and store in the fridge for 5 days if they last that long! :). Enjoy with a giant glass of milk...at least that's how Ivy and I do it!

Oh summer, how we've missed you! There's something about them moment when I flip the calendar to June. It invites my spirit to slow down, enjoy the longer days and indulge in sweet treats.

I found this recipe on Half Baked Harvest and I've tweaked it to work for us. We love our brownies with a little espresso thrown into the mix. So the brownie base has a little coffee kick. I also love how easy no-churn ice cream is to add here. But my favorite thing to do is grab a pint of frozen custard from Culver's or Freddy's and use that for the ice cream layer.

For these, I followed the recommendation of using a layer of peanut butter on top of the ice cream layer, but next time, I think I'll make home made caramel. Dip these pretty babies in home made magic shell and top with flaky salt, a drizzle of more chocolate or sprinkles and you've got a yummy treat for those nights when the sun sticks around longer

How to Make Frozen Ice Cream Bars

These really are super easy. So rather than a recipe, I'm giving you steps to follow. You can use recipes I've posted here or some of your favorites!

1. Use a brownie recipe designed for an 8x8 pan but bake it for half the time in a 9x13 pan. This will be the base of your bar. Let it cool completely. If you need an awesome brownie recipe, give these a try! Let these cool completely in the pan, but don't take them out.

2. Grap a pint of your favorite ice cream or frozen custard and let it soften so it's easy to spread once the brownies are cool. Spread a layer of ice cream over the brownie base and pop into the freezer for 2 hours.

3. The third layer is on the way! You can use peanut butter, fudge if you need even more chocolate or a layer of peanut butter spread thinly over the ice cream. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

4. Waiting is hard, but it's worth it! Use the parchment to remove your amazing brownie ice cream cake. With a warm, sharp chefs knife, cut the short edge in half. Cut the long edge into thirds and those thirds in half for 12 bars. Put these back in the freezer while you make Magic Shell.

5. Home made magic shell couldn't be easier. Just two ingredients! We're going to make a pretty big batch to cover all of these pretty bars. Melt 2 cups of Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips with 6 tablespoons of Refined Coconut Oil (measure while it's solid).

6. One at a time, use two forks to dip your bars all the way around in the magic shell and put on a parchement lined baking sheet. If things get crazy messy, you can spoon the magic shell over the bars with the bars on a rack. Use extra magic shell or sprinkles to make them pretty.

7. Place back in the freezer for an hour and then wrap individually. Enjoy throughout your summer for as long as they last!

I swear that there are times when I feel like I need to move to a warmer climate so that I can enjoy citrus fruits on the reg! Honestly, as much as we love Colorado-the fruit situation (except for Palisade Peaches) is pretty weak. :)

Having said that, a girl's gotta do what a girl's gotta do and when winter keeps showing up, I make something with lemons so that I can get that warm weather feeling. Considering how busy we've been with baseball, work and Ivy being in college, these crinkle cookies were the perfect quick treat to shake off the winter blahs.

Nothing beats a sweet crinkle cookie that is somewhere between a cake and cookie and asks you not to wear black because it'll show when the powdered sugar rains down.

Recipe adapted from Broma Bakery

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temp - note I use salted because that's what I always have on hand. If you use unsalted add 1/2 tsp of salt with the dry ingredients.

1 1/4 cups granulated sugar

Zest of 1 lemon

2 eggs

1 tbsp lemon juice

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp lemon extract (optional, Ivy doesn't love too much lemon but I don't believe that's a thing)

2 cups all purpose flour (spoon and level)

3/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

pinch salt

1/3 cup granulated sugar

1/3 cup powdered sugar

Step One: The cookie dough

Don't heat your oven yet, at altitude I recommend letting these chill.

1. Combine the lemon zest and 1 1/4 cup sugar in a small bowl and rub it together with your fingers until the sugar is moistened and fragrant.

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream the butter and lemon sugar mixture together until light and fluffy (about 5 minutes on medium to medium high speed), scraping down the bowl as needed.

3. Add the eggs one at a time while on medium speed and make sure they're completely incorporated before adding the next one.

4. Add juice and extracts keeping things rocking at medium speed. You might notice things looking a little curdled, but don't worry! When you add the dry ingredients it'll all make sense.

5. In a separate bowl combine the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt) and whisk to combine. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the mixer while on low. Any faster and your kitchen will be covered in flour. Mix JUST until incorporated. I usually stop before it's fully incorporated and finish mixing in any stray dry ingredients with a rubber spatula.

6. Put the 1/3 cup granulated sugar in one medium bowl (you need room to roll the dough around) and 1/2 powdered sugar into a different medium bowl.

7. Use a medium disher (looks like an ice cream scoop, but it's not!) to scoop 2 tablespoon portions into your hand and roll into a ball. Take that ball and roll it in the granulated sugar first and then it takes it's first trip into the powdered sugar. Place the ball on a wax paper lined cookie sheet. Notice I said the first time, right? Roll the remaining dough into balls and repeat.

8. Put your dough balls into the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes. At altitude, this helps a ton. Now you can preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

9. Take your dough balls out of the fridge and roll them in the powdered sugar again. This is how I managed to get the super coating I needed to make those crinkles as pretty as I wanted them. Bake 6 at a time on a parchment lined cookie sheet for 10 minutes or until the edges are just set and the middle is puffed up. Don't over cook these! Let them cool on the cookie sheet completely.

I got 18 cookies from this recipe. I hope you love them as much as we did!

Whenever I typed that title, it made me giggle a little bit. Why, you ask? Well, because my not so guilty secret is that I'm a total Monty Python nerd. Which means that the word Quest makes me sing "The Knights of the Round Table" and start quoting random parts of the movie to myself. My nerdiness knows no bounds.

While "Spam-a-lot" has absolutely nothing to do with brownies, I am, never the less, on a quest for the perfect brownie. It's so weird, because you'd think that there's no such thing as a bad brownie, but I am here to tell you that you'd be thinking wrong. I've had over baked things that pretended to be brownies. I've had brown squares that should have had at least SOME chocolate flavor but didn't. That is the worst! So if a girl wants a yummy little square of chocolate heaven, she's gonna have to figure it out for herself...and then share it with you to save you the pain I've been through!

Now, this should all be simple, right. Load up on ingredients, try every "Best Brownie Evah" on Pinterest and all will be chocolate bliss. I wish! Ivy and I exist at altitude, so many a fallen brownie came out of my oven. Delicious, but not what I was looking for. And for the record, sometimes Pinterest lies. There...I said it. One final factor in my Quest For The Perfect Brownie is that my son (Ivy's little brother) only likes cakey brownies and I love a crinkly topped fudgy brownie. What to do?

Since I believe there can never be too much chocolate in my life, the answer is make them both! For cakey brownies, I think the winner winner chicken dinner (wait, we're still talking about brownies, right) is King Arthur Flour's cakey brownie recipe. My son agrees and he can devour them at a break neck pace. That's probably equal parts him loving them and that he's a 16 year old boy who can eat his way through the pantry in an hour if I'd let him.

For Ivy and I, the clear winner was much harder to find. We both love some serious chocolate flavor and that means cocoa powder and real chocolate need to be part of the equation. We also love the way coffee enhances the flavor of chocolate so some espresso powder is a must! Remember my story about fallen brownies? Turns out, at altitude the only levening you need is eggs. So I've started leaving out baking powder from every recipe I try. I also LOVE a crackly crust on top and there are a bazillion tips and tricks for getting one. Is it air in the egg and sugar mixing stage? Is it banging the pan on the counter halfway through baking? Yes. No. Maybe? I've tried it all and it does seem that really beating the eggs and sugar for some serious air bubbles helps.

Ultimately, I settled on this recipe from Mike Bakes New York with some tweaks. They're fudgy, chocolaty and beautiful and I can't eat just one. Are they the Holy Grail of Brownies? I dunno. I think I'll keep trying, tweaking and eating new variations. As long as no snarky French Knights try to steer me wrong, the quest continues!