Chocolate Dipped Stackers

Although I've been having some issues with Pinterest recipes not working out lately, the website did give me some inspiration for today's recipe!

I call them Chocolate Dipped Stackers because you stack up some cookies and random tasty treats and then dip the whole thing in chocolate. 

The bag of Candy 'n Cookies was found at Dollar Tree.

Ingredients:
Oreos
Something for your center
Dipping chocolate

Cole was my photographer again this week!

We decided that we would separate the Oreos and only keep the halves with the cream attached. Then, we took two of the cream-coated cookies and stuck a candy cookie in the middle.

As if that wasn't enough sweetness overload, we dipped the whole thing in chocolate.

Freshly dipped.

Like the Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bites, we set the Chocolate Dipped Stackers on plastic wrap to solidify.

My Tips:

Feel free to switch up the ingredients! For instance, instead of candy cookies, next time I want to try a marshmallow center. Reese's cups, soft chocolate chip cookies or a strawberry slice could also be tasty middles.

There are also other kinds of chocolate that can be used for melting. Michaels sells just about any color of chocolate wafers you can imagine! Whether you need red and green for Christmas, orange and black for Halloween, or pastel colors for Easter, you can dip whatever you wish into the colored chocolate of your choice.

Since Cole and I usually like our chocolate cold, we stuck the stackers in the fridge before going to work. Bad idea! They hardened so much that my taste testers had a hard time biting into them, so we had to set them out to warm up.

If you're in a hurry for the stackers to be ready to serve, it should be okay to place them in the fridge for a few minutes. I just wouldn't recommend leaving them in there for a long period of time. 

Happy stacking! Let me know how yours turn out.

Rocky Road Cookies

I was really excited for this week's recipe: Rocky Road Cookies. Chocolatey cookies with marshmallows and almonds- what's not to be excited about?

But unfortunately, Pinterest let me down again. 

This is how mine turned out. Not the prettiest...

In case I just made a mistake somewhere, here's the recipe for you all to try.

Ingredients:
3 cups powdered sugar
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 tsp salt
3 large egg whites
1 tbsp vanilla extract
2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup mini marshmallows
2.5 oz toasted sliced almonds

First, you'll need to preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.

In one large bowl, mix the powdered sugar, cocoa powder and salt. Then add the egg whites and vanilla. When combined, add the chocolate chips and almonds.

Mix it up!

Spoon out small blobs of the mixture onto your cookie sheets and top each cookie with a few marshmallows.

Stick in the freezer for 5-10 minutes to prevent the cookies from spreading on the pan.

They looked really good at this point, but they went south soon after.

Bake for 12-13 minutes until the marshmallows are golden brown.

My Tips:

I think the recipe calls for too much cocoa powder. It's not too often that you'll hear me say something is too chocolatey, but this is one of those situations. 

Also, this recipe doesn't contain flour, so the cookies don't really have a way to rise. I think the cookies might be a little softer with some added flour or baking powder.

I was so disappointed in these cookies that I ended up throwing all of them away, and that doesn't happen very often. But I guess not every recipe will turn out the way it's expected to. On to the next recipe!

Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bites

With the weather being so beautiful the last few days, the last thing I wanted to do was waste a bunch of time in the kitchen making a huge mess with a new recipe. So instead, I spent a few minutes making heavenly bite-size treats of goodness.

The best part is that these Chocolate Peanut Butter Pretzel Bites are super easy to make while not making your wallet protest.

Mm mm mm. They taste best fresh from the refrigerator!

Ingredients:
Peanut Butter Filled Pretzels
Chocolate (for melting!)

One bag of candy melts covers about 100 pretzel bites

I'm going to start off by saying how much I'm in love with my Chocolate Pro Melting Pot. It has to be one of the best inventions ever! I can easily melt loads of chocolate at once in order to form chocolate candy, use as fondue for fruits and snacks, and easily drench miscellaneous goodies in sweetness.

I got mine at Michaels for about 30 dollars.

First, you pour some of your chocolate wafers into your melting pot and turn it to Melt. If you don't have a melting pot, you can buy one, or melt your wafers in a bowl in the microwave on low heat.
 

The melting pot offers a feature to keep the chocolate warm after it's melted

When it has melted to a smooth consistency, turn the melting pot to Warm and dunk your pretzel bites. Make sure they're covered as much as you'd like. You can even dip them twice for a thicker coat of chocolate. Then, transfer them to a non-stick surface where they can harden up.

Plastic wrap makes for a good non-stick surface

They'll be ready in less than 10 minutes! Enjoy!

My Tips:

I bought these pretzels (approx. 200 in a tub) from Giant Eagle for about 5 dollars. The Wilton Candy Melts chocolate came from Michaels for about $2.49 a bag (cheaper if they're on sale that week). It's such a cheap, delicious treat.

For my non-stick surface, I used a piece of plastic wrap. It was easy to move around and the treats peeled right off when they were solidified. 

I like my chocolate chilled, no matter what it is, so I left my treats in the fridge for about an hour after they had solidified at room temperature. They were spectacular!

My first batch was about 50 bites, but I actually had to make a second batch because Cole and my dad were asking for more.

Try it out! Dip lots of things in chocolate and fall in love with each one, then tell me your favorites in the comments.

Baked Cheese Bites

Do you guys remember how my Cake Batter Rice Krispies didn't turn out quite how I had hoped? Well, this week's recipe was a little bit of a mess, too.

I found the recipe for Baked Cheese Balls on Pinterest when Cole and I were scrolling through looking for something tasty to try. They looked so good and easy to make that we had to make them immediately.

We went to the store and picked up two different kinds of string cheese- Sargento's mozzarella and Kraft's jalapeno- because I wanted to dip mine in marinara sauce, and he wanted something with a little bit of a kick.

Ingredients:
String cheese
Milk
Bread crumbs

Cut the string cheese into bite-size pieces. Dunk each piece in a bit of milk, then roll around in some bread crumbs. 

Only use about 1/2 cup of milk and maybe a cup of crumbs. You can always pour more if you run out.

Transfer to a cookie sheet, making sure to space the bites evenly apart.

Little bites of cheese heaven

Here's where we hit the problem. The oven temperature and bake time didn't match between Pinterest and the actual blog. 

We baked ours for 8 minutes at 425 degrees and we got this:

Yeah. At least they didn't stick to the tray.

To be honest with you, we still ate these "cheese chips." Well, a few of them. They obviously could have been much better, but we just laughed about our failure and tried again.

For the second time around, we reduced the temperature to 325 degrees and only baked the bites for 5 minutes. They turned out better than the ones above, but they still weren't quite what we had hoped.

We also realized that the two different types of cheese melted at different rates. The jalapeno bites held up through the second round, but the mozzarella ones were pretty flattened.

Jalapeno on the left, mozzarella on the right

We didn't have time to try it out a third time, but I assure you that I will figure out the perfect temperature and bake time and post an update later this week.

My Tips:

We were thinking about trying a different type of bread crumb. The kind we used didn't have as much flavor as we had hoped. I think we will try out a different kind and possibly add some spices for taste.

I ate my mozzarella bites with a pizza sauce I heated up and Cole used a bit of ranch dressing to kick up the flavor of his jalapeno bites.

The good thing about this recipe is that it is baked instead of deep-fried, so it is somewhat healthy!

Have any suggestions? Let me know in the comments!

Chocolate Mousse Parfait

This week's post is for those of you desperately in need of some chocolate. The best thing is, you can change up the flavors and ingredients to form a parfait custom to your tastes.

Oreos, Cool Whip, chocolate mousse, vanilla pudding... Have I died and gone to heaven?

Mine doesn't look nearly as good as the original, but it still tasted wonderfully delicious.

Ingredients:
1 box chocolate pudding
1 box vanilla pudding
4 cups milk (for the pudding)
2 tbsp sugar
Crumbled Oreos
Small tub of Cool Whip

The point of this recipe is to layer all kinds of your favorite sweets to form a glass full of goodness. Remember, you can use whatever flavor of pudding you like!

I started off by preparing both flavors of the pudding. When they were set and ready to go, I took the chocolate pudding and turned it into chocolate mousse.

To do this, I mixed half the tub of Cool Whip and the sugar into the pudding. Caution! This will look scrumptious and you will be tempted to grab a spoon and eat all of the mousse in one sitting.

If you can keep your spoon out of it long enough to prepare a whole parfait, I can assure you won't be disappointed.

I may or may not have licked the spoons. All of them.

I started layering my parfait by dumping some crumbled Oreos into the bottom of my glass. I added some vanilla pudding, lots of chocolate mousse, and topped it off with Cool Whip and more crumbled Oreos.

My Tips:

I didn't fill up my glass because I thought it would be sweetness overload, and I was right. I honestly couldn't even finish the whole parfait.

Use the ingredients that you find most appealing- no one's forcing you to abide by a strict recipe! Just have fun with it. 

Set up a parfait bar at a kids party or family gathering and have them build their own desserts. Add chocolate chip cookies, sprinkles, M&M's, Reese's Pieces, peanuts, graham crackers or anything else you can think of. The kids will have fun building their desserts AND eating them.

Try it out! Have any suggestions for other ingredients? Let me know in the comments.

Buffalo Chicken Dip

So, Cole and I were house-sitting this week and we decided to bake something to make ourselves feel more at home. What was that something? Buffalo Chicken Dip, of course.

Buffalo Chicken Dip has got to be one of my most favorite dips. It always reminds me of parties and get-togethers of the past.

I found a recipe for the dip on Frank's Red Hot website, but I made a few changes.

Here's my version.

Mmm.. Tasty.

Ingredients:
8 oz cream cheese
1/2 cup ranch dressing
1/2 cup FRANK'S® REDHOT® Original Cayenne Pepper Sauce
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese 
2 small cans of chicken (or 1 large can)

First, set your oven to 350 degrees and start by mushing the cream cheese into the bottom of your baking dish. It's not necessary to have a deep one- ours was only about 2 inches deep.

It gets easier to mix when all ingredients are added.

Then, add your ranch dressing, hot sauce, cheese and chicken. Mix it up!

It'll look something like this.

Half-way through the baking process.

Pop it in the oven for about 20 minutes. I took mine out halfway through to re-stir the newly melted ingredients.

When it's ready, let it cool for a bit before you devour it. Then spoon some onto a plate, grab a handful of tortilla chips and chow down!

My Tips:

Can I confess something here? I don't like ranch dressing. Maybe that's not such a shock to you guys, but most of the people I know think I'm absolutely nuts.

The good thing about this recipe is that the ranch and the hot sauce kind of keep each other in check. The ranch keeps the hot sauce from being too hot, and the hot sauce takes the dressing's flavor down a notch.

The original recipe says the ranch can be substituted with blue cheese, but we decided the dressing would be the best choice for us.

We made the dip again over the weekend, but added about 2 teaspoons of another specialty hot sauce (found in one of those sort-of-hot to my-mouth-is-on-fire hot sauce variety packs) to the mix this time. It was amazing. The two spicy flavors added so much to the dip that the batch lasted no longer than 36 hours.

 
Try it out! Let me know what you think. Are there any other variations that you like better?

Strawberry Marshmallow Creme Fruit Dip

For this week's post, I thought I'd share a very simple recipe- one that takes only 60 seconds to prepare!

It looked so good that Cole stole a few bites before I could take a picture.

Cole and I were craving something sweet the other night (when aren't we?) but we were exhausted from a long day and didn't feel like spending a lot of time on a recipe.

So, what do I do? Pull up Pinterest, of course. I scrolled through a few delicious samples and found this gem.

Strawberry Marshmallow Creme Dip was described as a two-ingredient and 60-second recipe. 

Needless to say, I was sold. We had to run to Giant Eagle to pick up the ingredients, but I swear we got to the store and back AND finished the recipe within 20 minutes.

Ingredients:
8 oz Strawberry Cream Cheese
7 oz Marshmallow Fluff
Fresh strawberries for dipping

7 oz is half of this tub of fluff.

There's only one direction for this dip: Mix well.

Mix it up!

Seriously. That's all you have to do aside from cutting the tops off your strawberries and rinsing them off.

This cream cheese was the Giant Eagle brand and had bits of strawberry in it- Not bad.

My Tips:

The dip was a little less sweet than we would have liked, so we dipped our strawberries in sugar after coating them with the creme. It worked well, but next time I'm going to add about 1/2 cup of powdered sugar to the mixture instead.

Even though it is strawberry flavored, this dip would be tasty with other fruits as well. My suggestions? I would try blueberries, raspberries or bananas.

So, how many of you have tried one (or more!) of these recipes? Feel free to leave some comments with your own ideas! I would be more than happy to try them out.

A Variation of Slutty Brownies

Slutty brownies are one of those desserts that you just can't get enough of. Cole and I were sitting around watching movies the other day and decided that we just had to have a pan full of the delectable treat.


So, we made a trip to Giant Eagle. As we stood in the baking aisle, we stared at all the different boxes of cookie mix and took our good old time deciding which to use. We ended up choosing Betty Crocker's Rainbow Cookie Mix after hashing out the possibilities.


We stuck with the original Betty Crocker Triple Chunk Brownie mix because we like the taste of it better than most other brands. As for the Oreos, we decided that we wanted to try the golden ones instead of the regular chocolate ones.

We used the original Slutty Brownies recipe- just with different ingredients.

Mmm.. can I just eat the dough?

Cole is a wonderful baking associate! This is his handiwork and photography.

Fresh from the oven.

Are you drooling yet?

What I Think:

These. Were. Spectacular.

Let me just say that I may never make Slutty Brownies with regular Oreos again. 

Okay okay.. I'm fibbing. But the brilliant idea of mixing both types of Oreo into the same pan of brownies hit me as I was reflecting on the recipe, so I will definitely have to try that next time.

Cole's dad praised this variation, saying that the original batch I made was too sweet and this one was perfect.

I'd have to agree with that statement for the most part. I love Golden Oreos, so the different flavor was welcome to my taste buds.

Recipes are meant to be changed and adapted for each chef's preference, so switch it up. Try out some new combinations and let me know how they turn out!

Cake Batter Rice Krispie Treats

I have a confession to make, guys. The recipe I was planning on sharing with you all this week didn't really turn out the way I would have liked.

My boyfriend, Cole, and I were prepared to make Cake Batter Rice Krispie Treats, but we didn't realize we had an incomplete recipe until I did some more research and found the real one today.

Here's how they're supposed to look: 

  Photo Credit Ali Ebright

    

Ingredients:
3 tbsp butter
1 bag of mini marshmallows
1/3 cup yellow cake mix (the dry cake mix, not prepared into a batter!)
5 cups crispy rice cereal
Sprinkles

First, melt the butter in a large saucepan over low heat, then add marshmallows.

Stir in the dry cake mix a spoonful at a time.

Pour in the cereal (add some sprinkles, if you'd like) and stir until covered in marshmallow goo.

Smoosh the mixture into a baking dish, top with sprinkles and set aside to cool at room temperature for about 30 minutes.

Enjoy!

Ali Ebright, of Gimme Some Oven, posted the original recipe.

My Tips:

The recipe that Cole and I used was very vague regarding the cake batter. We assumed that we should actually prepare the batter and mix it in with the marshmallow- and that's what we did. 

It didn't ruin it, but I definitely want to make these treats the correct way soon.

I would also suggest not mixing the sprinkles in with the cereal/marshmallow mixture. We mixed a bunch in and it turned the whole thing a grayish color. Everyone still thought it was pretty good, don't get me wrong. Gray just isn't a very appetizing color for dessert!

Shopping Tip:

Instead of buying bottles of sprinkles at your local grocery store, make a trip to Dairy Queen. They gave us about 8 oz of sprinkles and only charged $1.04. 

Chicken with a Crunch

This week, I thought I would let you guys in on a secret: the recipe behind my favorite breaded chicken. It's super tasty, easy to make and has the perfect amount of crunch that your dinner guests will request again and again.

My dad even likes this recipe, and he doesn't like chicken much at all. 

I learned to make this dish by watching my Aunt Jean in the kitchen when I was younger, and my grandma and I have made it countless times for family reunions.

I like making it when I have an hour to wait around and relish in the decadent aromas.

The best thing about this recipe is: there is no set recipe. You can adjust the amount of ingredients you need based on the amount of chicken you need to serve.

Here's what you'll need.

Ingredients: 
Chicken breast (I prefer tenders.)
Cornflakes
Potato Chips (I use the original flavor of Lays.)
Vegetable/olive oil
Pan large enough for the amount of chicken you need to bake.

Now, you'll all have to understand that I will go to great lengths to avoid a mess, and even greater lengths to avoid washing dishes. This means that I almost always line my pans with parchment paper (for baking desserts) or aluminum foil (for baking chicken, pork, etc.) Try it out. I guarantee you'll be impressed with the easy clean up.

Here we go! Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Line your pan with aluminum foil. It doesn't matter what size pan you use, just make sure it's big enough for the amount of chicken you need to prepare.

Place a few handfuls of Cornflakes in a Ziploc bag and seal it. Crumple the bag between your fingers to pulverize the cereal into tiny pieces. When you have a bag full of crumbs, pour them into a small bowl.

Then, repeat this process with the chips.

After you've added the chip crumbs to the Cornflake crumbs, mix them together.

Pour some of this mixture into the bottom of your pan so the bottoms of the tenders will be properly breaded.

Grab another bowl and pour about a half an inch of oil into the bottom.

Dip breasts in oil, then the crumb mixture.

Take a piece of chicken and dip it into the oil. When it is thoroughly coated, drop it in the bowl with your Cornflake/chip mix. The mix will, for the most part, stick to the chicken.

Arrange neatly in a baking dish.

Nest the chicken pieces into your pan so they will bake evenly, and pour another layer of the Cornflake/chip mix on the very top.
*This picture doesn't have the aforementioned top layer.

Stick it in the oven for 45-60 minutes. Just keep an eye on it and when the top layer is a crisp golden brown, cut into one of the pieces to ensure the inside is no longer pink. Here's some tips for knowing when it's done.

Crispy, crunchy and tasty.

I like to serve mine fresh from the oven with scalloped or roasted potatoes and a vegetable side dish.

Try it out, mix it up and most importantly, enjoy!

My Tips:

When I'm gathering ingredients at the grocery store, I like choosing the chicken tenders over any other cut. They are the easiest to work with and they bake the quickest. Plus, you can fit quite a few tenders in a decent sized pan and each guest can have two or three pieces.

I'm thinking about using Doritos or Cool Ranch Doritos to switch up the flavor next time. I'd also like to add some different kinds of shredded cheese to really kick up the tastiness.

If you don't feel like mixing your own breading ingredients, there is a wonderful product in your cheese aisle at the grocery store called "Kraft Fresh Take" and it is available in flavors including cheddar jack and bacon, Southwest three cheese, roasted garlic and rosemary, and Italian Parmesan.

I've tried the cheddar jack and bacon, and it really is simple to make and definitely enticing.

Slutty Brownies

Yeah, you read that correctly. And you'll be tempted to leave the safe, warm sanctuary of your home just to grab ingredients for this wonderful creation.

Disclaimer: Brownies are extremely delicious and it will be hard to utilize self-control in the presence of such an ooey gooey masterpiece. You have been warned!

This picture makes me drool.

Still interested? Try the recipe for yourself.

Ingredients: 
1 box cookie mix
1 box brownie mix
2 eggs
1 bag of Mini Oreos

First, preheat your oven to 350 degrees and line your baking pan with parchment paper. This will help you to remove the brownies from the pan without causing the entire thing to crumble. Lining your pan is also good for a quick and easy clean-up!

Follow the instructions on the box for your cookie mix. I added a little bit more water than was directed.

Smoosh the cookie mixture into the bottom of your pan. 

Then dump your Oreos on top and push them into the cookie mixture a bit. 

Follow the instructions on the box for your brownie mix. I followed these directions and didn't make any changes.

Pour the brownie mixture on top of the Oreos and spread evenly.

Pop that baby into the oven and bake for about 30 minutes, or until you can insert a toothpick into the center and it comes out relatively clean.

Let the brownies cool for a bit, then lift the whole thing out of the pan and cut into pieces to serve.

Voila! If you're really feeling a treat, scoop some ice cream on top of a warm brownie. Mmm..

Here's how mine turned out:

The brownie was still gooey..

The Londoner posted the original recipe, where she boldly stated these are the best brownies in the WORLD. They are "slutty" because they're super easy and definitely filthy.

What I Think:

Sweet Baby Jesus, these brownies are phenomenal. This I promise you. 

As usual, I found this recipe on Pinterest and had to try it out ASAP.

The brownie mix calls for a longer bake time than the cookie mix, so The Londoner used a little extra oil in her recipe to keep the cookie from burning. I just added a little extra water (about a teaspoon) to the cookie mix. This helped to keep it moist instead of crunchy.

I made these for my family and friends for Christmas (why buy presents when you can delight someone's taste buds?) and they were a huge hit. I even included forks with the gift, so the recipient could eat straight out of the tin.

I have to say, this might possibly be my favorite dessert recipe of all time. But I know I'll find something else to crave.. sooner or later ;)

Since I'm definitely going to make these again, I'm thinking up some new combinations. Think Reese's or marshmallows instead of Oreos, a different type of cookie for the base (like snickerdoodle!), extra chocolate chunks in the brownie batter, or even a blond brownie mix instead of the classic chocolate.

For those of you on diets, don't you fret! The Londoner has a fix for this. It's called the Anti-Diet and it isn't a diet like you're used to. Instead of following a fad, she gives great advice on healthy living and shedding pounds along the way.