southern fusion.

I'm still trying to get a hang of making pralines ever since the last time I made them successfully. Turns out, the sugar to milk ratios are pretty important to these little suckers. Too much milk and I get myself a caramel. And if they're not finicky enough, I can't just throw in anything or else they won't set properly. Right now, I'm still trying to figure out how to make almond butter pralines from the original recipe that I'm using.

However, I did successfully make some Mexican chocolate pralines! In an effort to make the praline a little more gourmet, I got the wacky idea to play around with flavor combinations. I've always loved chocolate and cinnamon together. Add a little bit of chile to it, and this flavor was exactly what I was looking for! I dusted these with a little sprinkle of cinnamon to make it extra fancy, but feel free to leave that out. I, on the other hand, like the extra boost of cinnamon!

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Mexican Chocolate Pralines
(adapted from Snapguide: Jada's DIY's & Recipes)

3/4 cup granulated white sugar
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup fat-free half and half or evaporated milk
4 tbsp light butter (cubed)
2 tsp pure vanilla paste or extract
1 1/2 cups roasted pecan pieces
1 tbsp dark cocoa powder
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ancho chile powder
1/4 tsp kosher salt

 
Prepare a piece of non-stick parchment paper (about 12-15 in. long) and place on counter next to cooking station. In a small bowl, stir together cocoa powder, cinnamon, ancho chile powder, and salt. Set aside.

In a medium saucepan over medium heat, add both sugars and the milk into the pot and mix well with a wooden spoon until sugars dissolve. Dip a pastry or any kind of small cooking brush in cold icy water then brush the sides of the pot to melt away any sugar crystals that may have formed.

Put in your candy thermometer. Make sure the tip is not touching the bottom but is in the actual candy liquid. The mixture should begin to froth at this point. Cook the candy, stirring occasionally, until it reaches it's proper temperature of 240F degrees.

Turn the heat completely off and take it off the burner. Add in the butter, vanilla, cinnamon mixture, and chopped pecans.

Stir mixture until it becomes thick and start to turn opaque. When the candy starts to hold together, quickly spoon it onto the parchment paper. Make sure to not over crowd and make them touch, otherwise the pralines will dry stuck together. Sprinkle with additional cinnamon to garnish, if desired.

Let the pralines set at room temperature for 30 min. Afterwards, if not serving right away, store in a air-tight container for up to 2 to 3 days. Makes about 9 to 12 pralines.

please, with a cherry inside?

I love sweet things. I've got a pretty hardcore sweet tooth. In fact, I'm one of those people who gets the frosting from other people's cake. :) And since Valentine's Day is just around the corner, that means a plethora of chocolates, cookies, and candies available in the stores. And did I mention cakes and brownies? Yumm!

Speaking of brownies, I tried making some a few months ago. When I was going through my pantry, however, I found that I was unfortunately out of cocoa powder. So what's the alternative? Blondies, of course! I found a great decadent recipe for white chocolate cherry almond blodies and, boy, were they rich! I guess 1 1/2 stick of butter will do that. I think the main issue I had was all that butter. While they tastes sinfully good, I just couldn't get the butter factor out of my mind each time I took a bite. I've been on a hunt for a better recipe ever since.

This recipe piqued my interest. With a title of No Butter Baking. on the blog, I thought that I finally hit jackpot! No butter in sight and the blodies themselves looked decent. There is, however, a half cup of oil. Hmm...

Since I wasn't sure how these were going to turn out, I decided to improvise a little and play with the recipe. Semi-solid coconut oil replaced the vegetable oil in order to mimic fluffiness of the butter. There isn't really any liquor in my house so the brandy was switched with pure vanilla extract. I added some whole wheat flour to help soak up the inevitable liquid that this was going to produce and added some walnuts, just because. Also, I wanted to see if I could lift the batter a little, so I added some leavening agents to the dry mixture.

So what did I end up with? Not a bad blondie. It was kind of greasy though, which I expected. But since I used coconut oil, I just popped them in the freezer for a bit which helped with the texture and cutting. I think if I added another 1/4 cup of whole wheat flour or reduced the oil just a bit, these might've turned out a little bit better. Although, I'd probably end up with a stiffer dough. I still have to play around with the recipe, but all in all, this didn't turn out too bad. :)

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White Chocolate Cherry Walnut Blondies
(adapted from No Butter Baking.)

1/2 cup semi-soft coconut oil
1 cup loosely packed dark brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup white chocolate chips
1/4 cup dried cherries
1/4 cup toasted chopped walnuts

 
Preheat oven to 350F degrees. Line

In a large bowl, cream together coconut oil and brown sugar. Add egg, vanilla, and salt, and whip until fluffy.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flours, baking soda, and baking powder until well combined. Add to wet ingredients along with white chocolate chips, cherries, and walnuts.

Pour batter into a parchment lined pan and level. Sprinkle top with additional cherries, chips, and walnuts and gently press into the batter.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until tester inserted in center comes out clean. Let cool completely in pan then chill in the freezer for 5 to 10 minutes for easier cutting. Remove from freezer then cut into 16 squares.

chocolate covered failures.

Yesterday was a very trying day. From the moment I woke up to the time I went to bed, nothing I did seemed to go right. Ever have one of those days?

It all started when I woke up later than I wanted to. 10 am, not too bad. just enough time to make some shrimp and grits for breakfast. That idea turned out to be a disaster. Ingredients were flying everywhere, things weren't tasting like they should, and the whole thing wasn't worth the effort it took to make . . . and I usually make a decent shrimp and grits. So after taking longer that I wanted in the kitchen, I was running behind for my shower. And since I was behind on taking a shower, The hubby came home right when I got out and we had an errand to run that day during his lunch break. So, that snowballed for a while until we got home.

When we finally got home later that we should've, I decided to go back into the kitchen and de-stress. I figured that the best way to do that was to finally make some Southern pralines. This recipe seemed easy enough and, since I wanted my pralines to be chewy, perfectly fit what I was looking for.

Problems started arising when I realized that I didn't have the right ingredients. Well, that was no biggie since I always sub a lot of my cooking with this or that. Heavy cream was a major ingredient in the recipe and I didn't have any. What I did have, however, was a big ole box of store brand, powdered skim milk from a recipe I tried a while back. So, not only was I subbing CREAM with NON-FAT dairy, I was using a CHEAP substitute POWDER to boot. Needless to say, I was wondering if this was a bad Idea after all.

I pushed on, though, despite my reservations. Despite adding too much vanilla, adding salt, and misreading the recipe. By the time I realized that I had missed the final step of stirring the pot to crystallize the boiling sugar, my concoction was beyond making pralines . . . it had cooked into caramel.

At this point, I reached the "I-don't-give-a-fuck-anymore" mode. My pralines were ruined, I wasted my precious Georgia-grown pecans my sister gave me, and I hadn't even gotten dinner ready. All the failures seemed to accumulate to this point and I was just not having it. However, I wan't so far gone that I still didn't want to salvage what was left on my counter.

Off I went to Walmart and purchased a couple bars of Cadbury's Dairy Milk and a single Lindt's White Choclate bar. I proceeded to melt the chocolate down and mix it with some coconut oil to help temper the chocolate. Then one by one, I covered the pralines-turned-caramels first in the milk chocolate, then drizzled it with white. When I ran out of the milk for dipping, I used the white instead.

In the end, my hopes for pralines were just a distant memory. I've since found a good tutorial for my next attempt on making these confections. While these milk chocolate pecan turtles turned out to be an adequate consolation, it still is a far cry to what they were supposed to be. Failure is failure, no matter how you look at it. *sigh*

But, what better way to fix failure than to cover it with lots of chocolate?

well...ain't t that a 'sumbitch!

"You should try making some 'Sumbitches..."

I remember agreeing with my husband when we watched the train episode of How I met Your Mother. Since then, I've made a mental note in the back of my brain to try and re-create those little suckers.

Fast forward to now. We've recently been deployed back to the states and living in Georgia means getting ingredients much more easier and much more cheaper. Huzzah! But first things first...I wanted to find a good base for my cookies. In came google search...

I knew that I wanted my base to be a peanut butter cookie. But I also wanted them to be soft and chewy so that it would go along the texture of the caramel. Also, I wanted them to stay soft and chewy for days. Enter this recipe! I loved that it promised all those things that I was looking for AND the fact that I didn't need to flatten them out! These were perfect for just a scoop and drop method that I was looking for!

The next thing to consider was the chocolate and caramel. I rewatched the episode online and, wanting to be close as possible, knew that I didn't want to go the Rolos route. While that may have been easier, I wanted the chocolate and caramel to be evenly distributed and not centralized. So, I opted for tossing in some caramel bits and some semi-sweet chips.

The result?

Oh, my god, the chewiest, nut butteriest, chocolate and caramel cookies in the world! Adapting the recipe, I love that these have two types of nut butters in them: crunchy peanut butter and almond butter. The almond butter is from Costco and was an impulse add-in. Since the only ingredients are roasted almonds, I think it really toned down the sweetness of these cookies (not to mention add to the amazing chew). The caramels were perfectly spread out and every mouthful had that caramelly goodness along with a bite of chocolate. PERFECT!

And guess what? I must have done something right, because I've already made these twice and each time they've disappeared in just a few days. And there's only two of us here, lol. These, by far, are the hubby's newest favorite cookies! Huzzah!

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'Sumbitches
(adapted from Alaska From Scratch)

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup salted butter, softened
1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
1/2 cup almond butter
3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1 tbsp milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips
1 cup caramel bits

 
Preheat oven to 350. Line baking sheets with parchment paper. In a mixing bowl, stir together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, beat the butter, peanut butter, and almond butter together until smooth and fluffy. Add the sugars until combined, then incorporate the egg, followed by the milk and vanilla. Add in the flour mixture, chocolate chips, and caramel bits until thoroughly combined.

Using a medium cookie scoop or one rounded tablespoon, place dough on baking sheet allowing room for cookies to spread out while baking.

Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, being careful not to overbake. The cookies will look slightly underdone in the center. Let stand 5 minutes to set on baking sheet before transferring on a sheet of wax paper to cool completely.

Makes about 2 1/2 dozen cookies.

taste it and make it: cookies!

When I was back in San Diego, I used to work for this resort. At the resort, they had a little coffee shop that sold some fancy pastries and coffee drinks. I remember, I would stop by there every other day and get this big ass bakery cookie that they sold. It was a German chocolate flavored cookie that was just awesome!

What I liked about the cookie was that it had coconut flakes, pecans, and chocolate chips baked into the cookie itself. It sweet, compact, and had the taste of German chocolate cake but in cookie form. So, rather than buying the cookie at $3.50 every other day and the fact that I'm now living in Guam, I decided to look in the internet to see if I could recreate those delicious cookies.

The problem that I kept coming across was the fact that the cookies I found were either, filled, topped, had the wrong base, or had ingredients that I really didn't want in them (namely corn syrup). The closest recipe that I could find was this, which had a nice short ingredients list. Still...not what I wanted in the recipe. So I decided to do some experimenting.

Taking some pointers from this site, I decided to change the flour amounts. Since I definitely wanted a chewy cookie, I added an extra yolk to the recipe. I also took out the corn syrup as I didn't think that it needed it and bumped up the vanilla. While I normally love coconut, I thought that 2 1/4 cups seemed a bit excessive so that got cut too. Needless to say, this recipe got dissected, pulled apart, and brought back together again.

So what did I end up with? A fantastic cookie that was amazingly identical to the cookie I had from the resort's cafe! It was nice and chewy, nutty from the pecans, caramelly from the toasted coconut, and oh so chocolatey from the semi-sweet chocolate!

I packed a batch of this for my hubby to take to work and it was gone within minutes. Poor hubbs, he didn't even get to taste any. Luckily for him, there was a batch waiting for him when he got home. Now, whenever he wants to be a popular kid at work, his number one request is a batch of these German chocolate chip cookies. Please and thank you! ;D

German Chocolate Chip Cookies
(adapted from FabFood and Cook The TV!)

2 cups flaked sweetened coconut
1 1/2 cups chopped pecans
1 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup bread flour
1 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 tsp or so kosher salt
1/2 cup brown sugar, tightly packed
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup butter, softened
1 large egg plus extra egg yolk
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 pkg semi-sweet chocolate disks, chunks, or chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Spray cookie sheet with non-stick spray.

Toast the coconut and pecans on a large skillet, stirring occasionally, for 7 to 9 minutes, or until lightly browned. Be careful not to burn. Let stand until cool. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, thoroughly stir together the flours, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl, with an electric mixer on medium speed, beat together the sugars and butter until very well blended and light (do not over beat or else the cookie will not spread properly). Beat in the egg, extra yolk, and vanilla until well blended. Beat or stir in the flour mixture, then the pecans, coconut and chocolate, until evenly incorporated.

Drop the dough onto the baking sheets by heaping measuring tablespoons, spacing about 3 inches apart. Using the tip of a table knife (or your palm), spread out the cookies to about 1-1/2 inches in diameter.

Bake the cookies, one sheet at a time, in the upper third of the oven for 6 to 9 minutes, or until lightly browned all over and slightly darker at the edges. Leave cookies on baking sheet until completely cooled. Makes about 45 cookies.

a fabulous idea.

This started as trying out a cookie recipe that promised fudgy cookies that were chewy and ultra chocolatey. Not only that, but these babies weren't made with any flour so I was looking forward to something decadent and rich. I switched out the chocolate chips for white and added walnuts for some crunch. And, oh! Were these good!

So of course I had to save some for the hubby to try. But then, a couple of days passed by and the cookies started to go from fudgy to stale and crumbly...and he hadn't even gotten a chance to try them yet! So after day five hit, I tried them and they just weren't the same. But then a thought came into my head....what if I used them for something else? Parfaits? Ice box cake of some sort? Hmm....

Ding! Ice cream sandwiches!!

Oh, and what a crazy great idea it was! The decadent factor went up two-fold after taking the first heavenly bite! And to top it off, I used cookies and cream ice cream, so it was just a double dose of cookie goodness. I made the sandwiches again today and, this time, I let them sit for a day so that they were still chewy. Oh my god, they were even better the second time around!

These icy treats were perfect for the last few days here in Guam. The rain had just let up and the sun was scorching down, lol. So now, there are ten sandwiches in the freezer, lovingly waiting to be devoured. And I can't wait! :D

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Fudge Walnut Chip Cookies
(adapted from Chocolate and Carrots)

3 cups powdered sugar
2/3 cup unsweetened Hershey’s dark chocolate cocoa powder
1/4 ts. kosher salt
2 to 4 large egg whites, at room temperature
1 Tbsp. pure vanilla extract
1 cup white or semi-sweet chocolate baking chips
1/2 cup walnuts, crushed

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Set aside two baking sheets with silpat mats or parchment paper.

In a large bowl, whisk together the powdered sugar with cocoa powder and salt. Whisk in the vanilla and egg whites starting with just two.

Beat just until the batter is moistened. You’re looking for a brownie-like, thick and fudgy batter consistency. If it seems too thick, add another egg white, then a 4th one if it still seems too thick.

Stir in the baking chips and walnuts.

Scoop the batter by the tablespoon full onto the prepared baking sheets. Leave enough space between each cookie for them to spread.

Bake for 12-14 minutes, until the tops are glossy and lightly cracked. Let the cookies cool completely on the baking sheet and store in an airtight container for up to 3 days. Makes roughly about 20 (3 to 4 inch wide) cookies.

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Double Cookie Ice Cream Sandwiches
(makes 10 sandwiches, 2 servings per sandwich)

20 day-old Fudge Walnut Chip Cookies
1/2 gallon reduced fat cookies and cream ice cream (we like Kemps. :D)

To make sandwiches, pair cookies together so they're about the same size. Working quickly, scoop ice cream on the bottom of one cookie to about 1 inch thickness. Press the matching cookie firmly on top and repeat with remaining cookie pairs. Wrap individual sandwiches with cling wrap or parchment paper and freeze to store.

Note: these make *large* decadent sandwiches! I find that cutting the sandwich in half is more than plenty for an after dinner treat. :)