CHOCOLATE PECAN PIE BARS

Chocolate Pecan Pie Bars

http://glorioustreats.blogspot.com/2011/11/chocolate-pecan-pie-bars-recipe.html

These are really, really good. Hard to stay out of.

Crust ~

1 3/4 cups flour

1/4 cup packed brown sugar (light or dark)

3/4 teaspoon salt

3/4 cup cold butter, cut into pieces

1-2 Tablespoons cold water

Filling ~

3 eggs

3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/2 cup light corn syrup

2 teaspoons vanilla

2 Tablespoons butter, melted

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 cups pecan halves, coarsely chopped

3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Directions ~

1. Heat oven to 375*F

2. Line the bottom and sides of a 9"x13" baking pan with aluminum foil.

3. (For the crust) In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat 3/4 cup butter, brown sugar and salt until smooth and creamy. Add flour, and beat until coarse crumbs form. While the mixer is running, add 1-2 tablespoons of cold water, as needed to help form dough.

4. Press dough into the bottom and 1/2 inch up the sides of the prepared pan. Prick the dough with a fork several times, randomly around the pan. Bake 10-12 minutes or until light golden brown.

5. (For the filling) In a large bowl, mix eggs, brown sugar, corn syrup, vanilla, melted butter, bourbon and salt with a whisk until well blended. Stir in pecans and chocolate chips. Pour filling into baked crust.

6. Bake 20-30 minutes or until golden brown and filling is set.

7. Cool 1 hour, then set in the refrigerator to further cool. Cut into squares using a serrated knife, with a slight sawing motion, and clean the knife between cuts as needed, if you want nicely cut bars. Store covered, in the refrigerator. Serve cool, or at room temperature. Can be stored up to 3 days.

THANKSGIVING

2011
Jackson was disappointed that we didn't have turkey. But both kids LOVED the ham. I don't think he was too disappointed once he tasted the ham. Forgot the stuffing - add next time??

Scott and the kids made a centerpiece turkey. Squash for the body. Bosch pear for the face. Cheese and grapes on skewers for the tail feathers. Red and yellow bell peppers for feet and side feathers. Raisins for the eyes. We also made place mats and laminated them.

Snack:

Chex Mix - didn't have wheat chex so I used Fiber One cereal. Taste great!

Hard Boiled Eggs (Sneaky Chef)

Lunch:

Crab salad - Broulims Deli

Relish Plate (mushrooms, cucumbers, celery, carrots, broccoli, radishes, pickles and olives)

Cranberry Bread w/cream cheese (Lemon Cookbook pg. 34) - like Bandon Boatworks recipe better. We did really like this the next day. So next time make a day early.

Dinner:

Ham - Jill's Every Other Sunday Ham (McCleve 2nd Cookbook)

Rolls - Rhodes frozen rolls

Green beans with carmalized onions and tarragon (we like perfectly lemon green beans better - LDS Living pages)

Mashed Potatoes - cooked in chicken stock (made early in the morning and put in crockpot)

Turkey Gravy - from a packet

Sweet Potato Dish (Pioneer Woman) - made on Tuesday

Walnut Fruit Salad (2009 Quick Taste of Home pg. 170)

Drink - Martinelles

Dessert: (made these on either Tues or Wed)

Chocolate Silk Pie (2009 Quick Taste of Home)

Pumpkin Cookies with Maple Frosting (only made 1/2) - were pretty good. Next time I think it would be better with a pumpkin dessert or just normal pumpkin cookies

Pecan Chocolate Bars (froze 1/2)

maple-brown-butter semifreddo (Martha Stewart) - we didn't even pull it out. Will eat later. Made on Monday

2012
I had already bought everything and then the Stowell's (Dave & Lucy) called and invited us.  I made pretzel salad (Lisa's recipe), rolls (Diana Walker), pumpkin/pecan pie (Martha Stewart) and cranberry bars.

Then on Saturday we cooked the ham and:
canned green beans
rolls (Martha Stewart)
mashed potatoes
sweet potato dish (had made earlier in the week  -Martha Stewart with coconut, lime and coconut milk)
fruit salad (Taylor pg. 33)
chocolate silk pie
Appetizer:
crab dip
crackers
celery/carrots with sour cream dip

2013
would be fun to have snack mix - Harvest Blessing - see Snack Mix 2

BANANA SNACK CAKE

BANANA SNACK CAKE

Jackson really liked this cake. He thanked me over and over for making it. When mixing it I kept on checking the recipe to make sure there wasn't more things. It did mix together though. Mine was done cooking in about 20 minutes. I liked it better without the frosting. I wouldn't mind trying with pumpkin and use a vanilla pudding.

This snack cake is so simple, so few ingredients, so moist. Frosting is not even required!

This is another great after-school snack or side to stick in a lunch box. Or both! Since it's made in a 9 x 13 cake pan, you'll have enough for a couple of days, easy.

I found this recipe on www.allrecipes.com but made some changes according to reviews.

Banana Snack Cake

• 1 yellow cake mix
• 3 ripe bananas
• 1 tsp baking soda

Mix all three ingredients well. Pour mix into a 9x13 pan that has been spraying with nonstick cooking spray. Bake at 350° for about 35 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean. May be served as is or topped with whipped cream.

The frosting pictured is 4 oz. cream cheese (softened), 8 oz. whipping cream and 1 box of sugar free banana pudding. Can use regular pudding. Whipped together until creamy.

CHEWY CARAMEL MYSTERY COOKIES

CHEWY CARAMEL MYSTERY COOKIES

New favorite cookie - yum! I froze some - the caramel gets really hard, so sit them out for 1/2 hour or so before serving.

I was too lazy to type in the recipe so I swagbucks it and found this site (there is a link on her site for a printable recipe:

http://www.pipandebby.com/pip-ebby/2011/10/11/chewy-caramel-mystery-cookies.html

I agree with everything she said - except I only used snickers, but would like to use her combination next (all in bulk section??). I too found it was hard to get them off the cookie sheet and then when I did the caramel dripped. So I just transferred them directly on the cooling rack still on the parchment paper (whole sheet at once) or next time I would line the cooling rack with tin foil or more parchment paper. I only had big M&M's so that is what I used - worked fine. I also put too many on a cookie sheet and they ran into each other. They get a lot bigger. By reading her comments I should have only done 9 per cookie sheet. I did 12 cookies and then made one big cookie on the round stone.

I saw this recipe in Food Everyday: Martha Stewart Magazine and was intrigued by the "mystery" in the title. Mysteries are always exciting, right? I read through the recipe, and I loved what the mystery ingredient was. I made the cookies almost immediately! I ended up bringing most of these to work with me, and it was fun to hear what people thought the mystery ingredient was after they took a couple bites. I got all kinds of different guesses!

And here it is! The mystery ingredient. An assortment of miniature candy bars. Genius!

Coarsely chop 16 miniature candy bars. I used exactly what you see in the above photo: Twix (4), Milky Way (4), 3 Musketeers (4) and Snickers (4). I'm sure any kind and any combination would be just as wonderful. And these were wonderful.

Cut 20 caramels in half. Set the candy bars and caramels aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon fine salt

1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda

Using an electric mixer, beat together in another large bowl:

1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened

1 cup light brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Beat on high until fluffy and pale, about 3 minutes.

Beat in 2 large eggs.

With mixer on low, beat in the flour mixture in three additions until combined. Fold in caramels and candy bars.

On parchment-lined baking sheets, press cookie dough into 2-inch circles, 2 inches apart (9 cookies per baking sheet). Bake for 8 minutes in the preheated oven.

Remove from the oven and press M&M's candies onto cookies for decoration.

I'm not kidding you, I had this bowl of M&M's off of the counter for 1 second before a chubby hand scooped into it. This was not a staged photo. :)

Return the baking sheet to the oven and bake for 8 to 9 additional minutes. Remove from the oven and let the cookies cool completely.

Getting the cookies off of the parchment paper without breaking them was a bit tricky. The caramel that seeped onto the bottoms of the cookies (uhh, yum!) liked to stick to my spatula. And then to the cooling rack. One thing that helped was using a metal spatula and loosening the perimeter of each cookie before trying to completely free it. I generously sprayed my wire rack with cooking spray before transferring them, as well.

I have to tell you that these were totally delicious little treats. I loved the different flavors from the different kinds of candy bars. It's 3 Musketeers! No, wait! It's Snickers! No, caramel!