Halloween Candy Bark

I’ll admit that I’m not really a huge fan of Halloween. I don’t like to dress up, I’m over scary movies, and I could just do without the “holiday.” I think it’s fun for kids, but as an adult, I find it pointless. Sorry.

Just because  I don’t love Halloween doesn’t mean I’m that house who doesn’t answer the door when kids ring the bell, though. Like I said, I think it’s fun for kids, so sure, I’ll give them candy (but only if they say “trick-or-treat” and not if they just stand at the door with their bag open). So, a few years ago, I bought a ton of candy thinking that I’d get a lot of trick-or-treater’s at my house. Boy, was I wrong! We got maybe 10 kids. Good thing I bought a package of 120+ pieces of candy. Sigh. So, instead of eating all the candy, I decided to chop it up and throw it in some melted chocolate. Voila! What resulted was Halloween Candy bark!

The first time I made it, I chopped up the candy, then mixed the pieces in some melted milk chocolate. I then spread it on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper to cool. The problem with this is that it looked ugly. It kind of looked like chewed up and spit out candy bar. Yeah. Sick.

The following year, we again bought way more candy than we needed. I made the bark in the same way, but drizzled melted white chocolate on top for some visual appeal. Again, it tasted good and looked just a little less gross.

This year, I think I got it. It turned out looking so festive! I used a slightly different method and threw some candy corn on top. Success! 

Ingredients:
3-4 fun sized Baby Ruth bars
3-4 fun sized Butterfinger bars
3-4 fun sized 1000 Grand bars
3-4 fun sized Crunch bars
3-4 fun sized Snickers bars
3-4 fun sized Milky Way bars
3-4 fun sized 3 Musketeers bars
2 regular sized Heath bars
1 regular sized Cookies ‘n Cream Hershey bar
1/2 cup of Peanut Butter M&Ms
1/2 cup of mini marshmallows
1/2 cup candy corn
12-16oz milk chocolate, melted
2oz white chocolate, melted

Directions:

1. Chop up candy into small pieces. Note: You can use whatever leftover Halloween candy you have, or whatever you like. The ingredients listed are just what I used for this batch.
2. Melt about 12-16 oz. milk chocolate. To save time, I melted mine in the microwave. You could certainly melt it in a double broiler instead.
3. Pour the melted chocolate onto a cookie sheet covered in parchment paper. Spread the chocolate out evenly so you have 1/8″ to a 1/4″ in thickness.
4. Press the chopped up candy into the chocolate. Note: If you have left over candy or melted chocolate, or just want to make the ultimate bark, add another layer. After I pressed in the candy, I added another layer of melted chocolate and more chopped candy.
5. Melt the white chocolate (again, I did this in the microwave). Use a spoon or silicon spatula to drizzle on top of your bark.
6. Press in the candy corn, and top with more white chocolate if desired.
7. Let the bark set at room temperature, or in the refrigerator. Once set, break off or cut into smaller pieces. Enjoy!

   

Cherpumple Challenge

Cherpumple. What does that even mean?! Yeah, I asked myself that same thing when my husband sent me this link. Clearly I’m arriving a little late to this party considering this article was posted about a year ago, but this is the first I’m hearing about his culinary dessert phenomenon. And just how did I hear about it? My husband’s coworker presented the challenge to me.

So what is Cherpumple? It’s a triple layer cake with a pie baked into each layer. It seems to be the pastry version of the turducken (which I’ve actually had, btw, and it’s pretty good!). According to the WSJ article, Cherpumple is a cherry pie baked inside a white cake, a pumpkin pie baked inside a yellow cake, and an apple pie baked into a spice cake. It is then smothered in cream cheese frosting. Swoon! And who created such a wild and crazy dessert? None other than Charles Phoenix.

Those of you who know me know that I LOVE to bake pies, so this challenge is definitely in my ballpark. However, I see a couple flaws with this original recipe.

1. The use of frozen pies. No thanks. If When I do this, I’ll make my pies from scratch, crust and all.
2. The use of boxed cake mix. Again. Meh. I’ll make my own mix. It’s easy peasy.
3. Canned frosting. Yuck! I am NOT a fan of canned frosting. It tastes processed and plastic-y to me. I’ll make my own cream cheese frosting, thank you very much.

If When I do this, I might try different flavor combinations. I don’t know. We’ll see. I plan on doing this sometime before 2012, and I’ll definitely keep you posted on the super success or epic fail!

Have any of you been crazy enough to try this? What are you thoughts?

 

Chewy Popcorn Balls

Before this weekend, I had never attempted to make my own popcorn balls before. I was never a huge fan of the traditional Halloween treat, but when I asked my husband what I should bring to a Halloween party that is kid friendly, he responded without skipping a beat, “Popcorn Balls!!” So, I challenged myself, and the result was far better than expected.

I decided to make the popcorn balls look like pumpkins, so I ended up putting chocolate Twizzlers in them to be the stem of the pumpkin. I wanted green Twizzlers, but I couldn’t find any. I’m not a fan of chocolate flavored Twizzlers, but in this case, they were merely for appearance.

I combined a couple of recipes to get to my end result, which not only looked good, but tasted great. They were the perfect combination of chewy, buttery, and sweet…perfect. Enjoy!

Chewy Popcorn Balls – Pumpkins

Yield: 16-20 popcorn balls

Ingredients:
3/4 cups light corn syrup
1/4 cup butter
2 teaspoons cold water
2 & 3/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 & 1/2 cups marshmallows
3 bags of popped microwave popcorn (I used lightly buttered)
red and yellow food coloring
chocolate flavored Twizzlers, cut in half

Directions:

1. Pop the three bags of microwave popcorn and put into large bowls. Make sure to sift out the kernels.
2. In a saucepan over medium heat, combine the corn syrup, margarine, cold water, confectioners’ sugar and marshmallows. Add red and yellow food coloring to get to your desired shade of orange (2 drops red, 3 drops yellow). Heat and stir until the mixture comes to a boil.
3. Quickly and carefully combine the hot mixture with the popcorn, coating each kernel. Be careful – it will be very hot! You can use a silicon spatula to coat the popcorn.
4. Grease your hands with vegetable shortening and quickly shape the coated popcorn into balls around half a chocolate flavored Twizzler before it cools. Again, be careful – the mixture will still be hot. You might want to use rubber gloves (still greased).
5. Wrap with cellophane or plastic wrap and store at room temperature.

New Music Wednesday: Christina Perri & Lydia Christine Crigger

I have a fairly eclectic taste in music. Pop, punk, ska, jazz, alternative, dance, electronica…they hold a little piece of my heart. I like to think I have a strong appreciation for most any kind of music.

Lately, I’ve been loving Christina Perri. A couple weeks (or maybe months) ago, I saw her perform live on some daytime show and I fell in love. The way she emotes her songs is incredible. She has this raw sound to her voice that I really love, too.

Not too long ago, I was perusing my Facebook and came across a sorority sister of mine. I saw that she had posted a number of videos, so of course I had to click them. I didn’t know she was in to music, let alone playing and singing her own stuff. For some reason I don’t remember that from college. Then again, she was a couple years younger than me, so maybe this happened after I graduated. Anyway, curiosity got the better of me and before I knew it, I had officially stalked this girl’s music – and I think she’s fantastic! She reminds me of Christina Perri in a way. Check her out!

Feather Hair Extensions

Last season when I was watching American Idol (guilty pleasure!), I didn’t quite understand the feathers in Steven Tyler’s hair, but he could pull it off. And the more I saw him, the more I started to love the trend. I just couldn’t help myself.

I’m not daring enough to go and get feather extensions actually threaded in, but I am lucky to have an awesomely attentive family member who follows me on Twitter and took note of this new trend I’m in to. She happened to be out and about and picked me up TWO feather extension clips. One is more subtle and one is more fun. How perfect! Not only am I the proud owner of some feathers, but I now have options. Priceless.

I wore my fun feathers this past weekend. I don’t know why, but I love the white synthetic hair strand attached to it. It makes me feel like Rogue from X-Men.

What are your thoughts on this trend?

DIY: Vanilla Extract

Apparently the food blogging trend of the day is making your own vanilla extract. I saw this exact topic on a handful of blogs I follow, so how can I not want to try it?!

I have my mason jars ready to go and just need to determine which vanilla beans to use and which alcohol. I’m leaning towards Mexican or Bourbon vanilla beans, though Madagascar beans are cheaper…
…and I can’t decide if I’ll use vodka or rum. Has anybody out there done this? If so, what did you use and what do you recommend? I also hear cheap booze is the way to go for this – true or false? I use vanilla extract mostly in my baking – so for sweet things – if that makes a difference.

I’d love some insight and direction for those of you experienced DIY-ers. Otherwise, stay tuned for an update on how this turns out in a couple months! It’ll be just in time for the holidays!

Photo Credit: Shutterstock

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars

I’ve been on a serious apple baking kick since we went to Long Grove’s Apple Fest 2ish weeks ago. Fall is my favorite season, so I definitely embrace the flavors: all things pumpkin and apple.

My husband loves apples, and I love cheesecake and Paula Deen, so I found this amazing recipe for Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars with Streusel Topping. It’s easy to make and so delicious! I didn’t even look to see how bad it is for you, but sometimes I just don’t care. Everything’s fine in moderation, right? (I might have an unusual definition of “moderation” though…)

Caramel Apple Cheesecake Bars

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
2 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1/2 cup sugar, plus 2 tablespoons, divided
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 apples, peeled, cored and finely chopped (Paula recommends Granny Smith, but I used Cortland and Winesap)
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
Streusel topping, recipe follows
1/2 cup caramel topping

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, combine flour and brown sugar. Cut in butter with a pastry blender until mixture is crumbly. Press evenly into a 9x13x2 inch buttered baking pan. Bake 15 minutes or until lightly browned.

In a large bowl, beat cream cheese with 1/2 cup sugar in an electric mixer at medium speed until smooth. Then add eggs, 1 at a time, and vanilla. Stir to combine. Pour over warm crust.

In a small bowl, stir together chopped apples, remaining 2 tablespoons sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Spoon evenly over cream cheese mixture. Sprinkle evenly with Streusel topping. Bake 30 minutes, or until filling is set. Drizzle with caramel topping.

Streusel Topping

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup quick cooking oats
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened

In a small bowl, combine all ingredients.
Yield: about 3 cups

Fall Fashion: Faux Fur

I’ll be honest, I used to shy away from fur – real and faux, for no seemingly good reason – but I think I might embrace it this season. I don’t know; I kind of dig it.

I think I need to start sporting fur in moderation, though - a la this BB Dakota Leather Jacket or this French Connection army jacket:

     

Then again, there’s something badass and elegant about a full fur coat like this Tahari belted jacket, or this Shelli Segal flared coat:

           

 

What are your thoughts on this Fall trend?

Homemade Flaky Pastry Dough

I try to bake from scratch as much as possible. I don’t buy my pie crusts, and I don’t (usually) buy my puff pastry either. I’ve been on the search for a good pastry dough recipe for awhile. It’s nearing the end of apple season here in the Midwest, which means it’s prime baking time for apple treats, which are my husband’s favorite. Every year I get the request for apple crisp and apple turnovers. I tried making apple turnovers with my favorite pie crust recipe, but it wasn’t the same. It was missing something.

This year I think I finally got it. It took a few years of trial and error, but this recipe I came up with is a keeper! I most recently used it for apple turnovers, but I think it would be great for any sweet recipe. If you’re looking for savory, just add less sugar and you should be good to go.

 

Homemade Pastry Dough

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3 tbsp. chilled shortening
1 stick (8 oz.) chilled butter, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
1/4 tsp. salt
2 tbsp. granulated sugar
1/3 cup iced water

 

Mix the flour and fats (butter and shortening) together in a large mixing bowl until the mixture is crumbly (use a pastry blender, two forks, or your fingers). Dissolve the salt and sugar in the iced water, and then blend it into flour and fat with a rubber spatula. With your hands,  the dough into a ball. Turn it out onto a  pasty cloth (or board, or waxed paper), and quickly knead it with the heel of your hands (just a couple times is fine). Gather the dough into a ball, flour lightly, and wrap in waxed paper or plastic wrap to chill for at least two hours. Makes an 8 to 10 inch shell or a 12 x 8 inch rectangle.

Baby Banz!

We’ve had quite the Indian Summer here in Chicagoland. After a couple weeks of temperatures in the 50s, we’ve been enjoying some 80 degree, sunny weather. We went on a nice photo walk  and took a trip to the pumpkin patch this weekend and though the colors scream Autumn, the temps sure do not. With the sun beating down on us and not a cloud in the sky, we were happy to have our Baby Banz with us all weekend. Noah also thinks it’s cool to wear his sunglasses just like his goofy parents.

I definitely recommend these for your little guys. They stay on great and Baby seems to be a lot happier not having to squint. Check ‘em out!