Tag: food coloring

HOMEMADE CHOCOLATE DIPPED TWINKIES…OR JUST REGULAR TWINKIES, BUT ALL HOMEMADE!

2 cups all-purpose flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup whole milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
yellow food coloring

Preheat oven to 325 and grease a Twinkie pan with Coconut oil spray as I did or Pam.

1. Beat butter and sugar.
2. Add eggs and vanilla.
3. Combine dry ingredients.
4. Add dry ingredients in 3 parts alternating with milk. Begin and end with dry ingred.
5. Add a drop of yellow food coloring to look Twinkie like!
6. Pour 1 scant ice cream scoop full into each Twinkie mold.
7. Bake about 15 mins.
Cool completely.
Poke 3 holes in bottom using a wide pastry tip. Use a skinnier tip to pipe in the whipped cream. Recipe below.

CREAM RECIPE:
2 tablespoons cold water
1 1/4 teaspoons unflavored gelatin
1 1/2 cups chilled heavy cream
3/4 cup powdered sugar

Add the cold water to a small bowl, then sprinkle the gelatin over it. Allow to sit for about 10 minutes, until it has set.
In
a small skillet, add about 1/2-inch of water, and heat over medium-high
heat. Place the small bowl with the gelatin directly inside the
skillet. Stir the gelatin until it is melted, about 2 minutes. Remove
the bowl from the skillet.
In
the mixer, use whisk attachment and beat the
heavy cream & powdered sugar. Beat on high to soft peaks. Add in the melted gelatin
mixture and continue to beat until stiff peaks have formed.

Once filled you can dip in chocolate if desired. Chill firm before dipping. Melt chocoate of choice in an 8×8 pyrex and lay twinkie in pan. Spoon melted chocolate over it and set on wax paper in fridge to firm up.
*** NOTE: I BOUGHT MY TWINKIE PAN AT SUR LA TABLE

WATERMELON ICE BOX COOKIES

Not too long ago I made these Lemon Ice Box Cookies and loved them. They were so easy and I loved how they were reminiscent of shortbread. As I was writing up the post I had the idea to adapt the recipe to make the cookies look like little watermelon slices. Well, finally 4 months later (after we moved our family of 7 to a new-to-us short sale home!) the dust is settling and I was able to act on my idea. They turned out absolutely darling! They’d be perfect for a summer barbecue. Enjoy!

Watermelon Ice Box Cookies
recipe adapted from our Lemon Icebox Cookies
Yields about 24 cookies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1 large egg yolk
1 tsp milk
1/4 tsp watermelon flavoring (I found my bottle of LorAnn Oils at Walmart in the cake decorating section)
1-2 drops pink food coloring
3 rounded TBSP mini chocolate chips
2-3 TBSP green decorating sugar, for rolling

In a food processor (or Kitchenaid mixer, like I used) pulse flour, powdered sugar, and salt until combined. Add butter and pulse/mix until sandy. Add egg yolk, milk, watermelon flavoring and food coloring and mix until dough comes together. Add chocolate chips and mix until they’re well distributed. Remove from mixer and form dough into a 2.5″ wide log. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm. (At least 2 hours, but up until 1 month.)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove cookie log from fridge and let sit for about 10 minutes. Spread green sugar sugar on a plate; roll cookie log over sugar to coat outside. I used about 1/4 of the bottle of green sugar- you’ll have to roll it several times to get it all covered. You can even use your fingers to fill in certain spots. Slice log into just larger than 1/4″ slices and arrange on a parchment-lined baking sheet. I got 12 rounds from my cookie log. Cut each cookie round in half, so that you have slices of “watermelon.”

Bake about 12-14 minutes, until cookies are golden brown around edges.

Cool completely and ENJOY!

FRENCH MACARONS

I don’t know if any of you have tried to make these finicky cookies, but man they are good. I’ve tried a few recipes and this seems to be the easiest. Oh, and if you happen to curse while you make these, it doesn’t count. Cursing is excused while making these, it’s part of the language of the French Macarons.
I’ve included tips that I have learned along the way as well as some that were included with the recipe.

FRENCH MACARONS
Recipe From Entertaining with Beth

INGREDIENTS

3 Egg Whites*
1/4 cup White Sugar
2 cups Confectioners Sugar (powdered sugar)
1 cup Almond Flour**
Pinch of Salt
1/4 tsp Cream of Tartar

*Eggs need to be at room temperature before beginning this recipe.
**Almond flour is better to use than almond meal, although you can still use almond meal if that is all you have or can find.

METHOD

Let your eggs come to room temperature. This could take a few hours, I like to take the eggs out of the fridge the night before, if I am making them in the morning. If you don’t have time for that, you can submerse them in warm water for 10-15 minutes. Make sure the water isn’t too hot to avoid cooking them. I also take more out than I need because I don’t know what is in the egg and if I goof up on the recipe, I have the eggs ready to go for the next batch.

Place three egg whites in the mixer and whip until fluffy or foamy. Then add granulated sugar, salt, and cream of tartar. Whip in the mixer until very stiff peaks form. This could take 8 – 10 minutes.

While the mixer is whipping the eggs, sugar, salt and cream of tartar, place the almond flour and the confectioners sugar in a sieve and sift it together. You may be left with larger bits of the almond flour. You can eat those or throw those away.

When the egg whites have reached their stiff form it should look something like this.

Then add the food coloring. The coloring will fade slightly while it is baking so add a little more, if you’d like. With this recipe, I added red food coloring and got a pinkish peach color. Mix the color in, it doesn’t have to be completely blended as you will do that with the next step.

When the color is blended in, add the almond flour/powdered sugar mixture. Take out your spatula and fold the almond mixture into the egg white mixture with the spatula. You have been super careful with this step. If you don’t blend it enough your macarons will be lumpy and cracked, or if you blend it too much then your macarons will be flat and not form their “feet”. Beth (the creator of this recipe) says 65-75 turns of your spatula should be about the right amount of time. You want it to look like lava coming out of the volcano. Do NOT use your mixer for this step.

Once you have reached the right consistency, spoon the mixture into a piping bag and pipe out smaller circles, 1-2 inches, onto a cookie sheet that has been covered with either a silpat or parchment paper. It is best not to use Pam Spray or anything like that as it will change the consistency of the mixture and ruin the macarons.

Once the circles have been piped out, bang the cookie sheet against the table, 3-5 times to get air bubbles out of the macarons. This will help prevent cracking on the top of the cookie.

At this point, we let the macarons sit on the table and set for at least 20 minutes – up to about an hour. This will allow them some time to dry out. You want them to be slightly tacky but not sticky. When they dry out it prevents them from spreading while in the hot oven and this helps to create the feet on the cookie. While they are setting, get the oven preheated to 300 degrees F.

Bake the cookies for no less than 20 minutes. If you under bake them, they will stick to the parchment paper. I like to bake them for about 21-22 minutes – yes, you need to be that picky about the timing. After a few tries, you should be used to your oven and how it bakes the macarons and you’ll know for sure the best timing for them. It is also best to bake them one tray at a time. Yes, they like to have the whole oven to themselves.

After they have baked, take the macarons out of the oven and allow them to cool on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes. They should peel nicely and quickly off the cookie sheet. If, however, they do stick to the pan a little, you can use a spatula to take them off or leave them for a little longer on the cookie sheet. Place them on a cooling rack to completely cool.

When they have completely cooled, turn half of them over. Pipe a small amount of buttercream frosting on them and top with another cookie.

Recipe for frosting is below this picture.

RASPBERRY BUTTERCREAM FROSTING

1 1/2 cup Salted Butter
3 cups Powdered Sugar
2 cups of Raspberries, worked through a sieve to extract about 6 tablespoons of juice.

Mix altogether in a mixer. Place in a piping bag.

Devour!!!

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