s'mores ice cream

This ice cream might just be the epitome of Summer.  All the flavours of our favorite campfire treat come together in a delicious explosion, and we think you'll love it!

(In case you were wondering....no, I

still

haven't been camping yet.  Don't judge me.)

As the days are slowly getting shorter, and the mornings a bit crisper, why not celebrate the last days of Summer with something epic?

S'mores ice cream.  Best of both worlds? I think so!

S'mores Ice Cream

Ingredients:

2 cups whole milk

2 cups heavy cream

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup graham cracker crumbs

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup mini marshmallows

1 cup chopped dark chocolate

Directions:

1)  Mix together milk, cream, sugar, graham cracker crumbs, salt and vanilla.

2)  Pour mixture into ice cream maker.

3)  Once the mixture just starts to thicken, very slowly add in the mini marshmallows and chocolate pieces.

4)  Pour into a container and allow to harden in the freezer for 12-24 hours before serving.

Optional: Top with a graham cracker, a couple pieces of dark chocolate, and a roasted marshmallow! 

*You can roast your marshmallows on a cookie sheet in the oven on broil if you don't want to go out and start a fire.  Just don't take your eyes off of them or they'll burn!

Also, the pumpkin spice takeover needs to hold on for a second....we're not done with Summer here!

p.s. 

♥ kelsey & jordyn

lemon layer dessert // a guest blog over at sift and whisk

Hello friends!  A couple months ago we were asked to be a guest blogger for Sift and Whisk while she was on maternity leave...and were so excited that she reached out to us!  We chose to make a lemon layer dessert, which we think is so perfect for Summer.

Hop on over to Sift and Whisk for the full recipe!

p.s.  ♥ kelsey

funky monkey bars

Mmmmhh...Funky Monkey Bars.

Now these are definitely one of our classic family recipes.  My mom cut the original recipe out of a magazine over 20 years ago....and it has stood the test of time!  You start with fudgey brownies (that have to be made from a box....otherwise they just will

not

work!), and then top it with peanuts, more chocolate, and a drizzle of honey and peanut butter.

These make a mess when you eat them...and they're totally worth it.

And a hilarious story about these....they were originally called Chunky Monkey Bars.  Somewhere along the line, someone started calling them "Funky" Monkey Bars, and the name just stuck!  Seriously though, I have no idea what monkeys have to do with any of it!

Funky Monkey Bars

Ingredients:

1 Brownie mix

1/4 cup of vegetable oil

1/4 cup of water

1 egg

1/2 cup honey

1/4 cup peanut butter

1 cup chocolate chips

1 cup peanuts

Directions: 

1)

 Don't follow the directions on the box!

  Instead, place the mix in a large bowl and add the oil, water, and egg.  Mix just until moist.  

2)  Spread in a greased 9x13 pan, and bake at 350 degrees for 20 minutes.

3)  While the bottom layer is baking, heat up your honey and peanut butter and stir together.  

4)  Immediately after removing brownies from the oven, sprinkle them with chocolate chips and peanuts.  

5)  Drizzle honey and peanut butter mixture over everything.

Cool before cutting.  Keep refrigerated!

**These take a

long

 time to cool (as in, more than an hour), so you'll want to make them well in advance of serving them!

If you don't like super sweet desserts, then these probably aren't for you!  They really are pretty decadent...so be warned!  Or feel free to leave out the chocolate chips on top, and let the saltiness of the peanuts help balance out the flavors.  Sweet and salty.  Is there anything better?

p.s. 

♥

 kelsey & jordyn

3-layer angel food peeps cake

We're eating this tonight and I can't wait.  It seriously took A LOT of self control not to chow down on this cake while photographing it.

Jordyn baked this cake last night (I helped by sifting and showing her weird things on tumblr...), and then my mom and I finished decorating it with buttercream layers, 7-minute frosting, and peeps!

Does anyone out there actually even like peeps?  I had my first one today...and I'm not a huge fan.  But they are kind of cute, so I guess I can handle them once a year. Ha!

This cake was inspired by Tieghan from

halfbaked harvest

, who created a gorgeous

6-layer coconut creation

with peeps on top!  If you don't follow her

blog

....hop to it!  She's insanely talented and so creative.

Now this cake has a lot of icing going on, so it's definitely for those of you that have a major sweet tooth!

I love the idea of putting coloured icing inside cakes.  It's such a nice, fun surprise when you finally cut it.

The recipes for homemade angel food cake and 7-minute frosting are below, but if you'd like some step-by-steps photos as well, you can click

here

for our original post including both of them!

Angel Food Cake

from: Fayrene De Koker (allrecipes.com)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups of Egg Whites (approx. 10-12 eggs) - *it's important that your eggs are at room temperature before you start!

1 1/4 cups of Icing Sugar

1 cup of Flour

1 1/2 tsp Cream of Tartar

1 1/2 tsp Vanilla

1/2 tsp Almond Extract

1/4 tsp Salt

1 cup Sugar

optional (but not really optional): 

1 TBSP

nonpareils (sprinkles) - to make your cake colourful!

Directions:

1)  First, separate the egg whites from the yolks, being careful that no yolk contaminates each egg white.  Make sure that you have 1 1/2 cups of egg whites, and place in a mixing bowl.

2)  Next, in a separate bowl, sift your icing sugar and flour together three times, and set aside.

3)  Add cream of tartar, vanilla and almond extracts, and salt to the egg whites.  Beat on high speed, and gradually add in sugar.  Mix until all of the sugar is dissolved, and stiff peaks have formed.

4)  Very gently, fold in flour mixture, 1/4 cup at a time.  Then fold in nonpareils!

5)  Gently spoon into an ungreased 10-inch tube pan.

6)  Bake for 40-45 minutes at 350 degrees.

7)  Immediately invert pan onto a cooling rack, and let the cake cool completely before removing from the pan.

7-minute Frosting

from: Company's Coming: Cakes - Jean Pare

Ingredients:

2 egg whites

1 1/2 cups Sugar

1/3 cup Cold Water

1 1/2 tsp Light Corn Syrup

1 tsp Vanilla

Directions:

1)  Set up a double boiler (ie. one pot sits on the burner with a bit of boiling water, and another pot/metal bowl sits on top of it.) and bring water to a rapid boil.

2)  In your top pot/bowl mix together egg whites, sugar, water, and corn syrup until well mixed.

3)  Place it over boiling water, and beat constantly on high for 7 minutes, or until the frosting will stand in peaks when the beaters are raised.

4)  Remove from heat, and beat in vanilla.

5)  Immediately frost your cake, as this frosting will set very quickly.

Buttercream

Ingredients

1/2 cup Butter or margarine (at room temperature

3 cups Icing Sugar

1 tsp Vanilla

2-5 TBSP Cream

Directions

1)  Begin by beating your butter on medium-high until well mixed.

2)  Add icing sugar, vanilla, and a couple tablespoons of cream.

3)  Beat on medium until combined.

4) Here's the tricky part: use a spatula to test the consistency, and stick a spoon in to do a taste test.  Adjust the taste and consistency by adding any of the above ingredients!

Once our angel food cake was completely cooled, I carefully cut it into three layers using a large serrated bread knife.  Then I made a batch of butter cream, coloured half pink and half purple, and iced each layer one colour.  After the cake is reassembled, we made 7-minute frosting and iced the rest of the cake, and added the sprinkles and peeps.  Be sure to add your peeps on quite quickly, before your frosting sets!

And props to my mom for letting me cut this cake up before we served it at our family's Easter dinner! I put it back together and nobody could even tell.  Ha!

p.s. 

♥

 kelsey (&  jordyn & momma)

Paska (Easter Bread)

Sometimes you eat sweet bread for breakfast, and pretend like it's not actually dessert.

No judgement, right?

It's Paska season!!!

Now, if you're of German, Ukrainian or Russian descent....then you probably know what's up with Paska.  If you're not, then you might be a bit confused.  Paska is a sweet bread that is made for Easter, and is often topped with icing and sprinkles!  (You can read more about it here)

All you really need to know is that it's white bread with sprinkles.  That gets an A in my book any day!

My lovely momma helped me whip up this batch of paska, as she is the expert bread maker in our house!  She's a pretty swell teacher, and I hope one day I can bake bread as well as her!

If you're a bit nervous about yeast baking....don't be!  Homemade bread always wins.

This recipe comes from my Auntie Irene (who technically isn't my aunt, but is best buds with my mom....you know how it is).  She has such a generous spirit, and is known for baking batch after batch of this stuff and gifting it away to everyone she meets.  She's the best!

---

p a s k a

recipe from: Irene Claassen
yield: approximately 5 loaves, or 40-45 buns (this will depend on the size)

Ingredients:

2 1/2 tsp yeast

1 cup warm water

2 tsp sugar

2 cups milk

3/4 cup butter

5 eggs

1/2 cup sugar

1 tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla

1 lemon (juiced and zested)

9-10 cups flour

.

Paska is best fresh, so we pop most of ours into the freezer (sometimes we slice our loaves before that), and then take them out whenever we desire!

Directions:

1)  In a small bowl, mix together yeast, warm water and sugar.  Set aside for about 10 minutes to let rise. (If it doesn't get nice and puffy, try again.  If your yeast is old and not rising, you'll want to buy some new stuff!)

2)  Add milk and butter together in a small saucepan, and heat until butter is melted.  Remove from heat and cool.

3)  In a large bowl, beat eggs until frothy.

4)  Slowly add the sugar to your eggs, then add salt, vanilla, lemon juice and lemon zest.

*Now this is when you'll want to pour the mixture into a Bosch bread mixer (or attach a dough hook to your beaters).

5)  Add yeast mixture, as well as the butter and milk to the egg mixture.

6)  Start adding flour, and stop when the dough starts to pull away from the sides of your bowl.  For us, it was around 9 3/4 cups, but it'll be a bit different every time depending on the size of your eggs and lemon.  This is quite a sticky dough, so don't be tempted to add any more flour than you really need to....otherwise you'll get tough paska!

7)  Once your dough has pulled away from the sides, keep mixing for another 8 minutes.  (Or you can always knead by hand!).

8)  Transfer into a large, greased bowl, cover with a clean tea towel, and let rise in a warm place for 1 1/2 hours (or until doubled in size).  Then punch down, and let rise for another half hour.

9)  Form dough into loaves (or buns) and place on greased pans to rise for another 1-2 hours.

10)  For loaves: bake at 325 degrees for 10 minutes, and then at 275 degrees for 15-20 minutes more until nicely browned.  If you're nervous about them not being done, you can always cut a loaf open to make sure the inside isn't gummy!

For buns: bake at 325 degrees for 13 minutes.

Optional:  You can choose to serve these with icing and sprinkles, or toasted with butter.

---

Some people like icing the top of their bread, others like to slice it and then ice the face of the bread.  My family loves toasting it and topping it with butter!  Sweet and salty.  So good.

There really isn't a wrong way to do it.  So whatever floats your boat is just fine!

All of the sprinkles that were used in the making of this post made me insanely happy.

What didn't make me happy was walking on sprinkles, and sweeping up sprinkles forever and ever.

They're kind of like glitter....you can never really get rid of them all!

♥ kelsey

chocolate pecan caramel thumbprint cookies

Mmmhhh....caramel!  You can't say that you're surprised that it's shown up again so soon. Ha!

We made these cookies for Christmas (yeah yeah...I'm working on the whole procrastinating thing), and they were a huge hit.  Definitely a bit more work than your average cookie...but well worth it when you want something extra special.

These cookies have so many wonderful textures going on...from the crunch of the nuts, chewiness of the chocolate cookie, and finally the smooth creaminess of the caramel!

Chocolate Pecan Caramel Thumbprint Cookies

adapted from: taste of home

Yields: ~2.5 dozen

Ingredients: 

1/2 cup butter, softened

2/3 cup sugar

1 egg, separated

2 tablespoons milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/3 cup cocoa powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup finely chopped pecans (walnuts would be a great alternative!)

FILLING:

12 to 14 caramels

3 tablespoons heavy whipping cream

Directions:

1)  Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

2)  In a large bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

3)  Beat in the egg yolk, milk and vanilla.

4)  In a small bowl, mix together the flour, cocoa powder and salt.  Gradually add to the creamed mixture.

5)  Shape dough into approximately 1-inch balls.  Place egg white in a shallow bowl and beat.  Place chopped pecans in another shallow bowl.

6)  Dip dough balls into the egg white, then pecans.  (You may need to pat the pecans on to help them stick to the dough)

7)  Place on a greased baking sheet and press a deep indentation into each dough ball.  (We used a measuring spoon, which worked well!  Your thumb would also be a good option...haha).

8)  Bake for 10-12 minutes or until set.  As soon as you remove from the oven, re-press your indentations to make sure they're deep.

9)  In a medium saucepan, melt caramels with cream on low and stir until smooth.

10)  Fill each cookie with the caramel mixture and allow caramel to cool and set. (Work as fast as possible here as the caramel tends to set very quickly.)

p.s.

 ♥ kelsey

mocha cheesecake

I could have titled this post: "the only cheesecake I ever make", because that is the truth.  

I've tried several other recipes for cheesecakes, but this one is my all-time favorite.  Since cheesecake is a relatively expensive dessert that I tend to only make once in a while (for special occasions!), I really don't like experimenting too much.  I just love this recipe too much!

Also, for those of you who aren't really coffee fans...fear not!  I'm totally not a coffee drinker (at all), and I can't get enough of this cake.  If you're still not sure, you can always leave out the instant coffee for an excellent chocolate cheesecake!

Mocha Cheesecake

from: Jean Pare - Company's Coming: Chocolate Everything

Ingredients:

1/3 cup margarine, melted

1 1/3 cups graham cracker crumbs

1/3 cup sugar

3 tbsp cocoa powder

3 oz semisweet chocolate chips

3 packages cream cheese (8 ounces each), softened to room temperature

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp flour

2 tsp vanilla

3 large eggs, at room temperature

1/4 cup milk

1 tbsp instant coffee granules

*whipped cream for topping (optional)

Directions:

Crust:

1)  In a small bowl, stir together margarine, crumbs, sugar and cocoa.

2)  Press into an ungreased 9-inch springform pan; set aside.

Cake:

1)  Melt chocolate using a double boiler (or in the microwave if you're very careful not to burn it!).  Set aside and let cool to room temperature once melted.

2)  Beat cream cheese, both sugars, flour and vanilla in a medium bowl.  Add in melted chocolate and beat until well mixed.

3)  Add eggs, one at a time, until just mixed.

4)  Stir together milk and instant coffee until granules are completely dissolved.  Add to the batter, mixing until just combined.

5)  Pour over crust.

6)  Bake at 300 degrees for about 1 1/2 hours until the center is almost set.

7)  When you've removed the cake from the oven, run a knife around the edges to help the cake settle without cracking.

8)  Chill for 8 hours or overnight.

Optional:

Chocolate Magic Shell Sauce:

Melt together 1/2 cup of chocolate (doesn't matter what kind!), and add 1 tbsp of coconut oil.  Stir together.

Pour over chilled cheesecake like you would a ganache, and the chocolate will form a shell!

*Our cheesecake was a teensy bit warm when we poured our magic shell over top, so that's why it looks a bit glossy still.  But if you've chilled your cake properly, or if you pop it back in the fridge once you've poured the chocolate over, then it will form a shell of chocolate that is so pretty!

This cake is long gone, but editing these photos were seriously making me drool.

#foodphotographerproblems

p.s.

 ♥ kelsey

[baked] apple cider donuts

I've been seeing a lot of Fall bucket lists going around the interwebs these days, and sometimes they make me chuckle. I live on a pumpkin patch where I pick apples for my job, we make apple cider on a weekly basis, there are hayrides every day of the week, and picking corn is kind of like a boring version of a corn maze.  Sooo....I've definitely crossed off most things on these bucket lists without even trying!  It reminds me not to take things for granted, and every day I feel so blessed to live and work in such a cool place.

However, one of the things on my Fall baking bucket list was to make apple cider donuts!  I had never actually heard of such a thing until I came across a post on tumblr about them.  I was instantly intrigued, and thought they sounded like the epitome of a Fall dessert.  Warm, cozy, fluffy donuts with apple cider and cinnamon?  Perfection!  

My expectations were cautiously high for these donuts, and I wasn't disappointed!  I also quite successfully convinced myself that because they were baked donuts (and not deep-fried), they must be healthy for you.  Am I right?

Apple Cider Baked Donuts
adapted from: eat, live, run

yields: 11-12 donuts

Ingredients:

2 cups all purpose flour

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 tsp cinnamon

2 eggs

2 tbsp unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup apple cider

1/4 cup buttermilk  [or 1/4 cup of milk with 1/2 tsp of vinegar....let stand for 5-10 minutes before using]

Topping:
2 tbsp butter, melted
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup white sugar
1 tbsp cinnamon (or to taste)

Directions:

1)  In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon.

2)  In a smaller bowl, mix together the softened butter with the eggs until fluffy (doing this ensures that your butter doesn't re-solidify once the cold buttermilk and cider are added).  Add buttermilk and apple cider, and mix well.

3)  Pour wet ingredients into the dry, and stir until just blended.  Try not to overmix!

4)  Spread the batter into a greased donut pan.  I used a large spoon to drop the batter in, or placing your batter into a pastry bag to pipe into the pan makes the process nice and easy.  Fill each mold about 3/4 full.

5)  Bake at 350 degrees for 8-10 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. You may want to break open a test donut just to make sure the inside isn't gummy!

6)  For the topping: melt the butter in a bowl that will fit a donut inside it.  Then, dip each donut quickly into the butter, and then into the cinnamon sugar mixture.

*These are best on the first day, as they tend to get a bit soggy once you place them in a container.

Do you have your own version of a Fall bucket list?  I'd love to hear what's on them! 

-kels