Heath Bar Cookies

Here it is-- the moment you've all been waiting for. I've decided to share my recipe for the best cookies ever (according to Adam). They really are truly awesome cookies. I get a lot of compliments and requests for these, and they are so easy! I found this recipe for chocolate chip cookies and just substitute the chips for broken Heath bar chunks. Don't buy the Heath bar pieces, buy the actual bars and break them on your own. That way you get big pieces--- what you get in the bag is small little crumbs and it doesn't taste the same. You could also do other things.... dark chocolate is good, as is butterscotch chips. I've also tried chopping up Snickers, but really Heath is the best.

In blender mix:
1 cup packed brown sugar (I use dark-- better tasting)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cubes melted butter (this is key)
Add 1 egg and 1 egg yolk
2 tsp vanilla
Mix together dry ingredients in a separate bowl (I never sift):
2 cups + 2TB flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
Mix into wet ingredients. Then stir in chopped up Heath bars (I use 6 bars-- 1.4 oz each).
Then I bake at 325 for 14 minutes total (swapping front to back and top to bottom 7 minutes in). I prefer my cookies to be slightly underbaked so they remain soft. When you see them turning slightly brown at the edges, take them out of the oven. They will cook a little longer on the sheet. Let them sit for a couple of minutes and then remove them with a metal spatula onto a cooling rack. Try not to eat them all before they cool completely. Yum!

Going back in time part 2: Devin's 1st Birthday Cake

For Devin's first birthday I was super excited to do his birthday cake-- I spent a lot of time planning exactly what I wanted to do--- and since he is a boy, I wanted to do a train cake. It was a big undertaking. I actually am a bit embarrased to divulge that I did a couple of trial cakes before the big day. With disastrous results to boot. It was a good thing I practiced, otherwise I probably would have had a meltdown the day of the party.

Anyway, my mother-in-law gave me the idea to bake the train engine in a recycled Hi-C can (you know, the juice that comes in a can). It was the perfect shape and worked well, but I had to practice to know how long to bake it. I practiced with a box cake mix and the first time I really undercooked it and when I went to remove the cake, it literally ran out of the mold. Yikes! Live and learn.... Eventually I figured it out.

The day before his birthday I took a vacation day from my full-time job and spent the day baking, cutting, assembling, de-assembling, mixing frosting, buying candy to decorate, preparing the cake board, etc. It was fun!

Here are some pics of the process and the final product.

I was pretty pleased and Devin seemed to like his first taste of cake (from scratch, of course)!

Going Back in Time: Devin's 2nd Birthday

When Devin turned 2 he was really into the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on the Disney channel (in fact he still loves that show). So, I wanted to do a Mickey themed birthday cake. I found a simple Mickey face on line and saved it into powerpoint-- then I played around and printed out different sizes to get a size that would fit my 9" cake pan well... I actually went a little bigger (you can see it cut off his ears a bit) because I wanted the face to be a good size. Then I made several copies and cut it into pieces to create a template. I frosted the outside first with white buttercream and then did an outline in black of Mickey's face-- then I slowly cut the image away as I frosted more parts. For instance, I cut just around Mickey's face so that I could trace the inside black lines. I kept cutting away at the template to make sure the size of Mickey's facial parts were correct. I definitely could not free hand this-- I'm not that artistic. When I finished with all of the outlines, then I just used a star tip to fill in the flesh tone and used a small cheese knife to fill in the black and red areas. Overall it turned out pretty well!

Devin's Birthday Cake

Hi-- anyone there? Ha!





So-- for Devin's 3rd birthday this year I made him a Toy Story cake with Woody and Buzz. He has been watching all three movies and is hooked on them. He loves to jump off of the couch and yell, 'To infinity and beyond!' With gusto!

Buttercream frosting is hard to work with-- I can never get it smooth. So, I decided to make it look like the sky and do swirls (similar to the movie poster)?! I don't know how well that part turned out....

Also, I couldn't find a pan to use because Disney is difficult with their merchandising! So, I did a buttercream transfer. I printed out a picture of Buzz and Woody and taped it to a cutting board. Then I taped plastic wrap on top of that really tightly and 'traced' the image with frosting. I also used some edible markers to do the details in the face-- which would have been difficult to pipe. Then I froze it (I did this a couple weeks ahead of his birthday because it was very time consuming). Then the day before his birthday I baked the cake, frosted it the day of and took the transfer out of the freezer. I flipped the transfer over and got the reverse image of my printed version. It worked out really well. I will use this technique again when I want to 'copy' something complex in buttercream. The best part is that it made a very happy boy!



The happy birthday boy!



Hello!

It's been too long!