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I eat in a style best described as “anaconda swallowing a horse.” No, it’s not pretty, but either way it is intensely exciting to watch a 120-pound creature trying to eat an entire meal in one bite. Not sure if I’m talking about me or the snake? I honestly have no idea either. But after nearly dislocating my jaw trying to eat last week’s pie in under six bites, I decided I needed to make something this week that wouldn’t end in an emergency visit to the dentist for jaw resetting. It just so happens that I’m also an incredible miser, and I’m still trying to get my money’s worth out of the mini muffin pan I bought to make tiny, boozy Super Bowl desserts in. I knew I needed a minuscule, micro dessert, but just about everything these days has some form of “mini” recipe, so I was still at a loss. I was thinking about mini cannolis, but I knew that would end in me just eating the filling out of a bowl while quietly trying to find some way to spin this “accident” into a good blog. Once I figured out I wanted a cream-based dessert that wouldn’t work without the sum of its parts (a.k.a., a “safety net”), the only thing that really made sense was a Boston Cream Pie. More pie? A second week in a row? I know…but you see, these pies are teeny tiny and adorable, so that makes them different. I know, I’m reaching, but work with me here because once you see how cutely delicious these look, you, too, will be begging for the cream-filled kind. Bonus points if you get the Lion King reference, we can be friends.

Brings new meaning to the phrase, “So cute I could eat you up.” Cause I’m gonna.

I happen to be fond of tiny things. This is why I own two dogs that would be normal in stature, but instead have tiny little legs because they’re Corgi mixes. I myself am a tiny thing, so perhaps I’m just trying to instill a sense of greater purpose for my pint-sized stature. I was made to make tiny desserts and own tiny, legless dogs. It’s a hard knock life. Anyway, these are actually more than just “a” bite. Well, they’re one jaw-unhinged-anaconda-Kate bite, or three normal people bites. I pity you small-mouthed plebeians. How long your meals must take…

I didn’t even know sugar cookies came in a bag. What else comes in a bag now that I’m not aware of? Milk? What is happening…

The recipe I found and adapted for my mini pies is super simple and doesn’t require a ton of weird ingredients. If I can find everything I need at our crummy commissary, it’s a win. Gather up:

• One bag of Betty Crocker sugar cookie mix
• One stick of room temp butter
• One room temp egg
• One pint container of heavy whipping cream
• One 3.4 ounce packet of Jello instant vanilla pudding
• 1/3 cup of powdered sugar
• Optional toppings: chocolate sauce, mini chocolate chips

You’re gonna need to grease the ever-living crap out of a mini muffin tin and preheat the oven according to package directions (in this case, 375 degrees). Mix together the cookie mix, butter, and egg until well blended. Find a trusty cookie scoop, and make 24 scoops. Plop each scoop into the muffin tin. Take a tablespoon and make an indent in the top of each ball of dough:

Ugh, the squuuiishhh is so satisfying. I clearly have deep-seated psychological issues.

Pay no mind to the cake mixes, you’ll see what those are for in a few days.

That tablespoon is workin’ overtime!

Right away, place the mini muffin tin on a cooling rack and use your tablespoon to press the divots back into each cup…they puff up during baking. I had to go through and do this step twice to keep the formation of the cups.

I mean, really, the possibilities here are endless. Cream pie filling, the world’s tiniest and most adorable scoop of ice cream, you name it.

Let the cookie molds cool for a few minutes in the tin before removing to the cooling rack. If you happen to have three tubs of frosting on hand like I did, go ahead and eat one. These don’t take too long to cool. Side note, didn’t actually eat the frosting, but not because I didn’t want to…I promise I’ll tell you why I have thirty varieties of canned frosting in my next blog. When the cups are completely cooled, make the filling by dumping the whole pint of whipping cream in your stand mixer. Blend on low for a minute while the cream starts to thicken before bumping up the speed to super high for another minute…at this point, you’ll have a giant bowl of Cool Whip, essentially. Finish up by blending in the powdered sugar and packet of instant vanilla pudding. 

The 1M tip: making my decorating abilities look fantastic with minimal effort.

Load up a piping bag with the pie filling. Use whichever frosting tip you prefer, but I selected the 1M tip. I simply placed my tip straight down over the top of a cookie cup and piped a hefty mound of frosting into the cup. I had to refill my bag halfway through and still had a little filling leftover.

It was a super simple way to make cute treats!

At this point, if you’re not going to eat all 24 at once, you’re going to want to refrigerate these. All that heavy whipping cream could get real bad real fast, and I’m emphatically trying not to give you salmonella via my blogs. Luckily, a 9×13 cake pan with a lid makes the perfect container:

Ahem, with a little space leftover if you’ve already eaten a couple.

For photo and blogging purposes, I took some chocolate syrup and drizzled it (we’ll say, generously) on a couple pie bites. And to literally top it all off, I gingerly placed three chocolate chips on top of each one. A star was born.

A beautiful, chocolatey star.

Remember how I went on and on about how densely chocolatey and rich the salted pie from last week was? Well these mini Boston Cream Pies are exactly the opposite in the best way possible. The pie filling is so light and airy, yet somehow still packed with an enticing, flavorful experience. The cookie cups have a nice crisp outer shell while remaining soft with that melt-on-your-tongue center. And the chocolate syrup and chocolate chips? You may say overkill, but I may say literally the perfect finishing touch. These have that sophisticated look that makes people think you spent hours in the kitchen crafting them, but you reap the benefits of a dessert ready in under 30 minutes. The only downside is I ate a few and couldn’t stop talking in a Boston accent for about an hour. The letter R no longer formed in my mouth, so I think I’ve finally gotten to the bottom of why Bostonian’s sound so delightfully wonderful: too much pie. Wicked smaht idea, Boston. ‘Til next time, my fellow eatahs!

Who wants to bet me money I could fit all three of these in my mouth at once?

Fun fact! Did you know that the only form of guilt more powerful than a mother’s guilt is Catholic guilt? Last week and once again, Lent decided to show up earlier than I was prepared for…I mean, I’m used to giving up meat on Fridays during it for reasons that are pretty much unknown to me but subsequently fall in line with Shrimp Fest at Red Lobster, so I don’t ask too many questions. But I always like to come up with something to give up that actually ends in real sacrifice and character building (who is this Kate and what have you done with the original mean one?!). I try nixing terrible bad habits like cussing, fast food runs, general laziness, etc. I’ve seen many friends give up Facebook for Lent, but I’m not sure how I would ever pass the time if I wasn’t acutely aware of all my friends’ stances on politicians, religion, and Taylor Swift. So I’m going for my old fallback favorite: giving up drinking alcohol. Notice I prefaced alcohol with the word “drinking.” I still intend to bake with it, but a cupcake topped with boozy frosting has never once led to the eating of seven other cupcakes and a foggy memory haze the follow morning. Same hangover gutbomb, but without the remorse and regret! Since I’m on the path to fancy hangover-free adulthood thanks to Lent, I decided I needed a dessert hoity toity enough to reflect my newfound status of droll teetotaler. Know what can make anyone have a good time? Pie. Know what can fill a boring situation with excitement? Chocolate. Know what just tastes really good no matter what? Salted caramel. Now pair those together, and you get the most beautiful amalgamation of all three: Salted chocolate and caramel pie. Did I mention the crust is made of Oreos? Because it is. And it is spectacular.

Pictured: decadence.

I’ve got my Blue Bell back, and now I’ve got the perfect platform upon which to place it. This pie is so insanely rich and delicious that it is the only thing I ever want to eat from now until the day I die of a sugar-related heart attack. This pie is so good that my entire house could be burning down around me, and as long as I had a slice, nothing else would matter. Although it is without a doubt not ‘light’ or ‘fat free,’ it is worth the extra time on the elliptical. The kicker? It’s only six ingredients!!! I promise I’m not tricking you. Stone-cold sober (but full of pie), I kid you not.

All the best desserts start with Oreos.

Like anything worth eating, this pie (original recipe here) is full of butter and all the right stuff. Gather up:

• 1 package of plain Oreos …these do, in fact, still exist which is shocking, because…Double Stuff.
• 2 sticks of butter, divided
• 2/3 cup of brown sugar, packed
• 12 ounce bag of dark chocolate chips …if you don’t like dark chocolate, use regular. I think the pie is the perfect amount of sweet with the dark chocolate, though. Milk chocolate may cross over into that “It’s so sweet I’m gonna gag” territory.
• 1 1/4 cups heavy whipping cream
• Coarse sea salt
• Optional: extra caramel sauce for drizzling and God’s gift to ice cream: Blue Bell’s Homemade Vanilla

I was starting to feel bad for my blender considering I wasn’t going to be making any frozen adult beverages any time soon, and then I found this recipe. I don’t own a food processor, so I make life work by beating things into tiny, crumbly submission with a rolling pin in most instances. But this recipe requires an entire bag of Oreos, cream and all, so I decided to give the old blender a chance to shine outside the realm of margarita making.

I was pleased with the results.

To make the crust, blend about 10 Oreos at a time into a fine pulp and dump into a medium-sized bowl. Once the Oreos are all crushed, melt one stick of butter in the microwave, and then blend it together with the crumbs to form a crust.

Gonna start dunking my Oreos in melted butter from now on…

Press the crust mix into a pie pan and freeze for about 20 minutes.

Homemade caramel…is there anything better?

While the crust is setting, get a medium saucepan out and melt the other stick of butter and the brown sugar together. Whisk it quite frequently, and once it starts to really bubble, stir constantly for a minute before removing from heat. Pour in 1/4 cup of heavy cream and blend well. Set this aside to cool for 15 minutes.

I’d even have settled for the pie as is at this point.

Once the crust is set and the caramel cooled, pour the caramel into the crust. Place back in to the freezer for 40 minutes so the caramel can firm up and form a skin. This way the layers of chocolate and caramel stay separate later.

I didn’t even need the spatula…this dessert is so kind when it comes to dishes.

When the caramel has about 5 minutes left to finish setting, bring one cup of heavy cream to a simmer in a saucepan. Pour out the bag of chocolate chips into a large bowl while this is taking place. Once simmering and almost to a boil, pour the heavy cream over the chocolate chips and let rest for a few minutes. Once the chips have had a few minutes to get melty, stir together the cream and chips to form a nice, thick chocolate sauce.

Dear God, you’re perfect.

Once the chocolate sauce is fully mixed, get the pie out of the freezer and pour the final piece of the literal pie on top. If you need to smooth things out, go for it. I didn’t have any weird unevenness or lumpy bumps, so you’ll probably be fine. If anyone is gonna ruin a dessert, let it be me. I’ll still eat it. Place the pie back in the freezer to set for 2 hours or into the fridge overnight.

The waiting was the hardest part.

I was DYING to try this pie. Once the chocolate was solid, I sprinkled coarse sea salt on top and took about 50 pictures because it was so beautiful I wanted to cry. I thought about skipping dinner, but the pie was taking too long to set and my hunger anger over waiting for Adele to perform at the Grammy’s was full-force. But when the time finally came, I loaded a slice up with a caramel drizzle and a scoop of Blue Bell. I no longer cared about anything else in the world. To say this pie is good is like saying we need air to breathe. It’s the right combination of so many flavors- sweet, decadent, salty, and just downright the best pie I’ve ever had in my life. I’m an avid dessert eater, obviously, but even I was taken aback by just how good this combination of caramel, chocolate, salt, and Oreos came together, especially with only six ingredients and some super simple steps. Basically, if you want to wow the crap out of everyone you know, bring this to your next social gathering. You won’t even miss the beer or wine with this bad boy handy, I know I don’t! Pie…the anti booze! I’m going to be incredibly dumb, fat, happy, and pie-drunk for the next several days, and I recommend you do the same. Make the pie. Eat the pie. Let the pie wash away your Catholic guilt. Although anything that tastes this good is probably sinful in some way, but that’s a problem for another Lent. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I want to thank this pie for making Lenten sacrifices possible. You’re the real MVP.

I was born into a family with proud Minnesotan roots. Roots so deep that even though I grew up in Texas, every Sunday was a “bleed purple and gold whether the Vikings won or lost” kind of experience. I will say the latter happens more often than the former though. So we don’t have the greatest record, and we’ve never won a Super Bowl, but our mascot is bitchin’, our defense will eat you alive, and we still have one of the most fantastic running backs in the entire NFL…ahem, not to boast, but we’re also this season’s NFC North Champions. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned as a lifelong Vikings fan, it’s how to channel the loss-rage into a little something I like to call “eating my feelings.” When we lost the 2009 NFC championship game thanks to He-who-shall-not-be-named (traitor), I blacked out a little, but I still think I managed to eat almost an entire pan of brownies. That may sound extreme, but it was better than rage spiraling and punching the person closest to me or drinking a pony keg’s worth of beer. Football is passion. We yell at our TV every Sunday in hopes the coach will somehow hear us and stop making terrible calls and get it together. We scream with glee when our team blows it out of the water with a game-winning touch down. But when it comes to the worst and we get one in the loss column, you know what’s always there to make you feel better? Chocolate. Chocolate has been solely responsible for ensuring I make it through every Vikings game since I was a child. Chocolate is the food version of a mother’s hug…win or lose, chocolate just makes people happy. So when the pinnacle of all football games comes around every February, you gotta make sure you have a dessert on hand for either celebration or defeat purposes. Enter the Rolo-stuffed brownie bite topped with Baileys salted caramel chocolate buttercream. Both a mouthful to say and eat!

This is what we call intentional yummy.

I’m totally on the fence for game. Do I love the Manning family? Absolutely. Do I hope Peyton can win one more and retire at the top? I so do. But at the same time, Cam Newton has been a beast leading the Panthers all season to a nearly perfect record. It would be a major blow to get this far and not win the Super Bowl. So I needed to make a dessert that would leave my ambivalence satisfied with either outcome. I made chocolate footballs last year, but there was no booze in those. I needed chocolate and booze in case Nationwide decides to show another dead kid commercial this year or in the event the halftime show is as underwhelming as it has been the past five years…I had to be prepared. So I rolled the idea around in my head, and I came up with a dessert so simple, you can make it in an hour. If you’re still wondering what deliciousness to bring to your own parties tomorrow, heed the recipe!!

Yes, I cheated and used a box mix.

You will have tons of leftover Rolos, so, win!

It’s ok, we’re all gonna feel a little sunken in tomorrow morning what with the food and drink hangovers.

More Baileys? Yes. There’s never enough.

This is a pretty simple frosting recipe, and if you wanted to make it booze-free, just sub milk or heavy cream for the Baileys. But I feel like I’m really on to something here. Why just drink alcohol during the big game when you can eat it, too? Gather up:

• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 1 tsp vanilla 
• 3/4 cup cocoa powder
• 4 cups powdered sugar
• 4 TBS Salted Caramel Baileys

Cream the butter and vanilla for a few moments, then add in the cocoa powder. Finish up by adding in two cups of sugar and two TBS of the Baileys, blend, scrape the bowl, and add in the final two cups of sugar and two TBS of Baileys. Place into a piping bag with the tip of your choice and pipe away!!

Yeah, I ate one for breakfast…what about it?

Dear. God. I am obviously saving (or trying my best to) these bad boys for the party in a few hours. But I had to sample at least one so I could blog about it. Very gluttonous and scientific reasoning, you see. ‘Ooey gooey’ would be the best way to describe these…that nice crisp brownie outer coating gives way to smooth, melted caramel and soft brownie center. The Rolos take your standard brownie game off the charts. I would most definitely call these a touchdown! I didn’t eat mine with Baileys frosting, as it was the wee morning hours and even I don’t start drinking or eating booze until a respectable hour of the day. But when I made the frosting last night, I may have accidentally licked the bowl after I was done piping. Baileys Salted Caramel is now my new favorite thing. Since I don’t drink coffee, I’m going to have to find new ways to add this into all my frosting and desserts from here on out. I hope you all enjoy the treats and festivities America’s favorite game will bring you this evening. May your pants remain comfortable and your mouths full…of brownie bites, pizza, and beer. But not all at once, that would be weird. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

Look, a three point conversion!

Ahh the 90s…the time of Crystal Pepsi, blow-up furniture, and approximately 76 different boy bands. It was a decade where boys wore bowl cuts and girls wore ungodly high platform sneakers (in hindsight, the bowl cut was the safer choice. Orthopedists everywhere are thankful for the trend though). The 90s had music so damn good that MTV still played videos in their regular programming. Kids these days will never know the real reason libraries exist and the horror of having a take-home research paper that required you to hope to God your Encyclopedia Britannica cd-roms worked without freezing Windows 95. When the Internet came on the scene, I still remember the joy I felt creating my very first AOL screenname and exceedingly colorful profile typed out in Comic Sans when it was still an acceptable font. We grew up in a time where our video gaming was limited as our parents forced us into this magical place called “outside” to play. You knew your parents loved you, but you were never more sure then when they packed your lunch with your favorite Lunchables and the Holy Grail of 90s desserts, Dunkaroos. As a child, I was not well versed with “pacing myself” (it could be argued I’m still not so great at it), and so I could never find the magic ratio of Teddy-Graham-to-funfetti-dip with my Dunkaroos. It always ended in the pitiful sight of a nine-year-old girl scraping the bottom of the dip with her tiny little fingers while muttering about how there’s never enough…ahhh, baby’s first fix. It has taken me the better part of 20 years, but I finally solved that problem. Fellow children of the 90s, say hello to Dunkaroo dip.

If they had just given us this much dip to begin with, there wouldn’t have been a problem.

That is a veritable bowl of nostalgia right there. One bite of this dip transported me back to my elementary school lunchroom cafeteria. Aside from our lunch monitors being power-hungry college students, lunch was an enjoyable experience for me. Every Friday we had square pizza (you know the one), and every once in a while I was fortunate enough to have my mom bring me a Happy Meal before I became too cool to eat with her in junior high. Why I ever turned down the opportunity to eat McDonald’s to save face is beyond me. I speak with like two people from my junior high days still, and I’m pretty sure they would’ve just been happy someone had good fries to share with them and not cared about the parent thing. I digress. Clearly I enjoyed the 90s, but we all know there’s nothing I enjoy more than a really simple but insanely delicious dessert recipe (sorry jelly shoes, you’re a close second).

Even the biggest of dreams have humble beginnings.

Yeah, three whole ingredients make up the Dunkaroo dip. My husband found this dip recipe on Imgur, the greatest website in the world to waste time on, and my only regret is that he is deployed and I will have to eat the whole bowl myself. Did I say regret? Because it kind of feels more like gleeful, sinister gluttony. I mean, I ate this FOR LUNCH. I know it seems like maybe I’m the mature one in this house, but the real truth is my husband is the adult, not me. I’ve already had ice cream for dinner more than once and he’s only been gone a few days. I have sweet tooth impulse control issues that can clearly only be controlled by a real adult, not just a pretend one.

I tweaked this recipe a bit to fit my sweet toothy needs, so here’s how it breaks down:

• One box of funfetti cake mix (do not make the cake recipe, leave it dry)
• 1/2-2/3 of a tub of Cool Whip (see note below)
• 16 ounces of plain yogurt (see note below)
• Mix all three of these things together, put in a bowl, cover, and let set in the fridge for a couple hours to overnight. I somehow channeled the willpower of a god and let mine set overnight.

Good things come to those who wait. Good, gluttonous things.

Hi, I’m the note below: For the amount of Cool Whip, it’s all about taste preference. I like a light, fluffy dip, so I used 2/3 of the tub. If you want a denser dip, just use half the tub. As far as the yogurt is concerned, I realize mine is vanilla and not plain. Know what our Walmart has? Six cases full of different kinds of yogurt. Know what is does not have? Plain yogurt in any size under “able to feed family of thirty-seven.” Since I didn’t want to throw away a ton of plain yogurt, I opted for vanilla. It really added a nice flavoring to the dip.

Can you feel the diabetes?

After my dip had set overnight, I turned it out into a pretty bowl and topped it with sprinkles…not because I’m taking it anywhere, just simply for photo staging. A picture of me using my hand a spoon didn’t seem appropriate. Well that and my inner child just cannot get enough sprinkles. I set this up with Nilla Wafers, chocolate Spritz cookies I thawed out from my mom, and birthday cake Oreos. Fairly certain I’ve never eaten more sugar in my life after sampling several of these, so this blog post was brought to you by the best sugar high I’ve had since that one time I ate eight pancakes in one sitting as a small child. Again, impulse control is just really not my thing. Honestly, this dip would be an amazing addition to your upcoming Super Bowl festivities. I just want to say how happy I am to have predicted the Super Bowl teams for like the fifth year in a row. I also have some residual happiness from watching Tom Brady lose. He clearly never ate Dunkaroos in the 90s, and I have a feeling that’s why he’s such a sore loser. So here’s to yet another Manning pulling one over on him and to the world’s most nostalgically delicious dessert dip ever. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

Not once in my life have I ever thought to myself, “I could go for a drink of Baileys.” I’m honestly not even sure what it could go into other than coffee, and coffee is just not my thing. It smells like acrid poo to me, and I imagine the taste is strikingly similar. Perhaps if I had just been adding Baileys into it this whole time, it would have sufficed. But I’m told drinking booze before noon is generally frowned upon, so I’ll never know. My point is, Baileys is like the wing man of spirits. It can take a boring drink and spice it up so just about anyone will agree to drink it. If that’s not going in for the assist, I just don’t know what is. I’ve fondly been adding Baileys into my frosting when I make my Guinness chocolate cake for ages, and the two just compliment each other so well. I started thinking to myself what if I ditched the middleman and just make a Baileys cake? Could Baileys possibly stand on its own and become the star player? These are the hard-hitting questions a former journalist turned baker ponders. Sure, my life could use some direction, but…cake. I’m happy to report that sometimes even the silliest of dreams can come true. Baileys cake is now the best damn cake I’ve ever had in my life.

Perhaps I should’ve prefaced this.

Yes, I am one of the meanest friends you could ever have, thank you for noticing! I was commissioned to make this cake originally for a friend of ours who is going off to pilot training. It also happens to be time for my husband to take another one of those government-mandated vacations in the near future, so our friends requested this cake also be a farewell for him, too. But in the beginning when it was simply a “good luck and goodbye” cake, I didn’t want to make some sappy, sentimental cake. I’m not so good with the goodbyes, but I am excellent with the snark. Our friend happens to share my same love of sarcasm and snarkiness, so I decided to go full speed ahead with a message that was both…along with some rainbows, a very tiny airplane, and a unicorn. I had to ditch the unicorn when my husband’s note was added in, but I think the message stands: we love screwing with you, friend.

This is perfectly normal.

See, he loved it. No hurt feelings, just a really big mess. And some general looks of disapproval.

I told you, you can’t have coffee without Baileys.

• 2 cups of flour, sifted or using the scoop and swoop method with a spoon. Just don’t hard pack it.
• 1 3/4 cups of sugar
• 3/4 cups of unsweetened cocoa  
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt
• 1 tablespoon of baking soda
• 1 egg at room temp
• 2/3 cup of vegetable oil…I wanted to try real butter for this, but opted to follow the recipe. It is plenty rich without the butter.
• 3/4 cup of buttermilk at room temp
• 1/4 cup of Baileys at room temp
• 1 cup of coffee at room temp

Remember, all ingredients will incorporate much better flavor- and baking-wise if they are at the same temperature. Plus hot coffee + 1 egg = a really gross scrambled mess. Start by greasing a 9×13 or two 8-inch round pans and preheating the oven to 350. In a medium bowl, mix together all dry ingredients and set aside. In your stand mixer, mix the egg, oil, buttermilk, Baileys, and coffee on low until blended. Add in a third of the dry mix, blend, and scrape the bowl. Do this two more times. Turn the batter into a pan and bake according to your pan size…I used a 9×13 and my cake was done at 28 minutes, so look for that window between 25-30 minutes.

Just the most perfect brick of cake I’ve ever seen.

Let the cake cool in the pan on top of a cooling rack for 10 minutes before removing from the pan and letting it finish cooling on the rack.

I couldn’t make a cake and not use copious amounts of butter at some point.

I tweaked my Baileys frosting recipe so there was more of a butter base this time and less Crisco. I’m becoming a real frosting snob, and the more butter the better.

• 1 cup of Crisco
• 1 1/2 sticks of butter at room temp
• 1 tablespoon of CLEAR vanilla extract if you want whiter frosting, otherwise use regular
• 6 cups of powdered sugar
• 4-5 tablespoons of Baileys

Start by blending the butter and Crisco. Then add in the tablespoon of vanilla, one tablespoon of Baileys, and two cups of sugar and blend. Repeat the sugar/Baileys blending process until you’ve used all six cups of sugar and 4 tablespoons of Baileys. I opted for the extra tablespoon to make piping easier and less stiff. Now let’s take a walk down crappy photo montage lane.

Obviously a crumb coat is necessary for a cake this dark with white frosting. I would’ve given it two crumb coats, but every ounce of frosting is spoken for with this cake. Let the crumb coat freeze for 30 minutes in the freezer.

Then place the final coat on and freeze for 15 minutes. Not pictured is what you need to do next: the Viva paper towel trick to smooth out the top and sides. Make it pretty, y’all.

So, I kind of shot myself in the foot with this rainbow idea.

Here I am preparing to paint with all the colors of the wind. Thanks, Roy G. Biv.

I started everything off by drawing and writing in where everything would go with a toothpick. Then I made the outside edges of the rainbow so I would know how much space I had for each color.

Once I had filled in my rainbow, I took my bag of white frosting fitted with a #1A large open round tip and made my clouds. I let frosting pile up and swirled it around with the tip to achieve that puffy look.

I mean, this is best birthday cake for an 8 year-old-girl ever at this point.

I outlined the plane in grey with the #3 tip before switching to a #21 tip.

Then I filled in the plane with that star tip.

After mixing the black frosting with the leftover colors and the black dye, I piped out the message very slowly and carefully with a #3 tip.

I’ve come across a lot of challenges in my life being left handed, but none so greater than trying to write on a cake. There was a lot of cursing, sweating, and praying simultaneously, so someone upstairs was probably doing a lot of head shaking and palm-to-forehead smacking.

I then switched my white frosting to a #21 tip and piped a shell border around the sides. So fancy and official…if the rest of the cake wasn’t covered in rainbows and mean wording.

This ends the crappy photo montage. You’re welcome.

Soar high, touch the clouds, other inspirational message here.

Today I turned 29 for what will be the first of many times. I could write an entire entry about how my body is slowly failing me, but that would be incredibly depressing for a cake blog. Cake should make people rejoice with happiness, and I firmly believe that is why it is never served at a funeral. Unless you want to fondly reflect on that pumpkin chunkin incident that turned fatal for poor Uncle Cletus, leave the cake for bonafide celebrations like birthdays or making it to work on time. I was trying hard to decide if my 29th birthday cake should reflect my age and maturity (ha) and be serious and delicate for once, especially considering my 30th birthday is ripe for a tombstone-themed cake. Thankfully, a little voice in my head spoke up (I know I probably need years of psychotherapy, but it’s my birthday, let me have this one). It told me do not go gentle into that good night–I need to embrace the youth that is still so prevalent in my soul, so I decided my cake needed to be fun and delightful. It needed to fill me with awe (or “aww”) like the cute and adorable cakes my mother used to make for me as young girl did. I thought about what I liked as a kid for a possible theme, but I’m not into Barbies, Power Rangers, or the Spice Girls anymore (that’s a lie- I still LOVE the Spice Girls, but wasn’t feeling up to the task of creating a cake-likeness of them). So then I decided to think about what fills me with delight every time I see it now. Minions obviously, 50% off signs, and really fat animals…which led me to think about one of the world’s most awkwardly adorable yet formal creatures- penguins. They combine both my love of cuteness and formal attire, so this was a no-brainer. I then thought about my favorite of all penguins, Kowalski from the Madagascar movies. A star was born.

“It is strategically… adorable.”

Old age and decrepit hands aside, I really enjoyed making this cake. Seriously though, my hands still hurt from piping all those individual little stars. I now have a crab claw and not a left hand. At one point, I thought to myself whether it was actually necessary to frost the top sides of the cake since no one would see it in pictures…but I couldn’t half-ass it. I had to go the distance and whole-ass it. I’m delighted by how cute this turned out to be, and BONUS, this recipe had leftover cake batter that I turned into six additional cupcakes. So I got to sample the goods a whole day ahead of time. You know, to ensure quality standards and blah blah blah.

Blah blah..ohh, pretty. Decorating tips found here.

Traditionally, I have strawberry cake with cream cheese frosting for my birthday. But I have become obsessed with raspberry this past year. I want it in my pastries, in my fruit cups, in my booze; you name it, I am gonna find a way to add in that flavor. I always thought of raspberry to be something for the adult palette as it was more robust and less sugary, so maybe I really am growing up despite my best efforts to still laugh at fart jokes and crack dirty double entendres as much as possible. One thing at a time, I suppose. I found a recipe here for a wonderful raspberry cake and decided it would go perfectly with my almond buttercream frosting. As per usual, I was most undoubtedly correct…which is the greatest birthday present of all.

Bonus, plenty of leftover raspberry jam! To put in your pastries, in your fruit cups, in your booze…

I like it when the hardest part of a recipe is having to stop my mixer to add things to it. Loooowww maintenance! This recipe does need cake flour and not regular flour. Cake flour is super fine and just adds an amazingly airy quality to the taste and density of the final product. I know this because the side of the cake flour box told me so. Here’s what you need to be a raspberry fiend like me:

• 2 cups sugar
• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 3 cups cake flour (use the scoop and swoop method and spoon flour into a measuring cup. Do not pack it down.)
• 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 3 eggs at room temp
• 3 egg yolks at room temp (thank God I don’t suck at separating the yolks…just separating the whites for whatever reason)
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup seedless raspberry jam at room temp
• 5-6 drops of red food coloring
• 1 1/2 cups whole milk at room temp

Start by preheating the oven to 350 and greasing your pans. This recipe makes enough cake for three 8-inch rounds, two 9-inch rounds, or one 9×13 with the bonus six cupcakes I mentioned. In the stand mixer, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. While that’s happening, blend the cake flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl and set aside. Once the butter and sugar is creamed, add in eggs one at a time and then the food coloring, vanilla, and jam. Be sure to scrape your mixing bowl often. Finish up by adding in a third of the dry mix and blend well. Then add a third of the milk and blend well. Continue this pattern until you’ve blended in all the dry mix and milk.

Hmm, I see a dog butt in this photo. He’s helping.

 If baking in a 9×13 pan, bake the cake by itself for 30-35 minutes and the cupcakes for about 15-16 separately. A smaller pan like an 8-inch round will take around 20 minutes. Let rest in the pan for 10 minutes on a cooling rack, then turn out onto the rack to finish cooling completely. Since I was cutting this into a penguin shape, I put my cake in the freezer for a couple hours to make trimming easier.

Nothing can be bad with this much butter.

About 15 minutes before I pulled the cake out of the freezer, I made my almond buttercream. I know I’ve given you this recipe a kajllion times, but that is because it is quite literally the most complimentary frosting ever (mean to the hips, but really nice with any kind of cake).

• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 6 cups of powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon of vanilla
• 1 teaspoon of almond extract
• 6 tablespoons of heavy cream, half and half, whole milk, skim milk, your choice depending on how rich you like things

Cream the butter for a few moments then add in two cups of sugar, the vanilla, and the almond and blend well. Add in two tablespoons of milk and blend. Add in two more cups of sugar, blend, and then two more tablespoons of milk and blend. Repeat one last time and you’re done! Set aside and get ready to cut up that cake!

I never said I was good at drawing, okay?

I like to draw templates when I’m going to make my cake into something that’s not in the standard wheelhouse of “round.” I drew out Kowalski (obviously by hand) so I had something to cut around on my cake.

Like so.

Clearly his flippers are larger than the cake, so I held on to my scraps after cutting around my template.

Right now he just looks like a fat, armless robot. Oh look, another dog.

I cut some cake scraps to fill out his flippers and connected them to my cake with wooden skewers.

Then I gave him a good crumb coat. This is a must when you’ve trimmed a cake down!

 I let Kowalski sit in the freezer after the crumb coat for about 30 minutes. Penguins like the cold, this is a fact. Now hold on to your butts, here comes a crappy photo montage!

You’re going to use EVERY bit of frosting for this cake, so sadly, don’t eat any. Instead dye a small amount orange and place into a bag fitted with an open star tip. I used a Wilton #21. Place a fair amount of white frosting into a bag with a coupler and for now, another open star tip. Dye a LARGE amount of frosting black. Place into a bag that has a coupler on it and fit with a small round tip. I used a #3.

In yet another attempt to make things foolproof because I do fall victim to blonde moments, I used a toothpick to outline where everything needed to go for Kowalski to look like a penguin and not a failed science experiment, or worse, just a regular bird.

I started by outlining his mouth. I was going to do buttercream transfers for his eyes, but when I finished them, one eye was white and the other cream colored. I used the same bag of white frosting for this, so I have quite literally NO idea how that happened. Instead, I recommend outlining his eyes in black at this point and drawing in his pupils, too. Lesson learned. Frosting can apparently play tricks on you. Who knew.

Once the mouth was outlined, I filled it in with my orange frosting fitted with the star tip. This is simple, but time consuming. You just place row after row of stars until the area you want is filled. When done, I came back over and re-outlined his mouth in black to create a fuller, thicker lip line…just like you do every morning. Penguins, they’re just like us! I also filled in his feet.

Once finished with his feet, I took the small tip off of my black frosting and fitted the bag with a #21 tip. This is why a coupler comes in handy. Then I outlined what areas would be in black.

And filled in the top of his body. My hand had gone numb at this point, so I took a break and ate a cupcake. It was the right choice.

Then I outlined the areas that needed to be white.

…Before filling in his body. I then iced my left hand (with an ice pack, not frosting, although I have done that on accident before) and ate dinner with my right hand. Eating with your non-dominant hand is like having someone else feed you, if that someone else is accident prone and really bad with a fork. I recommend trying it some time! Once dinner was done and my hand had been fully iced, I finished his body by piping the rest of the black frosting onto the sides of his body. Without eyes, penguins are actually quite terrifying. He kinda looks like he’s happily going to devour your soul and steal your eyes all in one fell swoop. Moving on.

Since my buttercream transfers didn’t work, I placed the small #3 tip back on my black frosting and outlined his eyes…which was hard to achieve evenness on top of all those stars. This is why I recommend doing this when you outline his lips and forgo trying to do the transfer.

Then I placed a #5 tip on my white frosting and filled in the eyes. I smoothed out with a spatula, and then added dots for pupils, and he was done. Kowalksi, you handsome sonofabitch, I could get lost in those wonky eyes.

This cake…I almost don’t want to eat it because it’s so cute. But I had a cupcake, so I know I’m going to eventually have to cut into Kowalski because he’s too damn tasty not to. The almond + raspberry experience is real, and it is amazing. A subtle zing of berry and the richness of almond are pretty much my favorite combination of all time now (sorry, vodka and soda). So far the 8th anniversary of my 21st birthday has been incredibly enjoyable. I’ve had great well wishes, excellent gifts, and wonderful conversations with friends and family. As someone who is introverted and never wants anyone to go out of their way for me because it makes me uncomfortable, it is a really nice reminder that I am so loved (and tolerated) by my family and friends. I want to thank you all for making the last year I ever publicly celebrate a birthday so great. Now if you don’t mind me, I’m off to eat another birthday cupcake and research how much botox is an appropriate amount of botox to still look lifelike but wrinkle free. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

Here’s looking at you, Kowalski. Yes, my slippers have ducks on them. I clearly like awkward birds, okay?

I hope everyone enjoyed their New Year’s Eve hangover as much as I did. I’m not sure why I love New Year’s Eve so much…the following morning is always a stark reminder that I am, in fact, not a 21-year-old frat boy capable of drinking until the wee morning hours with nary an ache when I wake up. Instead, I spend the morning after celebrating that I have somehow survived into a new calendar year by rocking back and forth in the fetal position wondering why champagne has to taste so good but hurt so bad. It’s bubbly and effervescent like a carefree child, but it can also end up being nearly as big of a pain in the ass as one, too…I would know. Seventy years ago, I was a child capable of causing mass destruction and epic headaches for all four of my parents. Perhaps my affinity for drinking champagne is karmic justice…or maybe I just like drinking good hooch. But we all know the only thing I love more than drinking booze is finding a way to infuse it into my desserts. So if you’re wondering what the hell to do with all your leftover bottles of champagne (is this really a thing?) this week, never fear, I am here to help. I mean, I could drink them all for you, or you could make these insanely zippy champagne cupcakes with champagne buttercream frosting.

Auld Lang Yum.

Classy, right? They were so pretty I almost didn’t want to let anyone eat them. But then I remembered we’re still working on finishing mint fudge and caramel bars from Christmas, so I stashed four of these cupcakes for ourselves and took the remaining dozen to a party. Charitable, I know. While the alcohol does evaporate out of the cupcake while baking, the frosting is loaded up with enough hooch to get you drunk if you eat more than one in a sitting…joining together gluttony and alcoholism in a way that is truly as American as apple pie moonshine.

A 9 dollar bottle of champagne is about as fancy as it gets in Clovis.

This cute blog has the original recipe that I tweaked to my liking. To start off, gather up:

• 1 and 2/3 cup of flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1/4 tsp of baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 cup room temp butter
• 3 egg whites at room temp
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 cup sour cream softened to room temp
• 3/4 cup of champagne–get this out about an hour before you’re ready to bake so it isn’t freezing cold but just cooled so it mixes well with the other ingredients. No one wants warm champagne, you heathen.

 As far as champagne flavors go, pick out whatever you like best. If you like sweet, go for it. Brut is my favorite champagne because it supplies that nice little kick to the taste buds that reminds me I’m alive but still not girly enough to drink champagne that’s pink. I won’t judge you if you do, and honestly, a sweeter champagne would yield a sweeter cupcake. So in this instance, I’d have to fold and say if I make these again, I’ll begrudgingly buy a bottle of pink champagne. But I’m doing so incognito across the state line.

Preheat your oven to 350 and line your muffin tin with cupcake papers. I went with a festive gold shimmer liner as to properly reflect that these cupcakes contain all the champagne. Now mix together the flour, sugar, baking soda, and baking powder in a bowl and set aside. Cream the butter in a stand mixer for a couple minutes until fluffy. Add in the egg whites one at a time and mix well….I suck at separating whites from yolks, so I had some yolk in there, no biggie. We can’t all be perfect, but that won’t stop me from trying anyway. Add in the vanilla, sour cream, and blend. Add in the champagne a little at a time and blend. Add in half of the dry mix and blend until incorporated. Finish off by adding in the rest of the dry mix and blending until fully incorporated.

Spoon in enough batter to fill the cupcake liners 2/3 of the way. Bake these for 16-20 minutes. They’ll be pretty blonde in color, so just test for doneness with a toothpick. When it comes out clean, you’re good.

I’m told gentlemen prefer blondes anyway.

Let these cool in the pan for about five minutes before removing to a cooling rack. I had enough batter to make 16 cupcakes. Once all of them were baked, I transferred my cooling rack to the freezer for 15 minutes to speed up the cooling process.

Surprisingly, did not drink the champagne out of the measuring cup. I am growing up.

Can we talk for a moment about how two weeks ago it was still 65 degrees, and then last weekend we all almost died in a blizzard out here in New Mexico? Thanks winter storm Goliath. I mean, the worst of it for us was the snow drifts that reached our roof in some parts and caused our internet to go down. Luckily I had my baking to keep me occupied. Between that and the dog figuring out she could climb the drifts to get on the roof, my day without internet was surprisingly full. Moral of the story is I don’t miss the 1990s pre-internet days nearly as much as I thought I did. When you’re trapped in a house with lots of champagne, dessert, and no internet, it’s a distinct possibility your husband could come home from work to find a drunk wife with a stomach ache and dogs climbing around on top of your house. Luckily, this was not the case…mostly because drunk snow shoveling didn’t seem like the smartest idea in the world to me. Now, back to the frosting. I made a MASSIVE batch and didn’t end up using it all, so I’m tweaking this recipe to a manageable amount for decorative frosting. Unless you want a bag to mainline all to yourself straight from nozzle to mouth, double up, but if you’re not looking into starting 2016 off with a shame spiral, go with this recipe instead:

• 3/4 cup of room temp butter
• 3/4 cup of Crisco
• 5 cups of powdered sugar
• 5-6 tablespoons of champagne, chilled

Y’all…I love fully buttered buttercream, but, it’s yellow. I wanted my frosting to have a soft golden hue to it (I was REALLY taking this champagne theme to heart), so instead of using a cup and a half of butter, I split it down the middle with Crisco. If you don’t care about frosting color, I’d say go for all butter. It just tastes better with butter. Is this a slogan? Because if it’s not, it should be.

Start by creaming together the butter and Crisco for a few minutes. Add in two cups of powdered sugar, two tablespoons of champagne, and blend well. Add in two more cups of powdered sugar, two more tablespoons of champagne, and blend well. Finish off by adding in the remaining cup of powdered sugar and remaining tablespoon of champagne. I wanted a stiff frosting to hold shape, but if you like things a little more loosey goosey both figuratively and drunkenly, add in the extra tablespoon of hooch.

I used a 1M tip and the standard swirl design for these cupcakes piled nice and high.

Fortunately, even with the Crisco, this frosting still had what I would call a nice “zing” to it thanks to the champagne. This is really where the sweeter stuff would come in handy as far as frosting is concerned. To finish off the champagne theme, I added “bubbles.” My bubbles were just some pink and white sugar pearls I had on hand from Hobby Lobby. I used my cake tweezers to gently place random pink and white pearls around my cupcakes to give it that bubbly look. I still swear by my cake tweezers…everyone should have a pair of tweezers in their kitchen solely devoted to placing sprinkles on goodies and removing dog hair from food. This is a real problem in our house.

You are precisely the opposite of what New Year’s resolutions are made of, my dear.

I realize you may be thinking of cutting out desserts or sugar or what have you as a part of your resolution for 2016, but please, do so AFTER you utilize your leftover champagne (seriously, how is this a thing) to make these champagne cupcakes. They are dense cupcakes that pack a lot of zippy champagne flavor with each bite. They are in no way remotely redeeming or healthy, but they are totally worth spending an extra 30 minutes in the gym for. After all, swimsuit season is a future you problem. Getting rid of the extra champagne (really?!) so you’re not tempted to drink it all and blow your resolution is a now problem. You don’t get a whole bottle in each cupcake (trust me, I looked into making that happen but it wasn’t possible), so you’re sharing the wealth. Not that I could ever really consider an overabundance of champagne as a problem per say, but my hangover from yesterday would beg to differ.  I’ll be back in a few days with my birthday cake blog. Nothing like the new year and all that champagne to remind you of your impending doom age change. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

To a very bubbly and effervescent 2016, minus the crippling hangover.

When I’m feeling down, there are a few words that bring comfort to me and fill me with hope and happiness upon hearing…words like “puppies,” “BOGO,” or most things prefaced by the word “free” for example. But nothing takes me from catatonic to a level of glee best described as “only child at a pony farm” quite like the word fudge. Coincidentally, if I’m in your home and you tell me there’s fudge, you can also see me go from calm and rested to in your kitchen in under .2 seconds, so I’ve got that party trick going for me. I adore fudge: flavored chocolate served to me in slab form. Perfection. My favorite place in the world to get fudge is a kitschy little Bavarian town in Michigan called Frankenmuth. I enjoyed visiting there to eat delicious German foods and contemplate whether lederhosen is as uncomfortable to wear as it is ridiculous-looking. I mean, the fudge there is so good you can even order it online and send it directly to your mouth via your mailbox. But since Frankenmuth Fudge isn’t paying me to blog about their wares, I’m forced to make my own fudge. My all-time favorite fudge fits in perfectly with the holiday season because it is loaded with tons of mint! I was trying to come up with a Christmas song to riff off of here but “Silent Night, Fudgy Night” took on a very different meaning once typed, so I’ll just continue on and tell you about my mint chocolate fudge recipe.

Melt in your mouth AND your soul! Fudge lovers rejoice!

So we all know how the free Andes mint after your Olive Garden meal feels like total overkill after shoveling down several baskets of free bread sticks and all the carbs, but we eat it anyway because mint chocolate is worth the gut bomb in all its deliciousness. This mint fudge recipe is essentially one 8×8 slab of giant Andes mint, and it is ah-mazing. I am trying my best to save the entire pan for Christmas company, but I keep finding reasons to shave slivers of fudge off every time I pass through the kitchen. Just finished my workout? I could use some fudge. Accidentally flayed my thumb open from knuckle to knuckle with my own pinky nail? I could use some fudge. First non-kitchen related injury in a year? I could use some fudge. Seriously, my thumb hurts and not just because it was betrayed by another one of my fingers. The fudge soothes me.

Did I mention this was really easy to make? The thumb pain is causing memory loss.

Five whole ingredients and you’re going to be the hit of the Christmas dessert table. You can feel smug in knowing it took you ten minutes to make something that everyone will devour in five. Fudge is on the exact opposite end of the dessert effort scale from a fully decorated cake. So gather up:

• 12 oz semisweet chocolate chips
• 12 oz white chocolate chips
• 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk divided in half (I poured half the can into a small liquid measuring cup and left the other half in the can)
• 1-1 1/2 tsp of mint extract depending on how minty you like things
• A few drops of green food coloring

 Start by lining an 8×8 pan with foil so it hangs over the edges. Then get two medium-sized sauce pans out and put the bag of semisweet chips into one and the white chips into the other. Start by heating the white chips over medium heat while stirring frequently to keep from burning. Pour a little bit of the divided milk into the white chocolate chips and stir like crazy (I made the mistake of pouring the full half of the milk into my chips and it was nearly impossible to get things to melt nicely again). Once your white chocolate is melty again in consistency, pour in the rest of the divided milk and stir like crazy. Finish up the white chips by adding in the mint extract and green food coloring and mix until nice and melty again. Place this on low heat.

Now melt the semisweet chocolate chips on medium heat while stirring frequently to keep from burning. Take the other half of the divided milk and pour a little bit in and stir like crazy. Once the chips are melty again, pour in the rest of the divided milk and stir.

Here’s where you can get fancy. You can dollop a spoonful of the now mint chocolate into the 8×8 pan and then a spoonful of the semisweet chocolate into the pan and repeat quickly a kajillion times before swirling with a knife. OR…

You can just pour the semisweet chocolate in and smooth it out…

Then pour the mint chocolate on top…

And just smooth it out. Optional: top with chopped Andes mints, chocolate chips, sprinkles, etc. before it fully sets.

It’s fudge. It doesn’t have to be pretty. It is going to taste fantastic with or without the swirling effort. I honestly wanted to do the swirl, but my chocolate was hardening up insanely fast since I added each half of the condensed milk all at once, and my chocolates never got all that melty after that. Layers of fudge seemed practical and less shame-inducing. I really hate making mistakes, but the edge is taken off when they still end up being tasty mistakes. Once you’ve got your fudge in the pan, place it in the fridge to harden for at least a few hours to overnight. I left mine in overnight and removed first thing this morning. Once it came to room temp, I sliced my fudge up to take some pictures. This incidentally led to me eating what I will now call “breakfast fudge.” Anything can be eaten for breakfast if you simply preface it with the word breakfast. Breakfast cake, breakfast pie, breakfast sundaes…

Anyhow, I hope everyone has a very Merry Christmas. If you’re traveling, at least El Niño is keeping things unseasonably hot and snow-free around most of the country, so that’s nice. If your family is visiting you, I hope you’ve stocked up on a higher than reasonable about of meat and booze. Regardless of your plans, I hope Santa (or your very patient significant other) brings you everything you’ve wished for, like world peace or a Ferrari. If not, at least you have my gift of fudge. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

All I want for Christmas is fuuudddggee! Whew, it was really going to drive me crazy if I couldn’t come up with a Christmas song to riff off of.

Peppermint does for winter what pumpkin spice does for fall…it gives it flavor. It was a very cold and snowy Thanksgiving for us when we visited family in Colorado, and all I wanted was a some spiked hot chocolate. Thankfully, my brother pulled through for me and made a delicious hot chocolate and peppermint Schnapps combo. Heaven, I tell you (both the drink and the fact that being the baby of the family means other people will always do stuff for me). It was in that moment that I decided this flavor needed to be made into a dessert of some sort. Mint chocolate is definitely one of my favorites, but peppermint and chocolate just takes things the extra dessert mile. My mom used to be able to find these fantastically amazing chocolates with crushed peppermint in them at Macy’s. It was quite literally one of the most enjoyable parts of my annual Christmas pig out. Sadly, they no longer make them, so I was left with a peppermint chocolatey void in my life and/or mouth. I couldn’t face a second Christmas in a row without them, and thus, the peppermint chocolate cupcake with peppermint butter cream frosting and crushed peppermint topped cupcake was born. I really, really like peppermint, y’all. I always failed at turning my candy canes into fake vampire or walrus teeth like every other normal child does because I could never resist just chomping the damn things into pieces and eating them as fast as possible. Most people savor a candy cane for like an hour; I’m done with one in about 43 seconds.

Let me tell you about how amazing my house smelled after making these.

Winter Wonderland has a smell, and it is peppermint chocolate cupcakes. Drool factor is a 10 out of 10. We had a small gathering last night to play Cards Against Humanity and mini beer pong, and I wasn’t planning on serving these up but instead saving them for myself because I am both greedy and a glutton (just checking those Seven Deadly Sins right off the list). I put these in my cake safe and placed them on top of the fridge. I sorta figured that was the international symbol for “off limits,” but considering most of our friends (and my husband) are extremely tall, this was like precisely at eye-level for practically everyone except me. There was oogling, and quite a few people managed to snake a cupcake. When you come to my house, it is pretty much assumed there will be dessert, so this was my mistake really. But I channeled my inner-Grinch and ended up hiding them so I would actually get to eat one before they all disappeared. Don’t look at me like that…the recipe only makes 12, and I have to be able to taste test my work so I can bring you these delightfully insightful blogs every week after all. So let me give you the recipe for these delicious cupcakes so you, too, can also hide dessert from the people you love. Tis the season to be selfish, fa la la la la la la la greed.

I know, looks like a lot, but they are so easy!

I found and adapted this recipe to make things even peppermintier. Not a real word, but fun to say. So gather up:

• 3/4 cup plus 2 TBS of flour
• 3/4 tsp of baking soda
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 cup of sugar
• 1/4 cup plus 2 TBS of unsweetened cocoa
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup room temp butter
• 1 room temp egg
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
•  2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/4 tsp peppermint extract
• 1 tsp espresso powder dissolved into 1/2 cup of boiling water

Preheat the oven to 350, and start by mixing together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, sugar, cocoa, and salt in a large bowl. In a stand mixer, cream the butter until fluffy. Add in the egg and extracts and mix well. Add in half the dry mix and all of the buttermilk and blend well. Add in the other half of the dry mix and the espresso and blend well. Don’t worry fellow coffee-haters, this tastes absolutely nothing like coffee, but instead the espresso gives the chocolate a nice, dark taste.

Throw the batter into a lined muffin tin and bake for 18-20 minutes. Your house will begin to smell like what dreams are made of.

Once done, place on a cooling rack to cool for 10 minutes and then remove from the pan and continue to allow them to come to room temp. Drool all over yourself due to the smell.

There’s a peppermintception occurring with this frosting.

Once the cupcakes are cooled and you’re nearing your ability to resist eating all 12 at once, make the peppermint butter cream frosting:

• 1 cup of room temp butter
• 5 cups of powdered sugar
• 1 tsp of vanilla
• 1 tsp of peppermint extract
•  5 TBS of the forgot-to-be-pictured heavy cream or milk
• Handful of crushed peppermint candy canes/peppermint candies to top frosting with

Cream the butter until fluffy and then add in 2 cups of powdered sugar, the vanilla, the peppermint, and 2 TBS of heavy cream and blend. Add in another  2 cups of sugar and 2 TBS of cream and mix well. Add the final cup of sugar and TBS of cream and finish blending. Now that I think about it, you could probably omit the peppermint extract and change one or two TBS of heavy cream to peppermint Schnapps and make this frosting boozy. Clearly I’m going to have to make these cupcakes again to try that because apparently like most of my best ideas, this one came far too late in the game. Sadness, thy name is Kate.

Not blood. Promise.

To get the cool two-toned effect, paint a thick line of red gel frosting dye on each side of the piping bag fitted with the tip of your choice (I used one bag with a 2D for half and another bag with a 1M for the rest because I am an adult and I do what I want). Carefully load up the bag with frosting, and it will look something like this:

Why are my wrists so veiny? Am I dying?

 Now pipe away! I did a traditional swirl like so:

Okay, this kinda gives me the Christmas spirit. I get it…it’s nice to feel full of joy and hope, but I always feel that way when dessert is involved. Unless it’s flan, and then you’ve filled me with rage and scientific questions about its consistency somehow being edible.

Aren’t these gorgeous? Aren’t you surprised I can take an accidentally artsy photo on occasion? Me too. Don’t forget to add the peppermint candies on top when you’re done applauding my creativity.

I am super happy to report that these taste even better than they smell. It isn’t easy being a Grinch (lies), but I had to do it in the name of blogging (also lies). Although my heart did not grow three sizes upon consumption, my butt may very well have. These definitely aren’t low on calories, but anything crammed with this much chocolate and peppermint simply is worth that extra hundred sit ups or five miles of jogging…try eating them while working out and it’s a two-fer! I’m always here to offer you reasonable solutions to life’s simplest of problems. I am a blogger with heart. A heart that is probably loaded with cupcake remnants and fried chicken. All I want for Christmas is to be able to eat anything I want without gaining an ounce. Is that so hard, Santa? If you can make reindeer fly, I feel like this is a pretty simple request. While I continue to place my faith in a fat, bearded man who really appears to enjoy his own fair share of cupcakes, I hope everyone is having a wonderful holiday season. We’re off to gallivant in Tahoe soon and then host family for Christmas, so I’ll be back with some more delicious minty recipes soon. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

Just load these up in a stocking, and you’re set on gift giving until next year…we wish you a merry cupcake and a happy cheat day!

We live in a world where a lot of people disagree just for the sake of disagreeing. I believe that one of the only things everyone can truly agree on is that chips and dip are the perfect precursor to just about any meal. That’s why we all fill up on a ridiculous amount of chips and salsa every time we go to a Mexican restaurant. It’s why we stay near the snack table at every bbq to eat the host out of house and chip. We eat chips and dip with reckless abandon because hey, a few chips can’t hurt, right? It’s only until you demolish the whole bag and hate yourself a little that it’s a problem. So this got me thinking…if people love chips and dip so much, would they love cookies and dessert dip, too? Could it be possible to bookend a meal with dips? Could I start a dessert revolution? Pure madness! So naturally, I had to try because I’m a crazy person who knows absolutely no limit when it comes to finding new ways to fill my body with a borderline stupid amount of sugar. If you cut me open, blood would not pour out…but chocolate cake might. Yesterday I prepared to attend a party and set my plans for dessert domination in play. Meet my dessert dips, and revel in my glory (I may or may not have delusions of grandeur, but I still think I’m pretty awesome either way).

When I dip, you dip, we dip.

Heellllooooo my pretties. Did you know Jello makes a cheesecake pudding? Because I did not, and it has officially changed my life. I was able to put together a turtle cheesecake dip centered solely around it, and for that the wonderful people of Jello will forever be in my good graces. The other cute little dish (literally, look at how cute my bowls are) is a toffee cookie dough dip. It is both a mouthful to say and eat! So how well did these dips go over at the party? I was told that these dips were some “Nobel Prize level stuff.” Suffice it to say, everyone you know will love you twice as much if you bring one of these desserts to your Thanksgiving festivities. And this is also one of those wonderfully fortuitous moments when the dessert both looks and tastes insanely impressive but is amazingly easy to throw together.

Case in point.

The turtle cheesecake dip shall open your world to endless possibilities. Could it achieve world peace? It’s a distinct possibility. No one can argue over a good dip. So gather up:

• 1 box of Jello cheesecake pudding
• 1 8 oz. container of Cool Whip
• 1 8 oz. brick of room temp cream cheese (use the full fatty fat fat kind, or the dip will be weird and not the right consistency)
• 1/3 cup of powdered sugar
• Chopped pecans
• Caramel sauce
• Chocolate sauce (I used Hershey’s chocolate spread)

Start by creaming together the powdered sugar, Cool Whip, pudding mix, and cream cheese. Once well blended, add in your desired amount of pecans. I used half of a small bag and saved the rest for topping.

Put that amazingness into a medium-sized bowl. Smooth it out with a spatula. Revel in your greatness.

Then eat a little of the chocolate sauce before you start to pipe it on your dip.

Then add a nice layer of caramel sauce. Feel free to eat some of that, too. Caramel is delicious.

And finish your layering with another pass of chocolate sauce.

Top with remaining crushed pecans and place in fridge to set!

Not a nut in sight!

Can we talk about how underrated Heath bars and toffee are? Bless the soul who thought to mix butter and sugar together at a high heat. We need more innovators like that. For this dip, gather up:

• 1 8 oz. block of room temp cream cheese
• 1/2 cup of room temp butter
• 2 teaspoons of vanilla
• 3 heaping tablespoons of brown sugar
• 1 cup of powdered sugar
• 1 cup of chocolate chips
• 1 cup of toffee bits

Hold on tight, people, this recipe is a wild ride, too. Mix together the cream cheese and butter until nice and fluffy. Then add in the vanilla, both sugars, and mix well. Finish up by adding in the chips and bits (new idea: open cookie store named chips and bits). 

Place into a medium-sized bowl. Smooth it out with a spatula. Continue to revel in greatness.

You could leave it at that, but I like to make everything pretty, so I topped my dip with some extra chocolate chips before placing in the fridge to set.

Yet another ten minutes of time for a night of ooh’s and aah’s directed your way. Even if you suck at baking, this is foolproof. And man alive, is it worth it. Each of these dips has something to offer. So much so that I have permanently placed these on the dessert rotation list, for sure. I will be dreaming of eating the minimal leftovers after we finish off the pumpkin cheesecake from last week. I have way too much dessert in this house. Not that it’s a problem for anything other than my waistline, really. And this year we’re not going on a cruise in the middle of December that I have to stay in super shape for, so I get to bust out stretchy pants and make the problem go away. Speaking of stretchy pants, I hope everyone has a fantastic Thanksgiving full of fried turkeys (the only way to eat turkey) and family. Don’t fry your family though…draw the line at cannibalism, always. Good old Kate Bakes Cakes will be taking a Kate Bakes Break until mid December due to traveling and the end of the semester (so. much. grading.), so I will see you all back then with some delicious Christmas treats when the timing is finally appropriate for Christmas-themed posts. Because unlike everyone else in the world, I remembered that after Halloween there was another holiday before Christmas...looking at you, Hobby Lobby. ‘Til next time, my fellow eaters!

I bid you a-dip.