Tag: Easy Dessert Recipes

Peanut Butter Brownie Bites Recipe

pin peanut butter brownie bites

If you like brownies and you like peanut butter, you won’t want to miss this recipe.

My two favorite pairings in the world are as follows:

  • Salty & Sweet
  • Peanut Butter and Chocolate

This wonderful recipe for Peanut Butter Brownie Bites involves peanut butter and chocolate and it’s honestly SO stinking easy that it’s almost embarrassing to call it a recipe.

You COULD make it harder.

You COULD make your brownies from scratch (I have a GREAT from scratch brownie recipe here).

Who has time for that nowadays?

Okay, sometimes I make time for it. But on this day, I just needed brownies ASAP and my FAVORITE boxed brownies were on hand (Ghirardelli Double Chocolate).

The hardest part of making these brownies, was holding off long enough to let them cool so I could drizzle melted peanut butter in the middle.

Yum. 

Why so many pictures you ask?

Well because these are gone. They were gone the day after they were made and I’m feeling kind of nostalgic 😉

Okay, now onto the recipe.

Peanut Butter Brownie Bites

adapted from Nestle

Ingredients: 

  • Either your favorite boxed brownie mix (mine:  Ghirardelli Double Chocolate) or your favorite from scratch recipe (here’s mine) and whatever ingredients needed to make them
  • 3/4 cup Creamy Peanut butter
  • Peanut butter chips
  • Chocolate chips

Directions: 

  1. Make brownies as directed, bake in cupcake or mini muffin tins until just barely set in the center (toothpick should come out just slightly coated in batter)
  2. Remove from oven and let cool.
  3. Brownies will either fall in the center, or you can push them down a bit to make a well for the peanut butter
  4. Melt the peanut butter in the microwave and drizzle into the center of each brownie.
  5. Top with chocolate chips and peanut butter chips
  6. Enjoy!

Peanut Butter Brownie Bites Recipe
Ingredients
  • Either your favorite boxed brownie mix (mine: Ghirardelli Double Chocolate) or your favorite from scratch recipe (here’s mine) and whatever ingredients needed to make them
  • 3/4 cup Creamy Peanut butter
  • Peanut butter chips
  • Chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. Make brownies as directed, bake in cupcake or mini muffin tins until just barely set in the center (toothpick should come out just slightly coated in batter)
  2. Remove from oven and let cool.
  3. Brownies will either fall in the center, or you can push them down a bit to make a well for the peanut butter
  4. Melt the peanut butter in the microwave and drizzle into the center of each brownie.
  5. Top with chocolate chips and peanut butter chips
  6. Enjoy!
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Kids Activity: Popcorn Ball Names w/ M&M’s and Pretzel Sticks (Plus Popcorn Ball Recipe!)

Disclaimer: I received this popcorn ball kit from GoodCook for free. All opinions are my own. 

Head on over to GoodCook for more popcorn ball tips! 

Recently I was sent one of the coolest review kits I’ve received as a blogger.

It was a popcorn ball kit from GoodCook!

This package was filled to the brim with goodies galore!

My absolute favorite was the Popcorn Baller though.

Seriously!?

There is a way to make popcorn balls that doesn’t involve burning the crud out of your hands? SIGN ME UP!

My daughter was very excited about this GoodCook Popcorn Ball kit as well. Since we were planning a playdate with some friends of hers, she asked if we could make popcorn balls for her and her friends.

Now I have nothing against Popcorn Balls for the sake of Popcorn Balls, however…

This was an “educational” preschool playdate.

So you know I had to find a way to incorporate our popcorn balls into some kind of learning activity!

All the kiddos that were going to be at the playdate were going to be around 4 years old.

Prime “Learn to Spell Your Name” age!

We decided to incorporate pretzels and m&m’s in our Popcorn Ball name activity.

I did NOT put pretzels into the popcorn ball simply because I was nervous that the 4 year olds would choke on them if they were hidden in the ball.

So we just added the m&m’s to the popcorn mixture prior to shaping the popcorn into balls with the Amazing Fantastic Incredible GoodCook Popcorn Baller!

Next, we put some pretzel sticks and m&m’s in a small cup and wrote the first inital of each child on a popcorn ball.

Then during the party, they had to “create” the rest of their name with the m&m’s and pretzels!

This was actually a great hands activity for the 4 year olds because they had to troubleshoot which letters were made more easily with pretzel sticks and which ones could only be made with M&M’s.

It was so fun!

The popcorn balls were great, and I know we’ll make some more (less educational, ha!) in a few weeks for Halloween.

Here’s the recipe we used:

Popcorn Ball Recipe

Ingredients: 

    • 2 (8 ounce) package miniature marshmallows
    • 8 tablespoons butter
    • 8 cups of popcorn (I popped on the stove with coconut oil)
    • 1 bag of M&M’s (my daughter separated these out by color)

 

Directions: 

Pop your popcorn however you like

 

Melt the marshamallows and butter together on the stove

Pour marshmallow mixture over the popcorn and mix well. Allow to cool slightly.

Add in M&M’s and stir

Use a large spoon or rubber spatula to add the popcorn mixture to your GoodCook popcorn baller

Use the popcorn baller as directed (be sure to spray the inside with some nonstick spray for easy removal)

Allow to set!

Enjoy!

Right now youcan get 25% off the Good Cook Popcorn Ballers on goodcook.com when you use the coupon code POPCORN.

 

Ingredients
  • 2 (8 ounce) package miniature marshmallows
  • 8 tablespoons butter
  • 8 cups of popcorn (I popped on the stove with coconut oil)
  • 1 bag of M&M’s (my daughter separated these out by color)
Instructions
  1. Pop your popcorn however you like
  2. Melt the marshamallows and butter together on the stove
  3. Pour marshmallow mixture over the popcorn and mix well. Allow to cool slightly.
  4. Add in M&M’s and stir
  5. Use a large spoon or rubber spatula to add the popcorn mixture to your GoodCook popcorn baller
  6. Use the popcorn baller as directed (be sure to spray the inside with some nonstick spray for easy removal)
  7. Allow to set!
3.2.1255

 

Disclaimer: I received this popcorn ball kit from GoodCook for free. All opinions are my own. 

25 Delicious Desserts from Around the Web (Plus 10 Desserts from Right Here!)



Dessert! Who wants some dessert?

Me me me me!

I love dessert. I’ll admit, I’m generally a fan of big meals and will forgo dessert for an excellent dinner.

However, when I do have dessert, I want it to be AWESOME. Right?

Of course!

Gotta make those calories count.

(or um…don’t count them. I won’t judge! I promise!)

Here are some desserts I have posted over the years on FFF:

  1. Chocolate Chip Caramel Cookie Bars
  2. Pecan Pie Bites
  3. White Chocolate Chunk Salted Oatmeal Cookies
  4. Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
  5. Cinnamon Sugar Pull Apart Bread
  6. Chocolate, Strawberries and Cream Trifle
  7. Chocolate and Nut Pie
  8. Chocolate Chip Cookie Pie
  9. Homemade Ice Cream
  10. Best Chocolate Chip Cookies EVER!

So yum. SO much yum. It’s been a fun 3 years 😉

It’s been a tasty 3 years!

Here’s to many more…and here’s 25 desserts I hope to try over the next few months (err, weeks? err, days?) from all around the web:

1. Peanut Butter Vegan Dreams PHOTO
2. Chocolate Hazelnut Butter Toffee
3. Eat S’more Cheesecake Bites
4. Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Snack Cake
5. Pineapple Dream Dessert PHOTO
6. Late Night One Bowl Vanilla Sour Cream Cake
7. Fudgy Strawberry Brownie “Nachos”
8. Chocolate Cake from scratch PHOTO
9. Peaches and Cream Dessert PHOTO
10. Baked Apples
11. Applesauce Sundaes
12. Mocha Brownie Tart
13. Easy Apple Crisp PHOTO
14. Maple Pecan Shortbread PHOTO
15. Mandarin Orange Fudge Brownie Torte PHOTO
16. Banana Bread with Nutella and Hazelnuts
17. Fruit Salad Ice Pops
18. Old Fashioned Oatmeal Cookies
19. Wacky Chocolate Cake
20. Brownies with Chocolate Caramel Glaze
21. Chocolate Chocolate Chip Wacky Cake
22. Mini Blueberry Cheesecake
23. Gooey Dump Cake
24. Humble Apple Cake Kicked Up
25. Cinnamon Orange Spiced Chocolate Zucchini Cake

If you have not gained 5 lbs just by reading this post…I would like to borrow your metabolism.

Let me know if you try any of these great desserts!

Monkey Bread Recipe – With A Surprise Stuffed Inside!

Monkey Bread Recipe

This easy monkey bread recipe is made with canned biscuits and other yummy ingredients. The best part is that there is a SURPRISE inside every bite! What is the surprise? This monkey bread is stuffed with cream cheese! Read the post for all of the details on how to make this super special monkey bread recipe! This recipe for Monkey Bread will KNOCK your socks off!

I remember the first time I had Monkey Bread. It tasted sooo good and I was so surprised to find out how easy it was to make!

If you’ve never had Monkey Bread, the basic recipe for monkey bread is just biscuit dough with sugar and butter that is baked up into a sweet and fluffy breakfast dish (find more breakfast recipes here).

I was flipping through a new cookbook of mine recently and I saw this clever recipe for monkey bread that added a filling inside each biscuit and I knew I wanted to try it out.

Related: Cake Batter Pancakes

I’m calling it Monkey Bread Surprise!

This can be breakfast, or you can serve this for dessert!

Here’s what you’ll need for this ooey gooey recipe for Monkey Bread (with a Surprise!):

Recipe for Monkey Bread: An Easy Monkey Bread Recipe!

Adapted from Gooseberry Patch Big Book of Home Cooking

Recipe for Monkey Bread Ingredients:

  • 2 refrigerated biscuit cans (each with 10 biscuits)
  • 8 oz of cream cheese
  • 1/2 cup of white sugar
  • 1 tablespoon of cinnamon
  • 2 cups of brown sugar
  • 1 cup of butter

Recipe for Monkey Bread Directions:

1. Preheat your oven to 350. You’ll need a greased bundt pan for this dish, so go ahead and grease your bundt pan.

2. Mix together the 1/2 cup of white sugar and the 1 tbsp of cinnamon (from here on out this will be known as the “sugar mixture”)

3. Open up your biscuit cans and flatten each biscuit (I use the bottom of my half cup measuring cup for this!)

4. Place a 1/2 teaspoon of the sugar mixture on each biscuit.

5. Cut up the cream cheese into 20 cubes and place ONE cube on each biscuit.

6. Meanwhile, melt the butter and the brown sugar in a pan on the stove on low heat, stirring occasionally.

7. Fold the biscuit dough up over the cream cheese, being careful not to let the sugar mixture fall out. Roll these into balls. (so the cream cheese/sugar mixture will be inside of the ball)

8. Place half of the biscuits on the bottom of your greased bundt pan. Top with 1/2 of the sugar mixture and half of the butter/brown sugar mixture. Repeat this pattern for the other half of biscuits.

10. Bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

11. Take your Monkey Bread Surprise! out and let it sit on the counter for 5 minutes. Then flip it out onto a plate (if you’ve never done this, it’s easy. Take a plate wide enough to cover the entire opening of the bundt pan and place it on top of the open side of the bundt pan. Hold the plate firmly against the bundt pan and flip the whole thing over so the plate is on the bottom. Lift up the bundt pan and your Monkey Bread Surprise! will be on your plate!)

Dig in! Tell them it’s Monkey Bread, but watch how surprised they’ll be when they see the sweet creamy middle! Yum.

Share this Recipe for Monkey Bread with your friends and pin it on Pinterest! Thank you!

 

Chocolate Chip Caramel Cookie Bars Recipe

Chocolate Chip Caramel Cookie Bar Recipe

You HAVE to try this super easy chocolate chip caramel cookie bar recipe! Ooey, gooey, caramel-y, this is the best chocolate chip cookie bar recipe you will ever eat!

Ooey.

Gooey.

Caramel-y.

Chocolate-y.

Chocolate Chip Caramel Cookie Bars.

These are so good. The ingredient list might look a bit daunting, but it’s so good and I don’t think you’ll regret making these.

(until you go to button your jeans in a few days…)

Looking for more dessert recipes? Be sure to check out these chocolate chip cookies, this chocolate chip cookie pie, and just to change things up a bit…maybe you can make some homemade vanilla ice cream to go with these chocolate chip caramel cookie bars!

Chocolate Chip Caramel Cookie Bars

Inspired by Pinch of Yum

Ingredients:

  • 11 oz bag of caramel (I found these by the chocolate chips)
  • 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
  • 2 sticks of butter
  • 2 cups of brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tbsp vanilla
  • 2 cups of flour
  • 1 cup of old fashioned oats
  • 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 2 cups of chocolate chips

Directions: 

      1. In a saucepan, melt 4 tbsp of the butter, the sweetened condensed milk and the caramels (stir often). Stir in 1 tbsp of the vanilla after it’s melted and remove from heat.
      2. Meanwhile, cream the rest of the butter and the brown sugar together.
      3. Add the remaining tablespoon of vanilla to the butter/sugar mixture and add the eggs 1 at a time and then add the peanut butter.
      4. Mix the flour, oats, baking powder, salt and chocolate chips together in a bowl. 
      5. Add the flour mixture to the butter/sugar mixture until well combined. 
      6. In a large glass baking dish (greased), add 2/3 of the cookie dough to the pan and press it down. 
      7. Pour the caramel over the top. 
      8. Then take the rest of the dough and pinch it over the top by the tablespoonful. (I recruited some help for this). 
      9. Bake at 350 for around 30 minutes.

Enjoy!

Chocolate Chip Caramel Bars
Ingredients
  • 11 oz bag of caramel (I found these by the chocolate chips)
  • 14 oz can of sweetened condensed milk
  • 2 sticks of butter
  • 2 cups of brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 tbsp vanilla
  • 2 cups of flour
  • 1 cup of old fashioned oats
  • 2 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 2 cups of chocolate chips
Instructions
  1. In a saucepan, melt the 4 tbsp of butter, the sweetened condensed milk and the caramels (stir often). Stir in 1 tbsp of the vanilla after it’s melted and remove from heat.
  2. Meanwhile, cream the rest of the butter and the brown sugar together.
  3. Add the remaining tablespoon of vanilla to the butter/sugar mixture and add the eggs 1 at a time.
  4. Mix the flour, oats, baking powder, salt and chocolate chips together in a bowl.
  5. Add the flour mixture to the butter/sugar mixture until well combined.
  6. In a large glass baking dish (greased), add 2/3 of the cookie dough to the pan and press it down.
  7. Pour the caramel over the top.
  8. Then take the rest of the dough and pinch it over the top by the tablespoonful. (I recruited some help for this).
  9. Bake at 350 for around 30 minutes.
3.2.1255

 

 

Two Ingredient Popsicles: Healthier at Home Popsicles that are Easy!

 

It’s summer and our kids all want a sweet treat.

Most store bought Popsicle are chock full of unpronounceable junk and chemicals though.

Check out these TWO ingredient popsicles from Motherhood on a Dime though.

Can you guess what the two ingredients are?

Strawberry Shortcake Recipe: Get Ready for Strawberry Season!

We’re coming up on strawberry season fairly soon here in Texas.

I know, we’re a lot earlier than the rest of the country!

Our favorite place to go get strawberries (pick your own strawberries at Froberg Farms) is already selling their homegrown strawberries (although public picking isn’t available for at least a month or two) so we stopped by this past weekend and picked some up.

My daughter adores strawberries and is a self proclaimed Strawberry Monster, so I thought I’d make her a sweet dessert that she’d enjoy.

I actually made this on Superbowl Sunday and the whole family thought it was great!

It’s very simple to make. Strawberries, whipped cream, and you can either make the cakes (which are kind of crunchy cakes…not soft like angel food or traditional shortcake) or you can buy your favorite cake at the grocery store and layer it in there.

It definitely tastes even better the next day after it’s all had a chance to set together (it might not look as pretty, but it will taste GREAT!) in the fridge overnight.

Try it out and let me know if you like it!

Strawberry Shortcake

adapted from Big Book of Home Cooking

Ingredients

  • 1 qt strawberries
  • 1 cup of sugar
  • 2 cups all purpose flour
  • 4 teaspoons baking powder
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/8 t nutmeg
  • 1/2 cup of butter (keep cold until you are ready for it)
  • 1/2 cup milk
  • 2 eggs (separate yolks from whites)
  • 2 cups of fresh whipped cream

Directions:

  1. Hull and slice your strawberries and place them in a container with a 1/2 cup of the sugar. Place in the refrigerator to chill.
  2. Now combine your flour, 1/4 cup of the sugar, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Once combine cut the cold butter into the mixture with a pastry blender or 2 forks. You want the mixture to be crumbly.
  3. Add the milk and egg yolks and stir until just moistened. It will look like dough, not cake batter.
  4. Place the dough in (2) 9″ greased cake pans.
  5. Whip the egg whites until they form peaks and spread over the dough in the cake pans.
  6. Top with the remaining sugar.
  7. Bake at 300 degrees for 40 minutes and then allow to cool for about 10 minutes before transferring to a wire rack.
  8. Once the cakes are cooled, spread the whipped cream onto one cake and top with half the strawberries. Repeat cake, whipped cream and strawberries for the top layer.

If you aren’t in the mood for a crumbly biscuit kind of cake, just layer with the cake of your choice. Likewise, if your strawberries are sweet enough, you could get away with omitting the 1/2 cup of sugar you chill them with (but even sweet strawberries taste great with sugar, yum!).

This dessert is so tasty and can feed a lot!

Linked up at…

Smockity Frocks

White Chocolate Chunk Salted Oatmeal Cookies

Do you bake fairly often?

I love to bake (although I hate to wash dishes after baking!).

My favorite thing to bake?

Cookies!

I am a cookie freak.

A homemade cookie freak , that is (okay okay, I’ll totally down a sleeve of Chips Ahoy Chocolate Chip cookies if you hand it to me).

I like experimenting with different cookie recipes and adding different and unique ingredients to my tried and true recipes.

Recently, Silpat sent me one of their Half Size Baking Mats to try out.

I’ve always just baked my cookies on a traditional baking sheet. I’ll admit my cookies do not cook evenly in my oven. I’ve kind of figured out how to make it work. It involves flipping the pan around midway through the baking time…taking the cookies out early and allowing them to cook a bit more on the pan and THEN transferring them to the wire rack to cool.

This often results in great tops and burnt bottom cookies.

Not cool.

I decided to give this Silpat Half Size Baking Mat a try using my White Chocolate Chunk Salted Oatmeal Cookies (say that 3 times fast!).

These cookies never cook evenly for me. I love them, but they don’t love my oven!

I baked the majority of my cookies on the Silpat Half Size Baking Mat and baked one pan just on an old baking sheet I typically use (minus the Silpat Half Size Baking Mat).

The difference is glaringly obvious.

Same oven. Same temp. Same time.

The White Chocolate Chunk Salted Oatmeal Cookies baked on the Silpat are perfectly done. Brown on top and bottom and ready to be immediately moved to the wire rack to cool (they also slid off easily…no cookies crumbled!).

The cookies on the baking sheet are both burnt AND undercooked. This is a problem!

I think the results speak for themselves…I am in LOVE with my Silpat Half Size Baking Mat!

 

White Chocolate Chunk Salted Oatmeal Cookies

inspired by Smitten Kitchen

Ingredients

  • 1 cup all-purpose flour
  • 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/4 teaspoon table salt
  • 14 tablespoons softened salted butter (I always use salted…you can use unsalted if you want since you’ll be sprinkling the cookies with sea salt)
  • 1 cup sugar
  • 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
  • 1 large egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 1/2 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
  • 6 oz of white chocolate cut into chunks (you’ll notice I didn’t have all white chocolate! SOMEONE got into the bar before I could bake with it. Hence the random semi sweet chocolate chips in this batch of cookies 😉 )
  • Sea Salt for sprinkling

Directions: 

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
  2. Cream together the butter and sugar. Add the egg and vanilla.
  3. In a separate bowl mix the flour, baking soda and baking powder together.
  4. Slowlybeat the flour mixture into the sugar mixture.
  5. Add the oatmeal and stir it in.
  6. Add the chocolate chunks
  7. Drop the dough by the tablespoonful onto your Silpat baking mat lined pan ( 😉 ).
  8. Top with a sprinkling of sea salt.
  9. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

These cookies will be crisp, chewy and a bit crunchy. That is how they should be! They are sooo tasty.

Enjoy!

 

 

Rice Krispie Turkey Treats: Gobble Gobble

The other day I was perusing the Rice Krispies website when I saw these cuties.

I got the bright idea that I would try these out (I mean how hard could they be?) so I went grocery shopping and got all the supplies:

  • 6 cups of Rice Krispies (I swear by using the real cereal…generic just doesn’t taste as good to me in Rice Krispie Treats!)
  • 1 bag of marshmallows
  • 3 tablespoons butter
  • 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips*
  • 1 tablespoon vegetable oil*
  • candy corn
  • White candies for eyes (I couldn’t find these so I just bought some white chocolate and cut off chunks)

*In hindsight…I wish I had just used the chocolate bark from Kroger instead of the chocolate chips and vegetable oil! That is what I’d do differently next time. I am sure it would “set” easier.

I waited until after school and the kids and I set to work making the Rice Krispie treats just like normal:

  1. Melt butter (don’t let it brown)
  2. Add marshmallows and stir over low heat until they are all melted
  3. Stir in Rice Krispies until fully incorporated

Next I started dropping the mixture onto my cutting board by big heaping spoonfuls. As it cooled it was a bit easier to shape into balls (next time I make these…I’ll make them into balls and then flatten the bottom so they “sit” better).

Once they had sat for about 10 minutes…I heated up the chocolate chips and vegetable oil in 30 second increments in the microwave until it was all melty. Next time, I’ll use chocolate bark and just melt that by itself.

We dipped the balls into the chocolate coating half of them.

Next we stuck them in the refrigerator until the chocolate was just about set.

I pulled them out and stuck the candies on them to make our turkeys! I also stuck a lollipop stick in them for the kids.

Snapped a quick pic before they gobbled them down!

This was a fun little project for the kids and I…but it was actually a lot more sit and wait then I thought it would be! Still…we had fun and I definitely think we’ll make these again!

 

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