Fantastic Giveaway!

Megan is having this fantastic giveaway! She is giving away this Diva Apron, some recipe cards, and from what I hear, wonderful Chocolate Raspberry Sauce. You don't want to miss out, and there are a different couple of ways to get you name in. Go ahead and check it out! You can find it right here! Oh, and make sure you go and vote for her too!

TWD- Parisian Apple Tartlet

This weeks TWD recipe was chose by Jessica of My Baking Heart. This little tart was very simple, but honestly, I thought it was a little bland. I think that if I added a little cinnamon to it I would have liked it better. Will I make these little treats again, probably, I will just make a few little changes.

Next week is ice cream! I am super excited!!

Lime Meltaways

I have been on a cookie kick for the last few weeks. It first started with the Mississippi Mud Cookies, then the TWD Chocolate Chip Cookie topped brownie, after that was the Strawberry and Cream cookies. Over the weekend I made Peanut butter chocolate chip cookies, they kids loved them, I loved them, the hubby loved them...so saying all of that, they were all gone before I could snap a pic, but they were from BFMHTY by Dorie.

So now, I give you these little dainty Lime Meltaways. I have seen these in both lime or lemon, and just hadn't taken the time to make them. So, my friend from Icing Heals All Wounds, don't you love the name? She really is just stating the facts!, made these little babies and I had a couple of limes just hanging out ready to be used. Perfect!

I love them! The good thing is that the dough makes 2 logs, so you can bake one now and freeze the other log for later. If you can contain yourself and not bake them right away. I want to make them with the lemon and maybe with an orange.

Lime Meltaways
From Martha Stewart

3/4 cup butter, softened
1/3 cup confectioner's sugar
2 Tbs. lime juice
Zest of 2 limes
1 Tbs. vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups plus 2 Tbs. flour
2 Tbs. cornstarch
1/4 tsp. salt

Cream butter and sugar. Add lime juice, zest, and vanilla extract and mix until well-combined.

In a separate bowl, sift together the dry ingredients (flour, cornstarch, and salt). Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture and beat until just combined.

Divide the dough into two halves.

Shape each half into a log that is about 1 1/4 inch in diameter, wrap in freezer paper, and freeze for at least one hour.After one hour, remove the dough from the freezer. Slice the logs into thin slices, between 1/8 and 1/4 inch, place the slices on a cookie sheet with some space between them (there will be minimal spreading), and bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes. Make sure you only slice as many cookies as you can fit in the oven at a time--if you have part of your log left after filling your cookie sheet, return the uncut portion to the freezer until it's ready to bake.Remove the cookies from the cookie sheet and allow to cool on a cooling rack for about 5 minutes. Roll cookies in bowl with additional powdered sugar.

Strawberries and Cream Cookies

These cookies are from A Passion for Baking by Marcy Goldman. This is probably my second or third recipe that I have made from it. My cookies don't really look the ones in the book and some of the reason is because my dried strawberries were more brownish, and not bright red. I looked everywhere for dried strawberries and happened to come across them at Ingles, and they were $5 per bag, and mind you, that bag was not very big.

The recipe says to roll the dough out to 1/2 and cut out into 2 inch rounds. I used the cookie cutter, but don't think that it would make a difference, as they did spread. These cookies turned into thin and crispy, but still chewy in the middle. I think next time, I won't roll them out, I will just use my little cookie scoop and see how they turn out. This cookie is basically a shortbread dough with the dried strawberries and white chocolate for the cream. I give these cookies a thumbs up!

Strawberries and Cream Cookies
By: Marcy Goldman

3/4 cup sugar
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp vanilla
1 Tbsp whipping cream
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 cup minced white chocolate
3/4 cup dried strawberries, coarsely chopped

You can order dried strawberries online from nutsonline.com, if you can't find them near you.

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Stack two baking sheets together and line top with parchment paper.

In a mixer bowl, combine sugar and butter on low speed until well blended. Then add flour, vanilla, cream, and salt and blend well. When almost blended into a dough, add white chocolate and dried strawberries, mixing by hand to incorporate and make a firm dough.

Knead dough gently on a lightly floured work surface about 1 minute to make dough more firm and get it to hold together. Flatten dough into a disk, wrap well, and refrigerate 30 minutes.

Roll out gently about 1/2 inch thick and cut into small round cookies, about 2 inches in diameter.

Place on prepared baking sheets. Place in oven and immediately reduce oven temp to 300 degrees. Bake until lightly browned around edges, about 15-20 minutes.

Apple Strudel for the Daring Bakers

The May Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Linda of make life sweeter! and Courtney of Coco Cooks. They chose Apple Strudel from the recipe book Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague by Rick Rodgers.

This was not one that turned out for me. Strudel has been on my wanting to make list for a really long time and I was eager to try it. I didn't have any problems with stretching the dough paper thin, it didn't get as big as it should have, but stretching went just fine. Put it in the oven to bake, let it sit for 30 minutes..sliced it. My dough was really tough. It didn't want to slice and couldn't really chew it. My kids threw theirs in the garbage. But, hey, I tried it, know how to stretch this dough and hopefully it will turn out better on the next try. This is the reason that I stay with the Daring Bakers, to push myself to try things that are difficult, and some that are not so much. Now, bring on June!

TWD-Chipster Topped Brownies

This weeks TWD recipe was chosen by Beth of Supplicious. I have made these before and they were a hit with the family, and this week was no different. I mean, how can you go wrong with brownies and chocolate chip cookies in one? I don't think that you can! Thanks for a fantastic recipe this week!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Brownies

You know those recipes that you think...there is probably one out there better than this, but these are good? This is one of those recipes. Again, I was looking through this stack of printed off recipes and came across this one. Hopefully, one of these days I will make it through that stack.

I would make these again, the kids loved them, and the hubby liked them too. They were moist, but probably could have used a little more peanut butter for my taste. Needless to say, they didn't make it through the day, until they were gone.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Brownies

3 eggs
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup margarine
2 tsp vanilla
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cup chocolate chips

Butter a 9x13 baking dish and preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cream together the margarine and sugars. Add the eggs and combine. Mix in the peanut butter and vanilla and mix until combined.

Mix together the flour, baking powder and salt. Mix this mixture to the wet mixture. Mix until well combined. Fold in the chocolate chips.

Spread batter in baking dish and bake for 25 minutes.