Fourth of July Cupcakes

Who doesn't like cupcakes? They are the perfect size of cakey goodness. My cousin and I wanted to make some fourth of July cupcakes so we could use the adorable pinwheels and cupcake wrappers I bought. She has never made tri-color cupcakes so we decided to have a little bit of coloring fun. They turned out very patriotic!

Ingredients:

1 box white cake mix plus ingredients listed on box
Red and blue food coloring

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare cake mix according to directions on box. Separate dough into three medium sized bowls. Tint one bowl red, one blue, and leave the other white. Line cupcake pans with paper liners. Start dropping one spoonful of dough in alternating colors into each cupcake paper until about 3/4 full.

Bake according to package directions.

Remove cupcakes from pan and allow to cool completely. Frost using icing recipe below or by tinting store bought frosting. Decorate and enjoy!

Betty Crocker's Creamy Vanilla Frosting:
3 cups powdered sugar
1/3 cup margarine or butter, softened
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
about 2 T milk

Mix powdered sugar and margarine. Stir in vanilla and milk; beat until smooth and of spreading consistency. Frosts a 13x9-inch cake or fills and frosts two 8-or 9-inch layers. 15 servings. 140 calories per serving.

Raspberry Peach Cobbler

Don't you just love cobbler! I had fresh peaches and raspberries so I decided to throw them together into one yummy cobbler. It was such a tantalizing aroma as it was cooking and I didn't even wait for it to cool down before I was snarfing it down.

Don't these peaches look good! Loved 'em!

I cut those beauties up (plus a couple of their peach buddies) and mixed them with the raspberries. Even smelling them cooking on the stove top was heavenly!

The poor beautiful raspberries got turned into mush though the more I stirred. That's alright though because they infused their deliciousness into the peaches!

I never make pretty little balls on top for the dough. I'm always in too much of a hurry to get it into the oven!

Ummmmmmm, yummy! Enjoy the recipe below.
I adapted it from one of good ol' Betty Crocker's classics.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 T cornstarch
3 cups peaches (5-6 medium blanched peaches)
1 cup raspberries (6 oz. tub)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
3 T shortening
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 T sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk

Directions:
Heat oven to 400 degrees. Peel and cut up blanched peaches. Set aside. Mix 1/2 cup sugar and the cornstarch in 2-quart saucepan. Stir in peaches, raspberries and lemon juice. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture thickens and boils. Boil and stir 1 minute. Pour into ungreased 1-quart casserole; keep peach mixture hot in oven.

Cut shortening into flour, 1 T sugar, the baking powder and salt until mixture resembles fine crumbs. Stir in milk. Drop dough by 6 spoonfuls onto hot peach mixture.

Bake until topping is golden brown, 25 to 30 minutes. Serve warm and, if desired, with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream. Makes 6 servings.

Snickerdoodle Cake

My family absolutely loves snickerdoodle cookies so when I saw this recipe from kaboose I knew we had to try it! It had a yummy cinnamon sugar crunch on top which we then topped with a dollop of whipped cream. It was a nice change from my usual chocolate cravings!


Ingredients:

* 2-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
* 2 teaspoons baking powder
* 1/2 teaspoon salt
* 2 cups sugar
* 1/2 cup shortening
* 2 eggs
* 1 cup milk
* 3 tablespoons sugar
* 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Cooking Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease and flour a 9x13-inch pan.
2. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream 2 cups sugar and shortening until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well with each addition. Alternately add milk and flour mixture in three stages, mixing well with each addition.
4. In a small bowl, mix 3 tablespoons sugar with cinnamon. Sprinkle this mixture evenly over cake.
5. Pour into prepared pan and bake in preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes or until done.

Nutrition Facts

Servings per Recipe: 24
Amount Per Serving

* calories: 167cal
* total fat: 5g
* cholesterol: 19mg
* sodium: 100mg
* carbohydrates: 28.9g
* fiber: 0.4g
* protein: 2.2g

Preparation Time: 0
Cooking Time: 0
Ready In: 0
Servings: 24

Pumpkin Struesel Muffins

I was having a MAJOR craving for pumpkin crunch bars but I couldn't find a recipe that didn't use 3 or more eggs and didn't use nuts on top. Sooooo....I made up one! Sort of. I made them into muffins instead but they satisfied the craving just as good.

Here's what I came up with!

Ingredients:

Muffin:

1 yellow cake mix

15 oz. can pure pumpkin

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

Struesel Topping:

1/2 cup quick cooking oats

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

3/4 cup packed brown sugar

1 1/4 tsp. cinnamon

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1/4 tsp. cloves

4 T melted margarine

Directions:

Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. In large mixing bowl stir together cake mix, pumpkin and cinnamon until well blended. Fill muffin cups 3/4 full. Toss together all the ingredients for topping saving melted margarine for last. Press 1 T of packed topping on each muffin. Bake for 20 minutes.

Makes approximately 18 cupcakes.

Banana Breakfast Cookies

Here's a simple healthy breakfast cookie that you can grab and go. I think next time I make these I might add some cinnamon and spices because they turned out just a little blah. They were still yummy though! I put some in the freezer so when I'm running late I can grab a few on my way to work.

INGREDIENTS:

3 ripe bananas
2 cups quick rolled oats
1 cup raisins
1/3 cup applesauce
1 teaspoon vanilla extract



DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, mash the bananas. Stir in oats, raisins, applesauce, and vanilla. Mix well, and allow to sit for 15 minutes. Drop by teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet.

Bake for 20 minutes in the preheated oven, or until lightly brown.


(recipe adapted from one seen on allrecipes)

Banana Cookies

If you like incredibly moist delicious banana cookies then you MUST try this recipe! I found it on the Simply Recipes website.

Banana Cookies Recipe

Ingredients:

1/2 cup of unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup of sugar
1 egg, room temperature
1 cup of mashed bananas (about 2 ½ large bananas)
1 teaspoon of baking soda
2 cups of flour
pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon of ground mace or nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon of ground cloves
1 cup of pecans (walnuts and chocolate chips are fine alternatives)
*I used chocolate chips for this recipe and it was fantastic!

Directions:

1 Preheat the oven to 350°F. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg and continue to beat until the mixture is light and fluffy.

2 In a bowl, mix the mashed bananas and baking soda. Let sit for 2 minutes. The baking soda will react with the acid in the bananas which in turn will give the cookies their lift and rise.

3 Mix the banana mixture into the butter mixture. Mix together the flour, salt, and spices and sift into the butter and banana mixture and mix until just combined.

4 Fold into the batter the pecans or chocolate chips if using. Drop in dollops onto parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Bake for 11-13 minutes or until nicely golden brown. Let cool on wire racks.

Makes about 30 cookies.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

Pure pumpkin goodness!

This recipe I found on food network was excellent! My hubby loves to buy pumpkin chocolate chip cookies from the store so I thought I'd try to make some that are just as good. With this recipe they definitely are!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies
Recipe courtesy George Duran

Prep Time: 15 min

Inactive Prep Time: 2 min

Cook Time: 15 min

Level: Easy

Serves: 60 cookies

Ingredients:

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup white sugar
1 cup light brown sugar
2 large eggs *
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup canned pumpkin puree
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
2 cups (12-ounce bag) milk chocolate chips, not semisweet
Nonstick cooking spray or parchment paper

Directions:

Heat the oven to 350 degrees F. Spray cookie sheets with nonstick spray or line them with parchment paper.

Using a mixer, beat the butter until smooth. Beat in the white and brown sugars, a little at a time, until the mixture is light and fluffy. Beat in the eggs 1 at a time, then mix in the vanilla and pumpkin puree. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and cloves. Slowly beat the flour mixture into the batter in thirds. Stir in the chips. Scoop the cookie dough by heaping tablespoons onto the prepared cookie sheets and bake for 15 to 20 minutes, or until the cookies are browned around the edges. Remove the cookie sheets from the oven and let them rest for 2 minutes. Take the cookies off with a spatula and cool them on wire racks.




*The only change I made to this recipe was that I added 2 T of flour to the mix for high altitude and substituted EnerG egg replacer powder for the eggs.