dessert

Sugar Cookie Masterpieces

| Allison

We recently made cookies with our friends, and I was on the sugar cookie team. They were so much fun to decorate! So fun that I spent quite a long time decorating my 12 cookies – about two hours in fact. Heh heh. 🙂 But it was really fun, trust me! Of course, I couldn’t let those pretty cookies disappear down peoples’ throats without saving the results of all my labor in picture form. So here they are – my sugary works of art. Warning: you may be hungry for cookies after this! And another note while I’m at it. The “Merry Christmas” cookie was drawn in edible markers, just in case you were wondering. 🙂

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(Click on the individual images below to make them bigger.)

I learned how to frost this mitten cookie↓ from the American Girl magazine. It’s a really fun technique that looks really pretty. Basically you frost the cookie in one color, add stripes of icing in another color, and drag a toothpick through the stripes in the opposite direction the stripes go. (Like if the stripes are horizontal, drag your toothpick vertically up and down the cookie.)

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One random note: does it bother anyone else when “cookie” is spelled “cooky,” like in old books?

Ahem. Did you decorate or bake any Christmas goodies yet this year? Christmas certainly a delicious time of year, isn’t it? And Christmas is only four days away! I just told you that in case, for some really strange reason, you haven’t already told yourself a million times today.

Before Christmas I’m going to do a post with really cute pictures involving bunnies and Christmas. I can’t wait to show it to you! Until then…

***Allison***

Choco-Peanut-Butter Candy Bark!

| Allison

This is what I made for my brother’s birthday a while ago:

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I made up the recipe for this candy bark, because originally I was going to make candy bark from a recipe, but we didn’t have all the ingredients or I didn’t like the recipe or something, so I decided to make up a recipe myself. I call it “Chocolate Peanut Butter Candy Bark.” Or “Choco-Peanut-Butter Candy Bark” for short(er).

Now for a short description. Ahem. This candy bark is delicately flavored with only the finest chocolate and creamiest peanut butter on earth, and sprinkled with deliciously candied pecans… OK, enough fancy language. I’ll translate that for you. This candy bark is made with semisweet chocolate chips, peanut butter, and sprinkled with yummy candied pecans. My family rated it five out of five stars (to add to my meal planner thingy), so it had better be good!

OK, I think the introduction is long enough now, let’s get to the recipe!

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Chocolate Peanut Butter Candy Bark

  • 1 and 1/2 cups of semisweet chocolate chips
  • 1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons of peanut butter
  • 1/2 tablespoon of coconut oil (or any oil)
  • 1/2 cup of candied pecans (I found a most delicious recipe for candied pecans on Pinterest right here. Seriously, even if you don’t make the candy bark, you should make these. You can do pecans instead of almonds.)

Melt the first three ingredients in a pan until smooth. Add candied pecans. Cover a cookie sheet in parchment paper, and pour the mixture onto it. Melt two tablespoons of peanut butter. (You can add just a few chocolate chips.) Drop the peanut butter in little dots all over the candy bark. Use a toothpick to swirl everything together to get a pretty marbled effect. Place the cookie sheet in the freezer for a couple of hours until candy is hard and brittle. Break into pieces and serve!

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I hope you enjoy this candy as much as we did!

***Allison***