Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween, everyone!


We had a little Halloween party over the weekend, and I wanted to share recipes for some of the goodies that I made.  In the coming week, you'll see recipes for some pumpkin peanut butter dip, pumpkin cupcakes with cream cheese frosting, black bean dip, and you've already seen the Halloween Rice Krispie Treats I made.  


I just wanted to share a few photos with you, as well, to give you a little preview of what's to come this week!

Made by Megan, Anthony, and Julia!  Yum!

Check out Maeby in her costume, too!!  

World's cutest and least threatening shark.

The poor little girl HATED it.  Because of that, we only kept it on her for about 5 minutes to take some pictures, then we let her run free.  When Sean put it on her, she wouldn't move.  She just stood there, very stiff-legged, with a look on her face that said "I'll get you for this".


Have some fun today and look for more recipes from me as the week goes on!

Halloween Rice Krispie Treats

So Sean and I had a little Halloween party over the weekend, and since I've somehow managed to not post any Halloween-related recipes, I thought I'd share one with you that I served at the party.  It's your basic Rice Krispie treat, but jazzed up for Halloween.  I hope you enjoy them!

This recipe was originally found at Pass the Plate.  


You'll need:


3 tbs butter
4 cups mini marshmallows
1/2 cup peanut butter
6 cups puffed rice cereal 
12 oz. bag of candy corn


In a large saucepan, melt the butter over low heat.  Add the marshmallows and stir until completely melted.  Stir in the peanut butter until it has melted, too.  This is kind of a sticky mess... so be prepared!  Remove from the heat and stir in the cereal and candy corn until everything is well coated.  Use a buttered spatula or piece of wax paper to evenly press the mixture into a well-greased 13x9x2-inch pan.  Let them firm up, cut into desired shapes/sizes, and enjoy!


If your store happens to be out of regular candy corn (coughWalmartcough...) go right ahead and use some of the other varieties.  I used some (somewhat racially insensitive...) Indian Corn, because I was a little wary of the caramel-flavored candy corn.  By the way, when did they even come out with the flavored candy corns?  I completely missed out on that one.

Enjoy these!

Sunday Farmer's Market

No recipe here, unfortunately.  But I just wanted to share with you some photos I took at the farmer's market yesterday morning (the one held under the JFX downtown).  In keeping with the season, there were lots of apples, pumpkins, all manner of gourds and squashes, as well as some really interesting cauliflower, and other odds and ends.  I was so excited to see all of the autumnal produce.

In the end, I managed to make off with a small pumpkin, 3 bumpy-looking gourds, some apple cider, and a crepe.  Not a bad morning =).  The cider and crepe were delicious, and the pumpkin and gourds will help to decorate our apartment during the Halloween party we're throwing this weekend.  Be sure to check back later this week and the beginning of next for recipes from the party!

Applesauce Spice Cake with Vanilla Buttercream Frosting

My parents came to visit us this weekend.  Okay, I should be honest with you.  I'll start again.  My parents came to visit Maeby this weekend.  She's their only grandchild (read: granddog) at the moment, and they just love her.  The feeling is mutual, I can assure you.  My mom has threatened on many occasions to kidnap her.  She likes to laugh it off and pretend that she's kidding, but we all know that she's at least half-serious about it.  You have to keep an eye on her to make sure that she doesn't try and smuggle Maeby out under a coat or something.


My dad's birthday happens to occur this weekend as well.  I wanted to bake him a birthday cake, preferably without having to resort to using a boxed mix.  Mostly because I didn't have a boxed mix handy and didn't feel like heading back to the store.  Also, because I thought it might be nice to bake a cake that was at least moderately seasonally-appropriate.  Enter: the Applesauce Spice Cake.

The recipe for the cake was originally found at Baking with Basil, and the frosting recipe was found at Savory Sweet Life. 

For the cake, you'll need:


2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp allspice
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1 stick butter, room temperature
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups unsweetened applesauce
2 eggs, room temperature


For the frosting, you'll need:


2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
3-4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1 tbs vanilla extract
up to 4 tbs milk or heavy cream


Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease your 9x13 cake pan with butter or non-stick cooking spray.


In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and spices.  Whisk until combined.  Add the butter, buttermilk, and applesauce to the dry ingredients.  Beat until well combined.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time.


Pour into cake pan and bake for 20-30 minutes, depending upon your particular oven.  Mine only took about 22 minutes, so make sure to start checking at 20 minutes.  You can also use this recipe to make cupcakes!  If you choose to go that route, fill the cupcake liners 3/4 of the way full and bake for 16-19 minutes.

The cake after baking, complete with the hole in the center where I tested for doneness.

To make the frosting, you'll want to beat the butter with a mixer outfitted with a paddle attachment on medium speed for just a few minutes.  Add 3 cups of powdered sugar (you can always add the 4th cup later on if you think you need it) and beat on the lowest speed, that way the powdered sugar doesn't go flying everywhere.  Beat this until the sugar has been well incorporated into the butter.  Increase the mixer's speed to medium and add the vanilla, salt, and 2 tbs of milk. 


If the frosting looks a little too stiff for your liking, you can add the extra milk 1 tbs at a time.  If it ends up being too runny, you can add some more of the sugar to stiffen it up.

A beautiful buttercream!  This is my favorite recipe to date.  It isn't so sweet that your teeth hurt while eating it.

Now frost your cake and/or cupcakes! 

All frosted up!

After slicing into it.  Mm mmm...

This cake smells wonderful while baking.  It smells just like fall.  It's sweet and spicy, and really moist.  Next time I think I'll bake it into cupcake form =).

Happy birthday, Dad!!

Spaghetti Squash with Garlic Butter

Recipe originally found at Steamy Kitchen.

You'll need:

1 spaghetti squash
2 tbs butter
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup finely minced fresh herbs (optional)
1/2 tsp salt (or to taste)
1/4 cup shredded parmesan cheese

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees F.  Place your spaghetti squash on a baking sheet and bake for ~1 hour (mine took 1 hour and 10 minutes).  You'll know it's done when you can easily pierce the skin with a sharp knife with little resistance.  Set the squash aside to cool for 10 minutes or so.

Cut the squash in half, lenghtwise.  Use a fork or spoon to remove the seeds and other membranes.  Discard them.  Continue using your fork to scrape the squash to get long strands that resemble spaghetti noodles.  If your squash is proving difficult to scrape out, put it back in the oven for 10 minutes or so.

Look at those squashy strands!

Heat a large sautee pan and melt the butter.  Add the garlic and sautee over medium-low heat for a minute or so.  Once the garlic is fragrant, add your strands of spaghetti squash, salt, and herbs if you're using them.  Add the cheese, and then taste to make sure you don't need more salt.

You can cook for a couple minutes more, or just eat it as is, depending upon your preference for the texture.  Cooking it for a bit longer will obviously make it a bit softer.  It has a bit of a crunch to it to begin with.

Using some fresh herbs would have made it a lot prettier by adding a nice pop of color, and would certainly have imparted some more flavor.  Unfortunately, my herbs bit the dust this past week.  The parsley and chives wilted and couldn't be revived, and the basil started turning brown.  Can I get a moment of silence?  This is a very sad thing indeed.  Oddly enough, my cherry tomato plant is still thriving!  I've gotten more cherry tomatoes off of it in the past few weeks (I wish I had taken pictures.  I had TONS!) than I got pretty much all summer.

This made for a nice, relatively low calorie, albeit interesting side dish.  Since it was just Sean and myself eating dinner, I only ended up using half of the squash.  Those things actually have a lot inside of them!  But you can obviously use as much squash as you need/want to.  Now I just need to figure out how I'm going to use up the other half...

Banana Peanut Butter Muffins with Chocolate Chips

I decided to seek out a recipe for a banana-based baked good in response to pleas from my family that I stop posting about pumpkin.  I'll appease them... for now.

This recipe was adapted from the one found here.

You'll need:

1/2 cup plus 2 tbs all purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 ripe bananas, mashed
6 tbs peanut butter (creamy or chunky will do)
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 tbs honey
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
3/4 cup chocolate chips


Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.  Prepare your muffin tin by greasing the cups or inserting muffin liners.


Stir the flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a medium bowl.  Set aside.


Mash the banana, peanut butter (I used chunky, because I love me some chunky peanut butter), brown sugar, honey, vanilla, and egg together in another bowl.  


Pour the wet mixture into the dry and stir until just combined.  Add your chocolate chips and stir to combine again.


Fill the muffin tins ~3/4 of the way full.  Bake 20-22 minutes, or until golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean.


I got 10 muffins out of this recipe.

C'mon now, peanut butter and banana?  And then you add in some chocolate?  These are great.  The outside is a little crisp, and the inside is moist and chewy, just the way a muffin should be.  

If you wanted to get those nice, bakery-style domes on top of the muffins you could fill the muffin liners up to the brim.  But then you'd have fewer muffins.  It's your call.  You could always double the recipe if you wanted to have plentiful and tall muffins ;).  Enjoy!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Scones

When I spied this recipe on Foodgawker, I nearly cried tears of joy.  Okay, not really.  That's a little excessive.  But I really was mega-excited about it.  Pumpkin in scone form?  Why didn't I think of this before?  And then add in some chocolate and nuts?  Don't mind if I do!  


A big "thank you" to Jo Cooks for this one!  I've adapted the recipe ever so slightly.

You'll need:


2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 tbs baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground ginger
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 tsp ground allspice
1/2 cup (8 tbs; 1 stick) cold butter, cut in cubes
1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup combination of pecans and walnuts, chopped
2/3 cup canned pumpkin puree (NOT pumpkin pie filling)
2 large eggs
milk for brushing tops of scones
sugar for sprinkling on top of scones




In a large bowl, mix all of the dry ingredients together, including the sugar and spices (but not the sugar used for sprinkling, obviously).  


Add the cubed butter, and using a pastry cutter (or two knives, or a food processor if you don't have a pastry cutter), cut the butter until it resembles small peas.  


Add the pecans and chocolate chips to the butter/dry ingredient mixture and lightly mix.


In another bowl, mix the pumpkin puree and egg.  Add the pumpkin and egg to the dry ingredients.  Use a spatula to mix everything together.


Form the dough into 1 big disc, or 2 smaller discs (either way they should be ~3/4 inch in thickness).  If you made 1 big disc, go ahead and cut it into 8 triangles, just as if you were slicing a pizza.  If you made 2 smaller discs, slice into 6 triangles a piece, in the same pizza-cutting fashion.


Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.


Lay your scones on a cookie sheet covered in parchment paper (or a Silpat, if you have one).  Place the tray in the freezer for approximately 30 minutes, so the scones can set.


After the 30 minutes is up, remove from the freezer, brush the tops with a little milk, and sprinkle with some sugar.  Bake the scones for 20-25, or until you can insert a toothpick or sharp knife and it comes out clean.  

Yum!  These were so good.  Sean and a friend helped me eat these, which was a good thing.  Otherwise I would have polished them all off myself in about 2 days.  Enjoy!!