The Brownies That Made The Village Weep With Joy

'Mkay, so usually the only thing I ever bake is cookies and I can give you 6 legitimate reasons for their superiority among all things dessert;

1) They are (usually) not messy to eat

2) They are (usually) not complicated to make

3) They don't need frosting or anything else to go on them 'cause they're just naturally good looking

4) They're super easy to store

5) I have never heard someone say "Nah, I'm not really in a cookie mood."

Bottom line: cookies are amazing and they are my favorite. But I can't JUST do cookies, this blog needs a little more flair than that. And you know what I realized the other day?! I HAVE NEVER MADE BROWNIES BEFORE. What a convenient time for that realization to hit, as the house was suffering from a severe lack of sugared treats.

SO HERE ARE SOME GREAT BROWNIES THAT WERE SO AMAZING EVERYONE CRIED (they were dry tears and the were slightly invisible but I swear to you they were there).

INGREDIENTS:

2 sticks of butter

2 1/4 cups sugar

4 eggs

1 tablespoon vanilla

1 1/4 cup cocoa powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 1/2 cups flour

chocolate chips (optional)

sprinkles for pizzazz (optional pizzazz)

HOW TO MAKE THESE SLICES OF CHOCOLATY PARADISE;

Preheat your oven to 350.

Spray a 9x13 inch baking dish with cooking spray and set it aside. This will soon be the throne for the King of the Brownie Kingdom.

Get your butter and cut it into chunks (this will make it easier for melting). Place butter in a microwave safe bowl. A LARGE microwave safe bowl, it's a ton of butter.

Add the sugar to your bowl, then place in microwave. Heat at 30 second intervals, mixing after each interval until the mixture is smooth and vaguely starts to bubble.

Hash tag healthy baker.

You may want to consider transferring this to an even BIGGER bowl, but if you think your bowl can contain the rest of the ingredients, continue on.

Add in the eggs and vanilla, and if you have an electric mixer, get it out. If you don't have an electric mixer, I hope you've been making good use of the gym membership you bought on January 1st.

Mix this until it is nice and smooth.

In another bowl, mix together the flour, cocoa, salt and baking soda. 

Start adding it to the wet mixture.

Okay, this was my first time making brownies and they make a WEIRD mixture compared to most things I make. The mix was almost, I don't know, I want to say stretchy? And it made huge air bubbles when I started mixing in the dry ingredients which momentarily freaked me out.

Ooooookaaaayyy then.

Once you have all of your dry ingredients and wet ingredients mixed together, pour it into your pan.

HERE COMES THE FUN PIZZAZY PART!

Once you've poured the mix into the pan, sprinkle chocolate chips over the top. I ran out of chocolate chips about halfway through (hmmm I wonder why *unsubtle cough* DAD WHO EATS THEM BY THE HANDFULS WHEN HE THINKS I'M NOT LOOKING *unsubtle cough*). I decided that half of the chocolate chips just wasn't going to cut it for me, so naturally, what do I reach for?

SPPRRIIINNKKLLLEEEZZZZ

Before, a dull, mundane pan of brownie mix.

After: HOLY CRAB CAKES WHO FLIPPED ON THE PARTY SWITCH 'CUZ THESE BROWNIES BE PARTYIN' LIKE IT'S 1999

You could add whatever you wanted to these actually. Nuts, raisins, hard boiled eggs, guacamole, whatever your weird little heart desires <3

Pop the pan into the oven for 28 minutes and when you pull it out you'll have a marvelous dessert that everyone will love (if someone doesn't love these I suggest you delete them from your BFF list immediately).

You're welcome, enjoy the brownies my friends.

Hehe Hi

Hello there.

Been a while, hasn't it?

Like five months WHOOPS NO IT HASN'T IT CAN'T BE FIVE MONTHS SINCE I POSTED A BLOG UPDATE NO

But it is because I suck and so does school for making me learn things and study. Basically what happened is that I got caught up in studying for half term tests in December and was unable to even  bake at all, let alone write a post about some cookies or something.

Then after holiday break my courses got increasingly difficult. So essentially all I've been doing these past few months is study and work and then study some more. It's been stressful, but the year is winding down, and what better way to de-stress than baking?!

The saying goes that baking is cheaper than therapy (only slightly cheaper, might I add), and I could definitely  use some down time with a whisk and some flour.

No promises that I will get to this blog weekly. I have decided to turn this into not only a baking blog, but also a cooking blog, because I find equal joy in both and this way I will have more post opportunities.

So, adventures in teenage... food stuff? I don't know.
But what I do know is that I'M BACK!! :D

Love,
Mackenzie :)

Gingerbread Cookies

SO IT'S ALMOST CHRISTMAS.

AND IT STILL HASN'T SNOWED AT MY HOUSE.

OOOUUUUTTTRAAAGGGGGEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm kind of frustrated with that, if you couldn't tell. What makes me super duper sad is that we didn't have snow for Christmas LAST year either!! SADS. SO MUCH SADS.

:(

Anyway, since it doesn't FEEL like Christmas, I thought that maybe some very Christmas-y cookies would get me more in the holiday spirit.

Also I had all of the ingredients for this on hand so I didn't have to put effort into going to the store.

GINGERBREAD COOKIES YEAH;

Ingredients

4 cups flour

1 tsp salt

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp pumpkin spice

2 tsp ground ginger

2 sticks butter, room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 cup molasses

1 egg

So for these cookies I used a stand mixer (thanks grandma for letting me borrow yours). You don't HAVE to use one, but it made it a lot easier.

Just a tip;

Make sure it's turned off before you plug it in. I got punched in the stomach by a mixing machine. 

Let's get started *cracks knuckles dramatically*.

First thing you're going to do is mix the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and spices together in a big bowl. These are going to make a TON of cookies, FYI. So be prepared. 

Next put the sugar and butter in a bowl and cream them together.

Add the molasses and egg into the sugar and butter mixture. Be careful, I found out that molasses is a lot more runny than I thought it was. I may or may not have spilled a little.

Or a lot. Don't judge.

But seriously, am I the only one who thinks that that stuff looks like poison? 

I just want to point out that once this stuff is all mixed together it looks really weird.. Like a science experiment. Do not fret, it looks more edible once you put the flour mixture in. Which is what you're going to do next.

Mix it until it's just combined, then cover it and out it in the fridge for an hour. 

*One hour later*

*Hopefully you read that in the Spongebob voice*

OKAY. Preheat your oven to 350 and cover some baking sheets with wax paper. 

Get out that cookie dough. GENEROUSLY flour your countertop or table or floor or wherever you want to roll out these cookies. Also generously flour your rolling pin. 

Then start rolling the dough. I suggest doing it in sections. You'll want the cookies to be pretty thin, but it doesn't really matter how thick they are as long as they're not ridiculous. The thicker ones will take longer to cool.

Once they're rolled out, cut them into Christmas-y shapes. I chose cute little trees.

Put them on the baking sheets and put them in the oven for 10 minutes, and turn them at the 5 minute mark.

You won't get to see them decorated, maily because I'm an idiot. I tried to melt the fosting just a little to make it softer, but I overheated it and it melted.

Jeez, frosting. I only heated you for 45 seconds, no need to have a MELTDOWN.

(My sincerest apologies for that joke.)

 This is how many cookies I got out of this recipe. I know, that's a lot of cookies. Thankfully it's Christmas so I can dump some of these off to other people so it's their problem. 

YAY CHRISTMAS.

Simple, not too mess, and festive. Checkmate, Christmas.

MACKENZIE'S FIRST ANNUAL BAKING SPECTACULAR

GET PUMPED.

GET EXCITED.

YOU MIGHT AS WELL TAKE YOUR SOCKS OFF NOW BECAUSE THEY'LL BE KNOCKED OFF OF YOU IN A MINUTE ANYWAY.

BECAUSE IT'S TIME FOR MACKENZIE'S FIRST ANNUAL CHRISTMAS BAKING SPECTACULAR!!!!!!

I am about to give not one, not two, but THREE recipes for things that every one will love. Seriously. Unless you have no soul, you will love these. 

SHALL WE BEGIN?

Let's start off with the Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes.

Reese's Peanut Butter Cup Cupcakes;

Ingredients

1 cup white sugar

1 egg

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 tsps vanilla extract

3/4 cup flour

1/4 cup cocoa

3/4 tsps baking soda

3/4 tsps baking powder

1/2 tsps salt

1/2 cup boiling water

This peanut butter frosting that will change your life;

Ingredients

1/2 cup butter, room temperature

1 cup peanut butter

2 cups powdered sugar

4 tbsp milk

DIRECTIONS;

Go and get your butter. Put it on the counter and go occupy yourself for 30-45 minutes. I don't know, go watch Modern Family or something.

After that preheat your oven to 350 and get some bowls. A couple of them. Using a wooden spoon/spatula/utensil you're going to mix the sugar, egg, milk, vegetable oil, and vanilla. The best part about this recipe is that it's super simple. 

Next mix your dry ingredients together. Then add your mixed dry ingredients to your wet ingredients and mix well. 

Next your going to want to boil your water. Once it's boiling, add it to the mixture. Your batter is going to be very thin, but don't sweat it, yo (I can't think of anything really funny to say right meow) (oh wait I just said something kind of funny) (lol).

 

See? Very thin.

 

Get yourself some muffin cups and a muffin pan. Line the muffin pan with the muffin cups, then pour the batter in. Fill it about 2/3 of the way full, and then bake them for 25 minutes.

While that's going on, you can make this frosting. Warning; this frosting may cause you to:

-Faint

-Scream

-Cry

-Sing

-Dance

BECAUSE IT IS THAT GOOD.

Directions for le frosting;

Put your peanut butter in a bowl. Start adding the powdered sugar and milk a little at a time, until it's all mixed in.

PUT IT ON YOUR CUPCAKES.

Put a little Reese's cup on there for added fanciness. 

 DONE.

EAT IT NOW BEFORE YOUR FAMILY COMES HOME AND TAKES IT ALL.

Recipe #2

Crockpot Apple Butter

WHAT WHAT DELICIOUSNESS IN THE HOUSE.

What what 48 hours of hard work and 24 apples for one and a half small jars of apple butter also in the house. 

:(

It's still really good though. So I guess I'll give it to you. But I don't suggest making this unless the Apple King decided to give you a share of his fortune. 

Ingredients;

Like a ton of apples. I would say 12 really big ones or 24 small ones. I used small ones.

1/2 cup water

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 tsps pumpkin spice

Also a crockpot

First you're going to peel and core the apples. 

Then, chop them up SUPER TINY. LIKE SUPER DUPER TINY.

Then mix the apples in the sugar and spices (that was really fun to say) and put it in the crockpot. Pour in the water, then turn your crockpot on high and leave it overnight. Then (and this worked best for me), prop the lid of the crockpot open with a wooden spoon and turn the crockpot on low for a few more hours.

Then, if you want it to be extra smooooooooth, put it in a blender and, you know, blend it for a minute. It's super delicious, but time consuming and takes a whole 'lotta apples. So if you happen to have a bunch of apples and you don't know what to do with them, this recipe is for you!

Recipe # 3

BANANA BREAD!

This recipe is for a MINI loaf of banana bread. For when, you know, you want banana bread,  but you just want like two slices. Not the whole loaf.

Yeah. Happens all the time.

Ingredients;

1 really ripe banana 

3 tbsp of butter at room temperature

3 tbsp sugar

2 tbsp honey

1 egg yolk

1/2 cup flour

1 tbsp wheat germ (new vocabulary word)

1/4 and 1/8 tsps baking soda

Directions;

Preheat your oven to 350 and grease a really tiny bread pan. I don't have a teeny tiny bread pan, so I decided to make cupcakes instead and just greased some muffin cup liners.

Next you want to use a fork to mash your banana up. Mash that thing REALLY well. 

Then, add the butter, sugar, and honey to the banana and mix well. 

Stir in the egg yolk.

Add in the flour and wheat germ, and then the baking soda and salt.

Pour into your bread pan/muffin cups and bake for 37 minutes. 

VOILA! Delicious. 

These are some of the most delicious things I've ever made. No joke. REALLY super good.

Make them and eat them and thank me later.

Maple-y Yummy Bars of Goodness

I know, I know, I missed a week. My best friend took me to a surprise concert last Sunday, where I saw my future husband, Hunter Hayes.

Anyway, concert was awesome, but I missed a week. I have good news, though!!

I DIDN'T MESS THIS ONE UP!!!!!

I made this maple bar things the right way without somehow messing it up along the way!!! GO ME!

As I'm writing this the maple bars are cooling because I am irresponsible and busy (lazy). Usually I have about four or five recipes I've taken pictures of and done on hand to write my blog every week, but lately I've been super busy with school (Pinterest), and my friends (my dogs) have been wanting to hang out with me a bunch lately. 

So again, I apologize.

ON WITH THE FESTIVITIES.

What you need for deliciousness;

FOR THE BREAD STUFF

1 1/2 cup milk

1/3 cup shortening

2 tbsp graulated sugar

2 tsps salt

1/4 cup lukewarm water

2 (1/4) envelopes yeast

2 eggs

4 cups flour

as much cinnamon as your heart desires

FOR THE CREAMY STUFF THAT GOES ON TOP OF THE BREAD STUFF

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup milk

Tentatively 1 1/2 cup powdered sugar

2 tsps syrup if you have it (I didn't, it didn't really matter)

So, first thing we're going to work on is the bread. What you're going to do is get a suacepan and pour the milk into it. "Scald" the milk (if you're in on the baking lingo, which I'm not, you'll know what that means), and I'm supposing tis is fancy speak for get the milk hot. Really hot. I figured it was ready when this started happening;

So if you stick your spoon in it and that happens, you know it's ready.

After you "scald" the milk, add the shortening, 3 tbsp granulated sugar, and salt. Mix it together in the saucepan and then set it aside until it's lukewarm.

Now take your yeast and lukewarm water and mix those together in a different bowl. Make sure the water is not hot or else it will kill the yeast, and then you're left with a mess. Add 1 tbsp of granulated sugar to the yeast water and mix t until well combined. Then set it aside for five minutes or so. 

While that's happening mix the flour and cinnamon together in a big bowl. I used a lot of cinnamon partly because I like cinnamon and partly because the cinnamon container fell out of my hand and into the bowl. But the recipe called for 2 tsps.

After mixing the cinnamon and flour together add two beaten eggs to the yeast and water.

Once the milk/shortening/sugar/salt stuff is cool mix it with the yeast/water/egg stuff until it's well combined. Then you can add the flour/cinnamon slowly. 

While mixing the flour stuff with everything else you may find that a whisk will not work anymore. This is when you must bring in some elbow grease.

START KNEADING THAT PUPPY WITH YOUR HANDS.

(Just kidding, no puppies were harmed in the making of these maple bars.)

That will take a while. A little tip I shall share with you is to break it into smaller junks and knead it. Then when all of the smaller junks are knead you can knead them together. 

If it seems too sticky to knead, add some more flour. But you still want it to be a little bit sticky.

Once you have kneaded all of the smaller junks together, knead it for 3-5 minutes, then spray a bowl with non-stick spray and put the now-kneaded dough in the bowl. Let it sit for an hour on the counter.

Wow. I said the word 'knead' a lot in that section.

 *1 hour later*

Now roll the dough out on the counter with a rolling pin until it's about one inch thick. Then cut it (I suggest with a pizza cutter) into sections. It doesn't really matter how big it what shape the chunks are. I just cut mine into squares.

Spray a cookie sheet or two with non-stick spray and put your chunks onto it. Let them sit on the cookie sheet for half an hour, as you make the frosting stuff that goes on top.

FROSTING STUFF;

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees in the meantime.

In a suace pan, mix the butter, milk, and brown sugar and bring to a boil. Once it's at a boil, turn it down to a simmer and simmer it for 3 minutes. Then turn your stove off and let it stand for 15 minutes.

After that you can add the powdered sugar and maple syrup. I might have barely gotten a cup of powdered sugar in there, because I ran out, so if you don't want to add the 1/2 cup that was left you don't have to. 

The recipe said you needed something called "mapeline", but I didn't even know that was a thing. I was just going to use syrup, until I saw that we didn't have any. Whatevs. I didn't see a difference.

Once the dough has sat for 30 minutes and your oven is preheated and ready, put the bars in for 7-8 minutes. Once they're done, let them cool for a few minutes and put the frosting on them.

They should look as awesome as this.

Oh my goodness, yum. 

How can they NOT taste good!?!

Ugly Yet Yummy Pumpkin Cake

My family had an early Thanksgiving dinner this year, because unfortunately most everyone had to work on Thanksgiving. I know, it sucks. But at least we get a feast a little earlier then everyone else!

So anyway, I didn't want to make a pumpkin pie for dessert because a) everyone makes pumpkin pie and b) I've already made like three pumpkin pies this year. Luckily, I found this recipe online and it tasted like Heaven.

Unfortunately I must have done something wrong because it looked nothing like the picture.

Pumpkin Cake with Cream Cheese Filling;

Filling;

2 eight ounce packages of cream cheese, softened

1/4 cup sugar

1 egg

1 tbsp milk

1 tsps syrup

Cake Part;

3 cups sugar

1 3/4 cup of pureed pumpkin

1 cup canola oil

1 cup water

4 eggs

4 ccups flour

4 tsps pumpkin spice

2 tsps baking powder

1 tsps ground cinnamon

1/4 tsps ground nutmeg

1 tsps salt

1/4 tsps ground cloves (?)

nuts of a sort

raisins or something like that if you want

I'm gonna tell you up front that I did not use almost all of those spices. I just used cinnamon for everything. First of all, what in the world is a clove!?! And nutmeg!?!

Anyway, here's what you do.

For the filling;

Beat the cream cheese, egg, sugar, and milk in a bowl until smooth and creamy. Now, to soften the cream cheese, you're going to want to put it in the microwave or something. I left it out on my counter for like an hour and it barely softened. This caused it to instead take on a cottage cheese like texture.

  But whatevs.

Beat in the syrup and set that stuff aside.

For the cake part;

Beat the sugar, pumpkin, oil, water and eggs together. Now, another thing I might have done wrong was not add canola oil. To be quite honest, I don't even know what that is. So I put vegetable oil instead, and when I ran out of that (at about 1/2 a cup) I put in olive oil. Oops.

In a different bowl mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices. Once you mix those together, slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix together.

Stir in your nuts or whatever you decided to put into this cake. The website asked for walnuts and craisins, but a) my mom hates walnuts and b) craisins are extremely expensive and I like raisins better anyways.

So I chose peanuts and raisins.

I was way too tired to even bash those to "chopped" that night, as you can see. I think it was like 1:30 in the morning when I was doing this. 

ANYWAY.

Spray a casserole dish with cooking spray and then dust it with flour. Pour half of the cake mix in, then gently smear the cream cheese stuff onto it. All I really had to do for mine was pour it because I am a failure. 

After that pour the rest of the cake mix on top and out it in the oven at 350 for 50 minutes and hopefully it will look better than this.

Before baking;

 

After baking;

GORGEOUS. 

BUT I fixed it with some AMAZING FROSTING. YES, THAT'S RIGHT! I FINALLY MADE MY OWN FROSTING!!!! 

My Aunt Theresa gave me a recipe for some frosting and it tasted AWESOME. 

Frosting;

For every 1/3 cup sugar, you need 2 teaspoons Crisco. Mix those together well (you'll probably have to use your hands) and then add 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract, and mix again! DONE. Now, if you want the frosting to be creamier, all you have to do is add more vanilla! It's great!!! 

THANKS AUNT THERESA!!!

 

Awesome Sugar Cookies (extremely awesome)

I know, I know, I missed a week. Last weekend I went away to a church camp thing and meant to write this post on sunday night, but inevitably I got SUPER lazy and have basically done absolutely nothing this whole week.

But I promise I'm going to make it up to you, because I am about to gift you with the BEST sugar cookies you will ever make. Best part? I had everything I needed. I didn't have to hunt around for unicorn tears or the blood of a saber-toothed tiger to make these.

AND they're delicious. Does it get any better? Let me answer that, no, it doesn't.

So strap on your excited helmets because it's about to get awesome over in this corner of the Internet.

FIRST YOU WILL NEED;

NOW WAIT. Go get 2 sticks of butter. Put them on your counter and wait for like 30 minutes.

WHERE WAS I, OH RIGHT;

6 cups of flour

1 tsps baking soda

1 tsps baking powder

2 sticks butter, room temperture (see? I had reason for making you put your butter on the couter)

2 cups granulated sugar

3 eggs

1 1/2 sour cream

NOW HOLD THE PHONE, BECAUSE THIS RECIPE ALSO COMES WITH IT'S OWN FROSTING. HEAR THAT? THAT'S THE SOUND OF YOUR MIND BEING BLOWN.

FROSTING;

1 cup butter, room temperature

1 tsps vanilla extract

4 cups powdered sugar

6 tbsp heavy cream

food coloring (optional)

sprinkles (also optional)

Now, lets get started on our magical journey to Delicious Cookieville.

First, get yourself a medium sized bowl and mix 5 cups of your flour, baking soda, and baking powder in that bowl. Set it aside, it's purpose will come later on.

If you have a stand mixer, which I think is a giant bowl with a whisky thingy attached to a machine and something that my grandma used to make mashed potatoes in, get that out. I do not have one of those. So I had to improvise.

 You want to cream the butter and granullated sugar together until 'light and fluffy'. I tried just about everything I could to cream them together and in the end I just used my hands to mash them together like Play-doh. It all worked out in the end. 

It was still a little crumbly, but whad'ya gonna' do.

Next add the eggs in, one at a time, beating until it's mixed in well after each one.

Add the sour cream and vanilla until well mixed, too.

I kind of ran out of sour cream around half a cup and so I had to use these things, which I'm pretty sure haven't seen the light of day since 2009.

 

But nobody threw up or had to be taken to the emergency room so I'm sure they were fine.

I also seriously doubt I got even a cup of sour cream in there, even with those little packets. It didn't seem to affect it much in the end, but maybe if I had had the full 1 1/2 cups the cookies would have been even MORE epic. 

Here it is after everything liquidy was added.

So then, add the flour stuff to the liquidy stuff and mix until it's combined. It needs to be thick enough to roll, so you can add more flour, 1/4 cup at a time, until you get to 1 cup. So, again, only add one more cup, 1/4 cup at a time, and only until you think it's thick enough to roll out. You don't have to add the full cup.

 

 Anyway, after you get that all mixed up and ready for rolling, divide it into two sections and roll it until it's about 1 1/2 inch thick. Wrap in plastic wrap, and chill it overnight.

*The next day*

Okay, now, preheat your oven to 425 degrees and line a couple of baking sheets with wax paper. 

Flour a working area to prepare for rolling. Do not be stingy with that flour, trust me. Put it on EVERYTHING that will be touching that cookie dough. The rolling pin, the counter, the cookie cutters, YOURSELF. EVERYTHING. 

Now roll out one of your sections until it's about 1/4 inch thick. Get your cookie cutters, cut out some shapes, and pop them in the oven for 7-8 minutes!

Cool, right?! Wait, let me answer that for you. 

YES.

They tasted better after sitting a while in the fridge, though (don't ask me why). 

And I liked the frosting, but it kinda made the cookies look less cool.

But boy, was it GOOD.

Frosting;

Cream together butter and vanilla, then slowly beat in powdred sugar. Once smooth, add cream in a tablespoon at a time, until ready to spread onto cookies. If you want, add some food coloring :)

So, was that worth the wait?! I think it was. Make them, and you'll be convinced, too.