Baking in Alicante....hard but not impossible.

As I have mentioned before baking here is Alicante is definitely a hard task, but not impossible. Thank goodness it isn't impossible because I think I might die if I couldn't bake even one thing for 5 months. For those of you who know me know I L-O-V-E to bake, it is just something I enjoy doing and I enjoy being able to put a smile on people's face with baked goods.

As you know from an earlier post I have made Christmas Crack before here and it was a hit! I mean honestly how could it not be who doesn't love chocolate, brown sugar, butter, and saltines. I don't know anybody. So some of my girl friends and I decided to make it again. Thankfully Pepita is nice enough to let us use her kitchen. (which side note, I am so happy that Pepita lets me have people over to hang out and bake and such cause pretty much all of my friends are not allowed to have people over so if Pepita didn't allow it we would be in the streets hanging out) We ended up making two cookie sheets of christmas crack and chocolate chip cookies! Thanks to my mother I had chocolate chips for the cookies and a measuring cup. SO helpful!

Britta and Alex double teamed laying out the parchment paper and saltine crackers.

While Michelle chopped up the HUGE milka chocolate bar for the christmas crack.

The christmas cracked turned out really good, so good we ate half of a cookie sheet of it before we were done baking the cookies. The chocolate chip cookies didn't sure out as good because we didn't have a measuring spoon for the vanilla and baking powder and we put in a little too much. They still tasted fine but exactly like chocolate chip cookies.

I bought ziplock baggies at the grocery store the other day since Pepita has no such thing. I mean why would she need to keep food fresh and away from ants just for us? But since I bought some I was able to bring all my goodies to school and share with all our other friends and my teachers. My spanish teacher is pregnant and said she had been craving chocolate so I figured what is a better way to get an A than to bring in some chocolate! She tried the christmas crack and loved it. She had me explain to her how I made it and she wrote down the recipe so she could try it. She actually told me today that she tried it yesterday and it didn't turn out all that good, but her daughter loved it.

Since that I made a boxed cheesecake too which was just ok but my roommates liked it. I told them if they wanted me to make it for them again they can just buy the box and I will make it. I am nice but not nice enough to spend all of my travel money on baked goods.

Did I tell you guys I love to bake for people :)

Baking, Baking and more baking!

So I know I haven't posted in awhile, but between school, work, traveling, and most recently finals I haven't had much free time. The free time I did have, I spent baking all sorts of yummy goodies. Before Thanksgiving I got the urge to make pie, partially because I got a pie cookbook, and partially because Thanksgiving was coming and my Mom never makes pie so I decided I wanted to. I made three pies, a peanut butter one, a coconut one, and a brown sugar one. I got them all from this book...

These are all three...

When I started I was only going to make one pie this brown sugar pie, because we had a pre-made crust in the fridge, but after baking the first I decided I couldn't stop after just one. You can tell this one is the pre-made crust because it is a lot darker than the other two. I took this pie to work and everyone really liked it. I was proud of myself.

The second pie I made was a coconut pie. I honestly thought going into making it that is was a coconut cream pie but I quickly realized that it wasn't. Oh well I didn't really care I figured it would still taste okay. Unfortunately I didn't get to taste it, but I was told it was really good. The reason I didn't get to taste it was because my parents took it to a party and I didn't want to cut into it before they took it. My parents didn't taste it either. When they came home from the party I asked how it was and my mom said they forgot about the desserts....I thought to myself yeah right you were probably too embarrassed to serve it, but they for real forgot about all of the desserts. It was a pizza party and apparently they filled up on the pizza and didn't eat anyone's desserts. Anyways my parents ended up leaving it at the people's house and when they brought the pie plate back they said they really liked the pie and ended up eating it all! I was happy at least someone enjoyed it.

One thing that I love about my Mom is that through all of her years of baking and cooking she has acquired so many different pots, pans, plates, and pretty much everything you can think of. She also has practically every ingredient you would ever possibly need, so when I go to bake you can pretty much guarantee that everything I need for any recipe is in our kitchen somewhere. I love it! The only thing I ever need to buy are things like flour, sugar, and such since I go through it so fast.

You can call this pie a fail. I unfortunately wasn't smart enough to read the directions carefully and kind of ruined this pie (that's why it looks like poo anyways). So I made the two different fillings, put the crust in the pan, pressed in the first layer of the pie then poured the second filling on top, and went to look in the book to see what the oven should be set at and how long to cook the pie for. I was reading through and realized it just says to put the pie in the fridge and let it set. I was like What?! you don't cook it, what about the crust? Well at the beginning of the recipe where it lists all the ingredients, it says I need a prebaked crust....I felt like an idiot. So what I ended up doing was scoop out the filling and baked the crust, but when I put the filling back in they mixed and the it ended up looking like this.....
Then after screwing it up no one really wanted to eat it and it sat out for a little to long so I just tossed it. I figured 2 out of 3 was good enough for my first time making pie.

Since making the pie I decided to make a few other things. I made more red velvet cupcakes for Heather's boss, Michelle's anniversary party. Apparently red velvet is her favorite type of cake and she really liked the ones I made the last time so Heather thought she would appreciate them for her party. Heather came home and told me everyone loved them! I think that is my favorite part of baking, getting to give people something that they will love and will really enjoy. When I made them I made a double batch so I brought some into work too.

I also tried a recipe I found on another blog for S'more cupcakes. I guess you can't really call them cupcakes, there isn't any sort of cake in them, but whatever I didn't come up with the name. The recipe was super easy. You can find it at Sumo's Sweet Stuff, she has so many good recipes but this is the only one I have tried so far. They turned out so delicious and this is coming from someone who doesn't really like marshmallows or s'mores.

I followed the directions just fine this time, but I was surprised when I opened the oven to take them out and found the marshmallows had grown big time. I should have realized that was going to happen...hello who hasn't seen someone blow up peeps in the microwave. After I let them cool they had shrunk a little but because the brownie had hardened in the big blown up shape I just took a knife and kind of folded it on top of itself and covered it up with the marshmallow fluff. They turned out awesome, I even broiled them a little bit with the fluff on top so it looked like a toasted marshmallow! I again brought them into work and everyone loved them. They all at least two...I am pretty sure one guy at four of them!

I got this from another blog and it is so ridiculously easy and fast to make. It is called Christmas Crack and for a good reason, it is so addictive. I have made so much of it already. All you need to do is boil one cup of butter and one cup of brown sugar and pour that over a cookie sheet filled with saltines. Make sure to put the saltines on parchment paper. Once you have poured the brown sugar mixture over the saltines, you bake it at 400 degrees for 5 minutes take it out pour a bag of chocolate chips over top, let them melt spread them out and refrigerate until chocolate it hardened.

The last thing I got from a book called All Cakes Considered! Awesome book, I highly recommend it! This is called an Appalachian Stack Cake. It is a 5 layer cake of ginger molasses cookies with a spiced apple filling. I made it for the Barrett Birthday's Bash. Heather was in charge of providing the desserts so she asked me to help out with it. I had been wanting to make this cake and I had all the ingredients so I figured why not. I was a little nervous cause I didn't get to taste it before hand so I was hoping and praying it didn't taste rancid or anything. Luckily it was delicious! Perfect for this time of season. The only complaint I had was that on the very edge it was a little dry because the filling didn't reach out that far and moisten it. Besides that it wasn't bad by any means. I really liked it cause it looked cool too and it isn't something a lot of people make.

I have made a few other things but these are all new things for me so I figured I would share them. I might share the other stuff later.

So as everyone can see I love to bake and I can't really get enough of it! That is why I am going to try and make a business out of it. My sister Heather gave me the idea. Here is how it is going to work... For the people who don't like to take the time or don't have the talent of baking I am going to offer my services to them. I have a list of the items I make and the costs of all the different things so that people can choose what they want, how much they want, and when they want them and I will bake the stuff and have it ready by the time they need it. I hope it works and people actually order stuff from me. I really need money for Spain and I have less than a month to get it!

Cookies, Pumpkins, Halloween Galore!!!

So one of my friends 20th birthdays was last weekend and her favorite cupcakes are red velvet so I decided to take a stab at making some from scratch. I love making and decorating cupcakes but I've never tried red velvet so it was a fun little adventure for me. I found a Paula Deen recipe online and they turned out soooo yummy!!! I was slightly impressed with myself! And I think my favorite part was the ghost shaped tins I found at Target, they were a quick and easy way to make the cupcakes that much cuter without having to take the time to do some intricate decorating.

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon cocoa powder
• 1 1/2 cups vegetable oil
• 1 cup buttermilk, room temperature
• 2 large eggs, room temperature
• 2 tablespoons red food coloring
• 1 teaspoon white distilled vinegar
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:

• 1 pound cream cheese, softened
• 2 sticks butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 4 cups sifted confectioners' sugar
• Chopped pecans and fresh raspberries or strawberries, for garnish

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line 2 (12-cup) muffin pans with cupcake papers.

In a medium mixing bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and cocoa powder. In a large bowl gently beat together the oil, buttermilk, eggs, food coloring, vinegar, and vanilla with a handheld electric mixer. Add the sifted dry ingredients to the wet and mix until smooth and thoroughly combined.

Divide the batter evenly among the cupcake tins about 2/3 filled. Bake in oven for about 20 to 22 minutes, turning the pans once, half way through. Test the cupcakes with a toothpick for doneness. Remove from oven and cool completely before frosting.

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:

In a large mixing bowl, beat the cream cheese, butter and vanilla together until smooth. Add the sugar and on low speed, beat until incorporated. Increase the speed to high and mix until very light and fluffy.

These are the finished products:

The white frosting was perfect for the ghosts.

This weekend was so much fun, we had a lot going on! First Friday night Heather and I went to the lady's night out for our church, Harvest Community. It was nice we went to Paradise Bakery and had dinner with some of the lady's and we got to talk and get to know some new people.

Then my friends and I went to Fry's and bought some pumpkins and we went back to my house and carved them. It was so nice having all of my friends together for some fun pumpkin carving. It has been a long time since all of us have gotten together like this.

While we were all carving pumpkins Jessy took our scraps and carved some different words.

Here are all of

us and our finished pumpkins. I thought they all turned out pretty darn good. I was kind of sad I didn't put much detail in mine but I was looking forward to making my pumpkin W-E-L-C-O-M-E sign.

We carved the pumpkins on my back patio on our newspaper covered table. The newspaper made for a very easy clean up, all we had to do was fold up all the lovely pumpkin guts in the newspaper and toss it all in the trash. It worked out beautifully!

I made sure to keep most of the pumpkin seeds so I could roast them for our cookie decorating party. Unfortunately my friends didn't pay much attention to that and they threw a lot of their pumpkin guts in with my semi clean seeds. Oh well I had to clean them better anyways, it just took me a little more time to do it.

Here are all of our finished pumpkins. It's funny cause surprisingly Bobby's is one of my favorites. It is surprising because last year when we carved pumpkins Bobby's was pretty bad, maybe that was because he was using an oversized pocket knife or something like that, but this year his was pretty good and kind of creepy.

It was so funny cause when I was taking this picture I almost said one, two, three. I couldn't help it I am just so used to it, I guess I didn't care if they were inanimate objects or not. My friends made fun of me, but I laughed at myself too so it was all good.

Then we took a picture with all of us by our respective pumpkins. What a good lookin' group :)

This is that W-E-L-C-O-M-E pumpkin sign I was talking about earlier that I was super eager to make! I saw it on someone's blog and I had to make it! Then I put it out front on our pillar to welcome everyone to our home.
This is another one of my awesome goodwill finds! I got these two skeleton fists and we put them out at our cookie decorating party with these burnt orange candles and by the end of the party they looked pretty cool. I decided to leave them like this because they look all old and authentic.

So on Saturday Heather and I had planned to have a cookie decorating party so of course we had to make lots and lots of cookies! Actually my wonderful mother made them for us cause no one makes better cookies than she does! She ended up making 3 different types of cookies and probably a total of 300+ cookies and these are just some of them.
I took our pumpkin seeds from Friday night, found a recipe online, cleaned the seeds, and made some pretty tasty roasted pumpkin seeds:

• 1 1/2 tablespoons margarine, melted
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon garlic salt
• 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce
• 2 cups raw whole pumpkin seeds
• All you have to do is mix them all together and roast them in the oven at 275 degrees for about 1 1/2 hours. The directions said for an hour but I think the longer time is better. I also read some of the comments other women wrote and I quadrupled all of the ingredients except the pumpkin seeds. I put even more salt than that just cause I thought they tasted better like that but you can change it to your taste preference. They turned out really yummy, I was proud of myself!

Here is all the rest of the food we had out for the party, unfortunately no one seemed to hungry so we had a lot of left overs. Our refrigerator is super full now.
The party consisted of mostly Hannah's friends cause I think Heather's and my friends all forgot about it, but oh well we still had a lot of fun.



These are just a small portion of the finished cookies. It was ridiculous because everyone took at least two plates of cookies home and we still had tons left over at our house! Looks like our coworkers are going to be getting some awesomely decorate Halloween cookies otherwise I am going to eat them all and that just would not help my weight loss.
These were the cookies I decorated:

Overall this weekend and Halloween season has been a lot of fun for me! I have decided that fall is now a close second to winter in my favorite season category, even though in AZ we don't get to experience all of the changing leaves and such. I can still decorate my house and have fun with my friends and family! Hope everyone else has had as good of a fall as I have this year!!!!!