Did somebody say Bacon?

So here's how this began...
One day at work a whole discussion began when someone mentioned bacon and chocolate..."BACON AND CHOCOLATE EWW....!" So a few emails flew around, but they were requests for bacon chocolate chip cookies. I was really close to trying it, but I really didn't want to taint my chocolate chip cookies....Finally, I came across something interesting. Bacon*and*Cupcakes. Now this makes more sense...pancakes, syrup, and bacon. What more could you ask for, for breakfast?

I was really iffy with this experiment too...but I did it anyways, and oh was I right about this one. SERIOUSLY...OMG ---soo good.

Before and After
note:these are mini cupcakes, I figured people would have to start small then work their way up to a normal cupcake...

So this is the secret to the cupcake....The nice maple flavor comes from maple syrup AND maple extract!

Our little friends....yum-o

So to ensure that every bite contains bacon....the base of the frosting is well...bAcOn!


It smells like full on breakfast at this point...BTW the batter tasted like pancakes..

baconated....mmmMMm

BUT WAIT!...this isn't the end! Every cupcake needs their designer hat...






Perfection but wait....we're still not done. We need bacon bling or else this experiment isn't complete.


Perfect: Outfit complete, bacontastic!

So now everyone joins in......




So far this is the best breakfast cupcake/muffin I've ever had in my life....Mcgriddles got nothing on these babies!

Now tommorow we'll see what everyone else has to say....yay!

KEEP IT FROSTYY!

-Martha in a Can-

Here we have Martha Stewart's Classic White cupcake mix.

So I received this as an awesome Christmas gift from Karen (thank you!), but could never find a good time to actually make it. Luckily Bill and Karen came for the weekend to check out our Apartment and have a nice little dinner with us. So what perfect timing to be able to share a great gift (and write a review)!

So the directions are a bit confusing....

It starts asking you to cream the butter (standard) then mix with the egg mix??....Well let me clarify or give you my interpretation of the directions.

- First just cream the butter than add your sugar....Let this become nice and fluffy

Note: the sugar had been pre-packaged for your convenience ;)

- Second, as the butter and sugar are creaming add the batter mix and a half a cup of milk in 3 increments. Make sure you start with the batter mix, then some milk, and then you should end with adding the rest of the mix to your new creamy batter.
-Third, set this aside and clean your mixing bowl. Attach your whisk attachment and whip up 3 egg whites. Whip for 4 minutes until you have stiff peaks.
-Fourth, add a little of the egg mix into the creamy batter. Now start to fold in the rest of the batter into the egg mix until fully corporated.
-Fifth, continue with the rest of the directions on the can....It's finally clear from here...FINALLY.

Then you get some of these !!

They look like sugar cookies on top...yes, nice and sweet ;)

Yes, I know you've seen these wraps before, I was in a hurry!! Get off my back! jk

Conveniently the canister comes with directions to some nice frosting.

Yay! Cupcakes got a hat!
Classic Vanilla Frosting

But at the end of the day we all enjoy a little extra something...America's favorite dunking cookie!

Oreos

PLUS +

Cupcake

=


Easy, Convenient, Fast, and Delicious
**I give it 2 thumbs up for sure!**

ENJOY!

There's only one cure for the overtime blues...

Espresso Chocolate Chip Cookies.....ZING!



So at work our entire crew for Land of the Lost has officially gone on overtime, and my buddy Tim who sits next to me has been sharing these magical beans he found at the Marina Produce Market on Centinela. [Magical beans= chocolate covered espresso beans] Trader Joe's has extra large ones and they are delicious and addictive. I've had this recipe forever now, and have always pulled it out during crunch time.

These are soooo good....Seriously I'm glad I made this recipe or else I'd be ill with a caffeine overdose....mmmmMMM

It's a great recipe: It includes whole wheat flour (usually very unusual for cookies) and instant esspresso powder.

The smell is glorious....


Now don't you forget, these ARE chocolate chip cookies too so don't skip out on the chococlate chips. Like I told my co-worker Sean, " You can never have TOO many chocolate chips!!"

oH snAp!...ghiradelli chocolate chips...can't get any more decadent

So it started out a very light brown dough (wheat flour) , and then the cocoa powder was added and become a rich chocolate color...mmmm yum!!

Boom-shaka....the magic is added in


As a safety precaution...the baking sheets were buttered and dusted with cocoa and not flour so that the cookies wouldn't stick and no flour was left on the goods.

getting close and personal with le dough



BING BANG BOOM....10 min later....

Warning: Rich cookies!!!


This is where Andy was trying to explain how these went well with beer... "COOh-KeeY...*Nom Nom Nom Nom*


ENJOY! and Beware!!!
--side effects include: screaming at your monitor, running out the building, laughing uncontrollably, answering to only yourself in the third person, discovering a new sense of smell, eating overtime catering, and oh so much more.......

Oooeey Gooey Cinnamon Rolls (Part UN!)

So recently I've been going back to old recipes I've found and trying to perfect them. For instance...I can make baked coconut shrimp with apricot marmalade sauce with my eyes closed now, and yes it taste decent. So the last time I tried cinnamon rolls they were pretty much weak sauce. The frosting was way too runny, and the rolls were....well dried out biscuits.

So this first try wasn't too bad...I enjoyed the frosting (cream cheese base) and the rolls weren't to crisp or undercooked.

What's great about this recipe is that you don't have to have a bread maker in order to set your dough. Which probably 90% of the recipes out there for cinnamon rolls require a couple steps in a bread maker (boo).

So we start out with a little yeast in your milk and flour...that brings you to here:

[This dough has been sitting for an hour and has doubled in size]

















Here we rolled out the dough and then topped it off with our delicious filling.
note: this is where I made my mistake. I shouldn't have rolled it out so thin. For thicker rolls I'd go with a little less than half an inch.

The filling primarily just consisted of cinnamon and brown sugar...it's like peanut butter and jelly ;)

Of course I made sure that the brown sugar clumps were all smoothed out once it had been distributed....

Now we're rollinnnn.....




20 minutes and a cinnamon scented kitchen....

Perdy....but not exactly where I wanted them to be....This is why I call this Part 1!!


2 batches of frosting later.............

Do you ever get the store bought kinds and think "hey this would be great....with more frosting!!"....So the first batch didn't hack it so I made it and doubled the fun.



Then off to dailies I go to feed Team Chakafeel woot woot!


:When I have a good recipe I will post it for you guys, but for now this is experimente' part Un :

Until next time...keep it frosty

Sweet Sunday Santa Maria Style BBQ

So we just finally got most of the furniture in our apartment...well enough to have a sweet bbq and have some friends over to break it all in.

So like most Santa Marian's, why not have a traditiona tri-tip bbq on a windy Sunday. On the menu was SM-style Tri Tip along with baked beans and garlic-french bread. To start out we had artichoke spinache dip with sourdough bread, coconut shrimp with a sweet and tangy apricot marmalade, and the basic chips and salsa. Now where can you go in one trip and get the best quality for it all?

Nothing like fighting the elderly with your cart and bumping children with your knees on a Saturday afternoon...totally kidding, or am I? lol
Any who, the seafood was extra fresh so I decided to grab some jumbo shrimp and scallops for the grill. To my suprise there were the finest cuts of tri-tip in the meat section waiting for me as if they knew my plans... but leave it to the boys to bbq (i'm more of the in kitchen-kinda lady) After getting the essentials I turn the corner only to see a palet of strawberries calling my name. They weren't Santa Maria's finest but they'd do, and there is definitly a difference. Not suprised at all, I found some from Santa Maria at the local Santa Monica Farmer's Market.

So I decided to try out Sprinkle's Strawberry Cupcake Recipe.

So I started out by making my puree' and
blending these badboys into liquid candy.









From here I tried to strain out most of the seeds then mixed it in with the room-temp milk so that it was ready for my batter. :The recipe is fairly easy, and it makes exactly a dozen cupcakes:

I figured the cakes would turn out a nice pink color, but they turned out a lot lighter than I expected....It's something I can work on in the future.

[Even though they didn't come out the color I wanted them to be, they sure smelled like strawberries!]


NOW FOR THE GOOD PART



[Strawberry Cream Frosting]
Made with fresh strawberry purree' (which is left over from the cake recipe)
It turned out perfect---creamy and just plain delicious!


So now....easy cake toppers



So here are some white and pink candy chips, melted, and swirled!

So then we frost and decorate...All cupcakes were hand frosted, one by one.....

A little topping didn't hurt no one...

...or keepin it freesshhh*


OR a little bit of both...

but then some like it simple...

THEN THERE WAS ONE....

: WHITE CHOCOLATE CHIP COCONUT COOKIES:
so good, yet soo easy

- Just start out with your favorite plain oatmeal recipe or even a pre-packaged oatmeal mix.

- Then add some sweetened coconut flakes and white chocolate chips....boo-bam you're ready to roll....

Make them whatever size you'd like them....just watch them edges!

They turn out soft, chewy , and absolutely scrumptious.

So in conclusion, the bbq was a success...The cookies were all gone, and by the end of the night most of the cupcakes were dusted along with some missing strawberries....hmmm