Chcolate Pecan Hand Pies

These lovelies were a hit at our Christmas party! In my opinion, they should have been because they were a lot of work! I enjoyed every minute of it because it was a baking adventure for me. I had not made hand pies before Thanksgiving week and was still in the process of figuring it out. I have made larger fried pies (my family's southern tradition) and those are fantastic but these pies are baked, not fried. 

I have listed the recipes below. At the bottom, I have listed helpful tips for assembly! 

The two kinds of hand pies I made:

Pecan chocolate chip

Salted caramel apple

I took liberties with both recipes and was determined to be flexible because working with pie crust to make individual desserts, requires that mentality  or you'll become frustrated. 

Pecan chocolate chip (original recipe)

The cool thing about these, is I added chocolate chips on a whim and I thought it added an extra layer of sweetness that was perfect. I used about 1/2 C of semi-sweet chocolate chips. 

You are going to pre-make & bake the filling, before putting it into your dough. 

I estimate this will make about 16 hand pies (@ 4-5" across in size). It truly depends on how large you make themz 

5 T butter

1 C dark corn syrup

1 C packed brown sugar (light or dark will work)

1 C chopped pecans 

4 large eggs

1 t white vinegar

1/4 t vanilla extract 

1 pinch of kosher salt 

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Prepare an 8" square cake pan with nonstick cooking spray.

Brown butter in a small skillet (butter will start smelling nutty & have a chestnut brown color to it.

Whisk all ingredients together, including e browned butter together. Pour into prepared pan. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until the filling has thickened. 

Remove the pan from overn and pour filling into a clean bowl. Place bowl in the refrigerator and chill for at least an hour.

Once the filling is chilled, prepare your pies. See tips below for preparing the pies. 

Salted Caramel Apple (original recipe)

The original recipe (here) tells us to use store bought caramel squares. I have a favorite salted caramel sauce that I like to make, so I used that instead. 

This recipe will fill about 12-16 hand pies, estimating the same size as the pecan. Again, it all depends on how big you cut then. 

For the filling: 

2 C of peeled, small diced apples 

2 t lemon juice

1/2 t cinnamon 

1/4 C sugar

2 t all-purpose sugar

Mix all ingredients together, then prepare your pies. 

Once your caramel apple pies are baked and slightly cooled, get a spoon and scoop the salted caramel onto the pies. You can use as much or as little as you want. I also like to sprinkle on a little more sea salt on top of the caramel. 

Salted caramel sauce (original recipe)

1/2 C sugar

1/4 C water

1/2 C heavy whipping cream

3 1/2 T butter

1/2 t sea salt or kosher salt

Mix water & sugar in a medium size pan (too small of a pan could cause your sugar to over cook, I know this from experience...one day, I had to make this 3 times!).

Stir sugar & water over medium-low heat until sugar dissolves. Increase heat to medium. Swirl the pan frequently, don't stir, as you wait for the mixture to turn a deep amber color.

Once the mixture turns amber, mix in your whipping cream. The mixture will bubble vigorously but this is part of the magic! Stir over low heat until the caramel bits dissolve. Remove from heat, then add in the butter & salt. 

Cool and then transfer to a container. You can make this ahead and it will last about 1 week. I freeze any leftovers I have (it's too delicious to throw away) & it thaws beautifully. You can actually scoop it directly out with a spoon without thawing.

This sauce mixes into buttercream icing perfectly & it also makes a delightful topping for ice cream. Yum yum yum! You can tell I LOVE this sauce. 

Tips on making the pies:

Crust: I like making homemade crusts for pies typically but for recipes that are already quite labor intense, like this once, I decide to skip it and go for the store bought crust. I prefer the type of crust you buy in the frozen department. They taste closer to a real crust to me vs the ones in the refrigerated dairy section.

I used 2 frozen pie crusts to make each recipe. 

Working with crust: leave your crust out at room temperature for about 8-10 minutes until it is workable temperature. I turn my crust out of the pan onto a floured surface. Get your rolling pin ready with some flour as well and start rolling your dough.

Thickness of crust: 

for the round pies I rolled mine out until about 1/8" thick. Then I used a biscuit cutter to cut all of my crusts out (you'll need 2 for the round pies). Once you have them cut, you're going to roll them out a little more until they're wide enough to hold filling. 

For the half moon pies, roll it out to about 1/4" thick because although you don't want the crust to be too thin after you roll them out again (mine were almost too thin & started to tear when I put them together). Cut out circles with a large round biscuit cutter.

Making the pies:

Prepare an egg wash - one egg lightly beaten and get your pastry brush out

For the round pies: put about one tablespoon of filling in the middle. Brush pastry with egg wash. Then top the pie with the 2nd crust. Use a dinner fork (long prongs), to press the dough together to create the seal. Using a sharp knife, cut three dashes into the top dough, to create air vents for ths steam as the pies bake.

For the half moon pies: roll the dough rounds out until they're around 1/8" thickness. Place a generous tablespoon of filling on one side, leaving room for the crust to close/be crimped. Brush the edges with egg wash. Fold other dough side over the filling & again, crimp the edges we a fork. Cut a couple of dashes in the top of the dough to create vents for baking. 

Have fun we your pies and if they don't look perfect, don't worry, they'll still look gorgeously homemade and taste amazing! 

Bake @ 20 - 30 minutes. The reason I am listed a wide range of time, is the amount of time it takes to bake the pies will depend on the thickness of your dough. Just watch them closely, as you don't want them to burn, after all of your hard work to make them. 

Some of my "in-the-process" pics of the salted caramel pies:

Taste of the Season: Gingerbread Waffles

Yum, Yum, Yum. What a delicious way to end the work week, breakfast for dinner!

Cory & I didn't feel like going out to eat or going grocery shopping, so breakfast for dinner sounded excellent (specifically because we had everything we needed on hand). To throw some fun into our dinner, we tried out a new recipe of waffles: Gingerbread Waffles from Smitten Kitchen (original recipe here). They were delightful.

The ingredient list is long but don't let it scare you, they can be whipped up in a snap. It wasn't until I had them on the waffle iron that they became slightly high maintenance...meaning, they were a little difficult to remove from the iron. Never fear, there is a way to work through that and ultimately, they tasted amazing.

Happy eating and HAPPY WEEKEND!!!

Gingerbread Waffles

Makes about 12 waffles 

Whisk all of this together into one bowl:
1 C all-purpose flour
3/4 ground cinnamon
1 T ground ginger
1/8 t ground cloves
1/8 t ground nutmeg
1 1/2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/4 t salt

Whisk all of this together into a second bowl:
1/2 C buttermilk
1/2 C molasses
1/2 C brown sugar
1/4 C granulated sugar
1 large egg
3 T melted butter

Go ahead and turn your waffle iron on so that it can be hot and ready for the waffle batter. Once you have mixed bowl 1 and bowl 2, separately, slowly add the dry mixture into the wet mixture. When your batter is ready, pour onto the waffle maker.

These waffles are very delicate and not easy to lift off of your waffle iron. Be patient! There are 2 tricks to use on these (one is professional, the other is totally silly and Becca designed). Method 1: once you open up the waffle iron, let the waffles breathe a little bit. Next, lightly pull the waffle away from the edge so it is loose and then I tipped the waffle maker over until the waffles fell out onto the counter top! They stayed in tact just fine :)

These waffles have a gorgeous, taste just like traditional gingerbread cookies taste! I dusted mine with some powdered sugar and topped it off with whipped cream!

I will add that as these waffles sit on your plate and cool, they can get a little crispy on the outside and it's a little more difficult to cut a bite with your fork. I think this makes them even better but Cory was ditching the tough ones for the softer ones at this point 😊 

A tip for dusting food with powdered sugar: use a small handled, strainer (like this one), pour powdered sugar in the strainer and lightly tap the sides with your hand until you get the right amount of powdered sugar on your food.

One other tip for keeping your waffles warm, while you are making the full recipe: turn your oven on the lowest heat setting then place your waffles on an oven-safe plate and put them in the oven to stay warm until you are ready to sit down and eat.

What to do with leftover waffles: since waffles are not very good reheated, I'm going to put mine in the food processor tomorrow and used them as an ice cream topping! Nom nom nom! ☺️

Poinsettias - The Perfect Holiday Decorations

Everyone usually has a potted poinsettia out for the holidays. Have you ever tried using them as floral centerpieces or accents for your holiday gatherings? I had not either until I saw an online post a few years ago and was inspired. Now every holiday season, I love putting the blooms around my house!

The blooms are so full that they take up a large amount of space on your table. They will last at least 1 week in the water; mine have lasted 2 weeks this year!

Tips: 

When a stem is cut, this white, milky liquid drips out of the branches. Hold the cut stem over your kitchen sink, run some cold water over the stem to help the solution to exit the stem. Once this is done, they are ready to put around your home. 

For glassware, I use everything from bud vases to cute candy/sundae bowls. My favorite glassware for poinsettias stemless martini glasses!

I do recommend changing out the water after the 1st week of having them out.

I purchased a medium size poinsettia at Walmart this year for around $12 and I put out 7 floral displays. This is a steal, considering a large flower bouquet costs around $10+.

The potted poinsettia still had plenty of blooms after we cut the blooms needed for decoration!

Poinsettia blooms on the bar

I Can Make What?! - Ricotta Cheese

A close up of the beautiful, delicious and addictive ricotta cheese. 

Yesterday I had an OMG moment that was amazing party in my mouth with my taste buds doing the happy dance. And it was all because of RICOTTA cheese. SAY WHAT?! I know! I was eating it out of the bowl with a spoon!

I have never craved ricotta once in my life. In fact, I only buy it at the grocery store when I need it for lasagna. 

The game changer: making it myself! Words cannot describe how easy this is to make and ridiculously rewarding. I had originally made this a few years ago and was first of all shocked at how easy it was (why do people buy the bad tasting stuff at the grocery store?!) and it was delicious but then I never made it again because life got busy.

Fast forward to last week, I needed some ricotta but didn't want to go to the store (sometimes quick errands are not worth the hassle with a little one!). Randomly I had discussed making this with my neighbor a few days before and thought, huh, I bet I could make it today. I googled a recipe (of course, I didn't save the one I had used before) and found this gem from Ina Garten. 

Side note diatribe...Ina Garten is my new chef food crush. I used to not like her at all but recently I realized I misunderstood her & what she's about. The theme of her new book Make It Ahead (love!) and the press surrounding it's release totally changed my mind & she's amazing!!!

Back to the story...I found the recipe, had all of the ingredients & cheesecloth and voila! In less than 30 minutes I had this gorgeous ricotta ready to go! Flash forward to yesterday, I wanted to make lasagna. I was in a grocery store (won't name names of where) & I had this classic experience of: store, I want to hand you my money for this product but you are making it soooo difficult right now! I couldn't reach the large size (short-people problems), and the small sizes I picked up, they had busted (I even got store bought ricotta goo on my hands, yuck!) and that right there encouraged me to make my own, better tasting ricotta again, at home!

Once it was finished, I took a bite, then another, then another and I literally had to exercise my rarely used self-control to keep from eating the entire batch. I knew Cory would freak out about it too, so being the nice foodie wife that I am, I saved a bowl for him. If I hadn't, I wouldn't have taken these pics for you to see the yumminess!

What you need: cheesecloth & I recommend a Dutch oven

Recipe:

4 C milk (I used 1%, Ina recommends whole)

2 C whipping cream (yes!)

1 T kosher salt

3 T white wine vinegar

Mix milk & whipping cream together in the dutch oven. Then mix in the kosher salt. Bring to a full boil over medium heat.

While waiting for the mixture to boil, get out your cheesecloth. Wet your cheesecloth (wring it out) and then line a large strainer with the cheesecloth. Set the strainer over a bowl; this is where you will pour your milk mixture and your ricotta will form.

Once the milk mixture is boiling, turn off the heat and mix in the white wine vinegar. Ina says that this starts the separation process of the whey from the curds. Let this mixture sit for one minute.

Next, pour your milk mixture into the strainer with the cheesecloth and let sit about 20 - 25 minutes. You can let it sit longer and it will continue to thicken.

A few ways I like to use ricotta:

Lasagna

Toss the ricotta with some pesto and already cooked noodles in a skillet to heat for a moment or two and you have a luscious and filling quick dinner. Toss on some grilled chicken, perfection. 

Here is the link to the original recipe from Ina. She recommends using a high quality white wine vinegar, I just had the basic kind, so I can't wait to try the recipe with a really nice one! Ina's Ricotta Recipe

The BEST Buttercreme Icing - Tried & Tested

A couple of years ago, I thought seriously about opening my own bakery. I had an idea of the desserts I would want to sell but I did not have final recipes for them. Enter: my crazy weekend baking extravaganzas to find the perfect recipe. Needless to say, my husband LOVED it! He got to taste test everything and ultimately, I found some delicious recipes.

One of my 1st searches was for the perfect buttercreme icing. A lot of times, buttercreme icings can be too dense, too sweet and hard to work with when decorating. This icing literally takes the cake in being perfect in texture (light and airy), sweetness (just right) and ease to work with (you can refrigerate it then let it sit out to get to room temperature and it will work just as well as fresh). When I'm done making it, I like to eat it with a spoon...these hips don't lie.

Whipped Vanilla Buttercreme Icing

3 sticks + 2 T butter, softened and cut into cubes
3 C sifted powdered sugar (I recommend sifting)
3 T milk
1 1/2 t vanilla
pinch of salt

1) In the bowl of an electric mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, whip butter for 8 minutes. The butter will become delightfully pale and creamy.

2) Add the remaining ingredients gradually (throwing in a bunch of powdered sugar will make quite the dusty mess and cause you to cough!). Once all ingredients are in the bowl, mix on low speed for 6 minutes. The frosting will be light, creamy and fluffy. I fully invite you to get out a small spoon and try this confectionary triumph!

Another GREAT thing about this icing, it performs beautifully with mix-ins. Here are some ideas; for each of them, add your flavor to taste! Taste at will, as much as you want; you have my permission, as YOU just made this fabulous icing.

Mix-In Ideas:

• Salted Caramel Sauce (see recipe here: )
• Nutella
• Melted chocolate chips
• Crushed candy canes
• Peanut Butter
• Fresh strawberry chunks

Here are some photos of the cupcakes I have made with this icing! Yes! I usually only make mini cupcakes :)

Our Annual Christmas Party

Christmas season feels like it kicks into gear when two things happen at our house:

1. We get out our custom Lennox Christmas mugs with our names on them, that our wonderful Mymama gave to us 
   
2. We host our annual Ugly Christmas Sweater Party

Saturday was our 5th annual party and it was a blast!

I have finally hosted enough parties where I can prepare enough in advance so that when guests arrive, I'm not running around like a Christmas chicken with my head cut off and can actually enjoy my guests! I also had a tremendous additional helper this year, my sweet sister Margaret. She came in town for the occasion and we would not have been able to pull everything off on Saturday without her. 

This year, our party food was themed to: Country Christmas, which means I had an excuse to make some of my most favorite foods. This is the stuff I call "real food" as opposed to desserts :) We noshed on biscuits (buttermilk & chive and cheese), country style slow cooked green beans, hash brown casserole and a delicious brown sugar glazed ham. 

Although the real food was mouthwatering, my favorite course was and always is DESSERT! This year I tried my hands at making mini hand pies. They were a little bit of work BUT they turned out so deliciously scrumptious, I would make them again. From the buzz I heard around the house, I believe they were one of the favorites of my guests as well. 

I also made: sugar cookies with an icing glaze and finished with the best buttercream icing on the planet (no lie!), gingerbread cupcakes with brown sugar cinnamon buttercream icing, white wedding cupcakes with the best buttercream icing ever, white wedding cupcakes with candy cane icing, chocolate chip pecan hand pies, salted caramel apple hand pies and brown butter chocolate chip cookies. Oh, I'm craving them again right now!

Close-Up of the sugar cookies.
I was quite pleased with how the
sugar white and gold theme came out.
I tried a new glaze icing and it worked brilliantly. 

We also had one of my favorite beverage stops: A Hot Chocolate Bar. Yummmm.

I don't usually fuss a lot about decorations but this year I thought it would be fun to create little signs to describe the foods we were serving. I used watercolor paper, colored pencils, stamps and of course some sticker bling of rhinestones and pearls. 

I have posted or am planning to post, the individual recipes on the blog individually, should you be interested in making them! Happy kitchening!

Sugar Cookies - My Tried & Tested Recipe

There are specific recipes that I will go to bat against anyone and claim mine is the best. The only reason I feel this way, is because I tried and tested multiple recipes and can attest to the success of specific ones.

This Sugar Cookie recipe is a perfect example of one of my go-to recipes. Of course, you will NOT believe where I found the recipe...a bag of Great Value sugar about 10 years ago!

A few special things about this recipe:

• Prep: this dough is very easy to work with
• Easy prep & freeze: You can prepare the dough, roll it out and after cutting out the cookies, you can place them into the freezer to bake. They will hold their shape beautifully. 
• Your Choice!: They can be made as thin or thick as you want, either way, they're delicious
• Decorations: you can decorate these with a nice glaze, buttercream icing or even royal icing

Here are images of some recent Christmas cookies I decorated:

The Recipe:

Makes 6 dozen cookies

1 C sugar

1 C butter, softened

3 T milk

1 t vanilla

1 egg

3 C all purpose flour

1 1/2 t baking powder

1/2 t salt

Making the dough:

1) In a large bowl, cream the sugar and butter. 

2) Slowly add the milk, vanilla and egg. Mix well. 

3) Gradually add the flour, baking powder and salt. 

4) Once the dough is mixed, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate at least 1 hour. 

Cutting the cookies:

1) Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. 

2) On a lightly floured surface, roll out 1/3 of the dough to your preferred thickness (I prefer 1/8"). Keep the remaining dough refrigerated. 

3) Cut with floured cookie cutters and place 1" apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. 

4) Bake for around 5 - 9 minutes or until the edges of the cookies are lightly golden brown. 

5) Immediately remove from the cookie sheets and cool thoroughly before decorating with icing.

Icing Recipe:

Recipe for a very easy & tasty border & flood icing - I used it on the crystal sugar & gold cookies above:

For the border icing:

1 - 1 1/2 C powdered sugar

1/2 t vanilla or other flavoring extract

2 to 2 1/2 T milk or water (I prefer milk)
Food coloring, optional

I found I needed to use about 1 1/2 C+ of powdered sugar to get this to the right consisency. All ingredients may be mixed at the same time and this icing is so easy, you can use a fork! You want the icing to slightly drop off of your fork but still be thick, so it will hold once you put it on your cookies. 

Make sure you use the border icing on your cookies, before you use the thinner, flood icing. Let the icing set about 20 - 30 minutes before using the flood icing. 

Also, if you are wanting a pure white icing, I recommend using the clear imitation vanilla flavoring. The pure vanilla will tint it slightly. I'm a vniilla purist, so this is the only time I'll mention the merits of the imitation atuff 😀

For the flood icing:1 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla or other flavoring extract
2 1/2 – 3 tablespoons milk or water
Food coloring, optional

Again, you can mix this with a fork! You want it to be a lot thinner than the border icing but not too thin. When you run your fork through the icing, it should leave a slight trail of the fork prongs. If it's too runny, it could overrun your border. To reduce runniness, add more powdered sugar to your mixture. 

Glazed cookies will take at least 24 hours to dry!

Here are some photos of sugar cookies I have decorated over the years!