Taken From Sticky, Gooey, Creamy, Chewy

Ingredients:

3 tablespoons olive oil
3 tablespoons butter
3 Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and diced
2 ribs celery, chopped
1 large sweet yellow onion, chopped
2 dried bay leaves
1/4 cup chili peppers in adobo sauce, pureed
Salt and freshly ground black pepper to taste
3-5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
2 cups clam juice or fish stock
4 cups half-and-half or whole milk
4 cups fresh corn kernels, scraped from the cob (frozen is okay too)
1 pound fresh lump crab meat
1/4 cup dry sherry (optional)
Hot sauce for serving (optional)

Directions:

Heat a deep pot over medium heat. Add oil and butter. When butter is melted, add potatoes, celery, onion, bay leaves and chipotle peppers to the pot. Season vegetables with salt and pepper, mix well and saute until tender, about 10 minutes.

Sprinkle in flour and cook about 2 minutes, stirring constantly. Stir in clam juice and half and half and mix well.

Bring soup up to a simmer and continue to simmer for about 20 minutes, or until potatoes are soft.

Stir in corn, crab and sherry and simmer for another 5 minutes, until heated through.

Adjust the soup seasonings and remove the bay leaf. Ladle soup into bowls and top with a few dashes of hot sauce, if desired.

Serve with some crackers, crusty bread or cornbread.

Serves 6 as a first course and 4 as a main course.

Enjoy!

Cold War Brownies
Taken from 17 and Baking

Makes a 9″ pan

Brownie
6 tbsp unsalted butter, cut into pieces
4 oz bittersweet chocolate
Rounded 1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 cup flour
1 tbsp Dutch-processed cocoa powder
2 tsp chili powder
2 tsp cinnamon
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Topping
8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
1 large egg yolk
5 tbsp sugar
1/8 tsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp cinnamon

4 tbsp Nutella

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9×9″ pan with foil, allowing it to hang over the edges. Lightly grease.

In a saucepan, melt the butter and bittersweet chocolate together. Remove from the heat and stir in the sugar, then the eggs. Add the flour, cocoa, chili powder, cinnamon, and salt and mix in. Finally, stir in the vanilla and chocolate chips. Spread the mixture into the prepared pan.

In a mixer, beat together the cream cheese, egg yolk, sugar, and cinnamon. Drop dollops of the cream cheese mixture on top of the brownies. Drop dollops of nutella, too. Use a dull knife to swirl the whole thing. (Alternatively, mix the nutella into half of the cream cheese mixture and swirl. Or leave the nutella out.)

Bake 35 minutes, or until just set. Let cool completely before lifting out and cutting into bars. Store in the fridge.

My suggestion: Leave out the cinnamon and add more nutella!

Shortbread Base
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp instant espresso powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
8 oz (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 oz bittersweet or milk chocolate, finely chopped

Topping
6 oz bittersweet or milk chocolate, finely chopped
3/4 cup chopped salted, roasted peanuts

Center a rack in the oven and preheat to 375 degrees F. Butter a 9″x13″ pan and line with foil so that some comes up over the edges. Butter the foil and put the pan on a baking sheet.

Whisk together the flour, espresso powder, salt, and cinnamon and set aside. In a mixer with a paddle attachment, beat the butter at medium speed for 3 minutes until smooth. Add the sugars and beat for another 3 minutes, until light and fluffy. Beat in the vanilla, then add the dry ingredients. Use a low speed and cover the mixer with a clean towel to avoid flour flying up. Mix until the dry ingredients are almost incorporated.

Add the chopped chocolate and mix until just combined, mixing by hand if necessary. Scrape the dough into the pan and smooth the top. The dough will be very thick and sticky and make a very thin layer. Use a spatula or your fingertips to make an even layer.

Bake 20-22 minutes, or until the base is very bubbly and beginning to pull from the sides. Transfer the pan to a rack and turn off the oven.

Sprinkle the chopped chocolate onto the bars and put back in the oven for 2-3 minutes, or until the chocolate is soft. Spread with a spatula or the back of a spoon into an even layer over the bars. Sprinkle the chopped peanuts and lightly press down with your fingertips, and let the bars cool to room temperature.

Carefully lift the bars out of the pan using the foil and cut into bars.

Side note: I would leave out the cinnamon.

It’s been a while since I have baked. With all the traveling, it was hard to find the time to try out the different recipes. On Friday, I finally decided to go to Sultan Center to get ingredients to make something new. It was between two different recipes, making S’mores Bar or Peanut-Chocolate-Caramel Crunch Bars. The deciding factor would be on which ingredients I would find. Surprisingly Sultan Center didn’t have any graham crackers or marshmallow fluff, so I went for the latter.

Oh and how happy I was that I went for this recipe! These bars are so good! I have always been a fan of salty sweet goodness, and this bar was the pure definition of that! The brown sugar in the crust gave it the caramel flavor, while the chocolate provided all the necessary sweetness. To top it all off, the salted peanuts added the salty kick, leaving you wanting more!

Family Reviews:

Parents loved them! My brothers preferred less cinnamon. All agreed that they should be slightly thinner! Will take all that into consideration for the next time I give this recipe another go!

My first attempt at making these cupcakes did not turn out as great as I imagined them. I followed the recipe that I found online, but the cupcake resembled a dry muffin. I knew that the potential of this cupcake could be amazing. When used correctly, you just can’t go wrong with Nutella! So I decided to give it another try, but this time change a few things from the original recipe and tweak it up to my liking! The Result: A very yummy soft cupcake with a Nutella center! I thought it turned out to be great, and I was happy to have been able to get it right.

I sent a few out to be sampled by my cousin and some friends just to make sure that I was not giving a biased opinion. The feedback was great! They enjoyed the texture and the taste, although my cousin preferred more Nutella! The only thing I want to work on now with these is making them look more presentable! :p

If anyone wants to give these a try, please let me know and I will send you the recipe!

These days I have been struck by a baking mood. Whenever I see a recipe I find interesting, I print it off and save it for the next grocery trip to by the ingredients. After the chocolate chip cookies, I wanted to try something with peanut butter. I found this recipe, and I had to try it.

The recipe itself was very easy to follow, and the cookies turned out delicious! The chocolate, peanut butter, and sugar complimented each other perfectly, without being too sweet!  The only difference was making the cookies slightly bigger than what was called for in the recipe. It is definitely something I would make again!

Next up…Nutella Cupcakes!

I have always heard that baking with kids is a a good learning experience, so when I decided to bake cookies, I told my four year old nephew to join along. We passed by the Sultan Center in the morning to pick up some ingredients, and decided to do our baking after lunch. It has been a while since I have used the oven at home, but thankfully, the cookies turned out to be very good!

My nephew enjoyed all the mixing going on, but his favorite part was placing the cookie dough on the baking tray, as he thought was playing with play-dough! Overall, it was a fun baking with him, and he definitely wants to do it again!

As you can see, Spiderman goes everywhere with my nephew.

As we were mixing the dough, my nephew pressed the high button on the mixer, and the dough splattered all over the place.

The cookie dough!

If anyone wants the recipe, let me know!

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The recipe:

Ingredients

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 cup sugar
• 2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• 12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped into chips or 2 cups store-bought chocolate chips
• 1 cup finely chopped walnuts, or pecans (optional)

Directions

1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment or silicone mats.
2. Whisk together the flour, salt, and baking soda.
3. Working with a stand mixer, preferably fitted with the paddle attachment, or with a hand mixer in a large bowl, beat the butter on medium speed for about 1 minute, until smooth. Add the sugars and beat for another 2 minutes or so, until well-blended.
4. Beat in the vanilla. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for 1 minute after each egg goes in. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the dry ingredients in 3 portions, mixing only until each addition is incorporated. On low speed, or by hand with a rubber spatula, mix in the chocolate and nuts. ( The dough can be covered and refrigerated for up to 3 days or frozen. If you’d like, you can freeze rounded tablespoonfuls of dough, ready for baking. Freeze the mounds on a lined baking sheet, then bag them when they’re solid. There’s no need to defrost the dough before baking – just add another minute or two to the baking time.)
5. Spoon the dough by slightly rounded tablespoonfuls onto the baking sheets, leaving about 2 inches between spoonfuls.
6. Bake the cookies- one sheet at a time and rotating the sheet at the midway point- for 10-12 minutes, or until they are brown at the edges and golden in the center; they may still be a little soft in the middle, and that’s just fine. Pull the sheet from the oven and allow the cookies to rest for 1 minute, then carefully, using a wide metal spatula, transfer them to racks to cool to room temperature.
7. Repeat with the remainder of the dough, cooling the baking sheets between batches.

Enjoy with a nice tall glass of milk!

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