German Chocolate Brownie Cakes

     It's the New Year!! I have decided to try new recipes this year. Not just with baking but with meals. For many years I have just fallen back on the 'same old' menus. So yesterday, I decided to start with a new recipes for baking! What a SURPRISE ??! NOT.
     Well this recipe turned out nothing as I had planned..but I think BETTER! The recipe started out to be German Chocolate Sandwich Cookies. I decided to take a shortcut and use a cake mix to make the chocolate cookies (simple recipe on blog already). Looked in pantry and NO chocolate cake mix - rare event! I then thought well maybe I could use a brownie mix? I always use the Costco brownie mix (Ghiradelli) Thankfully I had one bag left in the box.
  I then, what I think, is a brilliant idea - why have I never thought of this? Why not make the brownies in a muffin tin with the foil liners? PERFECT! I followed the recipe on the box and used my ice cream scoop to fill the cupcake liners. The one recipe made 12 "cupcakes". Wasn't sure how much time it would take, so I decided to do 20 mins - PERFECT!
     We have some nut allergies in our house, so I decided to make the German Chocolate Icing without nuts and then separate it into 2. I decided to serve the Brownie Cakes plain, and then 2 dishes with the icing - one with pecans, one without. That way the guest could put on as much as they wanted :) 
     These are so DELISH, that the ones that ate these, thought they were so much better than a cookie would have been! I hope you will try them! ENJOY ♥

     

TOPPING:
7 oz (1/2 can) sweetened condensed milk
1 egg yolk
4 T (1/2 stick) butter
Cook in saucepan over medium heat until bubbly and starting to thicken. BE CAREFUL you need to keep stirring as it will burn. Remove from heat. 
Add
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 c flaked coconut
1/2 c chopped pecans

One BROWNIE Mix
Make as recipe directs. Fill 12 foil muffin tins. Bake 20 minutes

OTHER IDEAS:
Make brownies in muffin tins and then top with scoop of ice cream and drizzle with chocolate sauce or caramel sauce. Your creativity will be endless ♥

3 Layer Carrot Cake

I have always loved carrot cake, but because of nut allergies in our family, we wouldn't order it for dessert while out. They did have a delish small frozen carrot cake that I would buy from time to time and we enjoyed that, because we could pick the walnuts out of it at home!

This recipe is SO GOOD! I finally got smart in making it. . . . it is a 'large' recipe and therefore it would ALWAYS spill over a little in the oven! Well, you know how bad that smells while burning on the bottom of the oven.  I now bake it in 3 pans, and all is well :)

3 c flour
3 c sugar
1 tsp salt
1 T baking soda
1 T cinnamon
1 1/2 c oil
4 eggs
1 T vanilla extract
1 1/2 crushed pineapple (drained)
1/2 c raisins
3 c grated carrots (about 6)
Preheat oven to 350.  Grease three 9" pans lined w/parchment paper.  Sift dry ingredients. Add oil, eggs and vanilla. Beat well. Fold in coconut, carrots, raisins, and pineapple. Pour evenly into pans.  Bake 40+ mins.  cool.

Cream cheese frosting:
8 oz cream cheese
4 T butter (1/2 stick)
3+ c powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
(I also added some milk and more sugar to make sure I had enough icing)
Of course you can add nuts and delete raisins if you don't like them.

ENJOY!! ♥

Caramel Glazed Pear Cake

I LOVE looking through cookbooks with photos! Sorry - I know my photos aren't very good yet, but I am working on that part of my blog :)  A lot of the photos I took awhile ago and didn't have a blog in my mind at the time.  Anyways, while in NJ this summer I was enjoying one of sister-in-laws cookbooks, called Southern Living Farmers Market Cookbook (I have googled it and it is available at Wal-mart but I seldom go there). I did however have her scan this recipe from her book to bring home to try.  I LOVE it!! I also took it out to our small group meeting and they all gave it a thumbs up as well.  Recently my friend told me she made it for her daughter-in-laws birthday cake and all asked for seconds!
Hope you will try it and then leave me a comment :)

4 pears peeled & diced                      

1 T sugar                               

  Mix together in separate bowl and let stand for 5 mins.

3 eggs

2 c sugar

1 ½ c oil

3 c flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp baking soda

2 tsp vanilla extract               

      Mix all ingredients together . Add pears – just until all mixed in.

Grease bundt pan. Bake 350 for 1 hour or so.  Let rest in pan for 10 mins and then  remove.  I decided to have the wide part of the cake on top so all of the yummy glaze  would seep into the cake better, and I think it looks prettier:)

GLAZE:

1 c brown sugar

½ c butter

¼ c evaporated milk          

     Over medium heat, bring to a boil and cook for 2 ½ mins.  Drizzle onto cake.  ENJOY! And share with others ♥

Pennsylvania Shoo Fly Molasses Cake

This is the cake that our son picks every year for his birthday cake!

 I got this recipe from my husbands Aunt Grace, when we lived in PA.

 My husbands family background is Pennsylvania dutch and therefore we have many recipes that include molasses.

A lot of people aren't familiar with molasses, but it's not too scary :) My Mom often made "Earthquake Cookies" (I'll post those at a future date), but definitely not the cakes, pies and cookies that they make in PA.

4 c. flour
1 2/3 c white sugar
1 tsp salt
1 c shortening
Using a pastry blender - blend until you have fine crumbs.  Reserve 2 cups of this mixture for the top.
2 c. boiling water
1 c molasses
2 tsp baking soda
Combine well and add to flour mixture. This will be very thin. Pour into greased and floured 9 x 13 pan. Top with 2c of crumbs you reserved.
Bake 350 for about 45 mins.

ENJOY! and share with others ♥