Orange Coconut Cremes

Yeah! The final post in my week-long blog challenge! I was able to write a blog post every day this week, and this is the last one!

Here's another quick and easy treat to put out on your Christmas platters or give to friends and family. Personally, I find the combination of orange and coconut absolutely irresistable. Add in chocolate, and you're golden.

Are these sweet? Yes. Are they incredibly sugary? Yes. Are they addictive? So much so that you will eat one or two too many and make yourself feel sick. I don't often feel inclined to try more than one item of whatever I've made, but I definitely caught myself sneaking into the fridge to snag a couple before having to give them all away. Oops!

Yield: 108 servings (I halved the recipe, no way I need over 100 of these babies!)
Ingredients:
1 14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup butter, cubed
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 package (1 kg) powdered sugar
1 cup flaked unsweetened coconut
2 teaspoons orange extract
12 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped
2 tablespoons shortening

Directions:
In a small saucepan, combine milk, butter and salt. Warm over low heat until the butter is melted.

Place powdered sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer with the paddle attachment. Add condensed milk and butter mixture, and beat until smooth. Add coconut and orange extract, and mix well. Roll into 1 inch balls and place on baking sheets lined with waxed paper. Refridgerate until firm, about 1 hour. If the mixture is too soft to hold it's shape, add more powdered sugar or refridgerate for awhile, as the mixture will be warm from the condensed milk mixture.

In a microwave, heat chocolate for 30 seconds, remove and stir. Continue to heat chocolate on 20 second bursts, stirring in between until chocolate is completely melted. Stir in shortening and mix until fully incorporated. Dip balls into chocolate; remove by placing a fork underneath and lifting, allowing excess chocolate to drip off. Place on waxed paper and either let stand until set or refridgerate to set more quickly.

Source: slightly adapted from Taste of Home Pin It

White Chocolate Topped Gingerbread Cookies

I don't have much to say about these cookies, other than that you can never, ever go wrong with soft, sugary gingerbread cookies. Soft gingerbread/molasses cookies are one of my favourites of all time, yet I hardly ever enjoy them! There's the very odd occasion that I purchase one of the ginormous ones from Starbuck's, but that likely equals once, maybe twice a year.

Simple. And perfect.

I halved the recipe and managed to get about 2 dozen. The ingredients shown below are for a full recipe, so I think it's safe to say it will produce somewhere around 4 dozen cookies.

Ingredients:
3 cups flour
2 teaspoons ginger
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup molasses
1 egg
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 oz. white chocolate

Directions:
Combine flour, ginger, cinammon, baking soda, nutmeg and salt in a medium bowl.

Using the paddle attachment on a stand mixer, beat butter and brown sugar on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add molasses, egg and vanilla, and beat well. Gradually beat in flour mixture on low speed until well combined.

Press dough in a thick flat disk and wrap in plastic wrap. Refrigerate 4 hours or overnight.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Shape dough into 1-inch balls. Roll in granulated sugar. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake 8 to 12 minutes or until edges of cookies begin to brown. Let baked cookies rest on baking sheet for a few minutes before removing to wire racks to cool completely.

Store cookies in airtight container for up to 5 days.

Source: Culinary Concoctions by Peabody Pin It

Nordic Christmas Sugar Cookies

Welcome to part II you could say, of my sugar cookie extravaganza. I apparently don't think that one beautiful set for Christmas is enough, and have to do an entirely different set. Actually, that's not the reason at all; it's just that I had so many ideas and was able to narrow it down to 2, but unfortunately not any further. I just couldn't decide which I liked better: the Winter Wonderland theme or the I'm not sure what to call this but let's go with Nordic Christmas theme. Which one do YOU like better? Cast your votes now! My Winter Wonderland cookies can be seen here.

The 4 at the bottom, starting with the branch, then the pine cone, birch trees, and the pearly ornament were my absolute favourite of the whole batch.

As promised, here is the chocolate roll-out cookie dough that I promised to provide the other day when I posted the Winter Wonderland cookies. Let me just say, when I was handling this dough, I actually said out-loud "ooh this dough is just dreamy." Sean asked me "dreamy?" and I explained that it held together and rolled out like a dream. This was in comparison to the only other chocolate sugar cookie dough I've used before, which you can check out in my post on Valentine's Day Sugar Cookies. While that dough was crumbly and a bit of a pain to roll out, it really did taste fantastic in the end. This new recipe tasted good too, but I think perhaps I may have added a bit too much flour as they were harder than what I'm used to, and Sweet Sugar Belle described them as on the softer side. So I'm a bit disappointed they didn't turn out as I hoped, but I'll definitely be trying the recipe again in the future.

Ingredients:
1 cup butter
1/4 cup shortening
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
2/3 cup cocoa
3 OR 3 1/2 cups flour

Directions:
Cream butter, shortening and sugar together in a stand mixer using the paddle attachment. Add eggs and vanilla, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Add baking powder and salt, and mix again. Combine the cocoa powder until well blended. Add flour 1 cup at a time. If you are going to bake cookies right away, add 3 1/2 cups flour. If you are going to chill the dough, or wait for another few hours or even a couple days, stop at 3 cups.

Roll out dough on a lightly floured surface, and cut out desired shapes. Place on baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Bake in preheated 375 degree oven for 6 1/2- 7 1/2 minutes.

Source: Lila Loa


Because I'm on day 5 of my week long challenge (whooo!) I'm going to provide a quick re-cap of what I've done so far:

Day 1: Vanilla Bean Caramel Sauce

 

 

Day 2: Peppermint Patties 

 

 

Day 3: Winter Wonderland Cookies

 

 

Day 4: Christmas Caramel Popcorn

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Christmas Caramel Popcorn

Day 4 in my week long challenge! Whew, and can I say I am feelin' pretty good now because I have 95% of all my Christmas baking done, so it's smooth sailing from here on! Just in time too, because I'd love a day or two of relaxation before the Christmas craziness starts.

I actually made this caramel popcorn about a week ago, to bring to a Christmas party for my fellow MSW classmates. It's a very adaptable recipe- you can really throw anything in it to make the holiday or event you're going for. I added some red and green mini m&ms to give it a more Christmasy feel. This is definitely a sweet and addictive treat. Betcha can't eat just one. ;)

P.S. If you're wondering where the 'healthy eats' part of my blog is lately... it's non-existent. I'm slightly embarrassed to say that my meals outside of dessert have been atrocious lately. The past 2 days I had a can of soup for lunch. It was a low point. My only excuse is that the last week I've been very busy with baking, and the couple weeks prior I was absolutely swamped with final assignments for school, so spending time on food was my last priority. I hope to get back on track in the new year!

Ingredients:
1 cup unpopped corn kernels
1 cup light brown sugar
1 cup light corn syrup
1/2 cup butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 (14 oz.) can sweetened condensed milk
mini Christmas m&ms

Directions:
Preheat oven to 250 degrees F.

In a popcorn maker, pop your kernels as directed. Be mindful of using 'gourmet' kernels; apparently they pop larger than other kernels and therefore amount to more. I ignored this fact despite reading it beforehand in the instructions, and because my popcorn popper has a lid on it and the popcorn pops upwards... well let's just say Tucker got a good few treats on the floor that day. Place kernels in a large bowl, and make sure to pick out any unpopped kernels. You'll have to stir the popcorn, so you may need to use 2 bowls (I had to because I had so much popcorn).

In a saucepan over medium heat, combine brown sugar, butter, corn syrup and salt. Heat until melted and begins to boil. Once boiling, pour in sweetened condensed milk and stir continuously for 5 minutes, to prevent burning. Take this step seriously; again I didn't because apparently I thought I knew everything, and yes, you guessed it, I had to start all over again when I noticed bits of brown floating around.

Remove from heat and pour directly over popcorn, stirring until coated evenly. Stir in desired amount of m&ms. I did so before baking because I wanted them to stick to the popcorn; however, be aware that they do melt a little bit.

Spread popcorn evenly on baking sheets, and place in preheated oven to bake for 45-50 minutes. Stir every 15 minutes to cook evenly.

Remove from oven, allow to cool for 5 minutes, then break into pieces and let cool completely.

Source: Cookies and Cups
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Winter Wonderland Cookies

Today is my third blog post in my week-long blog post challenge! I absolutely love the look of these cookies; not to toot my own horn, but they turned out fantastic! I love the colours, love that they have a silver sheen to them- thanks to my new Wilton Color Mist, and I love the delicacy of the snowflakes and all the ornaments!

You may have noticed that there are actually 2 different cookie doughs in the picture. I'm going to be posting the recipe for the Brown Sugar cookie dough today, and the Chocolate in the next few days! I really liked the flavour of the Brown Sugar cookie dough; it tasted like a mild gingerbread with a hint of orange.

For my recipe and directions on royal icing, check out my post on Baby Shower Cookies.

Yield: about 2 1/2 dozen
Ingredients:
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tablespoon milk, half and half, or orange juice
2 teaspoons extract (I used orange and vanilla)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Directions:
Cream together butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, scraping down the bowl after each egg. Add extract and milk, and mix until just incorporated. Sift together dry ingredients a cupful or so at a time until all of the dry mixture is incorporated. The dough should be soft but not sticky. If it is sticky, add flour little by little until it isn't.

Divide dough into two parts, wrap in plastic and chill for at least 30 minutes.

Roll out dough to desired thickness (I aim for 1/4 inch) and cut into shapes. Dust lightly with flour as needed. Set cookie pans in the freezer for 5-10 minutes before baking to help prevent spreading. However, I noticed that with this recipe despite chilling it before baking, the dough still spread quite a bit.

Bake at 375 F for 8-10 minutes. Cool on baking pan for 5 minutes before removing to wire rack to cool completely. Decorate as desired.

Source: Sweet Sugar Belle
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