Whole Wheat Apple Muffins

Breakfast, it's the best!

And it's even better with these....

They are so full of apples and cinnamon-y goodness.
recipe from smittenkitchen.com

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temp.
1/2 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar, divided
1 egg
1 cup buttermilk or plain yogurt
3 apples, peeled, cored, and chopped small

Preheat oven to 450. Grease 18 muffin cups and set aside. Mix together flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon and set aside. In a mixing bowl, cream the butter. Add sugar and 1/4 cup of the brown sugar. Beat until fluffy scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Add the egg and mix well. Mix in the buttermilk gently so it doesn't start to curdle. Stir in your dry ingredients and fold in your apples.
Pour it all into your muffin cups. Sprinkle on the remaining 1/2 cup brown sugar. Bake at 450 for 10 minutes, turn down the heat to 400 and bake for another 5-8 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean. Cool them a little before serving, those apples get super hot!

Pumpkin Roll

This recipe comes from my Grandma Lucy's cookbook. She put this cookbook together for her kids years ago with all of her recipes from over the years (she was the best cook/chef/baker I have ever known). That's what my grandma did, worked as a cook/chef & also owned her own bakery. My mom made all of her kids a copy & it is one of my most treasured possessions. I remember Grandma Lucy making these pumpkin rolls when I was little & it was my first time trying it. It turned out perfect! Just like I remembered! (Sorry for the trip down memory lane!)

3 eggs

1 cup sugar

2/3 cup canned pumpkin

1 tsp. lemon juice

3/4 cup all purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1 tsp. ginger

1/2 tsp. salt

Beat eggs for 5 minutes, gradually beat in sugar. Stir in pumpkin and lemon juice. Sift flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger and salt together. Fold into pumpkin mixture. Spread onto a greased and floured cookie sheet. (I sprayed mine with the non-stick spray that has flour in it & it worked great). Bake in preheated 375 degree oven for 15 minutes. Do not overcook!

This is what mine looked like after I pulled it out of the oven.

Filling:

2 cups powdered sugar

8 oz. cream cheese

1/4 cup butter softened

1 tsp vanilla extract

Beat filling ingredients together (I did this while my pumpkin roll was in the oven).

DELICIOUS!

Sprinkle a dish towel with some powdered sugar. When cake is removed from oven, turn it out onto the towel and sprinkle with more of the powdered sugar. (Make sure you sprinkle the towel well so that your roll doesn't stick.) Roll in towel and cool in freezer for 10 to 15 minutes.

Unroll cake and spread with filling. Re-roll and wrap in wax paper. (If your roll does stick to the towel, let it sit for a minute & warm to room temperature. Then add a little flour to the roll before putting it in the wax paper.) Store in refrigerator. Serves 8-10.

You just cut thick slices off of the roll. It is so delicious! Even my husband who is not a fan of cream cheese frosting loved it! YUMMY!

Snickers Bars

It looks like a stuffed brownie and tastes like a really amazing stuffed brownie. That's what confuses me. How is it that when you take a chocolate cake mix and add butter and sweetened condensed milk does it somehow transform into a brownie and no longer a cake? But it is still a cake that tastes like a brownie. Have I confused you yet?

My Wayne loves snicker bars! So when I came across this recipe I immediately thought of him. Of course, they don't really taste like a snickers bar. They just have the same goodies inside. You know, like the caramel and peanuts and chocolate..... Heaven!

1 box chocolate cake mix

3/4 cup melted butter

1 can sweetened condensed milk

1 (14 oz) package of caramels found in the candy isle

1 cup peanuts

1 cup milk chocolate chips

Mix the chocolate cake mix with melted butter and 1/3 cup of the sweetened condensed milk. It will be super thick. Spread 2/3's of this mixture into the bottom of an ungreased 9x13 pan. Bake at 350 for 7 minutes.

Meanwhile, unwrap the caramels and put in a microwave safe bowl. Add 1/3 cup of the sweetened condensed milk and microwave for 1 minute. Stir. Microwave for 45 seconds. Stir. Microwave for 30 second or so until the caramel mixture is super smooth.

Sprinkle the chocolate chips on the hot cooked cake mixture as soon as it comes out of the oven. Pour on the caramel sauce as evenly as you can. Next comes the peanuts. Make it pretty. The last layer, drop on the remaining cake mixture. Oh wait! Remember how we only used 2/3 cup of the sweetened condensed milk? Well, I'm not a fan of wasting. So I tossed the rest of the can into the remaining cake mix mixture. It made it a little thinner for the top layer. Then I made sure to lick that can clean as well as the spoon. I LOVE SWEETENED CONDENSED MILK!

Okay, now bake it for another 16-18 minutes.

MAKE SURE YOU LET IT COOL BEFORE CUTTING! The caramel needs time to harden a little. So just be patient and drool over it for about 2 hours.

Enjoy your brownie-like-deliciousness!