Halloween peppermint brownies

Time flies and it's already Halloween in two short days!  

I may not be very big on Halloween but it's good to get into the spirit a little bit with some pumpkin carving, trick-or-treating, and a few fun treats.  I find that as the kids get older, the fervor behind Halloween is quieting down so maybe I should try to enjoy it as much as possible while my son is still dressing up and excited to "boo" his friends and neighbors.  

The kids at school are having a Halloween bake sale today and I made these simple peppermint brownies for the sale.  I considered making a batch of owl cupcakes but when I saw this simple idea for making Halloween "faces" using peppermint patties on brownies from Martha, it seemed like an easy/tasty project to try.  I love an excuse to make brownies!

I took Martha's idea and made it even simpler.  I actually used a recipe from Joy of Baking that makes brownies that are meant to be somewhere between cakey and fudgy.  I wanted a moist brownie and also one that would hold up well.  Since I made sure to take my brownies out of the oven earlier rather than later, mine turned out more fudgy, which is how we like them.  Instead of embedding a peppermint patty into the brownies (as well as using one for the faces) as per Martha's recipe, I just added a little peppermint extract into the batter to reinforce the flavor, keeping things simple and not too crazy minty.  

I don't know if everyone's a fan of peppermint brownies but my son loves it and selfishly, of course, I was thinking of him.  He wanted a batch for himself and after I let him sample one, he really wanted to keep the entire batch.   In other words, these are my kid-approved!  Somehow, I did manage to pack up most of the brownies and they now reside with many other creepy and not-so-creepy treats awaiting the school bake sale.

Have a fun and safe Halloween!  Once Monday rolls around, it's officially time to talk Thanksgiving and Christmas, and I can hardly wait!

Devil's Food cupcakes with a chocolate-apricot surprise

It's no doubt that the seasons, as well as the holidays that come and go with them, have a big impact on my cravings.  So it's probably no coincidence that I found myself craving Devil's Food cake in the past few weeks.  Although, to be quite honest, I crave chocolate all the time!  If I'm not having some type of chocolate dessert at the end of the day, I will eat a couple squares of chocolate at some point during the day, almost every single day.  It's like an unwritten rule.  I find that I'm a much happier person when I have some chocolate in me.  

Instead of a cake, I thought I'd make a few cupcakes and put some of my Halloween-theme cupcake decorations to use!  These devilishly dark chocolate cupcakes are my kind of Halloween treat.

For fun and a little variety, I stuffed the cupcakes with a chocolate apricot filling before baking.  I stirred melted chocolate together with a little apricot preserve and butter, let the mixture cool and stiffen enough to roll into balls, and then chilled them until time to bake.  I was a little too generous with my chocolate-apricot surprises (in my greediness, I made the chocolate rounds larger than I should have).  The heavy filling mostly sank to the bottom but if you'll do as I say, not as I do, and go a little lighter on the filling, you should have more success.  Regardless though, the extra chocolate from the filling melds into everything while adding moisture and the apricot flavor, while not very distinct, provides a little note of fruitiness in the background that's quite nice.  The cupcakes themselves are so moist and just heavenly for any fellow chocoholics out there.

Inspiration really is everywhere.  In this case, the inspiration for the filling came specifically from a recipe, which originally involved red velvet cupcakes, that I found in a book - a cozy, culinary-themed mystery book to be exact.  You probably know the type of book I'm talking about - the kind that often have corny titles and silly covers. They may seem silly at first glance but I have to admit I'm a fan of many of them and judging by the proliferation of these types of mystery books, I'd say there are many people who enjoy them like I do.  Life is serious enough as it is and, sometimes, I just don't want anything too "heavy" and I totally welcome a reprieve in the form of some light, entertaining, good reads.

The other thing I was also channeling with these cupcakes is America's Test Kitchen's ultimate chocolate cupcake recipe, which is a full-on chocolate cupcake with chocolate frosting that includes a round of chocolate ganache placed in the cupcake batter right before baking.  It sounds like chocolate heaven and I wonder why I've yet to make that exact recipe!  And lastly...these cupcakes had me thinking of Italian tri-color (or rainbow) cookies - something we love dearly at my house - which have apricot and chocolate elements to them.  

I hope you have a fun and safe Halloween!  Remember to devour some devilishly good treats, all the better if it involves some good dark chocolate.

Homemade peanut butter cups (for Halloween)

Are you a fan of Pinterest?  I love checking out the "Food & Drink" category.  There are amazing photos of all kinds of food and sweets (not to mention cool tips and tricks) to ogle over.  Plus, it's nice to know there are so many people like me, who are obsessed with food!  I've actually tried a couple of recipes I found via Pinterest and this one came about the same way.

Homemade peanut butter cups caught my attention partly because I thought my little one would enjoy it.  With Halloween around the corner, I also can't help but have candy bars on my mind, especially since they're everywhere right now.  And once in a while, I just get a hankering to try making homemade copies of store bought things - even though it usually ends up reminding me there's a good reason why the item is best store bought.

With Halloween in mind, I sprinkled some black and orange nonpareils over some of my peanut butter cups.  Why not add different kind of sprinkles for whatever holiday you're celebrating.  Kids are big fans of sprinkles and they were the first of my little batch to go.  But I'm not suggesting you make these to pass out on Halloween...I actually don't think that would be practical (please read on)...

To make these, you layer chocolate, peanut butter whipped with a bit of butter and confectioners' sugar, then chocolate again, in some cupcake liners.  Freeze each layer for about 15 minutes and before you know it, unwrap your liners and you have homemade peanut butter cups.  It's not exactly Reese's Pieces but I really like being able to see the layers of chocolate and peanut butter, and I think it's a fun little project to do if you're into making homemade renditions of store bought candy.

For the chocolate, I used a mix of (mostly) semisweet and milk chocolate.  You could use what you prefer; milk chocolate would be sweeter and should give you a softer texture than dark.  I used standard cupcake size wrappers to make my peanut butter cups.  You could go mini, using a mini muffin tin and liners.  That would be a little more labor intensive but looking back now, I actually think minis would've been a better idea.  Since these tend to melt (you need to store them in the refrigerator, the chocolate is not tempered) and be a bit messy to eat, it'd be a big plus to be able to pop one whole piece into your mouth! 

Overall, this was a fun little project.  The plus side is you made very tasty homemade peanut butter cups!  The downside is you can't really transport these since they're a little messy to handle.  They start sweating and melting on your fingers once taken out of the refrigerator - and you do need to let them rest a few minutes at room temperature before eating so that the chocolate layers aren't quite so hard (those chocolate layers are purely melted chocolate, with no butter or corn syrup to soften them).  In contrast, the peanut butter layer is softer than the chocolate and tends to squish out when you bite into it. 

To contain the mess a little, I think it's a good idea to serve each one of these in a cupcake wrapper so that there's something to hold onto.  But hey, store bought candy can be messy too, right?

The kids I served these to needed a lot of napkins but they were very happy (which makes me happy)!  Now if only there was a recipe for homemade Kit Kat bars...

Owl cupcakes...whoo's ready for Halloween?

Whoo...whoo wants a cupcake?  Halloween is coming and this is my nod to the holiday.  I've been wanting to make these since last Halloween when I first saw them.

I have to admit that Halloween is not my favorite holiday of the year.  Christmas is definitely more up my alley.  I guess it's because we didn't have Halloween in Hong Kong and growing up years ago in Brooklyn, Halloween not only meant costumes and trick or treating, it also meant hearing eggs whack the windows of the bus on the way home.  But I love Brooklyn and I do love the little ones dressed up in their adorable costumes during Halloween; I never get tired of seeing little Thing One and Thing Two's a la Dr. Seuss roaming around.  But I could do without the bloody masks and skeletons. 

But these cupcakes are sooo cute!  I saw them last year on One Charming Party but I'd already made a batch of spider cupcakes (see them after the jump) so I've waited a whole year to make them now.  It's simply chocolate cupcakes with dark chocolate ganache frosting.  Oreo cookies and a few reese's pieces complete the cupcake's transformation into an owl.  It's so creative yet simple - why didn't I think of that!  But I've come to terms with the fact that I'm just not the creative type but I think I'm a pretty good student.  The sprinkle "eyelashes" were my original addition though - what do you think?  She's the girl and I call her "Harriet."  It's kind of like having the lone smurfette in the midst of all the boy smurfs.

I also made some milk chocolate dipped pretzels rods to snack on.  I like to make these once in a while and it's fun also at Christmas with some green and red sprinkles.  I love the contrast between the sweet milk chocolate and the salty, crunchy pretzel.   

So whoo...whoo's ready for Halloween?

Have a fun and safe holiday!