TWD—Swedish Visiting Cake

“Oh, Hi, Mom, could you take my picture, I colored all over my nice pants and both shoes and some paper with this really cool bright yellow pastel type crayon I found.  And don’t worry, I didn’t get any on your bed!  Thanks, Mom.  I sorry.”  (SIGH!)

Tuesday’s with Dorie this week was a perfectly simple cake chosen by the fabulous Nancy from The Dogs Eat the Crumbs.  Nancy is great to help a lot of us bakers out by posting on the P&Q her quartered (or halved or third-ed or even smaller!) recipes and many helpful ideas about the recipes each week.  (I hate math and especially fractions, so thanks Nancy!)  She chose Swedish Visiting Cake (pages 196-197 in Dorie Greenspan’s Baking From My Home to Yours) for us and like many, I’m sure, when I first saw the cake, I wasn’t that excited to make it.  But I was intrigued by the fact that the cake is so simple you can make it in no time and have a great dessert ready.  So Sunday night as I was making dinner, I got out all the ingredients for the cake and whipped it up while preparing the last few things for dinner (multi-tasking here, you can’t do that with a lot of recipes!)  You can get the recipe for the cake on Nancy’s blog.  It really is a great one to have when you have last minute company. 

I was excited to use the cast iron skillet I got for Christmas and have only used one other time so far—for the Tarte Tatin we made back in January for TWD.  Get this—I followed the recipe!  I know, I know, what is wrong with me?  Okay, one MINOR change.  I ran out of vanilla.  So I used 1/2 teaspoon vanilla (instead of 1 teaspoon) and used 1 teaspoon almond extract (instead of a half).  They were both optional to the recipe, so really I could do whatever I wanted to there, right? 

Cake going in the oven.  Oh, wait, first I had the extreme pleasure of doing this--

The rubbing of the zest into the sugar!  It doesn’t even involve chocolate and it’s one of my favorite things to do in baking.  (Simple pleasures, right.)  Mix a few things here and there and then the cake was ready for the oven.

It baked for 30 minutes.  After it had only been out of the oven for about 15 minutes (at the most), Kevin wanted a slice.  (Shocker—Kevin wanted cake.  The key here is that there was no frosting, it’s really frosting that he hates so much.  I know, let’s not talk about the craziness of that!)

He put a dollop of some Cool Whipped Cream on top.  (We had some that needed to be used or else I would have whipped some real cream, although, I still prefer the fake, bad-for-you stuff.  I am a skim milk drinker only and I think whipped cream reminds me too much of drinking full fat, whole milk (I can barely even stand 2%).  Anyway, back to the cake.  Almost never in the history of me participating in Tuesday’s With Dorie has Kevin ever really tasted a cake, savored it and given me some good, honest feedback.  But this simple little cake was it.  He REALLY liked it!

I mean, he was even saying things like, “I like how moist it is inside but I really like the crunchy top from the sugar and almonds.”  We’re talking real opinion here.  I was almost in shock.  I usually have to really prod him about some of these recipes to get an “It was alright.” out of him about things.  He often just eats to fill his tummy as fast as he can and doesn’t really taste his food.  He liked the almond flavoring (although I decided it was a little too strong, and actually next time I make this cake, I want to try it with no vanilla or almond and maybe add a little lemon flavoring.  I wanted to taste the lemon more than we did with this one.

That said, I really liked the cake.

So did the boys.  They each had a piece.  (Taylor had to pick off all the nuts from his, but still ended up eating the whole thing.)  I really thought they’d all think this was too boring and not like the almond flavoring.

Scott ended up eating two pieces and finishing a good half of Parker’s.  (Parker is just not a really big sweets eater.  Sheesh, how would THAT be?)

Kevin had gone to a meeting at church after downing his piece.  When he got home a few hours later, there was about two pieces left.  He asked if he could finish the cake.  Kevin finished a cake.  You just might not realize the significance of that.  He. doesn’t. like. cake.  I’m not sure I can convince myself to make such a simple, kind of boring cake for his birthday, but I wouldn’t doubt if this is what he requests then.

And that was the end of that only hours after pulling the cake out of the oven.  I call that success!

And I call this little stinker dadgum cute!

This one, too, but he’d be SO mad at me if he knew I put this on the blog.  I did not take these pictures and I don’t know if Kevin was letting Sam use the camera or what, but this is a good interpretation of the usual kind of pictures of Scott we get—he’s a blur and trying to duck out of the pictures.

 

He will go out of his way to NOT STOP for a photo op.  This is the best we got.  Hi, Scottie!

Beautiful night (Monday).  Lovin’ springtime!  Riding scooters and bikes and blowing bubbles all evening.  Didn’t capture any pictures of Taylor and Parker.  Parker was hurt by a basketball to the head.  Our neighbor wanted to make him feel better, so he took him for a ride in his Porche.  Parker thought that was pretty darn cool.  Thanks, Ron!

Amazing Hard Boiled Egg Oatmeal Cookies Recipe Revisited (And Amazing Hard Boiled Egg Chocolate Chip Cookies Recipe with Pecans and Toffee Bits!)

Isn’t this a beautiful cookie?

THIS is my favorite oatmeal cookie.  I know, it’s a little late to remind you since Easter was a week ago and if you have any hard boiled Easter eggs left, you probably don’t want to use those.  But I’m telling you, boil up a few more, you’ve got to try these cookies!  Back in October 2008 a couple fabulous baking buddies, Anna at Cookie Madness, Rita at Clumbsy Cookie and I collaborated over emails and came up with this cookie that uses hard boiled eggs.  The ingredients are first pulsed in a food processor, cold butter is pulsed together with the flour, then the sugar, salt, baking soda, cinnamon and oats are added for a few more quick pulses.  Lastly, the egg is added.  After pulsing it together, it will still be a little crumbly and you’ll see flecks of the egg, but it all comes together when you dump it in a bowl and add the raisins and walnuts.  And after the cookies bake, you cannot see the egg, but you’ll have a wonderful oatmeal cookie, thick and delicious.

Amazing Hard Boiled Egg Oatmeal Cookies, by Katrina (Baking and Boys!), Anna (Cookie Madness) and Rita (Clumbsy Cookie)

4 oz. cold unsalted butter (1 stick)

4 1/2 oz. all purpose flour (1 cup)

1/2 cup quick oats, or if using old-fashioned oats, grind down in the food processor a little

4 tablespoon granulated sugar

3 tablespoon brown sugar

1 tablespoon honey

3/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla

1 hard boiled egg. chopped (either hard boiled or a lightly beaten egg cooked in microwave in 10 second intervals)

a good handful of roughly chopped walnuts

a good handful of raisins

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  In bowl of food processor, pulse flour and butter until mealy.  Add sugars, honey, salt, soda, cinnamon and vanilla.  Pulse again until mealy.  Add oats.  Pulse. Add the egg and pulse until combined. Remove to a medium size bowl and work in the walnuts and raisins with your hands.  Dough will be a bit crumbly, but will come together as you form it into a ball. Form the dough in to 2 ounce balls.  Place on baking sheet lined with parchment paper and bake about 15 minutes.   Do not overbake, I only baked mine 13:30 minutes.  Let cool on baking sheet five minutes, then remove cookies to cooling rack.  (I thought these were good just slightly warm, but are great completely cooled, too!)  Makes 9 cookies.

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Let us not forget which came first though—it was the Amazing Hard Boiled Egg Chocolate Chip Cookies!  Same idea but with no oats and lots of chocolate chips.  This recipe turns out a fantastic chocolate chip cookie!

So I made some of these with leftover Easter eggs, too.  And then just because I can, I added 1/2 cup toffee bits and 1/2 cup chopped toasted pecans to some of the dough and darn it all if these are just about the best tasting cookies ever.  (Have I said that before?) Hello, heaven!

Amazing Hard Boiled Egg Chocolate Chip Cookies, by Katrina (Baking and Boys!), Anna (Cookie Madness) and Rita (Clumbsy Cookie)

12.4 oz all purpose bleached flour (2 ¾ cups spooned and swept)

8 ounces cold unsalted butter, cut into small chunks (16 tablespoons or 2 sticks)

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 hard boiled eggs, chopped

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 package or 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

**toasted chopped pecans and toffee bits, optional but SO good!

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Combine flour and butter in food processor. Pulse until mixture is mealy and coarse. Add the salt and baking soda and pulse to mix. Add both sugars, vanilla and hard boiled eggs. Pulse again until mixture is mealy looking. Pulse just until the mixture begins to come together.

Dump mixture into a bowl, add chocolate chips and shape into eight balls. You will see egg whites in dough – they’ll disappear as the cookies bake.

Measure 2 ounce balls of dough and place 9 on a baking sheet a good two inches apart.  Bake on a parchment lined cookie sheet  for 15 minutes or until cookies appear lightly browned around edges. Let cool on cookie sheet for 5 minutes then transfer to rack to finish cooling.

You. must. try. these!

Toasted Coconut Chocolate Chunk Cookies from Cooking Light and Giveaway Winner!

A couple weeks ago, I found myself wasting time at the grocery store while waiting for the pharmacy to fill a prescription.  So I flipped through some magazines.  I don’t subscribe to the magazine (but should!), but I love looking at Cooking Light whenever I can.  Course, the first thing I look for in the index of magazines is the desserts and goodies!

I saw these cookies and they kind of just look like a regular cookie.  But the toasted coconut had me wanting to try them.  The recipe can be found here at Cooking Light online.  I followed the recipe exactly, except (there’s always a but ;), the recipe called for 2 ounces of chopped dark chocolate and I used 3 1/2 ounces.  Whaa?  I like chocolate.  The cookies were fantastic.  The coconut was really flavorful since it was toasted.  And the cookies were a wonderful chewiness, even more so the next day.  It was nice that the recipe was simple and straight forward.  Ever try toasted coconut in your chocolate chip cookies?  It’s good!

If you follow the recipe at Cooking Light, here are some of the stats about the cookies.  I believe the recipe makes 2 dozen.  Per cookie they have 88 calories, 3.8 grams fat, 1 gram protein, 13 carbs.  Not bad!   Just try to only eat one or two, go ahead, I dare you…… ;)

Head on over to Baking and Boys Giveaways to see who was picked as the winner of the Cuisinart SmartPower Blender from CSN Stores!  Thanks, CSN!

Just wanted to remind you about the giveaway I’m having courtesy of a blender from CSN Stores.  I’ve started another blog for giveaways and reviews and you must go there and leave a comment to be entered into the random drawing.  The contest ends Wednesday April 7 at midnight and is open to US and Canada residents.  Click on “the giveaway” link and check out the and the kitchen of our new house (Moving in June to Utah!).

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Sometimes (almost daily) Taylor and Sam LOVE just eating peanut butter on a spoon.  I didn’t get very good pictures of them, but no joke, Taylor had about 1/4 cup of peanut butter on his spoon and he was just shoveling it in.  Sam does the same thing, but his scoops aren’t quite as big.  Should we thank Grandma Scott for this love of peanut butter?  Okay, let’s.  When they want it, I let them.  I buy the Skippy Natural that has no hydrogenated oils or high fructose corn syrup, so I don’t feel bad.  It’s a good protein and filling snack and these two in particular need all they can get.  Two nights in a row they haven’t eaten really any of their dinner, which means that mean ol’ mom didn’t let them have a  bedtime snack-nothing .  They are starting to get the big picture here and I’m hoping it will be worth it to them to get a snack before bed if they eat their dinner.  It has not been pleasant when they sit and watch Scott and Parker enjoy their bedtime snack.  Long live peanut butter!  (And for the record, I have taught them not to double dip into the jar, which means sometimes there are 4-5 spoons with remnants of peanut butter on them in the sink.  Nutella is a popular one here, too.)  Okay, okay, TWD, coming up!

This week’s recipe for Mocha-Walnut Marbled Bundt Cake was chosen by Erin of When In Doubt...Leave It At 350.  I halved the recipe and made Non-mocha Walnut Marbled Mini Bundt Cakes.

The half recipe made 12 mini bundts and four little cupcakes.

I did some minor changes to the recipe.  Instead of finely ground walnuts, I just chopped them and I didn’t halve the amount in the full recipe.  I used 1/2 cup of walnuts for the half recipe.  I’m nutty that way.  I omitted the coffee and espresso powder.  Instead of the coffee, I just used hot water.  I used 2% milk instead of whole milk, since that’s what I had.  And finally, I used white whole wheat flour instead of all purpose flour.  So I said minor changes, but typing that all out, it sounds like a lot.  I suppose I have no idea what Dorie’s cake tastes like.  But it makes me feel better to eat some of these goodies when I make a few healthier changes.  These definitely needed the dark chocolate ganache I doused them with.  I made the ganache with 4 ounces of Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips and 3 ounces cream.  I heated the cream to boiling, then poured it over the bowl of chocolate and let it sit for a few minutes, then I slowly whisked it together until it was smooth and shiny.  I let it sit for a bit so the ganache thickened.  GOOD stuff that ganache.

I really thought I didn’t really think these were that good the day I made them, but by the next day, I’d have to say they are good.  The cakes have a nice contrasting flavor with the two flavors and the walnuts.  The four little cupcakes were especially good, more moist I suppose. 

You know when you’ve made some ganache and there’s a bit leftover?  That happened here, so I let it sit covered on the counter overnight.  It was perfectly scoopable the next day.  Have you ever had those truffles that are rolled just in cocoa and felt like it was maybe a little TOO cocoa-ish, not sweet enough from the unsweetened cocoa they were rolled in?  Yeah, that’s how I feel about those kinds of truffles.  So I just happened to have some Oreo cookie crumbs and rolled three little truffles in that, just to see how it was and to use up the rest of that ganache.  Know what?  GOOD perfectly sweet truffles!

I just remembered that two of them are still sitting in the fridge.  Hmm, catch ya later…….

(Thanks for the fun cake pick this week, Erin.  You can get the recipe on her blog.)  I personally think you should just buy Dorie’s book!)

Usual Easter morning here, the kidlets awoke to Easter baskets and lots of hidden eggs to find.

Wakin’ up.

 

The hunt.

 

The loot.

The bartering and swap.

I’m sure my extended family will be sad they missed out on these “fish roll” Bunny Tails I made for dinner tonight.  Saw this cute idea at Kara's Kitchen Creations (She’s having a giveaway on her blog right now, too, until Tuesday, April 6, check it out--It's for a nice slow cooker).  For the Bunny Tail Rolls, you can use your favorite roll recipe.  It’s all just in how you “roll” the rolls! ;)

Roll about a 6-8 inch piece of dough.  Fold it up so the two ends overlap at the top, for the ears, put another little round piece of dough in the space at the end of the roll—the bunny tail.  Perfect for Easter.

I used my trusty, favorite recipe for 30 Minute Rolls.  Whenever I make that dough, I’m “forced” to make cinnamon rolls or cherry almond rolls.  These are so good.  So I made some of those today, too.  And would you believe, after making the boys eat some cereal for breakfast before breaking in to their candy, I then let them eat candy all morning and have a cinnamon roll for lunch!  Such a health conscience mom!

 

Hey, we did have a good dinner.  Ham, mashed potatoes, asparagus and peas, brussel sprouts, bunny buns, salad and fruit salad.  Hands down my favorite part of the meal was the brussel sprouts.  I saw these a few months ago over at the fabulous Leslie’s blog, The Hungry Housewife and have wanted to try them since then.  Her recipe calls for shallots and I didn’t have any, so I used garlic.  She also uses fresh brussel sprouts and all I had was a bag of frozen ones.  Still, these have bacon, garlic and butter and are roasted in the oven.  What’s not to like about that?  Oh, then there’s a drizzle of a balsamic glaze.  Good stuff.  I made everyone at least try it.  No one really liked it.  But I loved them and am happy there’s some leftover.

Here’s Kevin and Bob playing with their new toys.

 

They are Droids.  No, they weren’t sitting there texting back and forth, but boy, they love their toys.  Look at Bob trying to hide his from the camera.  Gotcha!

Dessert---not even sure what this is called.  Ice Cream Dessert sounds good.  You just take a layer of Oreo Cookie crust, then any ice cream you choose, then some hot fudge (spread on while cold) and whipped cream (yes, I used Cool Whip!) and sprinkled with some more chocolate.  The ice cream I used this time was a peanut butter brownie ice cream.  I’ve made it in a 9x13 inch pan before, but this time I used an 8 inch pan which made for a thicker ice cream layer.  What I really like about this is you can use any cookie crust you want, any ice cream, and any topping and it’s different every time.  Mint chocolate chip is good.  I made it once for my mom (who doesn’t eat chocolate) and used vanilla sandwich cookie crust, a fruity ice cream and topping and it was really good.  The sky is the limit with this one.

Pretty low key day here for Easter.  We didn’t have church, which was a little strange, but our church has what is called General Conference twice a year.  The president of the church, Thomas S. Monson and all the general authorities speak in four meetings that are broadcast on certain tv stations on Saturday and Sunday. Easter just happened to fall on General Conference weekend this year.  So it was actually wonderful to be able to hear some wonderful messages and talks from these great leaders today.  They testified of our Savior, Jesus Christ and about his life, crucifixion, and resurrection and gave great counsel on things we can and should be doing to live better and be happy.  I believe in our Savior, Jesus Christ, too.  I’m so thankful for what he did for each of us and I strive to follow his example each day.

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Don’t miss entering the giveaway I’m having for a great

Baby Chick Sugar Cookies and Rainbow Pancakes

Just a reminder that I’m having a giveaway on my giveaway blog until Wednesday, April 7, 2010 (closes midnight CST).  Winner can be from US or Canada.  Head on over and check it out and leave a comment to be entered for the random drawing.

But look at these cutest sugar cookies you’ll ever see first!  I can bake like the best of them, my chocolate chip cookies, as well as other kinds, cakes, pies, brownies are all delicious, but one thing I’m not very good at is decorating things to look pretty/cute and fabulous.  You’ll see an example of that on my post about our recent cheesecake throwdown.  Dan walked in with an awesome looking white chocolate raspberry cheesecake.  Mine, not so decked-out.  (I did win the throwdown though!)  Anyway, what I’m getting at is these hatching baby chick sugar cookies are so cute and so easy that even I could make them.  So you can, too.  Yeah, I WISH I was as good as some of my blogging pals, like Amanda or Leslie.  But we can’t all be that good, now can we.

Super simple though, cut the cookies with an egg shaped cookie cutter.  When cool, frost the top half with yellow icing, let it dry (my icing recipe dries really fast!).  Add the little orange beak before the icing dries.  I used some candy coated sunflower seeds I had.  I’ve seen these done with orange icing and even what looked like cut up fruit leather.  Once the yellow is dried, frost the other half with white icing.  For the eyes, melt a little chocolate and put it in a plastic zipper bag with a little snip off the corner and pipe on the eyes.  You could also use mini chocolate chips for the eyes.  That’s it.  Done and so cute.

  

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  What’s up with the chick with the eye patch?  You could just say while we were making these, we decided to make one for Dan! ;) No, really, while piping the eyes, I really made a mess of one, so Scott thought it would be fun to put an eye patch on it to cover it up.  He just might be the cutest one.  While making the cookies, I also cut out a bunch of flowers.  I like making the icing runny enough that you can just dip the cookies.  It dries shiny and smooth.  Then I just piped some yellow in the center for the flowers.

Peep, Peep!  Here’s my favorite sugar cookie recipe that I’ve been using for years and have never had troubles with it, even rolling it out immediately, no dough chilling time involved.

I'm Gonna Call These My Mom's Sugar Cookies

1 cup unsalted butter (2 sticks, or 8 oz.), softened

1 cup granulated sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon cream (I almost always use milk)

3 cups all purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

Cream the butter and sugar together.  Add the vanilla, egg and cream (or milk).  Beat until fluffy, scrape sides of bowl at least once.  Add the dry ingredients until it comes together.  Turn dough out on floured surface, knead it into a ball, just a few times.  Do not over knead the dough.  Making sure there is enough flour on your surface that it doesn't stick, roll out dough until desired thickness.  I always do about 1/4 inch.  Cut dough into shapes with cookie cutters.  Laying on baking sheet lined with parchment paper, bake cookies at 400 degrees for 7-10 minutes (until desired doneness.)

Transfer to cooling rack.  When cool, frost cookies.

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The icing recipe I use is one I got from Allrecipes.  I adapt it just about every time I make it.  Sometimes I only use vanilla, and the amounts of milk and corn syrup I use always seem different, but there’s the main ingredients that I used for the chicks and flowers.  These really were fun and easy!

My Favorite Sugar Cookie Icing, by Katrina Smith, Baking and Boys!

3 cup powdered sugar

3 tablespooons corn syrup

3 tablespoons milk

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Beat with electric mixer, on slow at first, then beat on high for a couple minutes.  Add more milk until the icing is the consistency you’d like.  Sometimes I make it thicker (like for the chicks) and sometimes I thin it out (like for the flowers).  It always dries nice and smooth, but not so hard like royal icing.

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For April Fool’s Day yesterday, I didn’t do much, but the boys sure get a kick out of being pranked or being the pranksters.  I hurried downstairs and woke the boys up in a huff, telling them to hurry as I’d slept in and school was about to start and we were late.  I rushed them through getting dressed and kept them moving fast.  They were confused and kept trying to tell me what time is really was.  I assured them that I didn’t know why, but their clocks were wrong and it really was almost time for school to start.  So they were rushing through trying to get dressed.  Then Scott just stopped and said, “Wait a second, it’s April Fool’s Day!  You’re joking.”  Okay, well, it was fun for the minute it lasted.  I didn’t really try to do anything else the rest of the day.

But for dinner last night, I decided to make the boys pancakes.  We love having breakfast for dinner at least once a week.  So just for kicks, I put some of the pancake batter into four bowls and colored it.  They thought these were pretty cool. 

Here’s the pancake recipe I almost always use.

Whole Wheat Pancakes, by Katrina Smith, Baking and Boys!

1  1/2 cups white whole wheat flour

3 tablespoons granulated sugar

1  1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1  1/2 cups low-fat buttermilk

1 tablespoon canola oil (I actually forgot it with these and they were fine!)

2 large eggs

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (optional, sometimes I put it in, sometimes I leave it out)

Combine the dry ingredients in a medium-sized bowl.  Whisk together.  In another bowl, combine buttermilk, oil and eggs and whisk together.  Pour the liquid into the dry ingredients and stir until mixed together.  Our desired size spoonfuls on heated griddle.  Turn pancakes when tops are covered with bubbles and edges are beginning to look cooked.

*For the colored batter, I put some batter in four different bowls once it was combined and added different colors of food coloring to each and stirred it until combined.  Serve with syrup (and the boys love peanut butter on their pancakes).

So ya'll know we're moving to Utah this summer. And ya'll might or might not know--we've already bought a house! Aaahh, I know. But we are so excited to be in our new home. Our house has a fabulous kitchen (actually it has two full kitchens). But the main kitchen is big and amazing. It has a great, long island in the middle with bar stools on one side. Two of the bar stools actually have broken backs.  We’ll be fixing those soon after moving in.  On a different note, check out at the bottom of this post for a great giveaway opportunity from CSN Stores. When we went to the Salt Lake City Hogle Zoo a few weeks ago, we saw this cute little, baby giraffe.

We read online that it died last week.  How sad.  Said the reason was “failure to thrive”.  I’m sure the parents are still grieving. 

My wonderful friend, Mindy, showed up Sunday evening with this lovely bouquet of flowers chocolate for me.  How nice.  Then she and her mom invited Taylor, Sam and I over today to make some more bouquets for Taylor to take to his teacher.  They were fun and easy.  Thanks, Mindy and Kay.

Sam often tells me to take pictures of random things he’s done.  Here’s the silverware holder from the dishwasher with his tools and GeoTrax in it, in his toy wagon.  Nice.

And his sandwich creations which he begged me to take a picture of, peanut butter, honey and string cheese!  He was rather proud.

 

And he loves ridin’ around in his homemade car.  Well, his favorite is really when the big brothers scoot him around.

Is that random enough?  I found some Orange Creme Hershey’s Kisses at the store, I love buying  the Kisses when they come out with new flavors.  I love the look of their white chocolate with orange stripes.  I wanted to put them on some cookies.  There’s a recipe right on the back of the bag.  I followed the recipe exactly.  Shocker, I know.  The cookies are a good sugar cookie.  The only thing I would change is after I made a few batches and they spread quite a bit (a lot more than the picture of them on the bag), I chilled the rest of the dough for a few hours.  It didn’t spread as much.  I was having fun with the sugar sprinkles.  I like the ones with the yellow, orange, light green and green sprinkles the best.

I don’t like that the kisses start melting down to look like flattened cones.  So after a few like this, I took the cookies from the oven, immediately put the Kisses on and then put the cookies in the freezer for a few minutes.  The chocolate still had enough time to melt so it would stick to the cookie, but they held their shape better.

If you liked those little orange-flavored aspirin your mom gave you as a kid when you had a fever, then you’ll like these Kisses.  That’s what they taste like.  Really, they just taste like candy orange rather than real oranges, which is okay, since you’re probably not putting the Kisses in a fruit salad or anything!  I liked the cookies also without the Kisses, even when I baked a couple until they were pretty crisp (on accident).

They are quite fun and festive for Spring/Easter!

And now about that giveaway—I’ve started a new blog just for product reviews and giveaways.  Head on over and check it out.  Leave me a comment on the new blog, Baking and Boys Giveaways and Reviews to be entered in the giveaway, you won’t want to miss it.  The contest is open until next Wednesday, April 7 at midnight.