He's taken the cookies from this recipe to his place of work several times, and his coworkers are addicted. I mean... it's hilarious. He'll be sitting there working at his desk and all of a sudden he'll hear "...cookies..." "I hear Tom's bringing in cookies tomorrow...." This has escalated to the point where last Thursday he went in to work and on his desk was a $20 with a note saying "For Cookies" on it.

Man, I wish people paid me for my cookies. I get teased that I give away too many cookies. Although my grandpa hardly talked to my sister and me until we handed over the cookies we brought him. I'll miss having him to give cookies too.

Here are the two brownie recipes, Bella. The buttermilk recipe is quite large, if you make it you might want to plan to share them with friends or family, or possibly make half of a recipe. However, I am not sure how well a half recipe would turn out, we have never done a half recipe that I can remember. There have always been enough of us to eat them, although a pan used to last couple days, but now we just barely make them last 24 hours.

Buttermilk Brownies
2 cups sugar
2 cups flour
¼ cup cocoa
1 cup cold water
½ cup butter
½ cup oil
½ cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 eggs

Sift sugar, flour, and cocoa. Set aside. Boil water, butter, and oil. Pour over dry ingredients and beat until creamy. Add buttermilk, baking soda, and eggs. Beat thoroughly. Pour into a greased jellyroll pan. Bake at 400F for 18-25 minutes. Cool slightly, then frost and eat!

Frosting
½ cup butter
¼ cup cocoa
1/3 cup buttermilk
¼ teaspoon vanilla
4 cups powdered sugar

Bring butter, cocoa, and buttermilk to a boil. Add vanilla and powdered sugar, beat. Spread over warm brownies.

Irresistible Brownies
¾ cup butter
2 cups sugar
1 ½ cups flour
½ cup cocoa
½ teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
4 eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups chocolate chips

Melt butter, remove from heat. Add sugar, eggs, and vanilla, mix. Then add flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt. Stir with spoon until batter is well blended and smooth. Stir in chocolate chips and ½ cup of nuts if desired. Spread in greased 9x13 pan. Bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes until set.

SnowAngel, I think your cupcakes are gorgeous! I am rather jealous of your frosting ability. The frosting I put on cupcakes never looks that good. I suppose practicing on occasion might help.

Thanks, fantasia! You don't need to be jealous, that is the only tip I can frost a cupcake with and have any real success. I should practice with the tips, but since I figure out the M1 or star tip, I haven't messed with any of the other tips. Practicing with the other tips might be a good reason to make more cupcakes. *mischievous grin*

My cousin recently pinned a Butterfinger cupcake recipe on Pinterest, I think I need to try it this weekend. I love cupcakes and I love Butterfinger, I can't imagine what would be better than the two combined in one!

Paid to make cookies? Super cool! Although cookies never last that long at my house, some days they seem to disappear into the thin air. Or maybe it is my brothers.

SnowAngel

SnowAngel, those cupcakes look so good. And your frosting is flawless, wow! I'm impressed.

That is too funny about your husband's cookies, FK. Apparently he needs to start a mobile bakery out the back of his work car.

Does anyone have a good recipe for blueberries or raspberries? We went to a berry farm last weekend and as usual, picked far more than we know what to do with. I have a couple muffin recipes and one for blueberry scones (with lemony butter--so good), and we've done jam, but any others would be wonderful.

Thanks, malkah! I have quite a few berry recipes including the cupcake recipe. Last year I posted several berry recipes here: viewtopic.php?f=10&t=255&start=288

This is the recipe I have been making for my older brother for breakfast on weekdays. I make a batch of "cupcakes", then put them in a round Tupperware contain in the freezer and pull a couple of them out the night before so they will be ready in the morning. It works great. I normal make it with blueberries because that my family's favorite, but blackberries or raspberries work well too.

Blueberry Cream Cheese Coffeecake (pictured below without topping)
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
½ cup butter, softened
1 ½ cups sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
¼ tsp. salt
½ tsp. baking soda
¼ cup milk
1 ½ cups blueberries; if frozen, thaw for several hours or overnight in refrigerator

Topping:
2 T. soft butter
½ tsp. cinnamon
1/3 cup flour
½ cup brown sugar

Cream together cream cheese, butter, and sugar; add eggs and beat. Add flour, baking powder, salt, and baking soda; mix well. Stir in blueberries. Pour into greased 9x13 pan. Mix topping, sprinkle over batter and swirl. Bake at 350F for 40-45 minutes.

Or for “cupcakes” or “muffins”, place cupcake liners in a muffin tin and fill each one 2/3s full. Top with topping. Bake for about 20 minutes. (I think this is how long I baked them the last time.)

Optional: Drizzle with powdered sugar icing. (1-1 ½ cups powdered sugar and a couple teaspoons of lemon juice.)

This is the blueberry cupcake recipe I posted the pictures of. I frost it with buttercream frosting, it is my favorite frosting. I like to try new cupcake recipes, but I almost always use buttercream for frosting them.

Blueberry Cupcakes
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
6 tablespoons butter, melted
1/4 cup oil
2 large eggs
1 cup yogurt
1 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups blueberries

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line two 12-cup muffin pans with cupcake liners. Mix flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in large bowl. Whisk melted butter and oil in medium bowl. Add eggs; whisk to blend. Stir in buttermilk, milk, vanilla, and peel. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients; mix until just blend. Stir in blueberries. Fill cupcake liners to about two-thirds. Bake cupcakes until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean, 20-22 minutes. Transfer cupcakes to racks; cool. Frost the cupcakes. Optional: top each cupcake with a blueberry.

Mom said I can make the Butterfinger cupcakes this weekend. This is the recipe I am going to try: http://makebakecelebrate.com/butterfinger-cupcakes/ , it is actually a butterfinger frosting recipe. I don't think I will put the food coloring in it or the candy bar on top, might be too much sugar for the younger kiddos.
SnowAngel

I have discovered a new tasty and very unhealthy snack. (Don't look Jo ) It's a chocolate graham cracker covered in Nutella and marshmallow fluff. It's like a no-bake S'more. Yum!

But on a healthy note, we're making meatloaf tonight for dinner. I love meatloaf.

I looked! Oh my, that sounds scrumptious, fantasia! Will have to try that ... sometime, but not now.

I love meatloaf too. I think it gets a bad rap because who knows what any one person puts in it. My mom's recipe, which I use, is delectable. This includes a ketchup-y sauce on top, kind of a sweet 'n sour thing. Yum! The end pieces are the best to my tastebuds, mmmm.

I made a delicious bean and carrot skillet the other night with all the beans (yellow and green) from our garden. Cook 'em a bit first, then dump them all in a large skillet, adding garlic and onion, stir-frying for 10 - 15 minutes or so. So tasty! And the kitchen smells amazing too.

I have been chowing voraciously on black cherries the past few weeks, but they are now heading out-of-season, so my next healthy treat is peaches, peaches, peaches. Soooooo juicy and sweet. Goodness, can hardly keep them in the house! Local too (well, close ... from the Niagara region).

I love meatloaf too. I think it gets a bad rap because who knows what any one person puts in it. My mom's recipe, which I use, is delectable. This includes a ketchup-y sauce on top, kind of a sweet 'n sour thing. Yum! The end pieces are the best to my tastebuds, mmmm.

This sounds very similar to my mom's recipe that I grew up in. However, I've converted to my mother-in-law's meatloaf recipe. Rather than a tomato base, hers has peppers, onions, and herbs. Sooo tasty.

johobbit and fantasia_kitty both requested that I share my (borrowed from a church mom) enchilada recipe, so here it is:

3-4 chicken breasts
2T vegetable or olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 bell pepper, chopped
1 can cream of chicken soup
8 oz sour cream
chili powder, garlic powder, cumin (last two are optional)
5-10 tortillas (depending on how full you make them, what size you use, etc.)
2 cups cheese

Mix the soup and the sour cream. Set aside. In a skillet, cook the chicken in the oil over medium heat. Add veggies and spices. Saute until the meat is done and the veggies are soft. Mix 2/3 sour cream mixture into the meat. Spoon into tortillas and place enchiladas into baking pan (13 x 9 is good, but may not fit all of them). Pour remaining soup/sour cream mix over enchiladas and smooth out. Sprinkle with cheese and cover with foil. Bake at 425 F for 15 minutes.

We typically half this recipe for the two of us, but leave the soup and sour cream the same. You can use onion powder instead of the onions and just add it with the other spices.

Mmm, Nutella sounds delicious. I haven't had it for a long time, why do I keep finding recipes that use it? I think we need to get some.

We have a enchilada recipe that is a lot like that one, I haven't made for a long time. Sounds great right now. We try not to cook with canned soups and things like that very often, but I might need to make that sometime soon. Seems like a good meal to have when company comes next week.

Yesterday, for a friend's visit I bake chocolate cupcakes and used some of my new cupcake liners. The cupcakes were pretty good, a little dry though so next time I think I will use slightly less flour.

SnowAngel

SnowAngel, you have a talent for decorating cupcakes. Those are so gorgeous.

Well I have a funny story for those of you who are Olive Garden fans (and I know there are a few of you. ) Earlier this week when my husband and I were getting over colds and had no energy to cook anything for dinner, we decided that Olive Garden's Chicken and Gnocchi soup sounded really good. We both wanted the equivalent of 2 bowls each (four total) so we called up their takeout line and asked about how much that would be. We ended up getting a gallon of soup. Needless to say, we've been eating soup for lunch all week this week. But what was cool was we figured that one gallon = 10 bowls of soup. At a total of $30 for the whole thing (including breadsticks), that's about $3.00 a bowl. Not bad at all!

First, I have a question. Does anyone have a good recipe for an egg bake? My sister and I are hosting a brunch on Sunday and we promised an egg bake but are having a bit of trouble finding a good recipe.

Second, here are some pictures of a cake I made for my grandma's birthday:

The spout, handle, flowers and little knob on the top were made out of gum paste colored with fondant. I found out the hard way that even if fondant is wrapped up, it does dry out. I spent hours shaving piece off and making it usable by working Crisco into it. I definitely prefer working with frosting. The tea pot itself is made of two cake mixes. Each was baked in a glass measuring cup to make a 1/2 sphere. We had to bring our grandma to our place because I didn't want to move the cake. It was already starting to fall apart just sitting there.

Oh gracious, SnowAngel, those cupcakes look so yummy. *dittos fantasia in her applause of your decorating abilities*

Well I have a funny story for those of you who are Olive Garden fans (and I know there are a few of you. )

Nice OG soup story, fantasia.

Twigs, that is a lovely cake! I bet your Grandma really appreciated it. What a tricky thing to make, and so fragile, I bet. Nice job! It's almost too pretty to eat.

Now that we are starting to get into fall-time foods, I am about to make my cool-weather broccoli soup. I've got 6 hefty bunches of broccoli to cut up this afternoon, which is the bulk of the work for the recipe then that'll be ready when I want to add the base (potato and mushroom soup, along with milk) and grated cheddar cheese, yum! A bit of added bacon wouldn't be too shabby either.

My baby boy is turning 1 year old next week. As he hasn't mastered solid food completely yet, I'd like to make him an ice cream cake. Has anyone ever done this before? It doesn't look too hard as you just replace the frosting with ice cream, but I wasn't sure if it would melt too easily or if it'd be hard to frost cake with ice cream. Thoughts?

This probably wouldn't help in your situation with your baby boy, but I did hear a recipe on the radio for making ice cream cake. You basically cheat by stacking ice cream bars and then ice it with whipped cream. That sounded easy enough for me to do!