Vanilla Butterballs

I usually make these cookies with dark chocolate ganache in the middle but this time I made them with a vanilla bean Swiss buttercream. The recipe was from Gale Gand's Chocolate and Vanilla book. The cookies were sprinkled with vanilla sugar. The only thing I found challenging is that they roll around a lot. Use extra care when you put them in the oven. They are also hard to plate due to their round bottoms.

Chocolate Lava Cakes

For our 12th anniversary I made chocolate lava cakes. They were served with a raspberry coulis, fresh raspberries and a vanilla bean whipped cream.

Silk Mint Brownies

Since our grocery store was out of Silk soymilk, we thought we'd try Silk Chocolate Almond Milk. It was really good. On the back of the carton was a link to the recipe for these mint brownies. I really liked the variety in texture. The brownie was moist and chocolatey. The layer of mint frosting was smooth and creamy. And sitting on top was a layer of dark chocolate ganache. I garnished it with a sprig of mint from our window sill garden.

Strawberry English Mini Scones

 We are studying London this month for our homeschool and decided to make English scones. The summer organic strawberries were bursting with flavor. The scones tasted the best straight out of the oven. But the boys ate them the next day and they still really liked them. I thought they had lost some of their crispness as the moisture from the strawberries made them chewier.

Peanut Butter Filled Chocolate Cookies

I love to bake on weeknights and my little helper tiptoes out of his room at bedtime and always wants to join in the fun. Here he is hiding peanut butter balls in the chocolate dough and then flattening them with a glass. These cookies were moist and tasty especially with a glass of cold milk.

The Ultimate Sword Cake

For Sage's sixth birthday he requested an ultimate sword cake. He showed it to me on Minecraft and I thought, "Wow, that's a lot of colors!" This cake was very spontaneous. I started it around noon and it was ready just before dinner. Usually I will give myself a week of planning and three days for baking, frosting and decorating. But this time I dove right in. I made a vanilla cake with vanilla Swiss meringue buttercream. Courtney helped me to mix eight colors and pipe the sword onto the cake. I haven't seen any other ultimate sword cakes on the internet. Maybe this will be the first.

Seven Layer Finger Jello

The boys helped me make this jello dessert for a beach picnic. For some reason the lemon layer looked more like pudding when I added the water to it. Perhaps someone put lemon pudding in the lemon jello box by accident. It was so thick that after adding twice as much water I decided just to go to the store and get another box. The boys like to peel the layers off and eat them and are fascinated by how the jello dyes the milk layers different colors.  My mom used to make this for parties all the time when I was growing up. I'm happy to carry on the tradition.

Minecraft Grass Block Rice Krispies Treats

Sage brought these treats to share with his friends on his birthday at Minecraft Lego camp. The base is made from Rice Krispies cereal, cocoa powder, mini marshmallows, butter and chocolate chips. The grass part is Swiss meringue buttercream piped using a grass tip. The kids were so excited and so were the adults!