Jake's Afghan

I made my son an afghan for Christmas.  He kept stealing mine.  Now he has his own!

Hamburger Cookies

Fun for a backyard cookout!

Ingredients:

1/2 cup vanilla frosting
Red and yellow paste or gel food coloring
40 vanilla wafers
20 peppermint patties
1 teaspoon corn syrup
1 teaspoon sesame seeds

Directions:

Place 1/4 cup frosting in each of two small bowls. Tint one red and the other yellow. Frost the bottosm of 20 vanilla wafers yellow; top with a peppermint patty. Spread patty with red frosting. Brush tops of remaining vanilla wafers with corn syrup; sprinkle with sesame seeds. Place on top of red frosting.

Yield 20 cookies

Spider Cupcakes

We make these every Halloween.  Big hit even with the teenagers!

Ingredients:

One Devil's Food Cake Mix

Water, vegetable oil and eggs called for on cake mix box

One container white frosting

Red food coloring

Yellow food coloring

Black icing

24 pieces of soft black candy (jelly beans, gumdrops, etc.)

Directions:

Make and cool cupcakes according to package

Tint frosting with red and yellow food colorings to make desired orange color.

Spread orange frosting over cupcakes.

Using #3 head on 

White Bread

This is a great, easy white bread recipe that never fails to produce a large fluffy loaf.  Matter of fact, it makes two!  Next time I make it, I will take more photos of the process.

White Bread

4 1/2 teaspoons yeast

3/4 cup hot water

1/4 cup sugar

1 T salt

3 T butter, room temperature and cut into pieces

2 2/3 cup additional hot water

9-10 cups all-purpose flour

cooking spray

1. In the bowl of mixer, dissolve the yeast in 3/4 cup of warm water, about 5 minutes.

2. Add sugar, salt, butter, water, and mix gently to combine.

3.  Slowly add 5 cups of the flour, mixing on low speed until smooth.

4. Slowly add 3 more cups flour until the dough is smooth.

5. Remove bowl from mixer and knead in about one half to one more cup by hand in bowl.

6.Turn dough out onto lightly floured surface and knead in additional dough until dough is smooth.

7.  Turn dough out into large bowl coated with cooking spray.  Coat top of dough with spray.

8.  Cover with wet warm towel, and set in a warm place to rise for 1 hour.

9.  After an hour, punch down the dough.  Let dough rest for ten minutes.  

10. Punch dough down again, divide into two portions. Working with one portion at a time, roll the dough out into rectangles.  Roll up each portion, sealing edges firmly.  Tuck ends of roll tightly under bread and place into loaf pans coated with cooking spray.

11. Cover the loaves, set in a warm place, and let rise until doubled, about another hour.
12. Place one rack on the lowest position in the oven and preheat the oven to 425 degrees.

13. Bake the loaves for 30 minutes. 

 Remove the loaves from pans, place on a wire rack to cool.

Cake Pops

Anna and I made cake pops for New Year's.  Wow, harder than they look.  Turned out pretty cute, though.  They taste a bit like a cake doughnut.  Festive!