2 Oreo Truffles =]

First off... EXCITEMENT!! These turned out A-mazzing, I literally cannot keep my hands off them, not sure if thats a good thing....... BUT! Here lately my BFF has been counting calories.. which led me to the conclusion that maybe other people do that too... so guess what! I calculated the calories in tonights amazingly goodness, and the total comes to 67cal/truffle. Not bad right? I wouldn't know, I'm not big on keeping track of things, as we all know, I don't even own a measuring cup.. so why would I count calories much less remember what I ate today? I should probably get down to business so here we go, I got the recipe from >HERE< I found it thanks to stumbleupon, which is now my new best friend(sorry BFF, lol)

They turned out like so:

And they were incredibly easy.. like, INCREDIBLY, so incredibly easy that they only have 3 ingredients(2pkgs baking chocolate shown, I only used 1pkg plus 6 squares from 2nd pkg):

Oh! I should probably go ahead and say that if you went and looked at the link to where I found the recipe that you should please note that they used a double recipe... I'm not feeding an army so I only made a single recipe and I ended up with 72 truffles, yeah, I counted.. thats how I got the calories mathed out. 

To start off, throw all the oreos in a gallon ziplock baggie (except for 2 that will be sacrificed to the kitchen gods via drowning in my glass of milk- this is important because I excluded these when calculating calories)

Find your meat tenderizer and use a flat part of it (top/side doesn't matter as long as its not going to poke holes in the baggie) I had the rolling pin out because I was going to use it but didn't end up doing so, so ignore it. 

Great way to take out the day's frustrations; make oreo dust. Crumbs, dust, whatever you want to call it just try to make sure theres not big chunks in there, you want it pretty fine, if you have a food processor you can use it here but I don't so..

Put the softened(10sec in microwave, or you can do like I did and just set it on top of the crock pot thats cooking in the corner) cream cheese into the mixer.

I like to smoosh the cream cheese around a little bit...

Dump in the bag of oreo dust

Get it good and mixed then start forming balls

Here is all 72 of my oreo goo balls. Try to keep them fairly uniform in size mine are about an inch or so in diameter.

Put them in the freezer for an hour, I left the house and came back, it doesn't really matter as long as they're good and cold and wont fall apart in a bowl over a pot of boiling water...

Boil water, place a glass bowl over it, I use a wooden spoon to let steam out. Be sure not to let all your water boil off, it doesn't smell pretty and you will have concerned household members storming in to the rescue if you're one of those people who can't hardly smell anything (like me) including burning pan/wooden spoon....... lesson learned.

Use a spoon to roll the goo balls around one or two at a time in the chocolate, I only did one at a time, but its up to you.

You'll want them COVERED

Turn them out on a sheet of aluminum foil, I greased mine but it probably was not necessary.

Here a bunch of them are, I'd say half of them, I put another sheet of foil over them crimped the edges and put them back in the freezer, you can store them however you like and they keep fine in the fridge I just like the chocolate coating to be fairly crunchy. 

These were AMAZING! Can I say that again? AAMMAAZZIINNGG!!! Heres the calorie break down:

cream cheese: 800cal/block

oreos:2134cal/box -2cookies(106cal) = 2028cal

baking chocolate: 140cal/square x 14sq =1960cal - 70cal(leftover chocolate) =1890 cal

TOTAL: 4824 cal (if you sat down and ate the entire batch thats what it would be)

Total/#of truffles(72) = 67cal/truffle

I'd have to say that's not that bad.. so

Happy Baking!

Enjoy! =]

0 Mini Oreo Cupcakes

For today's yummy goodness I found the recipe >HERE<. The recipe calls for a box of cake mix, which I feel is cheating debated subbing a real chocolate cake for but, for the sake of following directions I gave in and bought a box of cake mix.. now I know that I made my yellow cake from scratch for the >cookie dough cupcakes< that I made not too long ago but this is different.. somehow... and after making them, I now know why this decision was made: the cake mix I used made the fluffiest lightest cupcakes I've ever tasted, like little chocolate clouds..  Anyways.. Heres how they turned out:

Oooh yeah! So heres what you'll need:

And, I kinda feel like this picture is a lie, you know? Because the box cake requires another 3 eggs, 1 1/3 C water and 1/2 C oil.. but your box may be different ..

Fill each tin about 1/2 way with cake mix

put a spoon full of cream cheese mixture into each tin 

Then add a mini oreo to each and cover with more cake mix

Bake 19-22 mins (I baked them 20mins and they came out perfect)

I found my mini cupcake tin buried under all my cookie sheets and whatnot under the stove so I made some MINI mini oreo cupcakes as well, they turned out adorable =]

This is one of the MINI ones

Heres the inside of them

And of course the full size version, which was a little neater on the inside. These were SO good, not sure if the bigger ones were worth the extra effort of putting stuff in them since you could hardly taste it but the little ones, AMAZING. I didn't have any cake batter left over and my last batch was a little stretched but in all fairness I got an extra tin full of little ones as well as my first batch being a bit on the fat side, I may have to trim them. 

Enjoy! =]

Happy Baking!

0 Oreos- of the homemade variety

today i MADE oreos.. yeah. =]

This was my Facebook status this morning, and here is the story, the how-to and the where from of it all.  A few days ago I was cruising through stumbleupon, because its my new favorite toy, and came across this sugarcooking.blogspot.com of course this sent me into a fit of excitement and I immediately bookmarked the page before continuing to "stumble" around the internet.  So I got the few necessary ingredients that I didn't already have in my stockpile of baking supplies, mainly the cocoa, there wasn't a huge selection of cocoa at Kroger in fact there was pretty much just Hershey's or the store brand and the dutch double process was not even an option, so I got Hershey's because there was really only a 10 cent difference in price so why not, right? Anyway so I got up this morning and found on the kitchen table this:

So after making the banana nut muffins that were so clearly requested by my parents (they're daddy's favorite) I made myself an omelet and began gathering my oreo supplies from the cabinets. 

I started following along exactly as the recipe instructed..

Mixing the flour, cocoa and sugar, then adding the baking soda and powder

Then turned and noticed the two little guys waiting desperately for anything to fall on the floor, they're my little clean up crew =] they were too cute and hopeful looking to not post on here

Thats Emmitt on the right with the giant ears and Hank on the left looking as cute as possible in hopes of getting scraps thrown to them =]

But back to the baking..

Mix all the solid stuff real good..

Then add in the butter (I soften it in the microwave for 10sec before putting it in so it mixes a little better)

The mixer will do most of the work for you but you may have to break it up a little with a knife or a fork (please stop the mixer before sticking things in there, I shouldn't have to say that but..)

It will get kinda clumpy, then add in the egg

I had to add in an extra egg to get it moist enough, it was all dry clumpy-ness, I also added a little bit of milk and by little bit I mean like a tablespoon, just enough to give it a little hold. 

So then you roll little balls, little. 

Seriously little..

Then smoosh it, they should be right around the size of a quarter this one is slightly bigger, I have small hands so don't let that be a size guide. 

Put them on a cookie sheet, I used wax paper to make reuse, cooling and cleanup a little easier, remember to keep them relatively the same size, its important. Then bake them. Once they're all baked and cooled or while they're cooling make the frosting, it's pretty basic so I didn't take step by step pictures but follow the recipe and it'll turn out, then put it in a baggie, any baggie will do but i recommend freezer baggies, I used a regular sandwich bag and ended up popping a hole in the side and covering my hands in frosting, which was fine because it gave me an excuse to taste test it... when putting it in the bag though if you fold the zipper part over it holds the bag open for you.

Cut a hole in the (bottom) corner of the bag and squeeze out the frosting onto the flat side of one of the cookies

Find a cookie that matches in size..

line them up..

and smoosh! =]

Feel free to lick the mixer clean =D

This is why size really does matter.. PLEASE don't make the same mistake I did, these aren't exactly attractive though they do taste just as good, I only had one like this though the rest were much better matched

and there you have an oreo <3 

This is what they SHOULD look like =]

This is almost exactly how much the recipe makes, I only ate about 2 cookies worth of dough and only 2 or 3 cookies prior to icing and managed to take this picture before testing my end results.  Which are really good, I was mildy disappointed mostly because my hopes were set overly high but overall I'm happy with them. 

Heres the recipe:

For the chocolate wafers:

• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 cup unsweetened Dutch process cocoa*
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 to 1 1/2 cups sugar**
• 1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) room-temperature, unsalted butter
• 1 large egg

For the filling:

• 1/4 cup (1/2 stick) room-temperature, unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup vegetable shortening
• 2 cups sifted confectioners sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

1. Set two racks in the middle of the oven. Preheat to 375°F.
2. In a food processor, or bowl of an electric mixer, thoroughly mix the flour, cocoa, baking soda and powder, salt, and sugar. While pulsing, or on low speed, add the butter, and then the egg. Continue processing or mixing until dough comes together in a mass.
3. Take rounded teaspoons of batter and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet approximately two inches apart. With moistened hands, slightly flatten the dough. Bake for 9 minutes, rotating once for even baking. Set baking sheets on a rack to cool.
4. To make the cream, place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl, and at low speed, gradually beat in the sugar and vanilla. Turn the mixer on high and beat for 2 to 3 minutes until filling is light and fluffy.
5. To assemble the cookies, in a pastry bag with a 1/2 inch, round tip, pipe teaspoon-size blobs of cream into the center of one cookie. Place another cookie, equal in size to the first, on top of the cream. Lightly press, to work the filling evenly to the outsides of the cookie. Continue this process until all the cookies have been sandwiched with cream. Dunk generously in a large glass of milk.

*As I said I used the Hershey's Natural Unsweetened Cocoa (its in the picture)

** I used 1 1/4 C because I always go middle of the road when in question and it worked out fine.

Happy Baking,

Enjoy! =]