Tried my hand at a few other things besides sugar cookies! I usually find an excuse to do this when we are having company or going someplace....Soooo since we had plans this weekend I had a few things brewing in my mind...here are the results - the good, the bad and the ugly.
Home made Graham crackers? Sounds yummy to me. When I get daily blog updates from so many wonderful cooks, I am tempted all too often to try to bake something different. I couldn't resist trying these. Would they be hard? What would they taste like? The taste was actually pretty much like a graham cracker and yummy. I just made mine a tad softer since I'm not a fan of "too done" cookies. The dough was rather interesting to work with. Not all that easy to roll out but I made it work. Here is the recipe I found on an excellent blog....HERE.
My little taste tester sure enjoyed them and me too!
I believe Trevor is going to turn into a PEEP lately. He eats so many of them and we have every color in our house. Did you know they make chocolate mousse PEEPS? I didn't either. I got the brilliant idea to try to make my own PEEPS after searching the internet and finding THIS recipe.
Here is what I was going for....our array of PEEPS we have at home.
A very involved recipe that I read about 5 or 6 times before starting to make sure I knew what I was doing. And several things going on at once. Here we have my gelatin over bowl of water to dissolve....
At the same time here is my corn syrup and sugar mixture boiling to 260 degrees......
The next step was putting the first 2 in the mix master with the fluffy egg whites. Things were looking pretty good until this stage. I was pouring it in and as you can see the corn syrup mixture decided to wrap all the way around the paddle attachment of the mix master. Wow.....it was the messiest thing ever and once I was done I wasn't sure I was ever going to get all that off. From there is all went down hill. I did get all the mixture in the bowl and it LOOKED okay still....the next step was to put it all in the icing bag - and here's where it just sounded simple, pipe those like I would do cookies into the peep shape. Well, let's just say it was too sticky, wouldn't even go in the bag. So I ended up with PEEP blobs.
Above are my blobs. I hated to just toss them out because they did seem to be marshmallow texture so I let the set and then let Trevor be my taste tester. He really liked them so they must taste like marshmallows. I'm not a marshmallow fan so I didn't even try them. All I know is that I won't be making those again. Not worth it!!! LOL But a girl had to try, right? That's why I call them my baking adventures!
So on to the the Key Lime pie. I made this the night before we were going to dinner out. It was a bit more involved than I had anticipated but not difficult at all. I searched high and low for a key lime pie recipe and really wanted one with ice cream. I only found one that didn't call for an ice cream maker. It was Mrs. Butter's Key Lime Pie. How could you go wrong with Mrs. Butter, right? Although it took some time to do this, it was relatively easy. The only tricky part was browning. After making the pie and the meringue topping directions tell you to put it in the oven until it browns. Not really saying how long. Below you can see it looks all browned, right? I think it was in there for about 15 minutes.
I thought I had success, pulled it out and went to bed. But I got to thinking about it and woke up really early on Saturday. I for some reason felt I should try to see if it would come out of the pan and just cut it in pieces before taking it someplace. The worst would be if I couldn't get it out when I got there!!! It came out of the bottom okay, but this was the only piece, (well, there may have been one more) that turned out presentable. Most of the pieces, sunk in the middle and didn't come out perfect like this. WELL...I can't take that I thought no matter what it tastes like so......
In a panic, found a recipe that I had all the ingredients for when I woke up early that AM. French Silk Pie. Made a graham cracker crust. These were both pretty easy to do and turned out nicely.
Here's the finished French Silk Pie. I had planned on taking a picture of it when I cut it up at dinner but I totally forgot! So this is all I have. But this came out nicely from the bottom and set up well.
The verdicts? BOTH WERE GOOD!!! LOL.
Everyone wanted the French Silk pie and really liked it. It was very chocolatey and I don't think I would add the extra bit of chocolate that I did just to be on the safe side. I tasted a few bites and it was just like Tippin's French Silk Pie if you remember those. I'm not a chocolate fan but the group loved it. I also made them try the key lime pie because I did take a few pieces over there as well. And they liked it too. I LOVED the key lime pie. It was wonderful in my opinion but then I"m an ice cream lover. So I guess in my panic I didn't really need to make the French Silk.....but oh well!
Home made Graham crackers? Sounds yummy to me. When I get daily blog updates from so many wonderful cooks, I am tempted all too often to try to bake something different. I couldn't resist trying these. Would they be hard? What would they taste like? The taste was actually pretty much like a graham cracker and yummy. I just made mine a tad softer since I'm not a fan of "too done" cookies. The dough was rather interesting to work with. Not all that easy to roll out but I made it work. Here is the recipe I found on an excellent blog....HERE.
My little taste tester sure enjoyed them and me too!
I believe Trevor is going to turn into a PEEP lately. He eats so many of them and we have every color in our house. Did you know they make chocolate mousse PEEPS? I didn't either. I got the brilliant idea to try to make my own PEEPS after searching the internet and finding THIS recipe.
Here is what I was going for....our array of PEEPS we have at home.
A very involved recipe that I read about 5 or 6 times before starting to make sure I knew what I was doing. And several things going on at once. Here we have my gelatin over bowl of water to dissolve....
At the same time here is my corn syrup and sugar mixture boiling to 260 degrees......
The next step was putting the first 2 in the mix master with the fluffy egg whites. Things were looking pretty good until this stage. I was pouring it in and as you can see the corn syrup mixture decided to wrap all the way around the paddle attachment of the mix master. Wow.....it was the messiest thing ever and once I was done I wasn't sure I was ever going to get all that off. From there is all went down hill. I did get all the mixture in the bowl and it LOOKED okay still....the next step was to put it all in the icing bag - and here's where it just sounded simple, pipe those like I would do cookies into the peep shape. Well, let's just say it was too sticky, wouldn't even go in the bag. So I ended up with PEEP blobs. 
Above are my blobs. I hated to just toss them out because they did seem to be marshmallow texture so I let the set and then let Trevor be my taste tester. He really liked them so they must taste like marshmallows. I'm not a marshmallow fan so I didn't even try them. All I know is that I won't be making those again. Not worth it!!! LOL But a girl had to try, right? That's why I call them my baking adventures!
So on to the the Key Lime pie. I made this the night before we were going to dinner out. It was a bit more involved than I had anticipated but not difficult at all. I searched high and low for a key lime pie recipe and really wanted one with ice cream. I only found one that didn't call for an ice cream maker. It was Mrs. Butter's Key Lime Pie. How could you go wrong with Mrs. Butter, right? Although it took some time to do this, it was relatively easy. The only tricky part was browning. After making the pie and the meringue topping directions tell you to put it in the oven until it browns. Not really saying how long. Below you can see it looks all browned, right? I think it was in there for about 15 minutes.
I thought I had success, pulled it out and went to bed. But I got to thinking about it and woke up really early on Saturday. I for some reason felt I should try to see if it would come out of the pan and just cut it in pieces before taking it someplace. The worst would be if I couldn't get it out when I got there!!! It came out of the bottom okay, but this was the only piece, (well, there may have been one more) that turned out presentable. Most of the pieces, sunk in the middle and didn't come out perfect like this. WELL...I can't take that I thought no matter what it tastes like so......
In a panic, found a recipe that I had all the ingredients for when I woke up early that AM. French Silk Pie. Made a graham cracker crust. These were both pretty easy to do and turned out nicely.
Here's the finished French Silk Pie. I had planned on taking a picture of it when I cut it up at dinner but I totally forgot! So this is all I have. But this came out nicely from the bottom and set up well.
The verdicts? BOTH WERE GOOD!!! LOL.
Everyone wanted the French Silk pie and really liked it. It was very chocolatey and I don't think I would add the extra bit of chocolate that I did just to be on the safe side. I tasted a few bites and it was just like Tippin's French Silk Pie if you remember those. I'm not a chocolate fan but the group loved it. I also made them try the key lime pie because I did take a few pieces over there as well. And they liked it too. I LOVED the key lime pie. It was wonderful in my opinion but then I"m an ice cream lover. So I guess in my panic I didn't really need to make the French Silk.....but oh well!
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