I need to get a haircut. I don't want to get a haircut, but I need to get one. I'm one of those weird women that hates to get my hair cut. It just seems like a waste of time when I could be up doing something else that is a lot more fun. I don't enjoy the head massage or any of that. Again, I said I'm weird. I just turned 50 and I'm in denial that I can be that old. Right now my hair is longish, just past my shoulders and my mom, who is 77 is utterly disgusted that I won't cut my hair in a bowl cut. Well, not a bowl cut, but that short. I am not a tiny woman and, even though some women who are larger like me look fine with it, I feel like I have this tiny little ball on my shoulders and this big body when I have short hair. So see my issue? Do I cut my hair and hate it or do I just get it trimmed tiny bit?

Too many decisions, so let's just look at pretty cookies, shall we?

 

($25 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

$22 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

Cookies for Kids

 

Today as promised is the day to post all the kids cookies that I have had the pleasure of doing the last several months. Some are your normal, everyday cookies that are cute and very trendy for the kids. Every once in awhile I get something I'm surprised by, but hey, that's what makes this fun!

Bumblebees ($20 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

                                                                   ($22 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($25 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($24 per dozen)

($22 per dozen)

($25 per dozen)

 

This is only a portion of the ones I've done. If you find an inspiration picture, I can usually obtain something close to it. If possible, give me the name of the creator of the original cookie design so I can credit them!

 

Birthday Cookies For Adult's

I must confess, it's been years since I've created a blog post! What can I say, I let my life get in the way, or let's face it, it was just too much work for me to write a blog everyday. This time around, I'm going to do one whenever I get a chance, or when I have new cookies to post, that will be the easiest.

The cookie business has gotten overwhelming the last few months. I 'm not sure what changed but something sure has. I love it though, it gives me a chance to do all types of cookie designs. Right now, it seems like Mermaids and Under The Sea is really hot. I've gotten to do 5 different orders!

I will only show a couple here as I'm trying to decide how to go about this. At first I was just going to post them all, then thought that would be overwhelming, so I think I will just go with a couple pictures that represent adult birthday cookies. Since I do a lot of kids birthday cookies, I will put them in tomorrows blog post. In the spirit of open pricing, I 'm going to post the prices of all cookies, that way if anyone wants something like them or similar, they will have an idea what the price might be.

($25 a dozen)

 

The above cookies were for a lovely lady named Lulu. Her daughter was throwing her an awesome party and wanted cookies to match her invitation. I also did a cookies and cream bundt cake for the party. I don't think I took a picture of it, but she also bought fresh flowers to put in the middle of the cake to make it look elegant and they also matched the invite. She sent me a picture of her mom and kids with the cake and they all looked really happy. Always nice when they send a picture! Thank you Whitney!

($22 a dozen)

 

The above cookies were made for a great lady turning 40 years old. They didn't want any design that looked old and wanted something fun and young looking. I think they picked some good designs and colors, don't you?

 

Okay, that's it for today! Stay tuned for more cookie pictures and adventures from Fluffybutt!

Frozen Dinners.....what is your favorite?

 

Happy May!!!!!!

 

I am so excited that Spring has finally raised it's head, it's officially been Spring for a few weeks now, but it sure hasn't felt much like it.

 

Today's post isn't about cookies, cakes, etc., it's about one of my favorite quick dinners. And by quick, I mean, open the box, make a couple slits in the plastic and uncover the dessert! Some days you just don't feel like cooking, or, if you live alone like I do, it's just not worth it some nights to make a full fledged dinner for yourself. So in steps, Hungry Man or in my case hungry woman? Rrroooarr! If you are hungry, this is the frozen dinner for you. Now they have several varieties, but this by far is my favorite one. So chime in, what is your favorite, I'm lazy, don't have time, or any imagination to cook today, go to frozen meal? Let me know and maybe I will get brave and try something else!

 

 



Gluten free anyone?

Gluten Free Apple Cake, it's better than you think!

 

 

Wow, it's been a long time since I've had a chance to blog. So long in fact that I had to try 8 different email/password combinations! It's terrible when you can't remember that important information isn't it?

 

 

No, I haven't been diagnosed with Celiacs disease or anything, but I've decided to change a few minor eating habits that I have. Don't get me wrong, I love all the processed food and I LOVE bread, cakes, cookies, you name it. If it tastes really good and fattening, I probably like it! However, for a long time now I've been thinking and sometimes talking out loud about how I need to change how I eat and how I need to start weeding out processed food from my daily life. Right now I can't imagine giving it up my entire life, or at least not completely, but it needs to happen a lot less often than it does currently. My love of McDonald's is well known to those that know me and I plan on trying to not go there very often. Believe it or not, the burgers are completely gluten free if you leave off the bun.

 

 

I bought some almond flour, coconut flour and some Bob's Red Mill All-Purpose flour months ago and tried my hand at winging some cookies and cake, but can you say DISASTER and a huge waste of money? They sucked big time. So now I have learned that right now, in the beginning stages that I cannot just wing baking the way that I do now with regular wheat flour. 1) because it's super expensive 2) because there are many before me that have already spent a lot of money perfecting recipes, so I will be a follower for once.

 

So that being said, I was nosing around the Internet the other day and ran across a website called gluten-free Goddess recipes. I must say she had a large wealth of information there that was awesome. I wanted to start out with something fairly simple where I already had most of the ingredients. So that is where this recipe originated from. I did change a couple things but the essence of the recipe is the same.

 

Since I had never made this before I decided to only do half a recipe just in case it turned out terrible and inedible. :) Then since I didn't have all of the different flours on hand, I substituted the Bob's Red Mill All-Purpose flour in place of all of the other ones. I had read somewhere that you could use the new Bisquick Gluten Free in place of wheat flour, measure for measure, so I thought this other flour would be the same and let me tell you, it turned out great!

 

 

Sour Cream Apple Cake

 

5 Medium Apples, room temperature, peeled, cored and sliced.

Toss with a small amount of lemon juice

 

3 large-organic free-range eggs

1 cup packed organic light brown sugar

1/2 cup organic cane sugar

2 t.vanilla

3T extra light olive oil

1/4 cup sour cream

 

2 cups almond flour

1/4 rice or sorghum flour

1/2 cup potato starch or tapioca starch

1-1/2 t baking powder

1t baking soda

1t apple pie spice

1t ground cinnamon

1/2 t fine sea salt

1/2 c pecan or walnut halves

 

I mixed the eggs, sugars, vanilla, olive oil and sour cream together at medium speed in mixing bowl. Then added all the dry ingredients. Once everything is combined, stir in apples and nuts. Spray a spring form pan with gluten free spray and cover the bottom with parchment/wax paper.  Bake at 350 in a pre-heated oven for about 50 minutes. Let cool in pan for about 10 minutes then remove outer ring. Turn upside down on cake plate and remove the bottom.

 

Cake serves 8-10 people. Slice and wrap individually, then freeze. Serve cake at room temperature or warm.

 

This recipe is for the full cake. However, even half the recipe made a nice sized cake, about 1 1/2 inch thick. It would be even more awesome if you made a little cream cheese frosting on it. lol  Not diet food by any stretch of the imagination, but if you are trying to live without gluten and just have to have something sweet, this will fit the bill. I couldn't even tell it was gluten free!

 

I did take some to my mom and she had no idea it was gluten free until I told her and she really liked it. I've talked enough that she is going to try and cut way back on gluten, then try going gluten free for at least 3 weeks to see how she feels.

 

No worries though! I'm not giving up my baking by any means. Just trying to clean up my life a little bit and maybe lose some weight in the process.

 

I hope if you try this cake you will agree that it's pretty tasty :)

 

 

Tammy

Fluffybutt Cookies

 

 

 

 



German Chocolate Cake

Sorry everyone I have been a very bad baker recently and have avoided my blog posts for quite awhile. It's not like I haven't baked anything, quite the opposite, I've been super busy so yeah, that will be my excuse, I've been to busy to think of witty and useful things to tell you all. I guess I need to determine what I really want my blog to be about, it seems like recipe sharing is really popular if you stick with easy things to make, or how too video's are popular as well, but personally, I have no desire to put my voice to a how too demonstration :) So, I think I will just go mainly with recipes that I've made so everyone can try them or just look at them. Some of these will be items I sell and I will post the recipes because it's some that are readily available to anyone, so it's not like I'm giving away company secrets, right?

First up:

German Chocolate Cake with Coconut Pecan Frosting


What you need for the cake:

4 oz. or 1 Baker's German Chocolate bar
1/2 water
4 eggs, separated
2 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 cup butter, softened
2 cups sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup buttermilk

Heat over to 350 degrees. Spray 2-9 inch cake pans and line with wax paper.

Combine chocolate bar and water in micro safe bowl and cook for 1 min., stir, and put back in for 30 more seconds. If mixture is smooth when stirred, it's ready. Set aside.

Separate eggs. Put egg white is a mixing bowl and beat on high until stiff peaks hold. Set aside.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda and salt. Set aside.

Next, in your mixer bowl, beat your butter and sugar until fluffy. Add in vanilla.  Add egg yolks, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Next adding alternate flour and buttermilk to you batter. Once everything is combined, slowly fold in your egg whites until incorporated.

Divide batter evenly among both pans and bake 30 min. or until toothpick comes out clean. Remove from oven and immediately run a knife around the edges to loosen (be sure you do this, or it will stick). Let cool for 15 minutes, then remove from pans and cool completely.

Coconut Pecan Frosting

1 can evaporated milk (12 oz.)
4 egg yolks
1 1/2 cups sugar
3/4 cup butter
7  ounce package coconut
1 1/2 cup chopped pecans
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla

Combine milk, yolks, sugar and butter in a saucepan and cook over medium heat for about 12 min.or until mixture is thickened. Stir constantly as it will scorch easily. Once mixture is thickened, remove from heat and stir in vanilla, add coconut and nuts. Mix well and let cool completely.

I like this frosting so much that I want it all over and in the middle of the cake. I'm not a big fan of just putting it between the layers and on top. I put a nice thick layer in the middle of the cakes and piped a damn of chocolate fudge frosting to hold it all in. Then I covered it completely in the yummy coconut frosting and then piped a little bit of decoration around the bottom and then on the top of the cake.

This is a very moist and yummy cake if you like coconut, nuts and chocolate. It's a fairly costly cake to make so be warned. The chocolate bar alone is $3. But then again, nothing is inexpensive anymore. Happy Baking!

Tammy
Fluffybutt Cookies Etc.

Caramel Apple-Brownie Cheesecake!!!

 

Wow, can you believe it is September and today is the last official holiday of summer? In a way it makes me sad as I never look forward to winter. I love warm weather and have actually really enjoyed the one we have had. Of course this summer has been very unusual in Missouri because normally our summers are extremely hot and humid, but this year, due to almost no rain for months and months, the humidity has been somewhere from 0-35%. I can imagine this is the type of hot, dry heat that those living in the desert areas enjoy. Another bonus to this weather, at least for me, is very few sinus or migraine headaches!

 

So back to baking now....................I mean really, if it contains fruit, nuts and dairy, that means cheesecake is a health food, right? Aww, come on, if enough people agree then that makes it a law, right? So I hear by declare that cheesecake is one of the best all around health foods known to man :D

 

 

 

Caramel Apple-Brownie Cheesecake

 

3/4 cup chopped pecans

2 (8oz.) packages cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 tsp. vanilla

4 large eggs, divided

1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

1/2 cup butter, melted

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

1 tsp. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

1 1/2 cups peeled and diced Granny Smith apples

Caramel Apple Topping (recipe follows)

Caramel Sauce (recipe follows)

 

1) Preheat over to 350 degrees. Bake pecans in a single layer in a shallow pan 8-10 min or until lightly toasted and fragrant, stirring halfway through. Reduce oven temp. to 325 degrees. Sprinkle pecans over bottom of a greased and shiny 9-in.springform pan.

2) Beat cream cheese, granulated sugar, and vanilla at medium speed with a heavy-duty stand mixer until blended and smooth. I have found this to be the absolute most important part of making cheesecakes, make sure that cream cheese and sugar is as smooth as can be! Add 3 eggs, 1 at a time, beating just until blended after each addition.

3) Whisk together brown sugar, melted butter, and remaining egg in a large bowl until blended.

4) Stir together flour and next 3 ingredients; add to brown sugar mixture and stir until blended. Stir in apples. Spoon batter into prepared pan. Carefully spoon cream cheese mixture over batter.

5) Bake at 325 for 1 hour and 10 minutes or until set. Remove from oven, and gently run a knife around outer edge of cheesecake to loosen from sides of pan. (Do not remove sides of pan) Cool completely on a wire rack, about 2 hours. Transfer to your serving plate.

6) While cake is cooling, prepare Caramel Apple Topping and Caramel Sauce. Reserve 1 cup caramel sauce for another use. Spoon topping over cheesecake: drizzle with 1/2 cup Caramel Sauce.
* Recipe was taken from the September 2012 issue of Southern Living.

Step 1) Toast pecan pieces, this step can be skipped if you don't care if your pecans are toasted or not.

 

Step 2) Cream cheese mixture, try not to eat all this right out of the bowl, yummy!

Step 3) Apple Brownie mixture, mixture will be super thick

 

 

Caramel Apple Topping

 

Melt 1/4 cup butter in a large skillet over medium heat; add 1/2 cup sugar and 1 tsp.fresh lemon juice, and cook, stirring constantly with a long-handled wooden spoon 5-6 minutes or until mixture turns a light golden brown. Add 5 Large Granny Smith apples, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch thick wedges. Cook, stirring often, 15-18 minutes more or until after apples are tender and caramelized. Remove from heat; cool 20 minutes. Be sure not to overcook or you will sacrifice appearance. Not saying I had to do this step again.....well okay, I did as I'm not good at following directions but I kept the first batch to spread underneath the pretty ones. I actually skimped on the apples to begin with so this worked out okay in the end. My Granny Smith's were on the smallish side and I only used 2.5 apples in the pic above. I had bought 3 Jonathan's so I peeled and sliced these for the "pretty" apples on top :)

  

Caramel Sauce

 

Bring 1 cup firmly packed light brown sugar, 1/2 cup butter, 1/4 cup whipping cream, and 1/4 cup honey to a boil in a med.saucepan over medium-high heat, stirring constantly; boil, stirring constantly, 2 minutes. Remove from heat, and cool 15 minutes before serving. Store in an airtight container in refrigerator up to 1 week. To reheat, microwave at high 10 to 15 seconds or just until warm; stir until smooth. 

Then because I am me..........I love cinnamon strusel topping so I made the executive decision to add that on top of the apples and caramel. What's a few more calories? After all, this is health food right?

 

Feel like a slice????  Here you go!

Till next time, happy baking!

Tammy
Fluffybutt Cookie Emporium ;)

P.S   A friend and I just taste tested this little baby. It is good, BUT, we decided that it really shouldn't be called a cheesecake but a dessert. I think if I made it again, and I probably will, I think I would either double the cheesecake mixture or cut the brownie portion in half. It really just depends on what you want the end result to be. But it is really good, just not what I think of when I think cheesecake :)