Frostings

My favorite frosting for anything is cream cheese frosting.  It's super easy to make.

Cream cheese frosting
Did you know you can soften cream cheese in the microwave too?  If you need to soften the cream cheese and butter in the microwave.  Just don't melt them.  It will change the texture of your frosting.

1 cube butter, softened
1 pkg (8 oz) cream cheese, softened
1 tsp. vanilla
powdered sugar

Mix butter and cream cheese together until smooth.  Add vanilla.  Mix in enough powdered sugar to get the consistency you want.  Usually around 4 cups but you can add whatever.  If you need more moisture you can add a tsp. of milk at a time until you have the right consistency.

Basic frosting

1/2 bag powdered sugar
2 TB melted butter
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. vanilla
3 TB milk (add a little at a time)

Stir until smooth.  Add food coloring to make fun colors.


Lion House chocolate frosting
Nice semi-rich frosting.  Tastes like fudge to me.

4 TB cocoa
3 c. powdered sugar
4 TB soft butter or margarine
2 to 3 TB milk
1 tsp. vanilla

Mix cocoa and powdered sugar in mixing bowl.  Add softened butter, milk, and vanilla.  Beat until smooth.


Other frosting ideas:

You can color corn syrup with some food coloring and paint cookies with it.  It makes the cookies shiny and is really fun for kids to paint.  It tastes alright too!  The syrup will dry pretty fast so they won't remain sticky.

You can make a thin glaze with powdered sugar and water/milk and drizzle over cookies.  You can also make a chocolate glaze by melting chocolate chips (add some butter or shortening if you need to thin out) and drizzle that over the top of the cookies.

Before you bake the cookies, you can add sprinkles or broken lifesavers and they will bake into the cookie.  That way you don't have to frost at all!

Sugar cookies!!!

Hey Valentines day is kind of the season for sugar cookies for us.  I don't know why.  Maybe we are feeding our winter depression. :)  Anyway, here's my favorite sugar cookie recipes.

Melissa's sugar cookies
Especially good cookies and you don't roll and cut them out.  They taste kind of like dough even after cooked.

1 c. sugar
1/2 c. butter
1/2 c. sour cream
1 1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 egg
2 1/2 c. flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt

Mix together first 4 ingredients.  Add egg and mix.  Add dry ingredients and mix well.  Roll walnut size pieces into sugar or sprinkles.  Place on a cookie sheet and bake at 400 for 7-8 minutes or until the cookie starts to crack on the surface.

Sugar cookies
The kind you roll out and cut and then usually frost.

1 c. shortening
1 c. sugar
3 eggs, beaten
1/4 c. milk
2 tsp. vanilla
3 c. flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. soda

Cream shortening and sugar until fluffy.  Beat in eggs, milk, and vanilla.  Add dry ingredients until well blended.  Roll out on floured surface and cut.  Bake at 350 for 10 minutes.  For soft cookies, roll dough out thicker and watch your baking time.  For crispy cookies, make dough thinner and bake until starting to slightly brown.

Pan sugar cookies 
Easy because you just spread into a pan - no cookie cutters!

1 1/2 c. sugar
2 1/2 cubes margarine, softened
2 TB milk
2 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs
2 tsp. baking powder
3 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt

Cream sugar and margarine.  Add eggs, vanilla, and milk.  Mix in dry ingredients.  Spread into a greased cookie sheet.  Bake at 350 for 20 minutes.  Frost and cut into bars.

Crockpot Italian Chicken

This a recipe that was recommended to me by my daughter for a
good Sunday crockpot meal. It is super easy to make and soooo
good.

Ingredients:
4 chicken breasts (boned & skinned) - I used two large ones
1/3 c. water
half pkg of dry Zesty italian dressing - (used regular and it turned out great)
3 Tbsp. butter or marg.
4 oz. cream cheese
1 or 2 cans cream of chicken soup
rice or noodles (cooked) - I did mashed potatoes

Directions:
Cook Chicken, water, Italian dressing and marg on high till
chicken shreds easily (about 4 hrs or so). Add cream cheese
and cream of chicken soup. Serve over rice or pasta.

Enjoy!!!

Banana Cream Pie

This recipe comes from my daughter's mother-in-law (Sheila Thorpe). It is delicious but don't be tempted to turn up the heat too much or it will scorch. She uses Marie Calendar's frozen pie crust but you can make a home made one if you want. Just before serving she tops it with whipped cream and slices bananas on top. Enjoy!!

Sheila's Banana Cream Pie (one pie)

3/4 c. sugar

3 rounded tbsp. corn starch

1/4 tsp. salt

2 c. whole milk

3 egg yolks

2 tbsp. butter

1 tsp. vanilla

1 pastry shell

Combine sugar, corn starch and salt in a pan. Gradually stir in milk. Cook over medium heat until just a low boil. Cook for 7 minutes, stirring frequently so it doesn't burn. Take a little of the hot mixture into a separate bowl and mix in the egg yolks. Stir this mixture into the mixture on the stove. Cook on a low boil for another 7 minutes stirring constantly so it doesn't burn. Remove and add butter and vanilla. Cool to room temperature and pour into pastry shell.

Chocolate Chip Pecan Pie

This one is soooo good, I had to share! Try it this Christmas!

Chocolate Chip Pecan Pie

3 eggs
1 1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. flour
6 T. butter, melted
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. lemon juice
1/2 c. corn syrup
1 1/2 c. semisweet chocolate chips
1 1/2 c. pecans
1 recipe pastry for a 9 inch single crust pie

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. In a large mixing bowl beat eggs until light and fluffy. Add sugar, flour, butter, salt, lemon juice and corn syrup. Mix thouroughly, then stir in chocolate chips and pecans. Pour mixture into pie shell.
3. Bake in preheated oven for 45 minutes or until set and golden.

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls

I saw this recipe on Good Things Utah one day, and it looked so yummy so I wanted to post it here. I haven't tried it yet, although I need to soon, so if anyone tries it before I do, please leave a comment on what you think...


Prepared by GTU viewer Carrie Swenson

Ingredients:

2 T. yeast
1/2c. warm water
1/2 c. canned pumpkin
2/3 c. sugar
½ t. salt
1 egg, beaten
¼ c. melted, butter
1/4 t. ground cloves
1 t. cinnamon
4-5 c. bread flour
½ c. brown sugar, packed
2 T. cinnamon
2 T. melted butter
Method:


Dissolve yeast in warm milk. Wait 5 minutes. Add pumpkin, egg, sugar, butter, salt, cinnamon and cloves and mix well. Slowly add flour one cup at a time. Scrape down sides of bowl after each addition of flour. Turn into lightly greased bowl, cover and set in warm place until double in bulk. Punch down dough and let rest for 5 more minutes. Roll dough out into a rectangle.
Brush dough with melted butter. Sprinkle the dough with sugar and cinnamon mixture. Starting with long side of dough, roll up jellyroll style. Pinch seams to seal. With sharp serrated knife cut roll into 12 1 in. pieces. Place rolls, cut side up in greased 9*13 pan. Cover and let rise until double, 30 to 45 minutes.
Bake rolls at 350 degrees about 20 minutes or until golden brown. Drizzle with caramel frosting as soon as they come out of the oven. Let cool until warm, add the rest of the frosting. Enjoy!

Caramel Frosting

¼ c. butter
½ c. brown sugar, packed
2 T. milk
¼ t. vanilla
Pinch of salt
½ c. to ¾ c. sifted powder sugar

In a small saucepan, heat butter until melted. Stir in brown sugar and milk. Cook over med. Low heat 1 minute. Transfer to small bowl and cool mixture. Stir in vanilla, salt, and powder sugar. Beat with Electric mixer until well blended. If necessary, add more sugar for desired consistency.

Pumpkin Bars

I got this recipe off another site called "Celery Go?". They are delicious so I thought I would share the original post.

Pumpkin Bars

Before I post this recipe, I want to give full credit to Dr. Deborah Dean, a professor of mine from BYU who first introduced me to these delightful treats! I hope she won't mind my re-posting the recipe here. I just made these again the other day, and think that they are a wonderful fall dessert.

4 eggs
1 16oz. can pumpkin
2 cups sugar
1 cup oil
2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking soda

Mix ingredients thoroughly. Pour batter onto large, greased cookie sheet (similar to a jelly-roll pan). Bake at 350 degrees for about 20-25 minutes. When cooled, frost with the following cream cheese frosting. (We make ours with Tofutti cream cheese, and no one has ever been able to tell the difference, a fact I'm fairly proud of!)

1 package cream cheese
6 tablespoons butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
3-5 cups powdered sugar depending on your sweetness preference. (we use 3-4)
2-3 tablespoons milk (if needed to thin the frosting to spreadable consistency. We don't usually need it, but the Tofutti cream cheese may not be as stiff as the real stuff...)