It’s that time of year where there are plenty of barbecues and outdoor gatherings again. Whenever our friends host, I never want to come empty handed so I like to have a bunch of dessert recipes on hand, especially no bake dessert recipes!
This No Bake Chocolate Eclair Cake is perfect for summer meet ups – you don’t have to turn on your oven and overheat your own home, and it can be made ahead and served chilled or at room temperature.
The cake is super simple to make. It is layers of graham crackers, whipped cream pudding, and chocolate frosting, mimicking the flavors of a chocolate eclair. If you don’t want to make your own frosting, you can also buy store bought and just use that.
Ingredients:
1 pint heavy whipping cream
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 (16 oz box) plus 2 tablespoons confectioners’ sugar, divided
2 (3.4 oz) boxes instant vanilla pudding mix
3 cups whole milk, divided
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
I originally made this Chocolate Coconut Cake for my dad for his birthday a few years ago. Since then, my parents request it any chance they get!
The recipe is a chocolate cake that substitutes coconut milk for regular milk in the recipe. It is then topped with a coconut cream frosting and some coconut flakes for extra coconut-y goodness!
Cake:
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 sticks (1 cup) unsalted butter, softened (or margarine to make dairy free)
2 cups sugar
4 eggs, at room temperature
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2/3 cup cocoa powder
1 (13.5 oz) can coconut milk
Frosting:
4 sticks (2 cups) unsalted butter, softened (or margarine to make dairy free)
Whiskey Cake is something that has shown up to family gatherings since before I can even remember. My mom makes this cake for basically all extended family celebrations, and it has become a favorite of mine. Recently, we were celebrating a friend’s birthday and I thought a Walnut Whiskey Cake would be the perfect birthday cake for him!
My version is a bit different than the one my mom makes, but the general gist is still there. I added some candied walnuts on top because, why not, but feel free to omit them.
The best part of this recipe is it is made with cake mix and instant vanilla pudding mix, making this cake both super easy to make and incredibly moist! Using a Bundt pan makes this cake look like it took you all day to make, but the hardest part of this recipe is patiently waiting for the glaze to soak into the cake before removing it from the Bundt pan.
One of my favorite things about having a blog is the opportunity to try new recipes and learn new cooking methods. I have never made Panna Cotta before, but it seems to be a relatively simple dessert to make.
Panna Cotta, which means “cooked cream” in Italian, is an Italian dessert traditionally made with sweetened cream and gelatin. Because of the gelatin, it maintains the shape of whatever vessel it is in.
It would have probably made sense to try to make a class panna cotta first, but my husband and I love all things pistachio, so I decided to try to make a Pistachio Panna Cotta as a treat for us!
Now that I know how darn easy it is to make homemade fudge, I like experimenting and making my own at home when the mood strikes me. This recipe for Homemade Chocolate Peanut Fudge uses just 5 ingredients and can be made with ingredients you might already have in your home!
I used peanuts in the below recipe, but really any nut you enjoy can be substituted in (walnuts would be the more traditional choice).
Ingredients:
1 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into smaller pieces
I am about to share with you my new favorite cake. Not only does this Tiramisu Cake taste amazing, but it is actually just a more spiffed up cake from a box!
I made this cake originally to celebrate my mom’s birthday, and everyone loved it so much, I decided to share it here too (my husband wasn’t upset at all to have this cake show up in our house again either!)
Ingredients:
1 package white cake mix (I used a Super Moist French Vanilla Cake Mix)
In the 11 years I’ve been writing posts for this blog, I have never posted on Christmas Day!
This year, I decided to finally rectify that and bring a recipe for a Christmas Pudding. Plum Pudding is quite a misnomer (at least to us Americans) – it does not include any plums, and pudding is actually a cake, not a custard-like substance. The method of cooking the plum pudding was new to me too; you actually steam it on your stovetop rather than bake it!
This recipe for Irish Plum Pudding is adapted from a cookbook I have owned for a while (Christmas Flavors of Ireland– paid link), although, I have to admit, I think I royally Americanized the recipe into something different. So, here’s my American Not-Plum Bundt Cake!
Note: You’ll need a 6 cup bundt pan (paid link), and a pot large enough to fit the bundt pan inside (I used a large pot I use to make tomato sauce).
Note: I was sent ingredients from Plugra Premium Butter in order to make this post. Opinions are mine alone. Ingredients included: 1 bar unsalted Plugra Premium Butter,1 container of the Spice House’s Vietnamese Saigon Cinnamon, Valrhona Manjari 64% Dark Chocolate, and Nielsen-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Extract.
Do I have a tasty recipe for you today! I was contacted recently by Plugrá Kitchens with a delicious sounding brownie recipe (these Mexican Hot Chocolate Brownies) using some of my favorite ingredients, so I knew I had to share it. This brownie recipe is based off the flavors of Mexican Hot Chocolate, which is a hot chocolate that is spiced with cinnamon and sometimes a little bit of chili to bring additional warmth and heat.
Plugra Kitchens was nice enough to send me a package with the best goodies to make these brownies, including (of course) Plugrá Premium Unsalted Butter, Spice House Ground Saigon Cinnamon, Nielsen-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Extract, and Balrhona Manjari 64% Dark Chocolate.
Plugrá Butter is an awesome ingredient to use for baking. Made by Dairy Farmers of America, its slow-churn and extra creaminess has the perfect balance of moisture and fat for use in baking. The Spice House‘s Vietnamese “Saigon” Cassia cinnamon is the strongest and sweetest cinnamon in their collection. The Vietnamese cinnamon bark is ground in house to produce a dark, rich texture that is fiery and fragrant, making it perfect for these brownies. My love of Nielsen-Massey‘s Madagascar Bourbon is well known to those that frequent this blog. Their Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla extract is made from premium, hand-selected vanilla beans cultivated in Madagascar, the world’s leading supplier of high-quality vanilla. It then utilizes a slow, cold extraction process to gently draw out and preserve all 300 natural vanilla flavor notes to create the richest tasting vanilla. Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla has a flavor profile that is full, sweet, creamy, and mellow with velvety after-tones. Valrhona Chocolate has been a partner of artisans of taste since 1922 and is a pioneer and reference in the world of chocolate.
With ingredients like that, you know this recipe is going to taste good! I adapted the recipe a bit, but the overall gist is still there. These Mexican Hot Chocolate Brownies are soft and chewy, with a subtle warmth and heat that pairs really well with the richness of the chocolate.
Ingredients (makes 18 servings):
1 (8 oz) bar unsalted butter, like Plugrá® European Style Butter
2 cups sugar
4 large eggs, at room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract, like Nielsen-Massey Madagascar Bourbon Pure Vanilla Extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
2/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon, like Saigon cinnamon from the Spice House
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
1 cup dark chocolate, like Valrhona Manjari 64% Dark Chocolate, chopped
Note: I was sent some baking tools from OXO in order to write this post. Opinions are mine alone.
It’s that time of year again – OXO’s Bake a Difference Campaign is live! Every year, OXO supports Cookies for Kids’ Cancer and the fight against pediatric cancer. Before I share my cookie recipe, I wanted to tell you a bit about Cookies for Kids’ Cancer.
Cookies for Kids’ Cancer (CFKC) is a nonprofit founded by two OXO employees after their son, Liam, was diagnosed with pediatric cancer. Through grassroots bake sales across the country, CFKC raises funds to develop new, improved and less toxic treatments for childhood cancer. Liam Witt’s legacy lives on as the organization works toward a cure for pediatric cancer, helping children and families everywhere.
For every cookie baked, OXO donates $1 to Cookies for Kids’ Cancer up to $100,000, so here is my new cookie this year to support the cause and spread the word!
Here are some of my old cookie swap and Cookies for Kids’ Cancer posts, in case you’re in a baking mood:
To help support, you can also register for the Bake a Difference campaign and host a virtual bake sale or an in-person event!
Moving to this year’s cookie: These Creme de Menthe Cookies are chocolate crinkle cookies with a chocolatey mint center. It is based off a cookie recipe I found in an Amish Community Cookbook (paid link) I’ve had for years.
I can’t believe I’ve never shared a pumpkin roll recipe on this blog! For someone as pumpkin-obsessed as me, I’m happy to finally rectify that!
This recipe is a mostly classic recipe, with the addition of chocolate chips into the cream cheese filling. I made this for Thanksgiving, and my aunt who hosts it enjoys pumpkin-chocolate combinations, so I made this one for her.
This pumpkin roll recipe has been developed to be made in a half sheet pan (paid link).
Ingredients:
1 cup plus 2 tablespoons flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 eggs plus 1 egg yolk, at room temperature
1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup pumpkin puree
12 oz cream cheese, at room temperature
8 tablespoons butter, at room temperature
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar, plus more for sprinkling
For those that follow me on Instagram or Twitter, it comes as no surprise that I am a huge fan of pumpkin recipes. In fact, I have over 30 recipes that use pumpkin on this blog!
So hopefully you’ll allow me to add another one to the list: Frosted Pumpkin Brownies!
So when I had a nagging sweet tooth recently, I figured it was time to also feed my pumpkin need. This recipe for Frosted Pumpkin Brownies is comprised of a chewy, chocolatey brownie topped with a nice thick layer of pumpkin buttercream frosting, resulting in a decadent treat for the chocolate and pumpkin lovers in your life.
Note: This post is sponsored by Adagio Teas. Opinions are mine alone.
I’m excited to share this recipe for Earl Grey Madeleines, plus an easy suggestion for a personalized gift option for tea lovers!
My sister is getting married later this year so I have been immersed in all things bachelorette, shower, and wedding over the last few months. Her bridal shower is coming up soon, so naturally, I have been thinking of different gift options to help celebrate my sister. I love a good themed gift that adds a bit of personalization, so I was thrilled when Adagio Teas contacted me recently about doing a post highlighting some of their awesome products.
Adagio’s website has an impressive number of loose teas, plus teaware, pantry items, and gift selections that can be easily curated into the perfect gift. I was immediately drawn to a 20oz Particle Teapot that is just the right size to brew tea for two. The enameled glazed iron pot is both a kettle and teapot, and includes a stainless steel infuser basket so you can steep the tea leaves right in the pot.
I scrolled through their extensive tea selection and chose a random assortment of sample sized teas so that I could include a bunch of different types in my gift for my sister. Naturally, I picked up a few for myself as well, including Earl Grey Bravo, a blend of artisan black tea from Sri Lanka, flavored with bergamot.
source: adagio.com
It probably goes without saying that I wanted to make something that would go well with the teapot and teas, so I decided to make these yummy Earl Grey Madeleines, using Earl Grey Bravo and raw honey from Adagio.
My family loves quite a range of tea, but Earl Grey is definitely a favorite of ours, so I wanted to incorporate that into the gift.
My sister is having a display shower, where gifts will not be wrapped, so I packaged them up in a large cookie jar, along with the teapot and a few sample sized teas, including Peach Oolong, Buddha’s Dream, 40 Winks, and, of course, Earl Grey Bravo.
Ingredients (makes 2 dozen madeleines):
2 cups cake flour (or all purpose flour and cornstarch, directions here)
Note: I was sent samples of Bear Mountain BBQ Wood Pellets in order to write this post. Opinions are mine alone.
With Memorial Day right around the corner, it’s time for more recipes using Bear Mountain BBQ Wood Pellets! This one is a bit different than my previous two posts fort Smoked Potato Salad and Smoked Wings… this time I’m bringing you dessert: a Smoker Grilled S’mores Skillet to be exact!
As a city girl, I don’t exactly get a lot of opportunities to roast some marshmallows over an open fire, but I do love s’mores!
This past weekend was my husband’s birthday. So to celebrate, I made him a special treat with some of his favorite ingredients: Almond Peach Crisp! My husband absolutely loves peaches, so I try to make him peachy foods from time to time.
This recipe makes about two servings, but can easily be multiplied to serve a crowd (I was afraid if I made too much, he’d eat it all in one sitting!)
Ingredients (serves 2, multiply as needed):
Peach Filling:
2 (10 oz bags) frozen sliced peaches, defrosted
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons flour
juice from 1/2 a lemon
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1/4 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
a pinch of salt
Almond Crumble:
1/4 cup each of:
flour
old-fashioned oats
brown sugar
sliced almonds
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1/4 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
