Claudia's Cookbook

Desserts

Rolo Cheesecake Brownies

Claudia's Cookbook- Rolo Cheesecake Brownies 19I apologize for the lack of posts over the past few weeks. It’s been rather hectic over here. First, we were hit with a terrible winter storm here in Winnipeg. They called it a blizzard in the forecast, but it actually didn’t reach blizzard proportions. It was close though. Then a couple days later, I somehow managed to hurt my back taking down our Christmas tree. Yeah, don’t ask. Needless to say, it rendered me useless and confined to the couch for the better part of a week. Today is the first day I can honestly say I feel much better and am able to move around without shrieking in pain.

The storm and the hurt back taught me a very important lesson about myself: I really dislike being cooped up in the house for days on end. I guess it would have been okay if I was able to stand long enough to get my bake on. Sadly, I wasn’t able to until last night. I wanted to make sure my resurrection into the food blogging world was a good one for you. I think I hit it out of the ballpark with these Rolo Cheesecake Brownies! They are rich and super delicious. They have the perfect balance of sweetness with the salted caramel and dark chocolate. Not to mention the cream cheese and rolo candies! You will not be disappointed when you try this recipe. Best of all – it’s crazy easy!

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Desserts

Cheese and Caramel Popcorn

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My best friend Denise is infatuated with Garrett Mix popcorn. Like, obsessed! When we went to New York City this past November, she bought two jumbo bags for herself and carried them onto the plane. One jumbo bag could probably fit a small child, I kid you not! I don’t blame Denise for her love of this popcorn. It’s seriously delicious. I often wonder if they lace it with something because it’s beyond addictive. So much in fact that I felt the need to replicate it in some way. I can honestly say, this recipe is not as good as Garrett’s, but since I don’t live anywhere near the closest store and refuse to pay the shipping costs, this recipe is a solid solution to my cheddar/caramel popcorn cravings.

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Our Most Popular Recipes of 2012

2012 was a fantastic year. I can’t believe it’s almost over! I wanted to take an opportunity to thank you all again for visiting our blog – whether it was for the first time or your tenth time.

Today, I wanted to recap our top 12 recipes for 2012. I always find it fascinating to see which recipes resonate the most with our readers. In our 3 years of blogging, our most popular recipes always tend to be the Ukrainian dishes. Our all-time most popular recipe is Cabbage Rolls, which was one of my very first posts on the blog. Without further adieu – here is your top 12 of 2012!

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#12 – Fiery Roasted Tomato and Garlic Soup – Without a doubt, this is my favourite soup of all-time. It’s creamy, rich and packed with a lot of delicious flavour.

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#11 – Pumpkin Snickerdoodles with Vanilla Icing – These were a pretty big hit with my friends. These cookies are soft, warm and sweet. Besides, who doesn’t like hints of cinnamon, ginger and pumpkin…especially in the autumn season.

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#10 – Salted Caramel Chocolates – This creation was the end result of me getting really into using chocolate molds. Not to mention, I love salted caramel. These treats are really easy to make and super delicious. There is nothing better than homemade chocolates in my humble opinion.

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#9 – Wookiee Cookies – My love of Star Wars resulted in my love for these cookies. The recipe is from the Star Wars cookbook that I received for a birthday present. These cookies start out as your basic chocolate chip cookies until you add cinnamon to them. They are delicious, and my fiancé’s favourite cookies!

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#8 – Danish Apple Bake – This apple dish is buttery, flaky and full of flavour. I still love my former coworker for this recipe!

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#7 – Rolo Brownie Trifles – This individual trifle recipe is decadent and rich – a perfect guilty pleasure treat. You simply can’t go wrong with Rolo candies, brownie, gooey salted caramel, and chocolate whipped cream!

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#6 – Pyrizkhy (Ukrainian Cabbage Buns) – As I mentioned earlier, Ukrainian recipes tend to be the most popular on my site. I posted this recipe a week ago and it made the Top 12 of 2012! These turned out to be a big hit for our Ukrainian Christmas Eve dinner this year.

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#5 – Chocolate Dipped Cream Cheese Butter Cookies – These cookies are a nice twist on the traditional holiday butter/sugar cookie. The cream cheese makes the cookie a little denser and the chocolate adds a nice sweetness. These were another big hit this year at Christmas time.

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#4 – Cadbury Mini Egg Cookies – These cookies are an all-time favourite amongst my friends. Since you can now purchase Mini Eggs year round, I try to only make these beauties around Easter, to not overdo it of course. I often get requests from my friends to make them during the non-Easter season and I cannot help but oblige. These are truly delicious!

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#3 – Pumpkin Caramel Dream Cake – An adaption to our very popular Skor Cake, this Pumpkin Caramel Dream Cake is rich and full of caramel and pumpkin flavor. Perfect for the autumn season…or any season!

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#2 – Egg Nog Cupcakes – Perfect for the holiday season, these cupcakes are sweet, dense and moist. I am not a huge egg nog fan, but these cupcakes have the perfect amount of egg nog flavour.

IMG_6209#1 – Imperial (or Empire) Cookies – I was so happy to see that this recipe was #1 in 2012. I love these cookies. They remind me of my days as a Starbucks Barista. They are soft, delicate and delicious. I choose to make them with Claudia’s Raspberry Jam recipe, but you can always use your own favourite.

So there you have it – our 12 most popular recipes of 2012! What were your favourite recipes in 2012 – from either our blog or another? Please comment and let me know!

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Merry Christmas & Happy Holidays!

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Wishing all of our dear blog followers and your families a very Merry Christmas, Happy Holidays and a wonderful New Year!

We recognize that this site would not be possible without any of you. Both Claudia and I hope you take the time this holiday season to relax, rejuvenate and connect with your loved ones over some fabulous food.

See you in 2013!

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Desserts

Egg Nog Cupcakes…and a surprise engagement.

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Two weeks ago I ventured to New York City with my best friend Denise for a quick 4-day vacation. NYC is by far my favourite city in the entire world. The hustle and bustle, lights, and delicious restaurants and bakeries on every corner is what I love most about the city. But after this latest trip, I have a whole new reason. On my last night in NYC, Denise and I ventured to Rockefeller Centre to see the infamous Christmas tree all lit up. Well, to make a long story short, it wasn’t lit up (apparently they turn it off at 10:30pm to conserve energy). I’m not going to lie – I was very disappointed. Mainly because I had been there for 3 nights already and this was my last opportunity to see the tree lit up before we departed the next day. While I was pouting and feeling sorry for myself, I decided to make the most of the evening and take some photos of my surroundings.

30 Rockefeller Centre © 2012 Claudia's Cookbook. All Rights Reserved.

As I was taking the photo above of 30 Rock, I heard a very familiar (and male) voice. I turn around to see my boyfriend, whom I thought was back at home in Winnipeg, standing there in the middle of Rockefeller Centre with a bakery box in hand. After the initial shock of seeing him wore off, he tells me to open the box.Proposal cupcakes

A proposal to rival all proposals. I was speechless but had enough strength to say “Yes”. And how could I not – besides it being the most amazing proposal ever, those red velvet cupcakes were the most delicious I have ever tasted – thanks to Tribeca Treats!

In honour of the holiday season, and the most important day of my life thus far, I wanted to bake and share a recipe that I love this time of year. These Egg Nog Cupcakes are dense, moist and sweet. Also, how can you possibly say no to egg nog buttercream icing?! Even if you aren’t a true egg nog fan, you will enjoy these.

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Desserts

Chocolate Dipped Cream Cheese Butter Cookies

I’m not going to lie…one of the reasons I love the holiday season is the 12 Days of Cookies emails I receive from the Food Network. Just when you think you’ve seen all the Christmas baking recipes there is, another one lands in my inbox and become nearly giddy. Yeah, I probably could use a hobby besides baking. But who has the time?!

I finally found time in Claudia’s busy retirement schedule (I swear she’s busier now that she doesn’t work full time!) to fit in some quality baking with her for this blog. Last night she came over and we decided to try a couple new butter cookie recipes we have been eyeing. This one was the big hit. You really cannot lose when you incorporate cream cheese into the dough and dipping the cookie in chocolate! These are a nice twist on the traditional holiday butter/sugar cookie. The cream cheese makes the cookie a little denser and the chocolate adds a nice sweetness. Because the dough needed to be chilled, Claudia decided to make the dough prior to us getting together, so I do not have any pictures of these steps. I figured combining all ingredients into a bowl didn’t really require visual representation anyway.

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Desserts

The Best Bran Muffins in the World

I love receiving recipe requests. After blogging for a few years now, sometimes it’s hard to come up with recipes every week to share. This recipe was a request from somebody on our Facebook page and we couldn’t be happier to share it with you. I’m a very picky bran muffin connoisseur. Most of the time I find them to be really dry and flavourless. This recipe is the complete opposite. These muffins are extremely moist and very versatile, with a deep sweet flavour that comes from the brown sugar. The original recipe calls for raisins, but Claudia prefers dates in her bran muffins so we decided to feature that instead. However, you can simply swap out the same quantity of dates for raisins if you prefer Raisin Bran Muffins instead.

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Desserts

Cranberry Bliss Cookies


It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas here in Canada. The image below is what I woke up to this morning. Our first big snowfall of the year:

It seriously made me want to watch one of my favourite holiday movies, Elf, and put up my Christmas tree. I decided it was a little too early for that, given it was only mid-November. I did however get a jumpstart on my holiday baking with these amazing Cranberry Bliss Cookies! I love Starbucks and their classic holiday pastry – the Cranberry Bliss Bar. I thought these cookies were a perfect modification. These cookies are decadent, with a yummy layer of cream creese, dried cranberry and white chocolate icing. They really do taste like the holidays!

Recipe adapted from: Gimme some oven

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Desserts

Danish Apple Bake

 

Time sure flies when you are busy. My personal goal with this blog is to connect and share a recipe once a week. When I realized it had been over 3 weeks since my last post, I realized priorities needed to be shifted and plans to bake needed to be made.

I have been meaning to share this recipe for a while now. I received it a few years ago from a former boss of mine. She brought this delectable treat into the office one afternoon and I immediately fell in love with it. I had to have the recipe. She was gracious enough to type it out and email it to me that day. The crust is buttery and flakey and the filling is sweet with hints of cinnamon and baked apples. Perfect for autumn.

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