It's like eating chocolate clouds!

The other day Sister Bacon was up for a visit! I love it when I get to see my siblings because it's not all that often it happens. And the kids loved seeing Auntie Bacon as well.  While she was here I decided to try out a new 'fluff' recipe I found to see if it was good. You know when it's best time to try experimental recipes on your guests right?

 "Here try some of this. If you're still doing good in 5 minutes I'll try some too!"

Normally I try things out first but this one turned out good anyway.  And it's super easy.  The next night I was looking for a quick dessert for the kids and thought I'd whip up some of these pudding fluff cups for them! 

I love this recipe because it's super easy and fast. The kids love it because they can help make it and it tastes awesome! Even Little Boy Bacon said "Mom this tastes just like eating chocolate clouds!"  Man I love that kid!

Here's what you need:

Pudding fluff:
1 box instant pudding- any flavor and any size
1/2 the milk required on box to mix up the pudding
same amount of whip cream as milk. (you can use store bought or mix your own from heavy cream)

Take the pudding and milk and mix together.  If you are using a small box of pudding and it calls for 2 cups of milk, you want to use half the amount or one cup.  If you are using a big box of pudding and it calls for 3 cups milk, you want to use 1.5 cups ect.  Mix those up good. The kids can help with this part. 

 Once it's mixed together, you want to take your whipped cream and fold it in.  Use the same amount of whipped cream as you did milk.  Gently fold, do not mix this or you'll lose the fluffiness.  I usually do this part because none of the kids have figured out what I mean by folding yet. When I said I had to fold the whipped cream in Little boy Bacon asked if it was like folding the towels he as to do for chores!  Someday they'll be expert cooks, until then I'll do the food folding. 

 There you have the pudding fluff! You can do lots of things with this now. Sister Bacon and I just ate it by the spoon full! YUM!  You can add in things like crushed up cookies, mini chocolate chips, M&M's, or other candies.  You can use it as a dip. Some vanilla pudding would make a great fruit dip!  You can even use it to frost a cake with.  Just make sure to store the cake in the fridge once it's frosted.

I decided to crush up some graham crackers I had laying around. 

I put a few scoops into the bottom of a cute dessert cup.  Added a big scoop of the pudding fluff on top and added a dollop of whipped cream I had leftover from the mix.  This was such a huge hit with the kids they even asked for seconds!

Can't get online, better bake some bars

It feels good to be back online!  The other day our power cord died for our computer! It wasn't quite unexpected since we've had to wiggle it around for the past few weeks to get it to show up as plugged in.  But I didn't plan for it to completely stop working like it did, and being unprepared I didn't have a back up plug either.  After calling around to different places I found they are not cheap to replace at about $70!  Thankfully I did more digging before sending Mr. Bacon off to buy a new one.  Turns out after a quick search from my phone on amazon, I found one for under $15.  A couple clicks and it was on it's way.  Of course it didn't arrive when they said it would, but an extra day delay and a $55 savings wasn't too bad for my pocketbook.

But what to do when you have a few extra days to be unplugged?  Since the weather was beautiful in Minnesota the kids and I decided to bake.  One of our favorite activities.  We baked up some of Mr. Bacon's favorites, sinckerdoodles.  And for dinner we decided to make pizza puffs, which are often requested around here!  But I wanted something else, with chocolate.

I dug around the cupboard and noticed I already had everything for making bars.  What kind? They are called 'Can't leave alone bars', or 'better than xxx bars'.   But one name was too big of a name for the kids to say and the other not appropriate so we renamed them Miracle bars. Why? Because it's a miracle if there are any left at the end of the day when after you made them! Yes they are that good!

Want to know how to bake up your own?

Miracle bars

What you need:
Box of white cake mix (ignore the instructions on the back)
1 cup chocolate chips
1 can sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated!)
1/2 stick butter (1/4 cup)

2 eggs
1/3 cup oil

In mixing bowl place cake mix, eggs and oil.  Mix until dough forms

In microwave safe bowl place sweet milk, butter and chocolate chips. Microwave until the chocolate chips are melted. For me that was about a minute.  Mix well to combine everything.

Now it's time to assemble the bars.  Take 2/3 of the dough and press it into the bottom of a well greased 9x13 pan.  I like to get my hands a bit wet with water, not quite damp but not so the water is running off them either.  Wet hands will allow you to press the dough into the pan and not have it stick to you. Some people flour their hands, that's too much mess for me! Once the dough is in the bottom, pour your chocolate mixture over it. 

Next with wet hands again, pinch off a ball of dough from what is remaining in the bowl.  There is no exact amount, I'd say less than golf ball size.  Take the ball and press it flat between your hands.  Take the dough and then lay it on top of the chocolate.  Don't worry if it looks odd shaped, rips or tears while you place it on. I promise it will still taste great!  If you want to be really creative you can roll out this dough and use cookie cutters to make shapes to lay on the chocolate too!  Continue to do this until all the dough is used up. 

  

Bake them in a 350* oven for 20-25 minutes until the tops turn golden brown.  Let cool completely before cutting.  Yes that is the gooey chocolate I was talking about! ENJOY!

It's even better than it looks!

Amazing isn't it? Like one of those pieces of cake you drool over in the glass case at the restaurant. Only without the $6 a slice price tag. Even better is that it's all home made and total for the whole cake cost about $6! This is one of Mr. Bacon's favorite cakes, Cheesecake. Even better that it's a Mocha chocolate cheesecake with chocolate ganache. I don't often make this cake, can you guess why? Honestly it is probably better for me to rub it directly on my hips, than eat it. It would probably come off easier that way too! But when I do make it, I savor EVERY.SINGLE.BITE. And I don't like to share it either!

This would be the perfect cake to make for mother's day coming up. I'm sure your mom might be surprised by how it tastes. Or perhaps leave the recipe up for your wonderful better half to find and make for you. Ahh, you're worried they'd burn the kitchen down?! Ok so even if you have to make it for yourself, hide out in the bathtub with a big slice of this cheesecake, a glass of wine and a good book and treat yourself for all that hard work. (even if you're not a mom!)

Ok normally I have great pictures that help walk you step by step though my kitchen making process, but to be truthful, I forgot last night. It was late, I made those wonderful donut muffins for Mr. Bacon's breakfast too and didn't even think of my camera. But I have some mouth-watering after shots!


Mocha chocolate cheesecake:
2 cups crushed chocolate graham crackers or sandwich cookies (like oreos)
5 tbsp butter - melted
3- 8oz cream cheese, softened
1.5 cups sugar
3 eggs
3 tbsp flour
2 tbsp instant coffee
3 tbsp Kahlua or coffee liquor
2 tbsp cocoa powder
5 tbsp espresso coffee

Preheat oven to 325*. Crush crackers or cookies in a large baggie. Add melted butter. Seal the baggie and mush together until moist. Dump the cookie crumb mix into a spring form cheese cake pan and press firmly to cover the entire bottom of the pan. Place the pan in the fridge to chill. In mixing bowl (I happily use my kitchenaid mixer- who I have named Gertie) place cream cheese and sugar and mix together. Add eggs, one at a time and mix between each one. Place 1/4 of this mix in a separate bowl, and set aside. In the bowl with the remaining batter, add in flour, instant coffee (I use Maxwell house international cafe) and liquor, mix well.

Don't worry about the liquor, the alcohol will cook off when it bakes. If you don't want or have the coffee liquor, you can replace it with water. I'd mix the water and the instant coffee together first and then add it to the cream cheese mix.

Pour this mixture over the crust. Take remaining 1/4 of batter and mix in cocoa powder and espresso (If you don't have espresso, just brew up some strong coffee!) into cream cheese batter. Pour this on top of the other cheese cake mix.

Place the cheesecake into the oven and let it be! Bake it for 50-60 minutes until fluffy. It's ok if it cracked too. Take it out and let if cook on the counter for a bit (the cake will fall, so don't worry about that either) and then for 4hrs to overnight in the fridge. I found that for my cheesecakes to turn out, it's best to make them when the pitter patter of tiny feet are not running around! The cake rises better and is more fluffy.

Once it's completely cool, it's time to add the chocolate ganache. This is why it's better to plan ahead if you are making this cake and do this step the next morning.

Chocolate Ganache:
9oz chocolate chips
1 cup heavy cream

In sauce pan, heat cream until boiling. Remove from heat and add in chocolate. Stir until melted and creamy. Let the ganache cool 5 min and then pour over the top of your cheesecake. Put the cake back in the fridge to chill until you need to serve it. Or can't stand it any longer and NEED to have a piece of it!

For a fancy touch for mom's big day, add a swirl of chocolate syrup underneath.

Garnish the top if you'd like. I thought it looked great and tasted yummy with a dollop of cool whip and a few mini chocolate chips sprinkled over the top.

Indulge and enjoy every bite of it. We did!

"I do ECLAIR ... "

Yes, these will be 'Gone with the wind' too! We were out doing our shopping at Sam's Club, and there they were. All cute and delicious looking, staring back at us....chocolate eclairs. Oh how Mr. Bacon and I wanted to splurge on a treat. But at almost $10 for a small pan of them? Really, you know Ma Bacon well enough by now that I just couldn't swallow that price. Especially when I know I can make them cheaper. So I dug out my recipe for them and got to work. Now this is another one of those recipes that look WAY harder than they really are. I was intimidated the first time I made them, and then when I was done, I said- well that was too easy! And they are just too good to NOT try to make!

Here's what you need:

Chocolate Eclairs
1/2 cup butter
1 cup water
1 cup flour
1/4 tsp salt
4 eggs

Filling:
1- 3oz box instant vanilla pudding
1 3/4 cups milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup powder sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Chocolate Glaze:
2 oz (about 1/3) cup chocolate chips
2 TBSP butter
1 cup powdered sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2-3 TBSP hot water

Heat your oven to 425*.
First start off by melting your butter in water on the stove. When butter has melted and starts to boil, add in 1 cup flour and salt. Stir like crazy until a ball of dough forms!

Take the pan off the heat and add in the eggs, one at a time and mix well between each egg. Your dough will become glossy when you first start to mix the egg in, keep mixing until you don't see the glossy dough anymore.

Take a ball of dough and form it into a rope about 2"x 1" for mini eclairs (for us everything tastes better when it's in cute bite size!), or 1.5"x4" for larger eclairs and place it on a cookie sheet. No I don't have time to sit with a ruler and actually measure what I put on the pan either, I just guess! The dough might be a bit sticky to work with, I found running my hands under water (don't dry them) and then shaping the dough to work well. Repeat until all the dough is used up.

Bake 15min at 425*, then reduce the heat to 325* and bake for another 20 minutes. For minis, bake 425 for 10 min, then reduce to 325* for another 10 minutes. Watch them no matter what size you make, when they puff up between 2-3 times their size and turn golden brown it's time to take them out of the oven. Once baked, place them on a wire rack to cool.

While these are baking you can mix up the filling. In bowl mix up pudding and 1 3/4 cups milk. Little boy Bacon was happy to help mommy with this step! In mixer beat cream, 1/2 cup powder sugar and 1 tsp vanilla until soft peaks form. Does this step sound like a lot of work? If so it's ok- that's why they make cool whip too! Save yourself the work if you'd like. Next take the pudding and whipped cream and mix them together.

Filling is done! You can put it in the fridge to firm up a bit before filling the eclairs. I did find this makes a TON of filing, enough for a second batch. If you don't want to make 2 batches of eclairs (they freeze really well too!) this tastes yummy on it's own. Add some diced bananas and graham cracker crumbs for a great snack for the kids (or yourself- shhh... I won't tell anyone!)

Once the Eclairs are cooled, it's time to fill them. I find filling them first to be less mess, if you'd like to frost them first that's ok too. Sometimes if I fill first, then frost some of the filling squishes out.

I used my pastry bag with a no. 10 tip to pipe the filling inside the eclairs, taking a knife to one end first to create a hole for the filling. If you don't have a pastry bag, no problem, you can just cut a slit in the top or cut the eclair in half and spoon in the filling too. Both are just as tasty.

Once filled now it's time for frosting. In microwave safe bowl or sauce pan on stove, combine chocolate chips and butter. Once melted mix in powdered sugar, vanilla and enough water to make the frosting glaze consistency (a bit runny). Dip the tops of the eclairs in glaze and set them back on wire rack to drip off. Place in storage container with lid and keep in the fridge- that is if they actually make it that far! Can you guess how long ours lasted?