Lemon Cream cupcakes

I wanted to try a recipe from my new cookbook that I got for Christmas.

We had bought a lemon cake mix the last time we went shopping so I went with this recipe. For those of you that don't have this book, here's the recipe:

Lemon Cream cupcakes

1 box lemon cake mix

2 eggs

1 cup sour cream

1 (8 oz) package cream cheese

2 Tbsp. grated lemon zest

1 recipe whipped cream

1 tsp. lemon extract

1/2 cup crushed lemon drop candy

Mix together cake mix, eggs, sour cream, and cream cheese until smooth and creamy. Add grated lemon zest and combine. Scoop batter into paper liners, filling 3/4 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 15-18 minutes or until cake springs back when lightly touched. Remove and cool cupcakes on a wire rack. Add lemon extract to whipped cream and combine well. Top cooled cupcakes with lemon whipped cream and crushed lemon candies.

I love frosting and didn't want to do the whipped cream thing so I found a lemon butter cream frosting recipe also in the book and went with that.

Lemon frosting

8 Tbsp. (1 stick) butter at room temp

3 3/4 cup powdered sugar, sifted

3-4 Tbsp. milk or cream

1-2 drops food coloring

2 tsp lemon extract

Can I just say yum?

There's something about home made frosting.

I need to work on my frosting technique but they taste awesome and that's what I'm going with. They were also super easy. I didn't sift the powdered sugar or put the lemon zest in the batter and they still turned out great - aren't those just suggestions anyways?

I'm good at leaving out things that I don't love in a recipe.

Anyways, I need to get these out of my house cause they are good!

Chocolate graham crackers

 

For those of you that don't like to spend hours in the kitchen, here is a simple treat.

I always have some left over icing when I make cake bites and I hate to waste things.

So, I grab some graham crackers and make chocolate graham crackers out of them.

Yum!

If you don't have any icing, you can mix cocoa powder, powdered sugar, vanilla, a little butter and warm water until you get the right consistency and flavor.

That's the way my mom always made them when I was a kid and they were just as yummy!

Oreo Truffles

I've been wanting to try these for a while because they sounded a lot like the cake bites I've been making except with cookies.

The recipe is simple: crush 36 Oreo cookies and mix with one 8 ounce package of cream cheese. Roll into balls and refrigerate. Then cover in melted chocolate.

Easy right?

Well, when discussing this recipe with a co-worker, she suggested using a food processor to crush the cookies because otherwise you can't get the crumbs fine enough.

I should have listened.

The recipe suggested putting them in a bag and using a rolling pin to crush them for people without food processors. So, since I did not have a food processor, I tried the rolling pin idea and that didn't work so well. I spent a half hour trying to get the cookies fine enough by first using a rolling pin and then I dumped the large crumbs in a bowl and used a potato masher to try to crush them finer and in the end I was just crushing the large pieces with my fingers - I almost drove to Wal-Mart right then and bought a food processor because it was so frustrating.

I finally got them small enough and mixed them with the cream cheese and rolled them into balls. Then I put them in the fridge and was done for the night. 

The next day I went to Wal-Mart and look what I bought:

I picked this up for 5 dollars and used it to crush the few remaining Oreos to sprinkle on top.

So easy.

This is what the Oreo truffles look like before dipping them in chocolate.

And, here's the final product. Yum! My husband approves so they must be good.

Oh and make sure you put the dipped oreo balls on wax paper to dry so you can easily take them off.
The first dozen that I dipped were put on a clean metal sheet pan and I had to use a spatula to get them off.
And, since these have cream cheese in them, it is best to refrigerate them.