Banana Boats

Today was my big one’s last full day of K…Monday will be filled with celebration and good-byes. It’s a soggy, gray day here and he keeps announcing that he'd like to stay in K forever, so I brightened the afternoon with a quick homemade treat.

Banana Boats

Banana
Chocolate Chips
Optional: ice cream + sprinkles

Place peeled bananas on a cookie sheet, and cut a thin divvet down the length of the banana (“it looks like a canoe!”). Fill the gap with chocolate chips, replace the banana top as best you can (to prevent the chocolate chipes from burning under the broiler...it doesn't need to look pretty) and broil on low heat until the chocolate chips are melted and the banana is slightly warmed. Serve with ice cream if you’d like!

Yummy Homemade Frosting

We like cake in our house. I’m a push over when it comes to sweets. If one of my boys announces that it’s a stuffed animal’s birthday…we bake a cake. Usually it’s me baking and them (ok fine, all of us) doing the eating, so I was pleased that my older son wanted in on the baking action last weekend.

The Homemade Frosting (I pretty much put on every cake around here)
Cream Cheese (bricks)
Powdered Sugar
Pure Vanilla Extract (or any other type of extract: lemon, etc.)

Let the cream cheese bricks soften a bit. Whip (I use a hand mixer) at least 2 bricks of cream cheese with a couple teaspoons of vanilla and start with half a bag of powdered sugar. Continue to add sugar until desired level of sweetness, and vanilla until desired taste. Color with food coloring, if you desire something jazzier that pure white.

Cinnamon Chocolate Brownies

With today’s drizzle came a massive amount of baking and a tent/fort that took over our living room. I now have (totally decadent) Cinnamon Chocolate Brownies cooling on one counter…Sweet Corn Muffins with Cranberries and Honey cooling on another…and crammed onto a third are Lemon Cupcakes and a big Lemon sheet cake that my son will decorate tomorrow after school in anticipation of a Bake Sale to benefit Horizons….oh, and my living room looks like a tornado went through it.

I risk sharing the Cinnamon Chocolate Brownie recipe; for fear that no one will buy these brownies if they know how much butter went into them. But, I am going to take that risk because they’re just too amazing not to whip up, and to share. This recipe is slightly modified from one I found on Epicurious.com a couple years back and has become my go to brownie recipe.

Cinnamon Chocolate Brownies
(Makes one jelly roll/rimmed baking sheets worth…enough to share with several friends)

1 cup all-purpose flour
At least 4 Tablespoons cinnamon
Dash of salt

1 12 oz bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips
3 sticks of butter (ideally at room temp)

7 eggs
2 cups of sugar
4 Tablespoons vanilla extract

1 12 oz. bag a semi-sweet chocolate chips (yes, this is a second bag)
6 Tablespoons unsalted butter (ideally at room temp)
5 Tablespoons whipping cream

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter & flour a jelly roll pan (large, rimmed baking sheet).

Mix flour, cinnamon and salt in a small bowl.

In a double boiler** stir the chocolate and butter until melted and smooth.

Turn the heat off and let the chocolate stand for a couple minutes while you beat the eggs/sugar/vanilla in a large mixing bowl. Add the flour mixture to the egg/sugar/vanilla one, blending well. Gradually add the chocolate mixture, whipping until combined. (You’ll be able to tell because it will go from a pretty marbled appearance to a dark, rich chocolately one.)

Pour the batter into your buttered/floured jelly roll pan. Bake for approximately 35 minutes, or until tester toothpick comes out almost completely clean. Cool the brownies on your countertop.

In the meantime, make the ganache. Back to the double boiler, you’ll combine the second bag of chocolate chips, the second batch of butter, and the whipping cream, stirring with a whisk until melted and smooth. Pour over brownies. Then pop the whole big baking sheet into your fridge until the ganache is set.

These brownies can be prepared 2 days ahead. In fact, I think they are better if you prepare them ahead of the day you plan to serve them. Simply cut them and layer them in a Tupperware between wax paper and store them the fridge.

** If you do not have a double boiler you can simply improvise by nesting a metal mixing bowl inside a saucepan filled with a couple inches of water. A double boiler prevents the chocolate from burning since the top pot is kept above the boiling water and heated only by steam.

Classy Kid and Cookies

I had pipedreams of going to a Parent’s Association meeting at my son’s school all by myself today…enjoying a (hot) cup of coffee with fellow moms….actually hearing what the speaker had to say…and capping my morning off with an organic latte and a treat at Le Pain Quotodien. Instead, I had our little one in tow. The novelty of my purse full of pens, play-doh and little cars and trucks quickly wore off, as did drinking half & half through a skinny straw. At the ripe age of two, my son decided it was time to go…and right then. So he did his attention grabbing “Dammit!” yell a couple times over and we quickly exited the meeting.

Score? Toddler: 1, Mommy: 0.

With our playgroup cancelled and the weather totally foul, I was in no mood to play trains or Candyland…again. So, I suggested we make some cookies. After all, what is a pity party without cake or cookies? If you’re looking for a rainy weekend activity, I can confirm (10 cookies later) that these are worth whipping up.

2 sticks of organic butter, softened (or done so in the microwave for 20 seconds)
1 cup dark brown sugar
½ cup Turbinado sugar
2 eggs
2 Tablespoons vanilla
1 ½ cups King Arthur White Whole Wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
hearty dash of cinnamon (2 Tablespoons or so)
sprinkling of ginger (1/2 or 1 teaspoon)
3 cups Quaker oats
Copious amounts of semi-sweet chocolate chips (at least a bag, come on these are cookies…)
1 cup dried cranberries or raisins (optional, but the chocolate is not in my book)

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper (for easier clean-up).
Using a hand mixer, beat the butter and sugars together until creamy.
Add eggs and vanilla; mix.
Add flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and ginger; mix.
Add oats, chocolate chips and cranberries (or any other ingredients you’re adding); mix.
Form drop cookies and bake 10-12 minutes, or until a nice golden brown.