There is something you should know about most boys I know under the age of twelve. They're all addicted.
To Minecraft.
Yep. That fuzzy block shaped, animated video game featuring Lego inspired robots, sheep, spiders, diamond swords and creepers has invaded my life. It is on my phone, my husband's phone, my iPad, my husband's iPad, my laptop and our Xbox. The only good part of this game is now my youngest child has something in common with his cousin who lives two states away, whom he sees only once a year and is five years older than him. These two boys talked two hours about Minecraft. Whoa.
My oldest child was turning ten this year. He chose to have his first sleep over birthday party this year. The theme was of course...video games. Not that it was really a theme, just justification for creeper cake pops. After some surfing on google images, I made my own.
Molded cake pops are my second choice. I prefer cutting my cake into shapes. I baked a from scratch yellow cake and using a ruler, cut cubes.
2. I melted a handful of candy melts from Wilton and dipped each stick into the cake. I froze the cake pop in the freezer for 30 minutes. Then I melted the rest of the green candy melts. I dipped and then let it dry.
3. Then came the conundrum. How do I get the faces on there? I tried two methods using Wilton products: Shape-n-Amaze and Cookie icing in a glue shaped bottle. I actually thought the cookie icing looked nicer (it was shiny). However, the Shape-n-Amaze was far easier to do, so I went with that for the rest of the cake pops.
I don't know why I fussed. The kids didn't care. They were thrilled they were creepers!
Now Bake That!
My son had his first baseball game today.
So in honor of all 7 year olds trying to bat with a machine pitcher, I made soft pretzels for April's bread baking adventure!
I used a recipe I had my eye on for awhile from Cook's Illustrated, soft pretzels. However, if you don't get Cook's Illustrated or have the Baking Illustrated cookbook, I searched and found a similar recipe on about.com Homemade soft pretzel bites. The main difference in the recipe is Cook's Illustrated used honey instead of sugar and some of the quantities are different.
Anyway, I prefer pretzel sticks. So instead of rolling into snakes and making knots, I just cut the dough in 12 pieces and stretched it out before boiling. I made cheese sauce from velveeta and milk. Basically the same sauce on the box for Mac n' cheese.
My parents were visiting from Minnesota and were super happy to help trying them out. They were awesome!
Now Bake That!
My husband games. He plays video games. He does role playing online computer games. He plays card games and occasionally a board game or chess. And as geeky as it sounds, Dungeon and Dragons. Or something like it. The cool thing about him gaming is he comes home in a good mood. Not the "Packers-just-won-a- football-game-exuberant-happiness" mood... but rather chipper. It's also an excuse for me to bake! He has taken various treats to this group, bringing me back empty or nearly empty containers.
We both got out of work late so I was rushing around when he got home. Unfortunately he was home for just a few minutes before declaring he only had 15 more minutes before he had to leave again. I panicked. I was only half way into my new recipe I just found for Caramel Butter Bars. I quickly whipped up a pan of rice krispie treats made with homemade marshmallows (I had made marshmallows last week for s'mores). My husband took the rice krispie treats and I was abandoned with an entire pan of these sweet beauties:
You know it smells good if I couldn't wait to eat one before snapping a picture.
Note: I left out the sea salt by accident. They were wonderful even without that added complexity. Well there was an entire pound of butter in it, so it was destined for yumminess.
Now Bake That!
