It's About Time

FINALLY!

I have baked something. I realize that it has been about a month since the last time I baked. I blame it on taking 20 credit hours and having to shop for my own groceries.

Well, I have two lovely fall-ish items for you to enjoy.

1) Peanut Butter Cheesecake Bites Dipped in Chocolate

For the first, I had to bring a dessert for my Nourish International Party (a group dedicated to sustainable development projects) so I decided to go with peanut butter cheesecake bites dipped in chocolate.

Well, I realized about half way through that the cheesecake bites were pretty similar to buckeyes, but I decided to go through with them anyway. They actually weren't that hard to make, but they required a lot of fridge time. I'm glad I started the recipe the night before!

They turned out delicious, but VERY rich. They are different from buckeyes because, even though they are pretty peanut buttery, they still taste like cheesecake. I did run out of regular chocolate half way through, so I made some of them with (blue) white chocolate.

2) Low-Cal Pumpkin Cupcakes Topped with Caramel Glaze

This recipe is one that my roommate, Kate (bestfootforward-kate.blogspot.com), recommended (and bought the ingredients for). It is a pumpkin cupcake topped with a caramel glaze. It was really easy to make, and the best part about it--each cupcake has 108 CALORIES!! I had to resist the urge to top it with a cream cheese frosting (which would defeat the point of making this low-cal recipe), but they still turned out yummy!

Here are the cupcakes without the glaze:
And with the glaze...Look out for more fall-related blogs in the near future! Enjoy!!

Older Desserts

Because I just started this, I will attach some of my older recipes!

1. Here are my meringue cupcakes filled with creme fraiche and berry compote (courtesy of Martha Stewart cupcakes). These took 3 HOURS to bake! They were very yummy though and worth the wait.

2. Here are mini dark chocolate salted-caramel cupcakes (courtesy of Martha Stewart cupcakes). They are dark chocolate filled with a delicious salty caramel filling and topped with a dark chocolate frosting.

3. These are a variation of Martha Stewart's

Lemon Meringue

cupcakes. My family

prefers key lime to

lemon meringue, so I

substituted lime curd

for lemon. They are

lime flavored cupcakes topped with lime curd, browned meringue

frosting, and lime zest. They were really light and delicious!

4. These are mini raspberry cheesecakes topped with fresh raspberries (courtesy of Martha Stewart). They were pretty tasty, and I'm sure would have been even tastier had I used the right amount of cream cheese!

5. These are a combination of recipes. For my sister's wedding shower, she wanted blueberry cupcakes with buttercream frosting. I used Martha Stewart's blueberry cupcake recipe, and then added a basic buttercream on top tinted to be the colors of her wedding. They are in cute flower cupcake liners and topped with edible pearls.