Preorder my book Sweets on a Stick: 150 kid friendly recipes for cakes,candies, cookies and Pies on the Go!

Yay! Someone told me yesterday they saw my book for preorder (Thanks Miss M)on one of the big sites so I popped in to have a look and they were right.

So as though I had nothing better to do I popped into all the online book sites and guess what nearly all of them had it listed........

Here it is at Amazon



and for those in Australia and New Zealand who like to buy from Fishpond.....

Sweets on a Stick: 150 Kid-Friendly Recipes for Cakes, Candies, Cookies, and Pies on the Go!

and I also spied it over at book depository, borders and a stack of other places.

Then I spent time on the phone with my mum giggling about the little author blurb which is all true but just funny to read on Amazon about yourself.

Remember if your outside of the US this book is a US release with weights and measurements accordingly, although there is a conversion table in the back.

OK today I promise to spend my time better and get some photo's of the cutest new cake pops I made.

Kinda Famous S'more Whoopie Pies

 I love whoopie pies. They are the perfect combination of cookie and cake with a big ole' dollop of sweet filling in between.

Every now and then I still see a post professing that they are the new cupcake, or macarons, which you know considering how long they have been around is kinda funny. In fact I know I did one myself a while back.

Just had to pop in a pic with these cute tags I picked up from Luminoso blu

It doesn't really matter to me if they're popular or not, just that they're yummy. I find them comforting. Pretty much they are one of the few things that I can not stop eating until I can't possibly fit in another one in. It is not unusual for me to eat 3 or 4 a day when I have baked a batch.

A couple of weeks ago I was sitting around thinking I didn't have much on so I grabbed out my copy of my trustee Whoopie Pies by Sarah Billingsley and Amy Treadwell  and thought I'd whip up a batch of their S'more whoopies.......



No such luck, I didn't have any graham flour, not a bit to be found or the ingredients to make it up myself so I decided to modify their recipe to see how it worked out.

It worked out pretty well, they were pretty yummy, I would recommend eating them within a couple of days for the best results as they became a little denser with age, unlike the chocolate chip whoopies I usually make.

Oh and I feel like these whoopies are famous now. They were included in a cookie bar at a super amazing Western Party by Sharnel Dollar designs and featured on Amy Atlas.

S'moreWhoopie Pies adapted from Whoopie pies by Sarah Billingsley and Amy Treadwell

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
3/4 cups wheat germ
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
115g (1/2 stick or 4oz) unsalted butter
1 cup brown sugar lightly packed
2 large eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 Tbsp milk
1 tsp bicarb (baking soda)
1 tsp white vinegar
1 tsp vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 190C (375F ) and line a couple of baking trays with parchment paper.

Sift flour, baking powder and salt into a bowl and whisk in the wheat germ.

At high speed beat the sugar and brown sugar until light and creamy. Reduce speed to med low and add the eggs one at a time beating until combined and then the buttermilk and vanilla, mix well.

Combine the milk, baking soda and vinegar in a bowl.

Add half the flour mixture to the butter/egg mix and mix on low until combined. Mix in the milk mixture and then the remaining flour mix and continue to mix until well combined.

Using a spoon drop Tablespoons of batter onto the lined baking trays leaving lots of room for the mixture to spread (around 7cm or 2 inches) and bake for 10 minutes or until the cakes begin to brown.

Cool on trays for 5 minutes and gently remove to wire rack to cool.

Sandwich these cakes together with marshmallow creme filling and chocolate ganache. I made a dam of chocolate ganache around the edge of the bottom pie and then filled it with marshmallow creme. When joined together the marshmallow oozed nicely over the top of the ganache. I would probably add another dollop of ganache into the middle of the pie in future for added chocolate yumminess.

Click here for the marshmallow creme recipe

Chocolate ganache, in a microwave on med low setting melt together 225 grams chocolate with 1/2 cup cream for 90 second bursts, stirring between each interval until melted. Leave on a bench to cool and set until firm enough to pipe or spread.

Snowflake flurry cookie bites - cute mini square Christmas cookies

 
I feel like the supermarkets dragging out the the Christmas decorations half way through the year, but I do have a valid reason.

One of my friends is hosting a Christmas in July celebration and asked me to make some of my white snowflake cookies and snowflake cake pops.

Anyhoo to cut a long story short I had just spied some super cute square cookies here and here I was really feeling the square cookie love.



So I decided to try out some incy wincy little square snowflake cookies in a few simple designs and colours.

I'm a bit of a fan of bite sized cookies. I would rather have 2 or 3 tiny cookies than a large one any day so these are perfect for me.

Equipment and Ingredients

24 mini square chocolate cookies
Ready Rolled Fondant (I used Bakels) or marshmallow fondant
mini square cookie cutter (mine was a plastic one from a d.line set which is straight on one side and ruffled on the other)
ball tool
edible silver balls
non toxic glitter or preferably edible glitter
Edible glue (I made mine up with water and Tylose powder)
Snowflake plunger set

Each set was 12 cookies made using a 3.5cm (1 3/8 inch) square cutter then I covered each cookie with ready rolled fondant rolled out on a benchtop dusted with cornflour (cornstarch) to a couple of mm (1/8inch) thick and adhered to the cookie using a little water and pressing on with the rolling pin.

For the single snowflakes I pressed out a snowflake using the smallest cutter from a snowflake plunger set and adhered it to the fondant covered cookie with a teeny amount of water. Using the small end of a ball tool I made an indent into each corner, brushed the indent with a little edible glue and pressed in an edible silver ball.

For the cropped double snowflakes I cut out two snowflakes using the smallest cutter from the snowflake plunger set for each cookie arranged them like I wanted them to sit on the cookie and using the same square cutter I used for the cookies I pressed down to remove the excess edges, using a sharp knife I evened up the edges and adhered the snowflakes to the fondant covered cookie.

For the large cropped snowflake I used the medium snowflake cutter from the plunger set and using the same technique described above cropped the snowflake. In the opposite corner to the snowflake I used the small end of a ball tool to make an indent, brushed the indent with a little edible glue and pressed in an edible silver ball. I then used a ziplock bag filled with royal icing to pipe 5 dots in a curved around the snowflake.


For the random line cookies I piped 2 lines close together at the bottom, a line at an angle crossing the double lines, a single line near the middle of the cookie and another further up near the top. For the white cookie I sprinkled a little non toxic glitter onto the bottom lines to add some interest.