Home made granola bars

My sister Jen came over the other day with her kids and father-in-law after we visited the pumpkin patch. She also brought cinnamon buns (which we promptly consumed by Nica) and homemade granola. Now normally I detest granola. I find it way too chewy and dry and... healthy (Lord forbid). But I took one bite of hers and I couldn't stop! I asked for piece after piece until it was all gone (sorry kids).

Surprisingly, Ariana who normally eats everything didn't like it even though it had raisins and it was sweet. Must have been the texture.

Here is the recipe that I can't wait to try out:

http://www.canadianliving.com/food/gluten_free_chewy_honey_nut_snack_bars.php

Ingredients

• 1/4 cup (60 mL) almond butter or natural peanut butter
• 1/4 cup (60 mL) liquid honey
• 2 tbsp (30 mL) packed brown sugar
• 2 tbsp (30 mL) vegetable oil
• 1/4 tsp (1 mL) salt
• 1/4 tsp (1 mL) cinnamon
• 2/3 cup (150 mL) gluten-free large-flake rolled oats
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) chopped pecans
• 1/2 cup (125 mL) chopped dates
• 1/3 cup (75 mL) hulled unsalted sunflower seeds
• 1 egg white

Preparation

In saucepan, bring almond butter, honey, brown sugar, oil, salt and cinnamon to boil over medium heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved, about 1 minute. Let cool slightly.

Meanwhile, in bowl, combine rolled oats, pecans, dates and sunflower seeds; set aside.

Whisk egg white into honey mixture; fold in oat mixture until evenly coated. Press firmly into parchment paper–lined or greased foil-lined 8-inch (2 L) square cake pan.

Bake in 325°F (160°C) oven until golden brown, about 20 minutes. Let cool in pan on rack for 30 minutes. Refrigerate until cold, about 1 hour. Cut into bars.

Lemon Blueberry Cake

Going to a girlfriend's house tomorrow and I've been dying to make some moist lemon blueberry cake. Victoria (again), had this recipe to share. Going to try this one and another one I found on Allrecipes.com. We'll see how they compare! I think Victoria's will be quite moist because she has sour cream in it (and I love baking breads and cakes with sour cream because it makes them super moist). I'm not a fan of those crumbly cakes. Anyway, stay tuned for results!

Lemon Blueberry Cake:

2 ¼ cup fresh blueberries

16 tbsp (2 sticks) softened butter

1 ½ cups granulated sugar

Grated zest and juice of 2 lemons

3 eggs

3 cups flour

1 cup sour cream

1 ½ tsp baking soda

Glaze:

2 cups icing sugar

½ cup fresh lemon juice

Preheat oven to 350F. butter/line a 10 inch tube pan

Freeze blueberries, this will keep the berries from sinking to the bottom of the cake

In a mixing bowl, beat together butter, sugar, lemon zest at high speed unti light in colour. Add lemon juice, eggs, and 1 cup of flour. Mix at medium speed until the batter is smooth and well blended.

Add sour cream, another cup of flour, and the baking soda. Mix at low speed until no traces of flour remain.

Combine frozen blueberries with remaining cup of flour. Fold this mixture into the batter, which should feel very thick.

Spoon dough into the prepared tube pan. Bake for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool for 15 minutes in the pan. Let the cake cool completely before removing it from its pan.

Glaze: Mix together confectioners sugar and lemon juice until smooth. Drizzle over the cake.

October 5th update: 
Made the loaf last night - Ariana helped! We did have one egg fatality. 

Baking notes:
Instead of one big loaf, made four mini loaves and some mini cupcakes too. I think my icing sugar was too old or maybe I didn't whip it enough because it had lumps in it and was really runny. I've given one loaf to Ariana's daycare (with the glaze in a separate container) and will take one to my mom's tonight as well as Julie's. Nica and Ariana both ate some this morning for breakfast and Nica originally gave it an 8.5 out of 10 but upped it to 9 out of 10 when he couldn't come up with why. He said he really liked the lemon-y taste. Ariana on her first taste test, picked out all the blueberries so all I saw on the floor were lemon crumbles.

 I forgot to add the baking soda when adding the flour the second time and only folded the baking soda in, instead of mixing it thoroughly. Not sure what affect this has had on the results, but it seems ok so far. I used pastry flour instead of all-purpose which should helped give it a lighter texture (versus heavy loaf). Seemed to work pretty well. 

I have no idea how cake shops do it, but I'm trying to figure out how they get a soft top to their loaves. This one, when finally baked, has a hardened top.  Maybe it's just how my oven works?

Peanut Butter Reeses Pieces Cookies

Stole another recipe for my friend Victoria who bakes the most amazing desserts. Surprisingly, she's never owned a Kitchenaid until recently. Don't know how she survived without one!

Anyway, I've had these cookies before - yum, yum, yum. I tried to make them once but never successfully bought a bag of peanut butter cups that survived to make it into cookies. Ah well. Maybe this time...?

I'll post a photo when I finally attempt this!

Peanut Butter Reeses Pieces Cookies

Combine:

½ cup white sugar

½ cup firmly packed light brown sugar

½ cup softened margarine or butter

And beat until light and fluffy

Add:

½ cup smooth peanut butter (measure PB after using half cup measure for flour and it won’t stick)

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

Blend for several minutes.

Add dry ingredients:

1 ¼ cup flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

Pinch salt, more if PB is unsalted and fold in

Batter will be fairly loose. Chill some hours of overnight. Put bags of PB cups in the fridge too

Pre-heat oven to 350F. Makes 4-7 dozen depending on how skimpy you scoop the PB cookies. Be sure to get at least two bags of mini PB cups

Bring dough out at the same time you start the oven preheating. Unwrap the PB cups and put back in the fridge.

Roll 1” balls of cookie dough and place in muffin tins – use the paper liners because these are greasy! You don’t need a lot of batter per cookie – they rise a lot. Press finger into the top of the ball to spread the dough a little. Bake for 6-7 minutes, or until it starts to brown on the edges.

Remove pans from the oven. The cookies will have puffed up, firmly place a peanut butter cup in the middle of each cookie “pillow”. Cookie edges should be even with or above the candy, as much as possible. Place back in the oven for a minute or two to melt the chocolate.

Remove and cool on racks for some time until the chocolate has set back up again. This will take at least an hour. Do not rush this part.