Brownie Bites Valentine Treats

During the Christmas holidays, my sister, Laurie, gave me Espresso Brownie Bites with Kahlua Buttercream Kisses as a gift – and the Kahlua and espresso powder needed to make more of them. What a great gift idea!

Chocolate, Kahlua and Espresso – wonderful flavors!

The recipe is found on A Farmgirl’s Dabbles Blog – https://afarmgirlsdabbles.com/espresso-brownie-bites-with-kahlua-buttercream-kisses-recipe/ I followed the recipe above, but did omit the cinnamon on the top.

Brownie Bites are fun to wrap up as Valentine’s Treat

Creative Valentine cupcakes!

I made some of the small bites, then also cut out some larger circles, sandwiched them together with the buttercream and put a larger buttercream kiss on top – then placed them in a cupcake liner.

Espresso Brownie Kahlua Ice Cream Sundae

When you cut the brownie bites circles, you have tidbits of delicious brownie left over. I put the tidbits in sundae dish, added a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream, a kiss of buttercream and a drizzle of chocolate syrup. Fun recipe to be creative with! Happy Valentine’s Day!

Stained glass cookies would be fun to make for Valentine’s Day – or any holiday! If you search for “stained glass cookies” on Pinterest you will find so many ideas – from spring flowers to Christmas ornaments.

These would add a fun pop of color to your holiday arrangements – and you get to combine cookies and candy!

Start by making your favorite sugar cookie dough. You want to hold a nice crisp shape, so choose a sugar cookie dough that is refrigerated. It works better if you roll out the cookie dough between two pieces of parchment paper before you refrigerate it. Then you are ready to cut the shapes as soon as it is chilled. I used the recipe below:

https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/best-sugar-cookies/

I used alphabet stamps similar to this one to stamp “LOVE” on the cookies:

https://www.amazon.com/Cutters-Plastic-Alphabet-Numbers-Fondant/dp/B07RGGHSKL/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=baking+alphabet+stamps&qid=1575648430&s=office-products&sr=1-1

You use hard candies for the center. Place the candy in ziplock bags, cover with a kitchen towel and crush into small pieces with a rolling pin or meat mallet. Don’t crush up really fine, you want tiny shards of candy, not a fine powder. The crushed candy is sharp and tears the bag easily, so I found it helps to double up the bags , placing one inside the other. Place the candies in the inside bag and secure the top before crushing.

I tried Jolly Rancher and Life Saver candies for comparison. The Jolly Rancher cookies are on the left. I though that they had the best transparent stained glass effect. With the Life Saver cookies, on the right, the color was not as pretty. It was darker and did not smooth out as well once it was cooled.

Roll out your cookie dough about 1/4 inch thick, cut out your designs and put on a prepared baking sheet. The silicone mats work really well for this, but you could also use parchment paper.

Place your crushed up candy in a bowl and fill the area that you want to look like stained glass. Fill until almost full and then use a toothpick to spread the crushed candy evenly and into all the nooks and crannies. Be very careful – any candy specks that fall on the dough will color the cookie. You can use a damp paper towel to remove small pieces of the candy from the cookie.

When I was experimenting with different designs, I found that the cookies with large center openings looked better. The “stained glass” effect was much prettier, and if you are doing this with kids, they are much easier to fill.

When you first take the cookies out of the oven, the candy will be bubbling. This is normal, it will spread out and the bubbles will disappear as the cookies cool. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet until the cookies are completely cooled and the candy has hardened.

These were made with cherry flavored Jolly Ranchers, I found it to be the best flavor to use for a bright red color.

Blue raspberry Jolly Rancher candies made pretty snowflakes and hearts.

Sprinkle a little pearl sugar on them for a snow effect.

Have fun playing with these stained glass cookies! Enjoy!

It is going to be a “blue” Christmas for many of us….not being able to gather together and share holiday hugs, but we can share through Zoom gatherings and FaceTime. We can also share recipes so everyone can bake and cook traditional recipes at their home. At least for me, baking will make the holidays better.

This is a festive recipe from Sally’s Baking Blog – sprinkles on the inside of the cookie and the outside.

These are made with dry cake batter mix, so they have an extra special holiday flavor!

Sprinkles and white chocolate chips look so good together! Gather your holiday sprinkles together and bake some cookies! It will make you feel better! Merry Christmas!

For the recipe and complete instructions, click on the link below:

https://sallysbakingaddiction.com/recipe-round-2-cake-batter-chocolate-chip-cookies/