An Apple Tale

Applesauce Spice Muffins

1/2 cup hard margarine

1/2 cup white sugar

2 eggs

1 cup white flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsps baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon 

1 tsp allspice

1 jar homemade applesauce (a little more than a cup)

Makes 1 dozen large muffins. Bake at 350 for 22 minutes. 

So, I have to go back in time a bit to tell this story. Mothers' Day to be precise. Some lovely anonymous person dropped off two huge boxes of apples in front of our church (and other local churches as well) along with some small cardboard containers and a note for moms to help themselves. Amazing, I think. Anyways, due to the fact of being the pastor's wife and that these apples were at both churches we attended that day, I came home with ALOT of apples. Golden Delicious and Ambrosia! Well that day I made apple crisp (probably along with every other mom who goes to church in the area) for my family for dessert. Then we took a vacation. When we got home I realized I had more apples than we could eat before they were done for and I don't waste food! So I cut up as many apples as would fit in my crockpot (didn't peel them, too much work) added some water and honey and a little sugar and some cinnamon to make it smell good and eight beautiful hours later I had some yummy chunky applesauce (yes that is my recipe, pretty specific, eh?). I let it cool, put it in jars and stuck them in the freezer (Jacob dropped one jar full of applesauce on the ground in the basement on the way to the freezer... Yea for a mess on the only carpet in the whole house). I think it made about 6 jars. So, today I realized I had stuck a jar in the fridge and figured it has been there a week, I better use it up. And this recipe was what I made. These muffins are so soft and yummy and just the right amount of spice. Enjoy! 

Happy 3rd Birthday Daniel!

So my little guy is three... and he told me exactly what he wanted for his cake - James Cake. That would be James from Thomas the Train. Anyways, here it is:

I forgot to take a picture, but the inside of the cake was tye-dye blue.
Blue is his favourite colour.

Blow!! (Three blows, one for each candle, so cute!)

Birthday Shirt I made for him. Got totally stained today.

Dancing Daniel.

More PB&C

That's peanut butter and chocolate... One of my favourite dessert combos. A friend gave me her "Fantastic Fudge Brownies" recipe and I adapted it slightly yesterday and it was amazing! Especially warm with vanilla ice cream...

Preheat oven to 350.

Mix all together:
1/2 cup hard margarine
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 heaping tbsps cocoa powder
3 eggs
1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup chocolate chips (optional but yummy)
2 tsps vanilla

Pour into 9x13 pan and bake 45 minutes.

Mix icing together shortly before brownies will be done. Pour on top of hot brownies in pan.

2 cups icing sugar
2 tbsps peanut butter
2 tbsps cocoa powder
2 tsps vanilla
2-4 tbsps very hot water (I boiled some in my electric kettle)

Let cool. Don't eat them all!

Milky Colours

So here is another fun experiment:
I covered the bottom of a round cake pan with milk, let the boys put a few drops of food colouring in of different colours. Then... I put a couple drops of dish soap in the middle. The colours start to move and swirl all on their own! When the boys started to spin the cake pans to help "move the colours" it more or less just all turned mud coloured. Still fun though!