TWD: Twofer Pie!

For your consideration: Twofer Pie from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan, page 321 featured this week on Tuesdays with Dorie which is actually Wednesday/Almost Thursday With Dorie this time around.

I still have tons of cooking and baking to do for Thanksgiving tomorrow. I've been hard at work since 4:00 and it's 11:00 now - you should SEE the kitchen. It's trashed, but I've completed the majority of things I needed to get done. I am so thankful for my DH who cleans while I cook. This pie is one of the deserts. I had help with it - The Messy One was all excited to get into the kitchen and make this with me. We had fun doing this together and it was definitely a learning experience for him, especially reading directions and learning how to measure and pour things. :)

I’m making another Dorie pie, the Sour Cream Pumpkin Pie at the same time – that one is in the oven, but as you can see, the Twofer Pie is finally done. It took over an hour to cook and I finally decided that I couldn’t wait around anymore and jacked up the temp to 350 from the prescribed 300. No harm done that I can see, but I’ll let you know after tomorrow how it tasted. (Preparation update: that one took a long time too. I turned it down to 325 from the 450 and it still took about 25 minutes longer. Next time I'll just drop both to 350 and watch the clock.)

Thanks to Vibi from La Casserole Carrée for choosing this recipe. To see what all the other TWDers did with it, check out the blogroll here. If you'd like to try making Dorie’s version of Twofer Pie for yourself, you can find the recipe on our hostess’s blog, or in Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours.

Update: Definitely not a keeper for us. I left this one behind at the inlaws in almost it's entirety. :(

The Bake Sale

Wow. I am so behind in my postings. Here are the recipes I made for our school bake sale back in mid-September. I wanted to make some things that appealed more to the teachers than the kids, because, let’s face it, kids will eat anything. Teachers, not so much.

I went trolling around the internet and my google reader to see what I could find that would be good for a bake sale. Here were my criteria:
1. Easy to make
2. Reasonably inexpensive ingredients
3. Easily packaged
4. Not too messy to eat
5. Something worth .25 to .50 cents
6. Something different than the ubiquitous oatmeal or chocolate chip cookies.

After a lot of searching, I came up with 3 recipes.

Here’s the first:
Butterscotch Coconut Drop Cookies
from Recipezaar

These turned out well, but came out much thinner than I anticipated. The cookie was very chewy and even somewhat “flexible” for lack of a better term.







Number 2: Rocky Road Smores/Brownie Muffins

These came from Anna of Cookie Madness. Very nice and a big seller. I toasted the finished product under the broiler for a few minutes to toast up the marshmallows and melt the chocolate a little bit so everything would stay put.

Third: (ready for a mouthful?)

Jumbo Chipotle Chocolate Brownie Muffins with Praline Topping.

I also found this basic recipe and idea on Recipezaar, but I morphed it into a brownie served in individual jumbo sized muffin cups. I added about 1 tsp. of ground chipotle pepper to the batter. I had read in the comments about doubling the topping. I did this and it was way too much for this serving method.

These didn’t photograph well, but they were so good. Just the right amount of pepper to give a teeny bit of heat and interest.

I was exhausted after cooking all day, and my kitchen looked like it had imploded. I had to leave to run hither thither and yon taking kids to activities, so I put up the perishables and left the rest for later. To my amazement, DH beat me home (this in itself is remarkable in that he was home while the sun was still out) AND he cleaned up the mess! Shocked, amazed and oh so grateful. Thanks honey.

I’m not sure how we did at the sale, but my kids were very happy gorging themselves on sweets. The Big Ones even bought some wee gifties for their teachers. Those are two smart cookies, if I do say so myself.