I’m getting sick of these ingredient pictures. They are boring. I’m taking a break from these for a while.

Perhaps you’ve already gathered this from the photo below…but this is the easiest recipe ever.

There are only 5 Ingredients needed to make these gooey caramel bars.

One of my favorite memories from growing up in my quasi-Martha Stewart (minus the crazy) home, was the constant smell of something baking.

It was normal to come home and have the house smelling like brownies, cookies or a cheesecake. My mother was always baking for our family as well as others. She made desserts for a local restaurant, so we were used to the smell of a cheesecake or torte wafting through the air.

My brother and I were not obese. How? I’m not quite sure.

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Butterscotch is underrated.

I think that most people associate butterscotch with Grandmas…

But I love both Grandmas and butterscotch.

I’m not saying that if you don’t love butterscotch you automatically don’t love Grandmas…

Ummmm…

Lets transition from Grandmas to baking.

I love banana bread with all of my being. It is a comfort food for me that reminds me of my childhood x 1000.

My mom makes the best banana bread/muffins in the world.

But I’m not sharing that recipe with you…

It is currently a secret.

So when I came across a recipe for a banana bread with a butterscotch swirl, I had to try it.

And let me tell you. It is AMAZING. The Butterscotch adds a sweet and buttery flavor to the banana bread and makes it more like a cake rather than a bread.

Eat it right out of the oven. Or microwave it. Just make sure it’s warm

To die for…

It’s a super simple recipe and this is all you need. (Plus buttermilk. Mine was in the fridge).

I got some pretty new bowls.

I’m a show off…

Apparently Mikey never eats bananas. Ours always turn brown and I have to put them in the freezer where they turn black. Black bananas are ok though. They look awful. But they won’t kill you, I promise.

I guess I should find out if Mikey likes bananas…Who am I kidding?

Mikey likes everything.

Lets begin.

Using a double boiler, melt some butterscotch chips.

Set that aside and mix up your butter and sugar.

Then add your eggs

Next mash up your bananas

What looks and smells like baby food???

This bowl of banana mush does!

Add the banana, buttermilk and vanilla to your batter.

Now take a cup of batter and add it to the melted butterscotch

This is some delicious batter right here.

Then you add half the banana batter, followed by the butterscotch batter, and topped with the rest of the banana batter. That sounds way confusing.

Make a butterscotch batter sandwich.

The heavenly aroma that will fill your house is like no other.

Check out this beautiful loaf of butterscotch banana bread.

Sorry I went a bit overboard with the photos…

Mikey approved of this bread.

Which means most people will (he doesn’t love sweet things but was a huge fan of this).

Recipe: 

Butterscotch Banana Bread

½ cups Butterscotch-flavored Chips

¼ cups Unsalted Butter, At Room Temperature

½ cups Granulated Sugar

2 whole Large Eggs

1 cup Mashed Over Ripe Bananas, About 3 Medium

⅓ cups Buttermilk, Lowfat

1 teaspoon Vanilla Extract

2 cups All-purpose, Unbleached Flour

1 teaspoon Baking Powder

½ teaspoons Kosher Salt

⅛ teaspoons Baking Soda

Melt the butterscotch chips in a small bowl over simmering water. Set aside and let cool to room temperature.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Oil and flour a non stick loaf pan.

In a large bowl, beat the butter with the sugar with an electric mixer until crumbly. Add in eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Mix in mashed banana, buttermilk, and vanilla extract.

In a small bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda. Mix to combine.

Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until just combined. Remove 1 cup of batter to the small bowl with the melted butterscotch chips. Mix well with a hand mixer.

Pour half of the banana bread batter on the bottom of the loaf pan. Pour the butterscotch batter over the banana bread batter. Top with the rest of the banana bread batter and smooth the top.

Bake at 350 degrees F for 50–60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes, then remove to the wire rack to cool completely.

I randomly found this recipe on the Tasty Kitchen website.

It was added by Renee@mykitchenadventures

I never liked these much growing up…

I have this hilarious memory of sitting next to my brother in our mini van on our way to one of his t-ball games.  My mom turned around when we were almost to the field and said, “Bradley, what are you chewing on?” He simply replied, “carrots”…

Carrots seem to have that impact on people. They get so dried up and tasteless and you just can’t stop chewing. I remember sitting at the table gagging while trying to finish my carrots. I hope you don’t think I’m crazy…Hasn’t anyone else experienced this childhood trauma??

I like carrots now.

And this carrot cake is far from dried up and tasteless. It’s super moist and fairly simple to make.

The recipe is from my magnificent mom (surprise).

Start out by peeling and grating 2 cups of carrots.

Then you are going to combine the sugar, oil and eggs together. (If you like, you may add pineapple. I don’t like chunks in my cake, so I stick to just carrots. If you add pineapple, do so here).

My favorite ingredient in this whoooollleeee cake is the cinnamon. I love love love cinnamon. I chose this Penzeys cinnamon because it is very similar to Mikey.

Strong, sweet and spicy.

MMMmmmmm.

Mix all the dry ingredients together in a seperate bowl and then slowly add into the batter.

After that’s incorporated, fold in the carrots.

Tasty batter!

Grease and flour 2 round cake pans and pour in your batter.

You may also use a 9×13 pan or cupcake pans.

While these are baking you should probably make some super delicious cream cheese frosting. (recipe to follow soon)

The air will smell so heavenly while your cake bakes. Your neighbors may decide to introduce themselves after 6 months of  closed blinds and silence…

As you can see, I need to buy some toothpicks so I don’t leave giant pokey-holes in my cake.

Check to make sure they are cooked through and let cool completely before frosting.

I am embarrassed to admit that I put the top cake on upside down…It’s not a huge deal, but makes frosting the sides a bit more like caulking a crack. Yum.

It was tasty. I had to take it to an Easter dinner, otherwise I would have shared a slice with you!

Recipe: 

What’s better than an Oreo?

An hour long massage? A french bulldog puppy? Mikey, a bowl of popcorn and a Mad Men marathon?   Yeah…those things are better. But barely.

When it comes to cookies, a handful of Oreo’s can be hard to beat. It’s Americas favorite cookie after all!

Especially an Oreo that is surrounded by an amazing chocolate chip cookie. A warm and gooey chocolate chip cookie, which equals a warm and gooey Oreo center.

This is such a simple recipe. And I owe the best part to Nabisco.

You can use any cookie dough recipe…but I highly recommend this one.

Easy enough, right? I ate a LOT of this dough…

Take an oreo and smush some cookie dough on it.

Then take more dough and smush it on the other side. Roll it around and completely encase the Oreo within the dough.

They are very large. But they are my new favorite cookie.

HOWEVER. Proper consumption is as follows: If not fresh out of the oven, place in microwave for a few seconds so that the Oreo gets warm, gooey and mushy and the chocolate in the dough melts.

Look at how amazing this is. It’s like an Oreo soaked in milk…but surrounded by gooey cookie dough. So it’s pretty much an Oreo soaked in butter. Yikes.

This makes for a large batch of large cookies. Find some people you love and share these cookies with them. It is dangerous to keep cookies this delicious all to yourself. And my mom taught me that it is really nice to share with your friends.
Recipe

2 Sticks butter, softened

3/4 Cups brown sugar

1 Cup granulated sugar

2 Large eggs

1 Tbsp Vanilla

3 1/2 Cups all purpose flour

1 tsp Salt

1 tsp Baking Soda

10 oz bag Chocolate Chips

1 Bag Oreos (Any kind. Next time I’m using Double Stuff or Peanut Butter Oreos)

Preheat oven 350 Degrees.

In a mixer cream butter and sugars until well combined.  Add eggs and vanilla until combined.

2.  In a separate bowl mix the flour, salt and baking soda.  Slowly add to wet ingredients until just combined and add chocolate chips. Take a scoop of cookie dough and place on top of an Oreo Cookie.  Take another scoop of dough and place on bottom of Oreo Cookie.  Seal edges together by pressing and cupping in hand until Oreo Cookie is enclosed with dough.  Place onto a parchment or silpat lined baking sheet and bake cookies 9-13 minutes or until cookies are baked to your liking.  Let cool for 5 minutes before transferring to cooling rack.

Makes about 2 dozen very large cookies.

Best served with a wide mouth glass of milk!

I have seen this recipe all over the internet, but the true shout out goes to the lovely Picky Palate blog.

http://picky-palate.com/2011/01/06/oreo-stuffed-chocolate-chip-cookies/