Sugar & Spice by Celeste

***Good Gracious...I love these cookies!  I guess you could say I'm a sucker for oatmeal raisin cookies, and I've always had a weak spot for them.  In fact, the best visits to Starbucks includes a grande skinny decaf vanilla latte and a big ole' oatmeal raisin cookie!  Theirs are awesome!  This recipe from the side of the Quaker Old-Fashioned Oats package is the best.  It's super easy to whip them together in a flash, and trust me - they are named "vanishing" cookies for a reason!  They do vanish very quickly after they are pulled from the hot oven! My sisters have been using this recipe for years.  I made them for the first time a few weeks ago, and now I'm addicted.  I love the flavor of the brown sugar in this recipe, and the cinnamon makes them smell absolutely heavenly while they're baking up in the oven.  Bon Appetit!*** Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies Source:  Quaker Oats Ingredients: 1/2 cup (1 stick) plus...

***Have you ever had one of those days where you knew exactly what you were going to make for dinner that night, and you couldn't wait to get into the kitchen?  Well, that was me today.  This lasagna has been in my head all day long.  One of my little sisters, Maranne, asked me for a good lasagna recipe recently.  I thought about THIS RECIPE for "Lasagna of Emilia-Romagna" that I posted back in March of last year.  It was a Daring Bakers recipe, which called for made-from-scratch pasta!  Needless to say, it's not the easiest lasagna recipe out there, although it was amazing. After a little searching, I came across this recipe by Giada de Laurentiis.  It sounded delicious, and I adore homemade bechamel sauce.  My little sister has been on a baking/cooking phase lately, and I'm loving it!  She's constantly texting me photos of her latest successes in the kitchen.  I'm so proud of her....She's making some major progress in the kitchen, and...

Our kitchen...All decorated for the big party! The Blood Fondue Bar was a HUGE hit! Around our house, Halloween = A lot of fun! Halloween is great, because kids AND adults can dress up, be silly and eat lots of candy all in one night.  What's not to love about that?  Growing up, I usually had a Halloween-themed birthday party, since my birthday is in October.  My parents would go all out - There would be streamers, ghosts hanging from the ceiling fan, and scary music.  So, for our 3rd Annual Halloween Party this year, I went all out too!  Our house was transformed into a haunted palace, thanks to spider webs, orange & black streamers, balloons, flying ghosts, and creepy music playing in the background. Brad and I spent a lot of time decorating for the party, and I was so excited with the way everything looked.  Brad even designed and printed the cute little signs that you see with all the recipe names on them.  We were determined th...

"Small Hearts" (aka Strawberries) "Ancient Eyeballs" (aka Grapes) "Sponge Brains" (aka Sponge Cake) "Brittle Bones" (aka Pretzel Rods) Blood Fondue Bar Source:  Halloween Block Party 2010 on HGTV.  Recipe by Kenneth Wingard; HGTV.  http://kennethwingard.blogspot.com/2010/10/blood-fondue-recipe.html Ingredients: 12 oz white chocolate chips 1 cup heavy cream 4 tbl butter Red food coloring Strawberries Sponge Cake (cut into cubes) Pretzels Purple Grapes, seedless Directions: Combine the heavy cream and butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat. When warm, add the chocolate chips, stirring constantly until smooth. Add food coloring several drops at a time until fondue becomes blood red. Transfer to a serving bowl. Arrange strawberries, sponge cake, grapes and pretzels in serving dishes with toothpicks or bamboo spears. Enjoy!

***To make this cute Jack-O-Lantern Cake, I simply made 2 bundt cakes using this recipe for Pumpkin Spice Cake.  One of the bundt cakes in placed upside-down on the cake stand first, to form the bottom half of the pumpkin.  The second bundt cake is then placed on top of the first one, to form a full pumpkin.  I used a Little Debbie Swiss Roll for the pumpkin stem, and candy corn for the face.  For icing, I chose a simple Cream Cheese Icing, which I colored with food coloring.  I did not use the Buttermilk Icing listed below.*** Pumpkin Spice Cake Source:  Gourmet magazine; November 2005 Ingredients: For cake: 1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened, plus additional for greasing bundt pan 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour plus additional for dusting pan 2 teaspoons baking powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon cinnamon 3/4 teaspoon ground allspice 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 1/4 cups canned solid-pack pumpkin (from a 15-ounce can; not pie fillin...

Breadstick Bones Source:  http://www.bedandbreakfastnetwork.com/blog/list/5-fun-halloween-recipes.html 1 (7-ounce) can refrigerated breadsticks 1 egg white, lightly beaten 2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmesan cheese Suggested Dipping Sauces: Bottled marinara sauce, heated Ranch dressing Honey mustard sauce Cooking Instructions Heat oven to 375°F (175°C). Grease or spray baking sheet with cooking spray. Unroll dough; separate at perforations into 6 breadsticks. Roll each 12 inches long. Carefully tie a loose knot in both ends of each breadstick and place on prepared baking sheet. Brush breadsticks with egg white. Sprinkle with cheese. Bake 12 to 14 minutes or until golden brown. Serve warm “bones” with desired dipping sauce. Makes 6 servings.

Blood Splattered Popcorn Source:  http://www.bedandbreakfastnetwork.com/blog/list/5-fun-halloween-recipes.html To make Blood Splattered pop-corn, just pop-up a batch of plain, unseasoned pop-corn. Let popcorn cool before applying the blood topping. Ingredients: •1 Bowl of unseasoned popcorn •1/2 stick of butter or margarine •1 teaspoon Red Icing Color (approximate) Directions: For the topping, slowly heat half a stick of butter or margarine in a small sauce pan, or microwave it on the lowest setting until it is fully melted. Do not allow the butter to boil or burn. Once the butter is melted, remove it from the heat and transfer it into a mixing bowl. Slowly add just enough red paste food coloring, also called Icing Color, which is available at most craft or cake decorating supply stores, to turn the butter a nice shade of blood red. One teaspoon of Icing Color for every one stick of butter. While you could use regular liquid food color, it takes much more to get the desir...