Step by Step Caramel Apples

Perhaps the only thing I like about Dan having overnights at work is that usually means a sleepover for Manda and I. Last month was no exception, and since it was in the midst of my apple encounters, we decided to try our hand at homemade caramel apples. All of the recipes I saw were insanely simple - mix a couple tablespoons of milk in a bowl of caramels, melt it in the microwave, and dip. I think I knew better than to expect that this would NOT be a huge mess, but overall the project was a little more frustrating than I would have thought. Either way, the end product was delicious.

Here's a step by step in pictures of mine and Manda's Caramel Apples.

1. Get out all of your supplies - a large bowl, Kraft caramels, wax paper, popsicle sticks, and apples of your choice (we used red delicious).

2. Have your helper unwrap all of the caramels and put them in the bowl with a couple splashes of milk.

3. Wash and dry the apples, remove stems, and insert a popsicle stick into each on the stem side (so they will stand upright).

4. Melt caramels in microwave for 2-3 minutes, stirring once. Meanwhile, line a cookie sheet with the wax paper.

5. Let caramel cool a bit, then dip apples one at a time, rotating slowly so all sides are covered. You can use a spoon to drizzle some caramel over the top of the apple (where the stick is).

6. Immediately roll in toppings of choice, if desired. We used crushed cashews and graham cracker crumbs.

7. Refrigerate until caramel dries.

A couple things we learned while making caramel apples:
1. Letting the caramel cool is an important step. We dipped the first couple of apples before the caramel cooled, and it slid right off and made a huge mess.
2. Patience is key. On her last apple, Manda stood outside on the back deck where it was cool and slowly turned the apple so the caramel didn't drip off before drying. We didn't take this level of care with the others, and it showed with how messy they ended up.


YUM!

Neglecting my blog

Last time I wrote I mentioned that I was bored at work and wishing I had more to do. Well did my wish ever come true. Last week was INSANE and from Monday through Thursday I did not leave the office before 7. I even managed to get myself up and moving early one morning and talked Dan into giving me a ride, which got me here an hour EARLY as well. Wow. Thankfully, this week has been a bit more manageable and I've been getting home at a decent hour, which is good since I feel like I'm coming down with something.

I always get a little bummed out when I realize I haven't written in my blog in ages, especially when I have a bunch of things I want to update about! Here's the list of entries I'm hoping to find time for in the next several days and over the weekend:

- Caramel apples with Manda

- Roasted garlic chicken for Manda's Confirmation dinner

- SUPER easy ravioli bake

- Browsing for new living room lighting

- Finding a creative outlet... designing my own Christmas cards?

and finally... Halloween at 9-oh-6... here's a preview!

Oh, Christmas List... Round 2

I really and truly wish I had more to do at work today... but I don't. Thankfully, the rest of the week does not look to be as dull, since I do get a little stir crazy without much to do. So, to waste away a bit of the morning, here's a few more things I'm definitely putting on my Christmas list. While the first installment of my Christmas list was full of fun items, this portion leans a little more towards things that are actually useful...

First up is the Orange Beautiful 2009 "perpetual" calendar which I have decided I really and truly just HAVE to have. With switch-out cards for each day of the week, each month of the year, and each date, this can be used forEVER, or as long as the beautiful letterpressed 140# heavy cover stock cards hold up. SWOON.

In cheery yellow, this would go great on my desk at work... or perfectly match my hopes for our home office color palate. Although currently listed as sold out in their etsy shop... it looks like there are still some available over at Supermarket. 

Another office goody, I've been eyeing one of these Pantone business card holders for ages. Available in a mess of fun PMS colors and sure to keep all of the cards I collect in one place, the organizational color freak in me loves this.

 

Does the fact that I want a little thermal lunch bag a-la-5th grade make me a nerd? Not having to shove my sandwich and baby carrots in my purse makes me not care, and the idea of having something to tote my snacks along in that is NOT a plastic grocery bag makes me happy. Besides, this fun turquoise color is my favorite and would be easy to spot in the three fridge wide mess in my office kitchen.

Oh look, something else in turquoise! This infinity scarf is a chunky knit and can be worn a bunch of different ways depending on the level of bitter cold in Chicago. 

Finally, ever since one of my first issues of Bon Appetit wrote about this snazzy chef's knife, I've been noticing just how much it would help in the kitchen. Considering I'm no professional chef, I know that super expensive knives are unnecessary and out of the question... but this bad boy sells for a mere $20 and is loved by chefs and caterers alike! 

FINALLY!

I have been looking for a site like this for AGES. Seeing as I am a terribly paranoid person about everything under the sun, it should come as no surprise that I am also veeeery paranoid about food and how long it keeps for. If I take meat out of the freezer to thaw in the fridge and it's not eaten the next day, you'd better believe it goes in the garbage. If produce even STARTS to look wilted we won't touch it, and I'd probably be embarrassed to calculate the cost of all the lunch meat I toss if it's not consumed within my little personal acceptable window of time. For two people that give up a Friday night a month to feed the homeless, you'd think we'd be a little less wasteful, but that is unfortunately not the case. In my own defense, I blame a large chunk of my food paranoia on my horribly weak stomach - I have a hard enough time not getting sick from food that is beautifully fresh, there's no room for experimentation with one-day-too-old meat. However, I'm hoping this handy little tool can help curb a bit of my fear, and ultimately save us some food - and therefore, money!

Check it out -

Still Tasty

Most Successful Apple Encounter EVER

OH. MY. Goodness. I'm not sure a dessert more delicious than this exists. Honestly. Well, at least not a dessert that does not involve chocolate, but we all know that isn't allowed in my house because it makes me deathly ill. The best part of this success? I took an existing recipe, did NOT follow it exactly, crossed my fingers... and the final product is amazing. I'm so proud. To make it all even better, three friends at work are sitting over in their cubes as we speak claiming this stuff is heaven on a plate. It's always a little nerve racking for me to share the things I make since I am still a complete amateur when it comes to cooking, so it's even more exciting to have people who's opinions matter to me LOVE it. So, because this was such a hit, I'm pushing all of the other apple recipes that were boring and dull and posting this first.

Perhaps my favorite part of having 50 apples in my house has been that in my search for apple goodness I've stumbled on a bunch of new foodie blogs that I officially love. This particular recipe is from Picky Palate - who has quickly become a new favorite read. I think that a lot of her recipes will allow for some tweaking and experimenting, which I think will continue to help my confidence in the kitchen.

I'm somewhat busy at work... so here's the link to the original recipe... and below is my adaptation, and a summary of what I changed from the original recipe. Go make it. Now.

Caramel Apple Cream Cheese Cookie Bars (renamed much more simply by Lauren, but not appropriate for the readership of this blog) :)

Ingredients:

3/4 stick of butter, divided

1 package of graham crackers, crushed (about 7-8 crackers)

1 roll Pillsbury Sugar Cookie dough, cold and cut in half

12 oz cream cheese, softened

1/3 cup sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

3 large apples, peeled, cored and cut into small chunks

heaping 1/3 cup brown sugar

several generous dashes of cinnamon

1 teaspoon corn starch and/or 1 teaspoon flour

1/4 cup quick oats

handful (about 12) of Kraft caramels, unwrapped

splash of milk

1. Preheat oven to 350. Grease an 8x8 baking dish (I used my trusty square Pyrex). Melt 3 tablespoons of the butter and mix with the graham cracker crumbs in a bowl, then press into the prepared dish. Bake for 8 minutes and remove from oven.

2. Crumble half of the sugar cookie dough over the partially baked crust.

3. Beat softened cream cheese, vanilla, and sugar until smooth. Spread over cookie dough layer in dish, bake for 25 minutes, and remove from oven.

4. Meanwhile, melt the remaining butter in a medium sized pot, stir in corn starch and/or flour until smooth. Add diced apples to the pot, then add brown sugar and cinnamon a little at a time, mixing to combine. Cook over medium heat for 7-8 minutes, until apples are coated and start to soften. Spread mixture over cream cheese layer in dish.

5. Crumble remaining sugar cookie dough over apple layer. Sprinkle with quick oats and bake another 30-35 minutes, until a toothpick comes clean from the center.

6. Melt caramels with splash of milk in a small bowl in the microwave - about 2 minutes stirring once. Stir until smooth and drizzle over cooled bars.

7. If you have any leftovers... cover and refrigerate. :)

YUM...


As a note, here's what I changed from the original recipe:

1. I made a graham cracker crust instead of using crushed up golden grahams cereal.

2. I made 1.5 times the amount of cream cheese mixture than the original recipe since I didn't think the suggested amount looked like enough once I spread it in the dish.

3. I needed to use up some apples!! So, instead of a can of apple pie filling (which may be quicker but honestly just doesn't sound good to me), I made my own with the cinnamon, brown sugar, and diced apples.

4. I didn't have any granola bars, so I substituted the quick oats.

5. I didn't want to buy half and half just for this, so I melted the caramels with milk... I'm sure that didn't make any difference at all in the end.

And as always... a few things I learned while making this:

1. 8x8 is not nearly big enough for something this amazing. I'm seriously tempted to make it again, and double the recipe. Although, the 8x8 was so tightly packed and layered high that the slightly overflowing end result was beautiful.

2. I'm not very good at "drizzling" anything - such as melted caramel. It's always a mess and gets all over the counter, and doesn't end up looking as nice as I would like. In this case, it didn't matter, it was still delicious in the end.

3. I have a difficult time following recipes that list a bunch of different things in one step. When transferring recipes to my blog or recipe book, I often re-write the steps to make more sense for me and to split up what to do with the separate ingredients.

4. Umm... I didn't really learn much else while making this except that I love cheesecake-like desserts, and I apparently also love them mixed with apples and sugar cookie dough. There's not much else to say, really, it was just that good!

So. Many. Apples.

It's been an entire week since we went apple picking... I have baked an apple pie, an apple cake, and a huge batch of apple muffins. Manda and I dipped half a dozen homemade caramel apples last night, and there's 10 minutes left in the oven on my latest undertaking - caramel apple cream cheese cookie bars. We've been eating apples for breakfast and snacks... and I STILL have about a dozen left to find something to do with. Manda really wants me to tackle homemade apple sauce, and I'm thinking about it simply because I think I could probably use up the rest of the apples and make enough to share. We'll see.

I realize I have yet to post any of the recipes for any of the above mentioned baked goods, but I'm hoping after tonight's excursion I can blog about them all together in one big post. That is, if tonight's experiment turns out - I took a formatted recipe and changed it up quite a bit to fit my own taste and available ingredients! Fingers crossed the finished product tastes as good as it looks.

Since it's nearly my bedtime and I am fairly certain I am walking into a crazy week at work tomorrow, I figured I'd post the pictures from our apple picking trip that I finally uploaded this weekend... and then get to bed. Here's hoping I can sleep even though I slept in yesterday and today AND took a nap this afternoon. Ridiculous, I know, but I can't help it when it's so darned cold outside and in the house and so so warm underneath our two down comforters. I spent the weekend so cold I even busted out my adult-sized one piece pjs that my mom got me for Christmas last year. (Yes, I seriously own one piece pjs. And I'm proud of it. I only wish they were footie pajamas.)


Here's a teaser from my first apple undertaking... Dan cutting into his dutch apple pie...


Kadence liked it...

Oh Christmas List, Oh Christmas List...

...it's never too early to start one!

I can't help but start my holiday drooling a little early this year, with all the blogs I follow, among others, tempting me on a DAILY basis. Here's some things I am already lusting over...

The One Line A Day Journal, for people like me who wish they were avid journal keepers, but... are just not. This trendy little book has a teeny little section each day for the next five years!


This aaaaadorable little salt and PEEP-er shaker in one would look so much snazzier on my dining room table than the current plain white set looks -


Orrr... maybe I'd rather this owl pitcher, which would compliment any table and sit pretty in the hutch when not in use.


Finally, tell me this necklace isn't (quite literally) screaming my name?! -