My First Sugar High Friday

I love King Arthur Flour and order from them religiously. They have the best products for baking and cooking and the Baker's Banter Blog is awesome! Just last night I was searching for a gift for my sweetheart and I stumbled into the site and what did I find Black and White Brownies. These look wonderful but tonight I'm searching for the two recipes I'm doing for Sugar High Friday.

The theme this month is "TOASTED" so I went with nuts. Almonds, because I was too tired to run and pick up walnuts for the Mallows.

I decided to try two recipes. Partly because I wanted to do a test run of gifts for the holidays and partly cause I thought it would be fun to do this with my 9 year old nephew. We ended up only doing the Choco-Mallows with some revisions. My Variation used almonds and I added caramel filled milk chocolate squares.


Below is the original recipe

Choco-Mallows

Ingredients

* 2 2/3 cups chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chips
* 1/2 cup heavy or whipping cream
* 2 tablespoons light corn syrup
* 1 teaspoon vanilla
* 1 teaspoon espresso powder
* 13 marshmallows, halved around the circumference
* 1/2 cup chopped walnuts, toasted if desired
* 16 ounces chopped dark chocolate or chocolate chips
* 4 ounces heavy or whipping cream
* 1 3/8 ounces light corn syrup
* 1 teaspoon vanilla
* 1 teaspoon espresso powder
* 3 ounces marshmallows, halved around the circumference
* 2 ounces chopped walnuts, toasted if desired




Directions

1) Line an 8" x 8" square or 9" round pan with parchment, and grease the parchment. If you don't have parchment, use waxed paper or plastic wrap.

2) Combine the chocolate, cream, espresso powder, corn syrup, and vanilla in a microwave-safe bowl.

3) Heat the mixture in the microwave (or in a saucepan set over low heat on the stove) till the cream is hot and the chocolate has softened.

4) Remove from the heat, and stir till the chocolate has melted and everything is smooth.



5) Spread about 3/4 cup of the melted chocolate in the bottom of the pan.

6) Space the marshmallow halves atop the chocolate. Distribute the walnuts evenly in the spaces between the marshmallows.

7) Spread the remaining chocolate atop the marshmallows and walnuts, spreading to the edge of the pan so that everything is covered.

8) Refrigerate for an hour or so, to set the chocolate. Remove from the refrigerator, and loosen the candy from the edges of the pan.

9) Bring to room temperature, and leave in the pan, covered with plastic, till you're ready to cut into squares.

Oh I also totally messed this thing up due to pressure from Sal, I just poured the chocolate over without mixing it with the cream etc. I'll have to do a revision after my weekend away. But they were still YUMMY!!!

Goodbye Fruit Flies

Well after weeks of madness the harvests are winding down, the weather is getting cooler, and the fruit flies are finally moving on or dieing. I'm not sure which. They tend to become the bane of my existence the last few weeks of summer, beginning of fall.

Tonight to continue my thwarting of the last few those pesky flies all those bananas they've been eying that were sitting getting speckled in the kitchen are getting turned in to bread and muffins. Not just any bread either but Apricot Banana Bread. The recipe below is wonderful, I do use the Mariani Apricots if I can find them but any good, moist, dried apricot will do. I love banana bread but this just raises the level of bread way above yum for me and adds a little tang. Oh boy and is it ever good toasted with butter or cream cheese. Now lets see if I can keep from eating it after it comes out of the oven.

Tomorrow night is my final time to finish my Sugar High Friday project with my nephew Sal. But, until that's unveiled here's the Mariani Orchard Recipe for Apricot Banana Bread, all I can say is try it you'll like it.

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon Baking powder
1/2 teaspoon Baking soda
1/2 teaspoon Salt
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup Mariani Mediterranean Apricots, chopped
3/4 cup ripe banana, mashed
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a large bowl, stir together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, sugar, apricots and nuts. Mix thoroughly. In a separate bowl, combine mashed banana, milk and egg. Stir in dry ingredients, mix until well blended. Pour mixture into a 9” x 5” loaf pan, bake for 1 hour or until bread begins to pull away from the sides of the pan and wooden toothpick comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 10 minutes, remove loaf out of pan and place onto a rack to cool completely.

Makes 1 loaf.