Pecan Crusted French Toast

For years and years, I used the same French toast recipe.  It was always good, but nothing to write home, or online, about.  Recently I have tried a few different French toast varieties.  And each time, I have thought that my latest recipe was the best ever.  Until my next variety.  First it was strawberry cream cheese stuffed French toast, then pancake coated French toast, and finally cinnamon bread French toast casserole.  Today, I am happy to introduce my latest best-ever French toast--pecan crusted French toast.

This great breakfast creation has, as the name implies, a crusty exterior with a soft, moist interior.  And it's better than my standard French toast for the following reasons:  1.  It has pecans.  I put maple syrup on it.  Maple and pecans together are like peanut butter and chocolate.  2.  It uses only egg yolk.  No egg whites allowed.  This gives it the richness of eggs without the egg-y taste that egg whites can cause.  3.  It has a heavy dose of vanilla extract and a bit of bourbon to give it over-the-top flavor.  4.  The brown sugar coating caramelizes as it cooks.  It's a little bit like eating candy for breakfast.  Yum!

Chocolate Chip Marshmallow Pecan Cookies

A lot of the great things in life were made by accident.  Post-It notes and about half of our population come to mind.  And now, these cookies.  Between you and me, these were totally meant to be something else.  These cookies are the product of one of those "oh-crap" kitchen moments.  

They were supposed to be turtle cookies with chocolate chips, pecans, and caramel bits.  I actually made them for a tailgate party last fall.  The day I was to make them, I sent my husband to the store (which almost never happens) with a very specific list, including caramel bits.  I told him the brand I wanted and everything.  He shortly returned home and reported to me that our small town grocery store doesn't have caramel bits.  "Oh crap" might not have been all that was going through my head at that moment, but I put my thinking cap on and came up with something that was delicious in its own right.

Congo Bars

Congo bars?  What the heck is that?  That's what I thought the first time I saw a recipe for Congo bars somewhere out there in internet-land.  For some reason, it just makes me think of something a gorilla would eat.  Do gorillas live in the Congo?  I think weird things.  Anyway, I kept seeing these Congo bars come up here and there.  So I figured they must be good.  Since everyone else was doing it, I decided to do it too.  I'm like that when it comes to baking.  

So what are Congo bars?  My assessment is that they are a little bit of everything good you could imagine to put into a cookie-type bar, actually put into a cookie-type bar.  These are a soft, chewy bar featuring shredded coconut, chopped toasted pecans, chocolate chips, and even white chocolate!  I don't know how these bars came to be, or why they are called Congo bars, but I am thankful for the person who came up with this idea!

Makeover Monday: Butter Pecan Waffles

I love butter pecan.  I love waffles.  I love maple syrup.  It really was only a matter of time before I put it all together for a breakfast I would absolutely adore.  I just can't believe it has taken me this long!  Butter pecan is one of my favorite ice cream flavors.  And I can only imagine what butter pecan ice cream would be like with the addition of maple flavor.  The combination was just meant to be!

When I found a recipe for butter pecan waffles, I knew I had to make it.  Finally, I could add maple to butter pecan in a socially acceptable manor.  And not only could I combine some of my favorite flavors, but I could adapt it to be healthier.  Because let's face it, no matter how delicious butter pecan ice cream drenched in maple syrup would be, it isn't exactly waistline friendly!

Butter Pecan Cake with Maple Meringue Frosting

Last Monday I mentioned that my husband was making his first ever from-scratch cake for my birthday, under my supervision.  Here it is!  It is probably not shocking that I chose a cake with my latest obsession, maple and pecan.  This recipe is adapted from Cook's Country, so I knew it would be fantastic.  And it was.  If you looked up "fantastic cake" in the dictionary, it would read, "a rich, buttery (2 sticks!) yellow cake with pieces of toasted pecans, topped with a light, airy meringue frosting sweetened with maple syrup, garnished with maple candied pecans."  At least that's what it would say if I wrote the dictionary!  The lightness of the frosting perfectly contrasted the heaviness of the cake.  And did I mention that I like maple and pecans together?  We had some of this cake with a hot cup of coffee one evening and I thought I was going to die of happiness.  I didn't though.

If you look through my step-by-step pictures, and have made a cake from scratch before, you might notice that the preparation method is backwards from the standard cake prep of creaming butter and sugar, then adding flour.  Cook's Country calls this "reverse creaming."  They claim it leads to a cake with a tighter crumb.  I can now fully back up their claim.  After cutting a few slices, I realized that I had left hardly any crumbs.  I have made cakes before that almost fell apart upon cutting so I was thrilled to have a cake that stayed together so well!

Whole Wheat Maple Pecan Scones with Maple Icing

This post is dedicated to my mother-in-law.  Last year for my birthday she got me The Pioneer Woman Cooks, which is a fantastic cookbook and the original source of this recipe (I health-ed it up a little bit!).  My birthday is approaching again, and yesterday I got a package from her with several more cookbooks, including The Pioneer Woman's new cookbook.  Score!  Not only did she provide me with this recipe, she made The Pioneer Woman's maple pecan scones for us while we were visiting last year.  I kid you not, these were my first scones EVER!  And I was instantly in love.  It doesn't hurt that they were maple pecan, which is one of my favorite flavor combinations.  But since that time I have made myself several other scones (a few of which I have already shared) and have loved them all. 

I have been wanting to make these scones myself since the moment I took my first bite of the batch my mother-in-law made.  They are so delectable!  We're talking about flaky, buttery, scones with crunchy bits of pecans covered with a sugary, maple-y icing, topped with more crushed pecans.  Add a cup of hot coffee and you have pure breakfast nirvana.

Maple Pecan Pie Popcorn

Today I would like to introduce you to a new snack I tried that is now near and dear to my heart.  It's sweet, it's salty, it's crunchy, it's highly addictive.  It's maple pecan pie popcorn!  I saw this recipe tucked into a corner in a Rachael Ray magazine and I knew I had to make it.

So this weekend I popped up some air-popped popcorn and set out to make this yummy sounding treat.  Then I looked a little closer at the ingredients and did a little calorie math in my head.  I love doing calorie math, but I didn't love the sum I was getting.  I was taking an innocent, actually healthy, snack food in air-popped popcorn and adding about 450 calories worth of sugar (syrup and brown sugar) and 800 calories worth of fat (butter).  That didn't sound right.  I did the math again.  Yep, I was about to take 200 calories worth of popcorn and add over 1200 calories of sugar and fat.  Not cool.  And although nuts are considered healthy, even the chopped pecans in this recipe were going to contribute and additional 560 calories.  Ouch!

Maple Pecan Fudge

As I continue my holiday baking, I thought I would try making fudge.  Although I love traditional chocolate fudge with walnuts, I know that it requires precision, and if not done properly it won't turn out.  I have never made fudge before, so I thought for my first time I would try something a little more low pressure.  And because I currently have a food crush on anything maple flavored, I decided to make maple pecan fudge.

This is really easy to make, and it turned out great.  Maybe too great.  I want to eat it for breakfast, lunch and dinner.  And snacks.  They taste like the icing on a maple long john.  Not that I would know what that tastes like.