Spring-y Rice Krispy Treats

Welcome, Spring! It's so good to see you here!

Actually, in Oklahoma, we really only have two seasons: Tornado Season and Blizzard Season. Most people just call it summer and winter, but whatevs.

So Easter has come and gone, and it is so hard to believe we have just one more week in April. I feel like this year has flown by! Does this happen as you get older? Time just flashes? Oh well!

I was excited to make these for a spring time blog post because they are just so darn yummy! Do you eat Rice Krispy Treats? If you're anything like me, you can eat an entire 9" x 13" dish of rice krispy treats without blinking. I find them to be one of the most addicting sweets ever! That's why I don't make them too often, otherwise I'd be as round as a house!

This recipe is super simple, and literally only 5 ingredients, but I do have some tips for you to make these treats even better!

1. Don't skimp on the marshmallows. Normally, I'm not a brand snob when I'm in the kitchen. HOWEVER, there are a few things I don't skimp on when it comes to name brand items: vanilla extract, coffee, soda, chocolate chips, powdered sugar, and marshmallows.

No I am not kidding. Jet-Puff Marshmallows versus Great Value Marshmallows are two totally different things. Jet-Puffs are fluffy and light, like what a marshmallow would taste like, while great value is pretty dense for a marshmallow. No joke. Don't skimp.

2. Don't make these in a smaller dish. A smaller dish means a thicker treat, and these will scrape the roof of your mouth off if you compact them into a tiny 9" x 9" dish. Just use a 9" x 13" and you'll thank me later.

3. Grease your dish and your spoon well. I use canola oil cooking spray. It doesn't leave a nasty vegetable oil aftertaste on your treats and it makes it infinitely easier to press into the dish and pull out later to cut into bars. You can also spray the canola oil on your hands and press down like that.

4. Use the sprinkles! Sprinkles are so fun, and they add a fun and festive crunch to your treat! You'll love the extra color and so will your taste testers! Melted chocolate is also a great option, and adds a bit more flavor!

Here are two more tasty marshmallow treats!

Trix Treats

Lucky Charms Treats

Lovely Rice Krispy Treats

Flash Spring Time Recipe Round Up

Hello all! 

I've been a very busy girl. With a new full-time job (in a bakery!!!!!!), I've been very busy with Easter orders this weekend. 

What I'd like to do, though, is give you the opportunity to check out some of my tasty treats I've been baking lately. The only thing is that I don't have time to blog 5 recipes this weekend. So I'm going to link up my Key Ingredient recipe cards on this post so you have access to all the recipes. 

I hope you enjoy!

Some great dessert options for Easter Sunday!

Link Here --> Fresh Strawberry Cake with Vanilla Buttercream

Link Here --> Carrot Cake Cookie Sandwiches with Cream Cheese Filling

Link Here --> Carrot Cake Banana Bread with Cream Cheese Frosting

Link Here --> Spring-y Rice Krispy Treats

Link Here --> Funfetti Cookie Sandwiches

Link Here --> Mini Canoli Cups

(No Photo) Link Here --> Lemon Sugar Cookies

(No Photo) Link Here --> Lemon Crinkle Cookies

Link Here --> Spring Time Pretzel Wands

Some great breakfast options for Easter Sunday!

Link Here --> French Toast Donuts

Link Here --> Mini Cinnamon Rolls

Link Here --> Cinnamon Swirl Banana Bread

Link Here --> Cinnamon Honey Scones

Funfetti Cookie Sandwiches

You can't go wrong with funfetti cookies. You can't go wrong with classic vanilla buttercream. You can't go wrong putting those two things together. That's exactly what I did.

I got an email last week asking me to do an interview for this blog and my custom orders! The Oklahoma Daily wanted to take a photo shoot of me in all my baking glory Sunday, and I literally got the time settled the night before. So I had to come up with something pretty and quick, which is where I got the idea to make funfetti cookies filled with vanilla buttercream. 

Before I get down to the recipe, I wanted to share with you the newspaper I was in! I was on the FRONT PAGE! How exciting it was to see my kitchen with me in it on the front page of a newspaper!

The recipe is pretty simple, this is a basic sugar cookie full of jimmies. There is a little bit of cream of tartar to give it a delicious sugar cookie kick that I just love. But here are a few tips and tricks to help you bake these cookies successfully. 

1. Butter and egg MUST be at room temperature. Why? Because if you don't, the ingredients will not incorporate right and you will get a crumbly mess of dough. 

2. Use jimmie sprinkles only! If you use nonpareils, you might wind up with a very tie-dye dough. Jimmies are long rice-shaped sprinkles, and nonpareils are the little tiny round sprinkles.

3. Chill for at least 30 minutes, but let the dough sit out for about 30 minutes if you chill the dough overnight. I learned that chilling for 30 minutes developed a perfectly sized cookie, but when I chilled it for a couple of hours, my dough hardly spread and I had thick squatty cookies that didn't look as pretty.

Publication in The Oklahoma Daily

I'm excited and honored to announce that I was on the front page of a local publication in Norman, Oklahoma called The Oklahoma Daily! Read the article here or look at the embedded publication below!

Coffee Break #5

Hello friends! I'm trying to pick back up with this blogging business. I've been really busy the last several months and a lot of you know why, but if you don't, grab a cup of coffee and sit down with me for a bit.

In January, I had the exciting opportunity to start working towards opening up a physical bakery in Norman, Oklahoma. I had a lot of signs pointing in the right direction, so I felt obligated to follow the attempts and began learning more about opening up my own business. My partner, Irene, and I worked together to develop a business plan and get things rolling. In February, we decided to try to launch a Kickstarter Project and see if we could get the money raised through pledges of people who supported our idea to open a local bakery in Norman. While the project was a great experience, we did not meet our goal.

At this point in time, I've learned quite a bit about trying to run/start a business. It takes a lot of hard work, a lot of passion, a lot of time, and a lot of knowledge. While I had the first three, I lacked the fourth, and in the end I didn't feel comfortable enough opening a business without knowing what it takes to actually run one. At the moment, Confections + Coffee, Inc. is on hold, and I'm going to take a while to educated myself on the ins and outs of running a baking business, including finances, laws, requirements, time management, employment, and everything in between.

I'm not sure if I will ever open the bakery, but in the end, I am so glad I tried to follow my dreams and am proud to say I took the risk just to see what it would be like. I'm young and have plenty of time to gain experience about the baking industry, and if I do decided to open a bakery later on in life, I know it will be right when I need to.