Happy National Pi Day!

A few years ago, I had a survey here on my blog and the question was, "Do you prefer cake or pie?" Surprisingly (to me at least!), the majority of you said, PIE! But being the numbers nerd that I am, National PI Day (March 14th) is one of my favorite days of the year! It's a given that today I'm stopping by my favorite pie shop and picking up not one, not two, but THREE slices of pie for my man, myself, and mini me for dessert! It's tradition in the Horton House. 

Confession: Out of all the things I've baked through the years, I've never made a peanut butter pie. Can you believe that? I can't. I mean, we like peanut butter and Wayne's favorite candy is Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, so WHY have I never made a peanut butter pie?

Another confession: I cheated on this recipe.  Instead of making a home made crust, I used a store bought graham cracker crust. And by doing so, I think this recipe could have actually made two pies, but instead, I made parfaits with the leftover pie filling. 

My inspiration for this recipe came from Pinterest and can be found here. It was a total WIN in our family recipe book. Get ready, though, because this recipe calls for lots of mixing bowls. It took a while for the whipping cream to get fluffy, even with my little hand mixer on the highest level.

The peanut butter layer included a box of vanilla pudding. Doesn't everything taste better with a box of pudding? I've recently discussed this with my blog friends and we've come to the conclusion that yes! Yes, it does! 

Loved that I found these mini Reese's to sprinkle on the top of the pie along with the drizzling of the leftover chocolate layer. Yes, there's even a chocolate layer.

This pie was so creamy and delicious, y'all! We loved it and I will definitely be making it again.

My earliest childhood memory of being in the kitchen with my mom was on Sunday afternoons. While my dad and brother took naps, mom and I would spend a few hours making something, which was usually a dessert. I loved to make parfaits with cool whip and a box of jello. Mama had these cute parfait glasses that she kept at the very top of the cabinet and I thought I was something special when I could coax her to getting them down and making red or green or orange parfaits. I lived for desserts back then and I guess I still do. So THIS is how the extra pie filling turned out! I made perfect parfaits!

My first ever peanut butter pie was a huge success! 

Happy National PI Day, Friends! 

PI Day ~ Strawberry Pretzel Pie

Happy PI Day! And, no, I haven't left off the "E" accidentally. Today is March 14th, also known as the Day of PI - 3.14. March 14th! I have been known to drop in our local pie shop to celebrate this awesome day with a nice slice of chocolate silk pie. What? Your town doesn't have a pie shop? Well, they need to get one, pronto! 

Strawberry season is nearly upon us here in Louisiana and a few weeks ago, I found this delicious looking recipe on Pinterest and decided to try it! I didn't realize at the time I pinned it that it was a Pioneer Woman's recipe. Here's how it turned out! 

Love having my Baby Girl in the kitchen with me! Saturday afternoon, she helped with making this Strawberry Pretzel Pie by chopping up the pretzels in a ziplock bag. My soon-to-be thirteen year old has gotten camera shy and wouldn't let me get a pic of her helping, but she did a great job on the crust!

One of our local grocery stores had strawberries on sale and so I scored these beautiful strawberries, plus an additional package for a mere penny. Alise especially loves strawberries and one of the reasons I decided to try this recipe is for her. I have a tendency to lean toward chocolate desserts and so I thought I would try something different. 

And here's the finished dessert! We all loved the sweet and salty taste and it was the perfect finish to a nice grilled supper by the pool Saturday evening. Instead of cutting the pie into slices, we just scooped it onto dessert plates. I decided not to use the whipped cream topping that the recipe called for, so I used Cool Whip instead. 

You can find Ree's recipe HERE. It would make the perfect dessert for Easter!

And since my Weight Watcher's Lemonade Pie is getting some extra attention these days, I thought I would link that post here today, too! When I got this recipe from our WW leader about twenty years ago, it was two points! It's SO good!

Happy PI Day, Peeps!

My Mama's Easy Pecan Pie

Okay I'll be honest. This is not a picture of my mama's pecan pie. I had every intention of making her pie, though, this weekend and sharing all the wonderful steps and pictures like the profs do, but what can I say? The weekend got away from me and well? Her pecan pie got thrown to the curb. Sorry, Mom!

However....

Because so many of you have asked for the recipe, I thought I would post it here for y'all and as a future reference for myself. Ya know? So I won't have to text my mom and say, "Send me a screen shot of your pecan pie recipe when you get a chance." Here goes:

Mama's Easy Pecan Pie

3 eggs

1 cup white Karo syrup

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 tsp. of vanilla

1 T. butter

1 cup chopped pecans

1 9 inch pie shell

Combine all ingredients and beat with mixer until well blended. Pour into uncooked pie shell.Bake at 325 degrees for 30-40 minutes or until the filling no longer shakes.

At this point, you may be like what the what? No worries!  My mama's got you covered!  Here's her own person story she texted me and I'm reposting here because it may be helpful. 

Who the heck wants a "shaky" pecan pie?  Not me! Take Mama's word for it! I promise it's delish!

My Mom's Strawberry Trifle Recipe

Actually, I think this was a recipe that I use to make and I gave it to my mom! Ha! I completely forgot about it and how light and yummy it is.  When Leigh suggested I make something with strawberries - since it's strawberry season here in Louisiana - for our Life Group party on Friday night, I called my mom and asked her for "my" recipe. Since everyone loved it - and we had it again on Easter Sunday - I thought I would share it here today on my blog.

Strawberry Trifle

1 prepared angel food cake
2 cups of sliced strawberries
1 14 oz. container of strawberry glaze
8 oz. cream cheese, softened (use Philadelphia only)
1 12 oz. container of Cool Whip
1/2 to 3/4 cup of Splenda

Take 2-4 slices of the cake and tear into pieces and line bottom of trifle bowl.  With mixer, cream softened cream cheese and Splenda. With a large spatula, fold in the Cool Whip. In a separate bowl, combine strawberries and glaze. Spread about 1/2 of the strawberry mixture on top of the angel food cake.  Then on top of that, spread 1/2 of the cream cheese mixture.  Put another layer of the torn angel food cake; then the rest of the strawberry mixture then the cream cheese mixture (end with cream cheese mixture).  Can garnish with strawberry halves.  Chill for about an hour or two.  Sometimes, I make 1/2 of the strawberry and cream cheese mixtures to have extra for layering.

Enjoy!

Red Velvet For Christmas

I absolutely love to bake and the holidays are such a special time to bring out all the delicious goodies! I normally mark off an entire weekend {usually the weekend right before Christmas} and dedicate it to apron wearing, spoon licking, and a very messy kitchen! The baking commences on Friday evening, with a glass of wine, and ends sometime mid-afternoon on Sunday, with a few breaks in between, of course. The most fun I've had Christmas baking was when Angie and I use to bake together at Christmas.  She would make her signature treats, I would make mine, and then we would share.  I loved it because combining our efforts always made for a more variety of treats to give away to friends and neighbors. We also included the girls and they decorated Christmas cookies at the kitchen table while we "slaved away."  Fun memories.

I've written posts in the past where I've shared my signature treats and things I like to bake for Christmas, and maybe I'll share them again a little closer to the big day, but today, for the Home for the Holiday Link Up and Northwest Native's Christmas Traditions, I thought I would share my absolute FAVORITE Christmas treat {I even introduced them to Angie about five years ago}. In our home, it's "GOD, FAMILY, FOOTBALL, & RED VELVET CAKE BALLS"! Somebody get me a sign!

And just to show you how awesome the blogging community is, I had never even heard of RVCBs until I read about them on Pinky's blog about six years ago.  Unfortunately, I can't introduce you to Pinky because she no longer posts and her blog is unavailable, but she started a RVCB Revolution that ranked right up there with the blanket scarf for all you fashion bloggers!  It wasn't long before we were all showing our "balls" for all of Blog Land to see!

And the recipe is so easy!  All you need is:

Red Velvet Cake Balls

One box of red velvet cake mix
Box ingredients for the cake
one container of cream cheese icing
white candy coating - that we like to call, "almond bark" here in the South

Bake the cake according to the directions on the box.  After the cake has cooled, crumble the entire cake in a large bowl. Stir in the icing into the crumbs.  Mixture will be thick.  Roll into bite size balls. Refrigerate for a few hours and then dip in melted "almond bark." 

I love this recipe because the balls can be made in advance and frozen.  I have a bag of them in my freezer right now! I just thaw them a little before I'm ready to use them and then dip them! {I personally like to eat them cold, right out of the fridge.  I love to hear that "crack" of the almond bark when you bite into them!}

I have red velvet cake balls for nearly every party or get together we have at our house.  We have a certain friend {Hello, Clint!} that asks if I'll be having them before he will commit to come over!  HA! For Halloween, I dip them in orange or lime green candy melts.

Today I'm linking up with Home for the Holidays at Talk of the Trains and you can, too, by sharing your favorite Christmas recipe or craft on your blog and joining us! I'm also joining Pinky for Countdown To Christmas and Northwest Native's Christmas Traditions!

I've also updated the Christmas party link up list and you can check it out HERE. I added the Blogmas link up and when I talked to Faith last week, she said that she would probably be doing another Christmas card link up this year, but I don't know specifics yet.  I'll keep you posted and if you know of any parties I need to add to the list, please let me know!

Merry Christmas!

Homemade Butterfinger Ice Cream

The first time I ever had Butterfinger Ice Cream was when Mr. Horton and I were dating and I think it was actually on the 4th of July! Being a city girl, I thought it was kinda weird that his family was putting "things" in their ice cream because my family always stayed with the simple vanilla or chocolate {I'm a texture girl and I don't like fruit in my ice cream, yogurt, or jello.  Just sayin'!}. Besides, I'm not a Butterfinger kinda girl {but M&Ms are a different story}, either, and so I wasn't just jumping over the moon to try this ice cream, but listening to his family rant and rave about it, you'd think it was the best thing since manna!

Ok.  It's the best thing since manna!

I'm so glad that we've continued the "tradition" of making homemade Butterfinger ice cream with our friends during the summer and introducing it to our family {and now it's even my parents' favorite!}.  I don't know if our marriage could have survived without it! Here's the recipe!

Homemade Butterfinger Ice Cream

8 eggs
1 1/2 cups of sugar
1 can evaporated milk
1 can sweetened condensed milk
2 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt
3 small packs of Butterfingers (pkg of 6)
whole milk

Unwrap the Butterfingers and place in a ziplock bag.  Beat the heck out of it until the candy crumbles. Beat eggs on medium speed in a medium size bowl.  Add remainder of ingredients and beat until blended thoroughly.  Add candy. Pour mixture into ice cream maker and fill to the fill line with whole milk. Freeze & churn until maker slows or stops. Enjoy!

This week, I'll be linking up with these blogs!

Penny's Passion
The Deliberate Mom
The Fab Journey
Waiting on Wednesday
Let It Shine
Three Kids & A Fish

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M&M Cookies For The Win

A few weeks ago, Wayne made a Sam's run.  

(And just a little side note, I found that most people either love or hate Sam's. I'm in the "hater" category.  And it's not that I HATE Sam's, it's just that I hate to go there.  I don't buy in bulk because we don't eat in bulk.  I mean, who can eat a whole flat of green beans in a month?  Certainly not us.  So we have certain things that we go for, like paper towels, trash bags, toilet paper, etc., but I don't "grocery shop" at Sam's.  But I have friends that do.  I have friends that "go to lunch" at Sam's by going around the store and trying all the freebies. Seriously.  I also don't like to go because I can't get out of there without, at the very least, spending $150 bucks!)

Okay.  So that's my rant for the day.  Back to Wayne.

He made a Sam's run and lo' and behold he brought back not a large bag of M&Ms but the XXL size bag.  I think he was trying to tell me something: Mama needed a chill pill in the form of chocolate!  So what does ONE do when ONE come into possession of said bag of M&Ms?

Well, you make M&M cookies of course!

Here's the easy recipe I used.  The only thing about this one is that the dough has to chill in the refrigerator for several hours and my two peeps were chomping at the bit to try one like, right then! I had to hold them off!  But they both agreed that the cookies were worth the wait!

This is a picture of the cookies before they were baked.  The recipe calls for rather large cookies, but I think next time, I will make them smaller.

M&M Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup light brown sugar

1/4 cup granulated sugar

1 egg

2 tsp. vanilla

1 1/4 cup all purpose flour

1/4 instant vanilla pudding

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

3/4 cup of M&Ms, plus more for adding on top before baking

1/2 cup semi sweet chocolate chips, plus more for top 

1. Combine butter, sugars, egg and vanilla in mixer on medium speed until mixed thoroughly.

2. Add flour and pudding mix (dry). Add baking soda and salt and combine on low speed.

3. Add candies and chips on low speed.

4. My dough made about 11 even mounds (next time I will make them smaller). Place the mounds of dough on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper and then flatten.  Add additional M&Ms and chocolate chips on top (I did not add extra chips, just the M&Ms for added color) and refrigerate the dough for 3 hours.

5. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  I baked my cookies for 12-15 minutes on waxed paper so they wouldn't burn on the bottom.  You want them just browned around the edges.  I let mine cool for just a few minutes and then I transferred them to a wire rack.

I hope your family enjoys these cookies as much as we did!

For the original recipe and more detailed directions, visit Averie Cooks by clicking HERE. I have also added the pin to our Horton Family Favorites board.

Homemade Peach Ice Cream

You scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream!!

Nothing says summer like homemade ice cream, don't you think?

Last Thursday, Wayne stopped on his route at the Oak Grove Farmer's Market and came home baring fresh squash, tomatoes and peaches.  I knew the tomatoes would be going with BLTs this week, but I wasn't sure what to do with the peaches.  We had peach cobbler the weekend before for Father's Day, so I wasn't in the mood for another one.  Wayne suggested we make peach ice cream!  So Sunday afternoon, we invited my parents over and that's what we did!  Wayne even googled the recipe himself and found the one he wanted to make from allrecipes.com {I love this site, by the way!  I've used it for a few years and I like it because you can personalize your own recipe box!  Does anyone else use it?}

I'll save you a click and give you the recipe here:

Homemade Peach Ice Cream
6 eggs, beaten
3 1/2 cups of sugar
10 fresh peaches, chopped
4 cups of heavy cream
2 cups of half and half
2 tsp. of vanilla
3/4 tsp. of salt

Directions

1. In large bowl, mix together eggs and sugar until smooth; puree peaches in blender or food processor and stir 5 cups of puree into egg mixture. Stir in cream, half-and-half, vanilla and salt and mix well.
2. Pour mixture into freezer canister of ice cream maker and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

Easy, peasy!  And SO YUMMY!!