St. Paddy's Rice Krispy Treats

Everybody's Irish on St. Patrick's Day right? Even me this all Italian girl.  Here is a fun and simple treat that the kids can help with.

 

3 1/2 Tbsp  butter or marg
1 package mini marshmallows
6 cups Rice Krispies
2 cups confectioners sugar
1/4 cup milk + more if needed
Americacolor green leaf food coloring
Shamrock or green sparkling sprinkles
Sugar decoration-optional

Prepare 9X13 pan- line with parchment paper and fold up along pan edges, creasing at the corners, coat with baking spray.  
Melt butter in a large pot over low heat, add the marshmallows and stir into butter with a wooden spoon until melted.  Remove from heat and pour in cereal, stir until evenly coated, then spread and press mixture into prepared pan evenly.  Let cool, then cut into squares or rectangles or even clover shapes as desired.
While cooling prepare royal icing:  Put the confectioners sugar in a mixing bowl, add the milk slowly and stir with a fork or whisk until you get a consistency of icing to dip the treats in, add a drop at a time of food coloring and mix until you get desired green color. This is the part the kids can have a lot of fun, warning - it can be messy:  Dip treats into icing on one side, drip excess icing back into the bowl, then lay to dry on wax paper.  Sprinkle as desired with sprinkles and decorations, let completely set.  You can also use this icing to dip and decorate sugar cookies with, I did this with shamrock cookies:

 

Enjoy and Happy St. Patrick's Day :)

Birthdays and Bakery cakes

 

When I was a little girl my mother would give me the choice of cake for my birthdays.  While some of my siblings picked cake mix-homemade cakes, I always chose a bakery cake from our local bakery.  I did this because I loved butter cream and the way they decorated with all the pretty edging designs and pretty, colorful roses.  I would always be in awe when my mother brought the cake home and opened the box.  It was so pretty, a work of art I thought.  And I felt special having a cake made and decorated just for me.

I wonder if those desires and cake experiences influenced my love of baking and creating pretty things.
Now as an adult, I rarely buy bakery cakes, because I've learned to make them myself.  I don't mind making my own cake, because its what I love to do.  Thanks Mom for getting me those cakes and fostering this love of baking :)
Today for my birthday I made a simple Whoopie Pie cake, garnished with chocolate shavings, yummy!

I used 1/4 of my favorite whoopie pie recipe and used 2 icecream scoops of batter for each whoopie cookie.  For the shavings, I grated bittersweet chocolate on the largest side of a cheese grater.
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/foodnation-with-bobby-flay/whoopie-pies-recipe/index.html?soc=share