With Sprinkles on Top

It’s EAA week in my hometown of Oshkosh, Wisconsin! EAA’s annual air show, AirVenture, is the largest air show in the United States. It’s kiiiiiiind of a big deal for anyone in aviation. For a week each summer, our little airport becomes one of the world’s busiest. There are planes buzzing overhead all week long and it’s just a really cool event that Oshkosh is fortunate enough to host.

I’m going to EAA (locals call it EAA, not AirVenture) today – to continue my tradition of going almost every year since I was a little kid. I made these cookies to celebrate. I ordered the airplane cookie cutter online and didn’t pay enough attention to the size — it’s pretty tiny! So it’s a small miracle that these cookies don’t look worse, considering I’m not great at piping outlines! I decorated them with the colors of the Christen Eagle, my favorite airplane.

Happy Friday to you all!

Airplane Cookies
Print Recipe

If you are a new to decorating with royal icing, here are some helpful tips and links:

• I used my grandma’s sugar cookie recipe, which is listed below.  Another good cut-out cookie recipe can be found at Bridget’s wonderful Bake at 350.
• I used a royal icing recipe from Annie’s Eats, which is listed below.
• If you are new to decorating with royal icing, please visit this post by Annie’s Eats, which will teach you about outlining and flooding.  Bake at 350 is also a great resource for cookie decorating and ideas (I love Bridget’s book, too!).

Here are the specifics on how I made these cookies:

• I ordered the cookie cutter from Amazon. As I mentioned above, I didn’t pay attention to the size and the cookie cutter I received is quite small. If you are hoping to make larger planes, look closely at the size.
• I outlined the cookies in black royal icing.
• Once the black outline was dry, I piped the red, orange, yellow, blue, and purple stripes. I dyed the icing with Wilton gel colorings.
• When the stripes were dry, I flooded the cookies with white royal icing.

Omi’s Sugar Cookies
Print Recipe
1 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon nutmeg

Beat butter and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream, and nutmeg. Add dry ingredients gradually. Chill the batter overnight or for at least 4 hours. Roll out dough and cut with cookie cutters. Bake at 350F until golden (in true fashion, my grandma didn’t give a specific baking time. I baked the cookies for about 8 minutes).

White Royal Icing
4 cups powdered sugar, sifted
2 Tablespoons meringue powder
5 Tablespoons water

Directions:
Combine all ingredients in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on low speed until the sheen has disappeared and the icing has a matte appearance (about 7-10 minutes).  Transfer the contents of the mixing bowl to an air-tight container. This will be the stiffest consistency of the icing, and at this point it is still too stiff to use for decorating. Add water a very small amount at a time and stir by hand until fully incorporated. Continue until the icing has reached a consistency appropriate for piping.

August is TOMORROW, you guys! I’m not ready! August pretty much means that summer is winding down and that school will be starting again soon (boo; but also yay! Because I’ve only got one more year to go!). August is also the month where you try to do everything summer-ish you’ve procrastinated away until now. If you don’t have the time to take your kids fishing, make these cupcakes instead!

I’m trying to make more boy-themed treats (though trust me, I know that girls can and do enjoy fishing). I’ve had an overdose of Disney princesses lately, so I’m making an effort to go in the other direction for a while. These fishing cupcakes were so easy to do — I hope you give them a try!

Gone Fishin’ Cupcakes
Print Recipe

A batch of cupcakes (I made mine from a box mix — doesn’t matter what flavor you use)
A batch of buttercream icing (my favorite recipes are listed here)
Blue food coloring
Pretzel sticks
Colored Goldfish crackers
A large star pastry tip
A small round pastry tip

1. Make your batch of cupcakes and allow them to cool entirely.
2. Make a batch of icing. Leave about a cup of icing aside. Dye the rest of the icing blue. I used two shades of blue, a lighter and a darker, to give the water more dimension. But this isn’t required!
3. Fit a pastry bag with the star tip — and pipe the blue icing onto each cupcake. If you use two shades of blue, fill half of your pastry bag with one shade and half with another — this will cause the two shades to blend and swirl when you pipe. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, see Sally’s great tutorial at Sally’s Baking Addiction.
4. Place a pretzel rod on each cupcake. Using a different pastry bag fitted with the small round pastry tip, pipe a curvy line of white icing onto each cupcake — starting at the rod.
5. Place a Goldfish cracker at the end of your curved line of white icing.

That’s it!

Note: if you don’t own pastry tips, it’s OK! You can spread the blue icing onto the cupcakes with a knife — and you can just snip the end off of a pastry bag with a scissors for the white icing step.

Planning a summer bonfire? Taking a road trip with the kids? Need a quick and easy snack? I have expressed my deep and profound love for puppy chow on my blog before, I’m sure. And I’ve also expressed my even deeper and more profound love for Oreos. (I know, I need to get a grip.) So the thought of trying cookies ‘n’ cream puppy chow was pretty great to me. As with all puppy chow derivatives, this was easy easy easy to make. Hope you enjoy!

Cookies ‘n’ Cream Puppy Chow
Recipe source: Your Cup of Cake
Print Recipe

“Cream” Puppy Chow:
5 cups rice chex cereal
1 cup white chocolate melts (or chocolate chips)
8 Oreos finely crushed
1/2 cup powdered sugar

“Cookies” Puppy Chow:
5 cups rice chex cereal
1 cup milk chocolate melts (or chocolate chips)
8 Oreos finely crushed
1/2 cup powdered sugar

+ Extra chopped Oreos

1. “Cream” Puppy Chow: Measure out rice chex cereal and place in a large bowl.
2. Measure out powdered sugar and crushed Oreos and place in a large plastic bag or in a large tupperware with a lid (you’ll need to shake the bag/tupperware later).
3. Melt white chocolate and stir until smooth.
4. Pour melted chocolate over rice cereal and stir until coated.
5. Transfer chocolate coated rice cereal into your plastic bag with sugar/cookies. Shake, shake shake until coasted.
6. Dump onto a cookie sheet to cool.
7. Repeat steps 1-7 using “Cookies” Puppy Chow ingredients.
8. Once cooled, mix the “Cookies” and “Cream” Puppy Chow together and fold in extra chopped Oreos.

YOU GUYS. These are weird, but amaaaaaaaaaaazing! One of my all-time favorite foods is potato chips. Probably because I’ve been eating them since birth. My family used to own a potato chip factory in my hometown of Oshkosh, Wisconsin. Potato chips everywhere… all the time. I was even posed with a box of potato chips in my 4-year old professional photos. Pretty fab, right? 

I don’t know why these haven’t been done before — or how I’ve gone this long without thinking to combine potato chips and marshmallows. These are just like rice krispie treats — but instead of rice krispies, use potato chips. I loved them. My dad (and treat tester), however, did not. He thought they were too weird and oily.

So I don’t know where you, my dear readers, would fall on this issue. It’s worth making them to see if you love or hate ’em!

Yield: About 9 krispies

Ruffles Krispie Treats

Print

An EASY treat for thsoe who love salty with a little sweet!

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Total Time 25 minutes

Ingredients

• 3 Tablespoons butter
• 4-1/2 cups mini marshmallows
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 6 cups crushed original ruffles chips, crushed (1 8-oz. bag)

Instructions

1. Melt butter in large pot over medium low heat.

2. Stir in marshmallows and melt completely.

3. Remove from heat and add in vanilla and crushed chips.

4. Coat completely in marshmallows and pour into greased 9×9 dish.

5. Press to flatten using greased fingers and cool to room temperature. Cut into squares and serve.

Notes

Your yield will depend on how big or small you cut your krispies.

Recipe credit: Lauren's Latest

I made these beauties a few months ago… but forgot to blog about them until now! Whoops.

I think I’ve mentioned this before in a different post, but Nutter Butters are a delicious cookie that I always forget about. These bars are super sweet (duh, marshmallow + cookies!) — so be aware of that.

But look how easy they are to make — only three ingredients!

Yield: About 9 bars

Nutter Butter Bars

Print

No-bake bars that you can make with only 3 ingredients!

Prep Time 10 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Total Time 25 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 pound package of Nutter Butters
• 5 cups large marshmallows
• 4 Tablespoons butter

Instructions

1. Place Nutter Butters in food processor and pulse until ground.

2. Melt marshmallows and butter in microwave until puffed, 2 minutes max.

3. Remove and pour in ground cookies.

4. Stir to combine then transfer to a foil lined 8x8" inch baking pan. Let set up for 10 minutes. Remove bars out of pan with edges of foil and cut into squares.

Notes

Your yield will depend on how big or small you make your bars.

Recipe credit: Picky Palate