Too Much of a Goodies Thing : How-to's

4. HOW TO MAKE CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIE DOUGH:::::::::::::::
I love cookies (who doesn't) and my recipe for chocolate chip cookie dough is super simple and soooo good you'll want to eat the dough raw! I've snuck a spoon or two of raw dough SEVERAL times before (but for the sake of health it probably isn't wise to consume ALL of the raw dough)!!!!

so the ingredients you'll need are margarine or butter, white sugar, brown sugar, one egg, vanilla extract, and all purpose flour, oh and your fave kind of chocolate chips.

The first thing you will need to do is make sure you are using room temperature margarine or butter. in this recipe I use margarine and I say room temperature because I've experimented ALOT with the 'perfect' chocolate chip cookie recipe trying to make what I deem to be the 'perfect' chocolate chip cookie and in the past I have gotten some seriously sucky results using cold, fresh out of the fridge butter and margarine. this is a tip: USE ROOM TEMPERATURE INGREDIENTS.

You're going to cream together that margarine. If you forgot to let it sit at room temperature for a while you could microwave it for about 20 seconds and it should be softened enough.

That is what your creamed margarine should look like and once you have that you can add in your brown sugar and white sugar. You want to mix until the sugar is pretty much dissolved into the butter. in the past when I was lazy and didn't want to keep beating the butter and sugar I would do "half" of the task and the cookie would end up with a really grainy texture because the sugar wasn't even close to being dissolved.

After you mix well you can add your egg to the batter and after the egg you can add your vanilla extract.

The vanilla is a pretty important step. Especially because after that you will now add in the flour, baking soda, and salt to the dough mixture. I've had experiences where my cookies tasted very flour-y but a good way to combat this is to just use enough vanilla extract - don't overdo it but if you use the ingredients in the correct portions your batter won't taste too much like flour!

After the flour has been incorporated into the batter add the chocolate chips. once mixed in, you can refrigerate the cookie dough for a few hours. I like to refrigerate mine overnight so that they don't spread out too much while baking.

ENJOY!!

3. HOW TO MAKE CREAM FILLING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
This cream filling recipe will be great for profiteroles, eclairs, Boston cream pies, etc. It is creamy and not too sweet and definitely one of my favorite fillings to make. In these pictures I used the cream filling to fill profiteroles and eclairs:

Here's what you'll need to make the cream filling:

1 egg yolk
3 1/2 tablespoons white sugar
a little less than 1/3 cup of flour
1/4 cup milk
small pot
stove
bowl

PROCESS:

STEP 1: mix together the egg yolk and the sugar until combined. Once finished add in the flour and mix until you get a pale yellow color. Meanwhile heat up the milk over medium heat. The first picture below will show the egg, sugar, and flour mixture.

STEP 2: Once the milk is heated pour it little by little into the bowl with the sugar, egg, and flour mixture. stir to combine all of the hot milk. When finished combining, pour it all back into the pot and cook over medium heat, stirring continuously until the mixture thickens.

Here is the finished cream placed into a bag to pipe into the eclairs and profiteroles. Yum!

2. HOW TO MAKE WHIPPED CREAM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
I LOVE whipped cream!!!!!!!!!! It's great for adding to ice cream sundaes or a mug of hot chocolate, but I use whipped cream as "frosting" for some of my cupcakes:

Here's what you'll need for homemade whipped cream:

2 tablespoons of confectioner's sugar
mixer
mixing bowl
8 oz heavy cream

PROCESS:
STEP 1: after pouring as much heavy cream as needed into a mixing bowl, use a mixer to beat the cream. It will take a few minutes to become noticeably stiffer.
STEP 2: Some soft peaks will form and this consistency may be great for topping ice cream. Add in confectioner's sugar and continue mixing just to combine.
STEP 3: if you want to use the whipped cream as pipeable "frosting" for cupcakes continue mixing and add more powdered sugar (2-2 1/2 tablespoons more) to stabilize whipped cream.

The above pictured consistency is pretty good for topping ice cream! Enjoy!

1. HOW TO MAKE MODELING CHOCOLATE!!!!!!!!
Modeling chocolate is a great and easy way to add decorations to cakes, cupcakes, and more! As you can see, I used modeling chocolate to decorate my cupcake:

Modeling chocolate is super easy to make at home. Here is what you'll need:

2 cups of chocolate morsels/chips of your choice. I used milk chocolate chips.
1/4 cup of Karo light corn syrup
spoon or spatula for mixing
2 bowls (one to melt chocolate and one to heat corn syrup)
microwave
refrigerator (not pictured but I imagine you know what a refrigerator looks like <3)
Ziploc bag (not pictured)

Note that for the purpose of this how-to I did NOT use the exact measurements I stated above. instead, I used about 1/4 cup of chocolate chips and 2 tablespoons of corn syrup.

PROCESS:
STEP 1: Place chocolate in a bowl and microwave at 20 second intervals, stirring in between each, until the chocolate is thoroughly melted (BUT NOT BURNT!!!!!!!!!!!) and there are no lumps.
STEP 2: Place the corn syrup in a separate bowl and microwave for about 5-10 seconds. You just want the corn syrup to be warm NOT piping hot.
STEP 3: add the corn syrup to the melted chocolate and mix. You will see the mixture firms up and seems to take the consistency of sticky dough.
STEP 4: With a spoon (or your hands) put the blob into a Ziploc bag and flatten it slightly.