Tag: Chocolate

Chocolate Pretzel Cookies with Peanut Butter Chips

Chocolate Pretzel Cookies with Peanut Butter Chips

Chocolate Pretzel Cookies with Peanut Butter Chips. Phew! What a mouthful. But I promise these cookies are worth the extra long title, especially if you’re like me and love that salty sweet flavor combo. I got the idea for these cookies thinking about my go-to 

#Choctoberfest 2020

#Choctoberfest 2020

Welcome the best time of year: #Choctoberfest! With everything going on in the world I think we can all agree on one thing… 2020 needs more chocolate. #Choctoberfest is our annual celebration of chocolate recipes, now in its 6th year. We teamed up with some 

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts

Growing up, our parents didn’t buy us many prepackaged treats. Fruit by the foot, gogurt, dunkaroos…we never had those. I still remember going to a friend’s house that had MULTIPLE flavors of goldfish crackers and pringles. Another friend had an entire closet in the basement filled with costco sized packs of fruit snacks and gushers. It seemed like heaven.

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts | longdisgtancebaking.com

My parents reading this will probably tell you we had plenty of other snacks and desserts, but my sister Cassie and I always wanted those popular, trendy treats we saw on tv commercials and in other kids’ lunch boxes. Life just isn’t fair when you’re a kid! One of the few snacks we did always have on hand though was pop tarts. We usually had the normal varieties, like blueberry or cinnamon sugar, but in the spring of 2000…we got the cookies and cream kind. I remember this because we always wanted those exciting cereals like Cookie Crisp or Oreo O’s, but they were more expensive so we never got them. So when pop tarts started making cookies & cream flavor, you know we were all over them!

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts | longdisgtancebaking.com

Another factor in this pop tart obsession was a complete kitchen remodel. I don’t remember any of the remodeling being done, I just remember we only had a microwave and that was enough for our pop tarts. There was a little nook at the top of the stairs, and Cassie and I would sit up there for hours playing Oregon Trail on the computer with our beanie babies, heating up cookies and cream pop tarts in the microwave. 

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts | longdisgtancebaking.com

Making these pop tarts is easy enough, they just require a little assembly time. I used our homemade pie crust and added some cocoa powder to make it chocolate (use the good stuff, it will make a stronger chocolate flavor!), then stuffed them with cream cheese and crushed oreos. It doesn’t get much better than that! These surprisingly were not overly sweet however, so I left a few notes in the ingredients if you want to adjust these for your sweet tooth.

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts | longdisgtancebaking.com

I highly recommend warming these up before eating (turns out 12 year old me was onto something with the microwave > toaster decision) or even easier…just eat while still warm from the oven.

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts | longdisgtancebaking.com

~Stephanie

Don’t forget to enter the #Choctoberfest giveaway! And see the end of this post for all the other decadent chocolate recipes posted today.

Cookies & Cream Oreo Pop Tarts

Crust

  • 4 cups flour
  • 1/3 cup cocoa powder (high quality for better flavor)
  • 1/3 cup granulated sugar (increase to 1/2 cup for sweeter crust)
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 3/4 cup shortening
  • ~1 cup ice water (I put water in the freezer while I get my other ingredients ready. Amount varies, usually ends up around 1/2-1 cup)

Filling

  • 8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
  • 1/2 cup powdered sugar (can increase to 1 cup for sweeter filling)
  • 1 cup crushed oreos (~8)

Icing

  • 2 cups powdered sugar
  • 2 tablespoons milk
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 cup crushed oreos (~8)
  1. To make crust: in a medium sized bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, sugar and salt. Break the shortening into pieces using your hands, slowly incorporating it into the flour mixture. Shortening will begin to break down, but make sure you leave chunks.
  2. Add water a little at a time, mixing gently with hands. Continue to add water until dough sticks together and can form a ball. Refrigerate until needed.
  3. To make filling: in a small bowl, use electric beaters to whip cream cheese and powdered sugar together until combined completely. Mix in crushed oreos. Set aside.
  4. Assemble pop tarts: preheat oven to 350 degrees. Remove pie dough from refrigerator. Roll out on a well floured surface to 1/8-1/4 inch thick (you don’t want too thick, or else your tarts will be all crust and no filling).
  5. Cut into 3×5 inch rectangles. Roll the extra dough out again and continue cutting out rectangles until all dough is used.
  6. Lay half the rectangles out on two cookie sheets. Scoop about 2 tablespoons of filling onto these rectangles. Spread filling out evenly, leaving 1/4 inch on each edge.
  7. Place the other half of the rectangles over the filled ones. Press all along the edges to seal (you don’t want any leaks!) and use the tines of a fork to gently press the edges even closer together. Poke the tops of the pop tarts with the fork several times to vent.
  8. Bake for 20-22 minutes, until edges are firm and middles are set. Let cool on wire rack.
  9. To make icing: in small bowl, whisk together all icing ingredients except the oreos. If icing feels too thin, add more sugar. If too thick, add just a tiny bit more milk. Spoon or frost the icing over cooled pop tarts (if they are too warm, the icing will slide right off). Immediately sprinkle crushed oreos over the icing while still wet.
  10. Enjoy immediately or store in air tight container for 3-4 days.

You are invited to the Inlinkz link party!

Click here to enter


#Choctoberfest 2019

#Choctoberfest 2019

Welcome to #Choctoberfest 2019! If you don’t remember from years past, this is a week full of everything chocolate. Plus a great big prize pack for one of you to win! This year, over 70 bloggers are joining together for a week full of chocolate 

Double Chocolate Walnut Cookies

Double Chocolate Walnut Cookies

Disclaimer: this post is sponsored by Imperial Sugar. I received sample products for recipe development, however all opinions are honest and my own. The final installment of this year’s #Choctoberfest: double chocolate walnut cookies. They taste just as good as they sound! I’m not sure when 

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Swirl Brownies

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Swirl Brownies

Disclaimer: this post is sponsored by Imperial Sugar. I received sample products to use in recipe development  however all opinions are honest and my own.

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Brownies | longdistancebaking.comChocolate. Cream Cheese.  Brownies. You’ve all had these before, I don’t even need to explain them to you. They are so popular and so well known, I naturally assumed we had already made them on the blog. Surprise surprise…we hadn’t! While we have a red velvet cream cheese brownie for Valentine’s Day we seemed to be missing the traditional chocolate version. I am here to fix that!

It had been awhile since I’ve eaten these brownies, but they tasted even better than I remembered. I think a big part of that is because we use a homemade brownie here, none of those boxed mixes. I know, I know, they’re easy. I used to be a devout user as well. In college, my roommate and I basically lived off of boxed brownie mix and pasta salads (strange combo looking back). This is no place for boxed though, trust me! The brownies come out so much more fudgy and moist (sorry) than any boxed brownie ever could. Kelly converted me with her Nutella brownies and now there is no turning back.

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Brownies | longdistancebaking.com

In my research I also learned from America’s Test Kitchen (aka the kitchen gods) that you don’t want to dump the cream cheese on top and swirl, as the cream cheese gets too heavy and settles down in the middle of the brownie. We want a layer of brownie, a layer of cream cheese, followed by another layer of brownie and that is what we are going to swirl. Look at those layers!

This year marks the 175th anniversary of Imperial Sugar which is a HUGE milestone! They believe that when you are baking for the ones you love, you’re sharing that love with them. In that case, I am sharing my love to all of you with these cream cheese brownies. I may not have gotten to eat many (I won’t name names, but someone else in the house ate the rest of them…) but I promise they are something worthy of a 175th year celebration.

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Brownies | longdistancebaking.comThere is one more #choctoberfest recipe coming your way! Another big shout out to Imperial Sugar for sponsoring this event and don’t forget you could win a year’s worth of sugar as  part of the #choctoberfest giveaway.

Happy baking!

~Stephanie

Fudgy Chocolate Cream Cheese Swirl Brownies

  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1/2 cup granulated Imperial Sugar
  • 2 cups dark chocolate chips
  • 3 eggs (2 for brownie layer, 1 for cream cheese layer)
  • 1 tbsp vanilla
  • 2/3 cup flour
  • 1/2 tsp baking powder
  • 8 oz cream cheese, softened
  • 1/3 cup powdered Imperial Sugar
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a 9×9 baking pan with parchment paper.
  2. In small sauce pan, melt butter, granulated sugar and chocolate chips over medium low heat. Stir frequently.
  3. Once melted, transfer from sauce pan into mixer and beat in 2 eggs and vanilla.
  4. In separate small bowl, stir together flour and baking powder.
  5. Slowly add flour and baking powder mixture into chocolate and beat until combined. Set aside.
  6. In another mixing bowl, beat cream cheese with hand mixer until creamy. Add powdered sugar and remaining egg and beat thoroughly.
  7. Set aside about 1/2 cup of the chocolate mixture in a microwave safe bowl. Pour remaining batter into prepared pan and spread evenly.
  8. Gently spread cream cheese mixture evenly over the top of the chocolate.
  9. Heat the 1/2 cup of chocolate mixture about 20-30 seconds in microwave until smooth and pourable. Dollop chocolate over the cream cheese. Use a knife to swirl the chocolate batter through the cream cheese.
  10. Bake 30-35 minutes, until edges are set and a toothpick inserted in middle comes out clean.


#Choctoberfest 2018

#Choctoberfest 2018

Welcome to #Choctoberfest 2018 with Imperial Sugar! Get ready for all things chocolate, because #Choctoberfest is here! If you’ve missed past years, over 100 bloggers from around the world celebrate chocolate  for an entire WEEK by putting chocolate in basically everything. Our previous entries have included Peanut Butter Chocolate Sauce Brownies 

Chocolate Oreo Milkshake

Chocolate Oreo Milkshake

To say I’m a milkshake fan would be an understatement. A HUGE understatement. Growing up, some of my favorite memories of my grandparents include grabbing milkshakes and burgers at Smokey’s. They had the best chocolate milkshakes- you know the kind that come with the metal 

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

This post is sponsored by Imperial Sugar. I have received sample products for writing this post.  All content and opinions are mine.

While I love to garden and have a small container garden on my patio, I think I love coworkers with gardens even more. The best days are when you come in to work to find giant zucchinis and squash with signs that read “Please take me home!” on the break room tables. Someone even went so far this year as to print out recipes to use the zucchini in! That’s when you know they are desperate to get rid of the extra veggies.

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins for #Choctoberfest 2017 | longdistancebaking.com In these situations I almost always grab the zucchini, take it home and shred it, and shove it in the freezer to bake with later (or forget about…). This year though, between coworkers and the baseball bat sized squash from my parent’s garden, my freezer was getting full. I knew I needed to do something with it all.

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins for #Choctoberfest 2017 | longdistancebaking.comThen along came #Choctoberfest, an excuse to put chocolate in everything. Being the gold sponsor for the event, Imperial Sugar had sent me boxes (yes, plural) of their sugar so I knew I would be baking something delicious with it. I already put chocolate chips in my muffins anyway, but I thought, let’s make the entire muffins chocolate. AND have chocolate chips. Like those giant chocolate Costco muffins that are so delicious.

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins for #Choctoberfest 2017 | longdistancebaking.comUnlike the Costco muffins however, these are full of zucchini. But you would never know it! You cannot taste the zucchini at all in this recipe. Which is helpful if you’re trying to sneak some extra vegetables into your children’s snacks and makes you feel less guilty about basically eating a dessert for breakfast yourself. If you’re not much of a chocolate in the morning person (I’ll try not to hold it against you) these loaded breakfast muffins are another great way to use up zucchini.

As mentioned earlier this week, Imperial Sugar and our other #Choctoberfest sponsors are giving away a big prize package to one lucky participant, so make sure you’ve entered the contest! There is also an opportunity for 100 people to win a year’s worth of Imperial Sugar. You really don’t want to miss this!

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins for #Choctoberfest 2017 | longdistancebaking.comWe hope you are enjoying this event and all of the chocolate goodness, and a big thank you to Imperial Sugar for their support! Scroll down below the recipe to see the rest of the #Choctoberfest posts being added today.

~Stephanie

Double Chocolate Zucchini Muffins (adapted from Ravenscroft Inn)

  • 1 1/4 cups flour
  • 1/4 cup cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp cinnamon
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1/2 tsp baking soda
  • 1/4 tsp baking powder
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2 vegetable (or coconut) oil
  • 1 cup Imperial Sugar
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • 1 1/2 c grated, drained zucchini
  • 1/2 c chocolate chips
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease or line muffin tin with paper liners.
  2. In large mixing bowl, stir together flour, cocoa, cinnamon, salt, baking soda and powder. Set aside.
  3. In another mixing bowl, whisk together eggs, oil, sugar and vanilla until well combined.
  4. Slowly add dry ingredients into wet, stirring just until combined. (mixture will be fairly thick at this point)
  5. Gently fold in zucchini followed by chocolate chips.
  6. Fill muffin tins about 3/4 way full and bake for 18-20 minutes, until centers are set.
  7. Let cool on wire rack, then store in airtight container or freeze for future.

 

SaveSaveSaveSave

SaveSave


Peanut Butter Chocolate Sauce Brownies

Peanut Butter Chocolate Sauce Brownies

I’m baaaaack! Wow, it’s been a while since I’ve posted a recipe on LDB so I’ll just give a quick update on where I’ve been before I get to these delicious treats! If you follow us on social media, you might have noticed that this