December 9th: More Sweets

Sunday I had my freshman friends over for dinner and to make some goodies.  It's fun to have young friends! :)  They got a good "pre-finals" sugar rush. 

Hot Chocolate Truffles

The truffles are pretty simple to make though a bit messy.  The best part was the leftover chocolate in the pan.  Soooo good.

Recipe and photos from Your Cup of Cake blog.  We realized the girls actually knew the blogger.  She's also a BYU student.  I'm very impressed the blogger manages school and her awesome blog.

The truffles would make a darling gift though ours weren't quite as pretty as these.  You could even gift a mug with them.  You simply drop the truffle into warm milk for delicious hot chocolate.

Mint Brownies

 I'm making up for not baking much the past 4 years.  Having a functional kitchen is awesome!  

I found a few mint brownie recipes that looked great.  A couple of them called for the Ghiradelli Brownie mix you can buy at Costco.  The mix was a sample the day I went shopping at Costco that week and I thought the brownies were great.  So I decided to do a version taking ideas from the recipe linked above.  I didn't use peppermint extract in the brownie batter but I'm sure that would make them even better.

Left: Andes peppermint baking chips melted by spreading them on the warm brownies

Middle: White chocolate melted the same way and crushed candy canes

Right:  The buttercream frosting leftover from these

Samara's verdict for best version (and I agreed) was the buttercream frosting.  She made us all and anyone who came one the next day do a taste test and then sort of bullied everyone into agreeing with her. :)

I also want to try this buttercream recipe.

Deer Valley's Lemon Bars

My first season working at Deer Valley, I worked in the bakery.  It was only for about two months but my biggest regret was not "borrowing" all the recipes.  I found out they have a cookbook so I get to keep my honor and sweets.  Yes!  The best part is the book gives high altitude instructions, which really does help the recipes work better here.

If you like lemon bars, you will LOVE these.  They are amazing.  Really and truly amazing, especially for breakfast.  We ate a really healthy soup before we made all of these so that totally makes up for all the treats, right?!

What are your favorite Christmas treats?  Do you the same ones every year or try new ones?