Rosemary Apricot Squares

I admit I have not baked in a long time, life is just so much busier now with a toddler and specially, in the middle of summer.  So many activities to do, and I have almost forgotten that baking was one of my favorite things to do.  I really was looking forward to this recipe because I loved bars..lemon bars specially. They are simple yet delicious so i wanted to give it a try. The only modification I made was, I replaced the brandy with gold rum since I dont have any at home.    I enjoyed this a lot!

Rosemary Apricot Bars

Courtesy of Baked Explorations

Ingredients

Rosemary Short Dough

• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons fresh rosemary, minced
• 12 tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar
• 3/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Apricot Filling

• 2 cups dried apricots
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 3 tablespoons honey
• 2 tablespoons brandy
• pinch of salt

Crumb Topping

• 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1/3 cup pecans, chopped
• pinch of salt
• 3 tablespoons cold butter, cut into cubes

Directions

Rosemary Short Dough

1. Grease a 9-inch square baking pan and line with parchment, overhanging on 2 sides.
2. In a medium bowl whisk flour, salt and rosemary.
3. In the bowl of a stand mixer beat butter, sugar and vanilla on medium speed until fluffy.
4. Stream in the flour and mix on low speed until flour is incorporated, then turn the dough into the pan and press into an even layer.  Refrigerate at least 30 minutes.
5. Bake at 350°F for 25-30 minutes.  Let cool on wire rack.

Apricot Filling (Make while dough is chilling)

1. Place the apricots, sugar, honey, brandy and salt in a medium saucepan with 1 1/2 cups water and simmer over low heat for 45 minutes, or until apricots are tender and most of the liquid has evaporated and thickened.
2. Let cool slightly, then puree in a food processor until smooth.
3. Spread over crust while it is still warm.

Crumb Topping

1. Combine sugar, flour salt and pecans in a bowl.
2. Cut in butter with a pastry blender or two knives until butter is incorporated and you have a sand-like texture.  (You can store this in the fridge until ready to use.)
3. Sprinkle crumb mixture on top of the apricot layer and bake at 350°F fr 20-25 minutes.

Let bars cool out of the oven for 30 minutes, then remove using the parchment and cut into bars.

Cake Pops for Vday

This year, i decided to make cake pops for our vday project. Never made it before but did some research. I liked bakerella's recipe but i also looked at other blogs for directions.  Here is what the final product looks like:

Here are the ingredients I used and steps:

Step 1: Bake a simple cake

Step 2: Mix frosting into cake 

Step 3: Make round balls of cake mix and frosting and freeze for 15 minutes.

Step 4: Melt some candy melts and use stick to hold the cake.

Step 5: Decorate with Sprinkles 

Step 6: Let dry and wrap!

Chocolate Mint thumbprint cookies with almonds

Round 2 of the thumbprint cookies I added chopped almonds and sprinkled the sugar instead.