Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough, Cinnamon, and Peanut Butter and Chocolate, Oh My!!

It's spring break here this week! Which at our house usually means visits from friends, lazy mornings, and mom trying out new concoctions. I generally stick with what I know during the school week and on busy weekends, so a week long break from backpacks, schedules, babysitting and the general Monday-Friday craziness provides the perfect opportunity to whip up recipes that have been waiting in my cooking and baking notebook.

So, without further adieu, here they are...the first thing we tried was a chocolate chip cookie dough cake. I tried out this recipe and baked it up as two cake layers with a filling instead of the cupcakes.
Here is the start of the cake layers....my kids always like to touch the brown sugar "sand castles." (All hands involved were properly washed, sanitized and hand-gelled liberally:)






I started mixing the filling while the cake was baking.

The finished layers....

Now, back to the filling. It's amazing how cookie dough-like it was, but without any eggs!

Since it was way too thick to spread, I patted it down into a disc-like shape to fit the cake and set it on the first layer, then put the second layer down.

I didn't have any photos of the frosting being made, but will mention that I thinned it a bit so it would spread over the cake without making crumbs. We had some Trader Joe's mini chocolate chip cookies on hand, so we used those for garnish. I believe Chips Ahoy! has a similar cookie if you don't have a TJ where you live.

Doesn't the whole thing look just like cookie dough?!?! And even though there are three different things going one here (cake, filling, frosting) they all taste JUST LIKE COOKIE DOUGH TOO!


And now I will honestly assess my efforts. While the idea of "from scratch" baking sounds so appealing, I have to admit that the cake layers were a little heavy. Truth be told, I would bake up a Duncan Hines yellow cake next time and add the mini chips in. For the few times I've mixed up a home-made cake I will say I still prefer the box. Phew, I finally admitted it, owned it, released and set it free - and I feel so much better! (Hello, I'm Mindy, a serious baker and noted frosting snob and I prefer box mix cake.)

Moving on....next up, Cinnamon Roll Pancakes. Yes, THEY TASTED JUST LIKE A CINNAMON ROLL!" All I can say is that they're are some incredibly creative people in the world - and I'm so glad I live in an age where I can click a few keys and find them! Here is the recipe:

I did not try the icing recipe since I had some cream cheese frosting in the freezer, but I'm sure either would be yummy.

And, last but not least.....Chocolate Peanut Butter Pie! The great folks at Jif supplied us with this....





This was a hit, except with my husband who declared "he's not the biggest Reese's Peanut Cup fan, but if it's all that's left in the candy bowl I'll eat it." That's like admitting you're not fond of air but you'll breathe it in a pinch if you must.

How has this not come up in 13+ years of marriage? Who doesn't think chocolate and peanut butter is the greatest union EVER?!?!?! I'm still puzzling over this a full 16 hours later.

So, what new recipes are you wanting to try?