Cranberry Chocolate Chunk Bread #SecretRecipeClub

Anyone feel like a little Christmas in June??

I honestly wasn't meaning to make a Christmas recipe when I picked this month's Secret Recipe Club selection!  This month I got to check out a completely new to me blog, Eat. Live. Blog.  As I was looking through Renee's recipes, I found her Cranberry Chocolate Chip Bread & knew this was the recipe I needed to try out!

Princess P loves cranberries so I thought this would make a great little treat for our weekend breakfast.  I knew I had all of the basic ingredients needed for the recipe so I just added more cranberries to my grocery list & off I went.  Come time to make the bread ~ I had no chocolate chips!!  For some reason, I was confident that I had a bag of white chocolate chips in the cabinet & I was going to use those instead of regular chocolate so I didn't even bother double checking.  And of course, welcome to my luck, I had none.  No white chocolate, no chocolate, no chips of any sort.  Well, fudge.  Just cranberry bread would suck.

But then I saw it, my recipe saver!  There sitting on top of a bag of candy corn (don't ask) was a dark chocolate candy bar.  Let's chop that bad boy up & that's close enough to chips for me :)

CRANBERRY CHOCOLATE CHUNK BREAD

YIELD: 8-10 slices

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INGREDIENTS:

• 2 cups flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1.5 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• juice of 4 navel oranges ~ about 3/4 cup
• zest of 1 navel orange
• 2 tablespoons shortening
• 1 egg, beaten well
• 1/2 cup dried cranberries
• 1.75 ounces (about 1/2 of a 3.5 ounce bar) dark chocolate, chopped
• turbinado sugar {optional}

INSTRUCTIONS:

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9 x 5 loaf pan.

In a medium bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda & salt. In a separate bowl, mix together the orange juice, orange zest, shortening & egg. Mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until well blended. Fold in the cranberries & chocolate.

Spread the dough into the loaf pan. Sprinkle the dough with a thin layer of turbinado sugar {optional}. Bake the bread for 45 – 55 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the bread comes out clean. Remove the pan from the oven and let cool for 10 minutes. Remove the bread from the pan and place on a cooling rack to cool completely.

RECIPE INSPIRED BY: Eat. Live. Blog.

Red Velvet Pudding Whoopie Pies #SurpriseRecipeSwap

 

How has it already been a whole month?!?  I feel like I just got done making last month's Lemon Bars and now we're here for another recipe!  

This month I had the privilege of getting to pick a recipe from the fabulous Jenni of Jenni's Ferris Wheel of Food!  I had heard of Jenni's blog before but I had never really gotten the opportunity to explore her site.  If you have never taken the time to check out Jenni's recipes, you really should!  She has an amazing index of selections!  Plus she has some fun crafts she's shared too!!  

When I was looking through Jenni's recipes, I of course immediately went to her list of cookies {shocking, I know} and y'all know that I'm a sucker for anything red velvet.  Jenni actually had two red velvet recipes for me to pick from!!  So instead of trying to pick, I combined them :)  The only downfall of mine was I didn't add enough red food coloring so they just look like chocolate cookies :(

RED VELVET PUDDING WHOOPIE PIES

YIELD: about 2 dozen whoopie pies

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INGREDIENTS:

for the cookies

• 3/4 cups butter, softened
• 1/4 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 box (3.9 ounces) chocolate fudge instant pudding mix
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon red food coloring
• 2 & 1/4 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

for the almond cream cheese filling

• 8 ounces cream cheese, room temperature
• 4 tablespoons butter, room temperature
• 1-2 teaspoons almond extract
• 2 & 1/4 cups powdered sugar

INSTRUCTIONS:

for the cookies

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Stir together the flour, baking soda and salt in a small bowl. Set aside.

In a large bowl of a mixer, cream butter and sugars. Add pudding mix and beat until well combined. Add eggs and vanilla. Beat in food coloring until blended. Add flour mixture, slowly, until well incorporated.

Scoop into 1/2 tablespoon size balls and place on prepared baking sheets. Bake 9-11 minutes. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

for the almond cream cheese filling

Beat the cream cheese and butter with a mixer until smooth. Beat in the almond extract. Slowly add in the powdered sugar 1/4 cup at a time.

Sandwich a heaping spoonful of filling between two cookies; repeat with the remaining cookies and filling. Refrigerate 30 minutes before serving.

RECIPES INSPIRED BY: Jenni's Ferris Wheel of Food

THIS RECIPE PROUDLY SHARED AT ANY OF THESE FABULOUS PARTIES

If you're interested in joining the Surprise Recipe Swap, we'd love to have you!  Just follow the link below for more info...

 

Wonderful Food Wednesday

Welcome to
Wonderful Food Wednesday- #42

Can you believe another week has already passed?!?  How's everyone's summer started off so far?  Anyone wishing it was already time for school to start back up??  ;) I kid, I kid! 

Y'all ready for another week of Wonderful Food Wednesday??!  Thank you all so much for linking up each week!  You have no idea how much the three of us appreciate each & every one of you helping make this party such a success!!

Want to be featured? Post your best and we'll pick a few of our favorites to feature each week. Check back next week to see if you've been featured on Wonderful Food Wednesday. If you're featured, your recipe will also be pinned to our Wonderful Food Wednesday Pinterest board.

Leave us a comment and tell us what you're cooking up!

Ready for this week's features?

Last week y'all were all about the copycat & DIY recipes so this week we're breaking out of the norm for features & we're showcasing all of them!!  That's right ~ this week we've got 7 amazing recipes to feature!!

*if we missed any other copycat or DIY recipes that were linked up last week, we sincerely apologize!!!!

1. HOMEMADE STRAWBERRY VODKA shared by Pink Recipe Box

2. EASY HOMEMADE TWIX BARS shared by Back For Seconds

3. COPYCAT CHOCOLATE FROSTY shared by The Rehomesteaders

4. HOMEMADE HERSHEY'S CHOCOLATE SYRUP shared by Cooking Is Easy

 5. MALL COPYCAT SOFT PRETZELS shared by Stumbling Upon Happiness

6. COPYCAT NO REALLY THOUGH WAFFLE shared by Cooking For The Seven Dwarfs

7. HOMEMADE AMERICAN CHEESE {DIY VELVEETA} shared by Coffee With Us 3

Be sure to stop by all of these fabulous blogs to check out these recipes and lots of others.

If you've been featured, feel free to grab our button and place it on your sidebar:

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1. Follow your hosts Kerrie @ Family Food and Travel

and Jessica @ All She Cooks , Jaime @ Mom's Test Kitchen

*If you are a new follower please leave us a message/comment so that we can hop on over for a visit.

2. Visit as many blogs as you can, leave comments, follow and grab their recipes.

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