Easy, Simple (Did I Mention Easy?) Baked Treats

I mentioned here that I baked a lot of treats over the holidays. I figured it might be a little late to share details, but then I realized with New Years and Superbowl coming up, people are most likely still entertaining. And if you are anything like me, you also need treat ideas on hand all year for that night when your child says, "Mom, I told Mrs. Williams you'd make yummies for the (insert holiday) party tomorrow."

So I am going to elaborate more with better directions.

First, the most requested recipe was for the Oreo Bark, which was easy to make... if you have a double boiler. The recipe is two ingredients... how much easier can it get? (This is pictured at about 4 o'clock in the photo above.)

20 Oreos (I made one batch with the Candy Cane Oreos and they came out great as well.)
2 2/3 cups white chocolate chips

•Line a 9-inch-square baking pan with waxed paper.
•Break the cookies into small pieces.
•Melt the white chocolate chips in the double boiler. (Note- I started with about 1/2 cup of chips in the boiler and then added more as it melted nice and smooth. Remember when melting chocolate, you can never stir too much.)
•Add your cookie chunks and stir.
•Scrape the mixture into the prepared pan and spread to about a 1/2-inch thickness. •Refrigerate until solid, about 1/2 hour.
•Remove the bark from the pan and carefully peel off the waxed paper.
•From here- I just break it into pieces from 1"-2" in size. I tried to cut with knife, but it just crumbled, so I went back to breaking by hand for that rustic look.

Next up, I put a spin on traditional no bake cookies by making them into balls. (Pictured at about 10 o'clock above.) I used my handy dandy cookie dough scoop to make perfect little balls.

1 3/4 cups white sugar
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup butter
4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
3 cups quick-cooking oats
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

•In a medium saucepan, combine sugar, milk, butter, and cocoa. Bring to a boil, and cook for 1 1/2 minutes. Remove from heat, and stir in peanut butter, oats, and vanilla. Drop by teaspoonfuls (or by balls) onto wax paper. Let cool until hardened.

The Poor Mans Turtles are super easy to make as well and a great mix of sweet and salty. (Pictured at about 7 o'clock in photo.)

a big bag of small pretzels
2 bags of rolo candies
1 bag whole pecans

•Place pretzels on cookie sheet (don't forget to use that parchment paper) and place a Rolo on top of each one. Put in 250º oven for about 2 minutes. Keep a close eye, as you don't want to Rolos to melt, just get soft.
•Take them out of the oven and gently press one pecan into each Rolo. Move to fridge and let cool until hardened.

My favorite new hack that I invented (because I am sure nobody has ever though of this before me!) was little Sugar Cookie Muffin Peanut Butter Cups Delight. (I invented the name too.) I had a few packages of sugar cookie mix in the pantry that I had gotten nearly free with coupons- so I wanted to use them up, but didn't want boring old sugar cookies. I decided to make mini muffins out of them and put peanut butter cups inside.

•Make the sugar cookies according to package directions.
•Use that handy cookie dough scoop again to make the perfect sized muffins in the mini muffin tin.
•I baked at 350º for 6 minutes, but I have a convection oven, so yours may be a minute or 2 longer.
•Remove muffins from oven and immediately push peanut butter cups into the center. You have to do this while still piping hot and squishy (that is the technical baking term)
•I used Rolos, leftover Oreos halves and some other goodies here. You can pretty much push anything inside there that you want.
•Let cool.

These are my new go to for school treats. I just need to keep some sugar cookie mix on hand and I will always be good to go when Ariana ambushes me with a goodie request. I like that they are bite sized and can easily be thrown in a bag and toted to school.

There you have it, Yummy Mommys baking hacks. And they are all delicious, trust me.