Alright, y’all. Brace yourselves. I am about to share with you the most fudgy, delicious, amazing frosting recipe that you will ever eat in your life. (I know I promised to share this recipe a few days ago, but life has been crazy this week. I apologize.)

My mama used to make this and spread it on brownies. I’m not a fan of frosted brownies (the frosting does something funky to the texture of the brownie, in my opinion), but I had no problem scraping the frosting off with my teeth and tossing the brownie in the trash.

I can remember my mom making this, standing at the stove and counting to 60, making sure that the milk and sugar boiled for exactly 60 seconds. I’m not sure what would happen if it boiled for 61 seconds, or heaven forbid, 62 seconds. My mama took the 60 second rule very seriously. So do I, and so should you. Don’t mess with perfection

I also remember that my parents always let my brother and me lick the bowl when they made brownies or cakes, but when it came to this frosting, it was a family event. The kids had to share with the parents.

Have I convinced you to try this yet?

Put it on brownies if you’re a frosted brownie kinda gal (or guy) or use it to frost doughnuts like I did. It’s a bit thin for piping, but it hardens up very quickly into a fudge like texture. In fact, I plan on experimenting with this soon to see if I can turn it into fudge. I imagine it would be divine.

If you’re really desperate for a little chocolate, but don’t feel like baking, go ahead and make a 1/4 batch of this and eat it with a spoon. It’ll make you happy. Trust me. I know.

Chocolate Frosting
Recipe from my mama

• 1 cup white sugar
• 6 tbsp butter
• 6 tbsp milk
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips (milk chocolate or semi-sweet)

Add sugar, butter, and milk to a small saucepan over medium heat and bring to a boil. Boil for exactly 60 seconds and remove from heat. Stir in chocolate chips and continue stirring until the chocolate has melted. Use frosting immediately as it will harden quickly. Makes about 2 cups and will frost a 9×13 pan of brownies.

I can pretty much guarantee that now that I have discovered the beauty of scones that you will all get sick of them and wish that I would stop posting scone recipes. Please, just indulge me for a bit longer okay? I need to thoroughly explore the world of the scone and I promise to only share the very, very best scones that I make. These fit in that very, very best category.

Bacon. Cheddar cheese. Green onions. Those are a few of my favorite ingredients and each one of them is hidden away inside these delightful little scones. Well, okay, so these weren’t “little” scones. They were big. Big and hearty and filling. They’re perfect for breakfast, but I think they’d go just wonderfully with a bowl of soup for lunch.

These were a bit fussier than my last recipe for Chocolate Chip Scones, but they were so worth the extra effort. We’ve been grabbing scones for breakfast every morning this week! They are quick to reheat in the microwave, but they are even tastier heated up in the oven for a bit.

Just look at these! They’re like a clean, compact little breakfast sandwich! In fact, I think I might go eat one now. For dessert. Don’t even try to stop me.

Bacon and Cheddar Scones
Recipe from The Pastry Queen

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tbsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 tsp ground black pepper
• 1/2 cup chilled butter, cut into small cubes
• 1 1/2 cups grated cheddar cheese
• 4 green onions, thinly sliced
• 10 slices bacon, cooked and crumbled
• 3/4 to 1 1/2 cups buttermilk
• 1 large egg
• 2 tbsp water

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Fit your mixer with the paddle attachment and add flour, baking powder, salt, and black pepper to the bowl. Mix on the low speed. Slowly add cubes of butter to the flour mixture and keep mixing until it is crumbly and your butter is in small pea sized pieces. Add the grated cheese and mix until blended in.

(If you don’t have a mixer just stir dry ingredients together and cut butter in with a pastry cutter or two knives and then stir in the cheese.)

Add the green onions, bacon, and 3/4 cup of buttermilk to the flour and cheese mixture. Mix by hand until all the ingredients are incorporated. Do not overwork the dough! If the dough is still to dry to hold together, add in more buttermilk 1 tablespoon at a time, until you can form the dough into a ball.

Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and form it into a ball. Using a well floured rolling pin, flatten the dough into a circle about 8 inches wide (mine was closer to 10 inches) and 1/2 inch thick. Cut the dough into 8 to 10 equal wedges depending on the size of scone you want.

Whisk egg and water together and brush the tops of the scone with the egg wash. I sprinkled a bit of kosher salt on the tops because I’m wild and crazy, but the original recipe didn’t call for this.

Place scones on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 18-20 minutes or until they are golden brown and no longer sticky in the centers. Serve warm!

I have three important things to tell you today. Earth-shattering things, really. Are you ready for your world to change?

1. My husband does not like cake. We have to make him brownies or cheesecake for his birthday each year.
2. I force him to try foods that he doesn’t like all the time, not because I am a jerk, but because I love him and I have high hopes that one day he will wake up with normal taste buds like a normal person and he will eat normal food.
3. I forced him to try these Chocolate Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting and he took one bite, pushed me out of his way, grabbed two more cupcakes, and gobbled the three of them down quite happily.

True story. Except for the part where he pushed me. He would never do such a thing, not even for these cupcakes. He’s a keeper and so are these chocolatey peanut buttery cupcakes.

Click here to read the recipe and hear a bit about a campaign that Electrolux is doing with Kelly Ripa to help fund research for Ovarian Cancer.

It’s Valentine’s Day so I’m pretty sure that means that I should be alternating between napping and eating chocolate all day, right? Isn’t that what true love is about?

My kids aren’t allowing me to nap, but they can’t stop me from eating chocolate. I decided that today called for good old chocolate chip cookies, but not just any chocolate chip cookies. These cookies are special. They have a secret ingredient that makes them fat and fluffy and delicious and beautiful.

The secret ingredient is just a small box of instant vanilla pudding powder. Crazy, I know, but it does amazing things to cookies.

The only problem with making these for your Valentine is you won’t be able to sneak in any kisses. You’ll be too busy shoveling cookies in your mouth.

Secret Ingredient Chocolate Chip Cookies
adapted from allrecipes.com

• 1 cup butter, softened
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 3.4 oz. package vanilla instant pudding mix
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (I use King Arthur’s white whole wheat)
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

Beat together butter and sugars until creamy. Beat in pudding mix, eggs, and vanilla. Stir together the flour, baking soda, and salt, and slowly mix that into the butter mixture until well combined. Stir in the chocolate chips. Drop by rounded spoonfuls (I use a cookie dough scoop) onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake in a 350 degree pre-heated oven for 10-12 minutes.

My first scone was bought from the grocery store bakery. It was pumpkin. It was also hard and crumbly and really dry. I don’t think I finished it.

My second scone was a chocolate chip scone that I made myself. It was soft, buttery, and delicious. I ate three.

Yes, it’s true. Scones are new to me, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t know a good scone when I taste one. Anything this fluffy and delicious is good food. It’s a fact.

I don’t know about you, but I generally avoid recipes that require me to spread flour on my counter tops. It’s just so messy and I always get icked out thinking that my counters aren’t really clean enough to be smooshing food around on them, no matter how much I wipe them down. Having said that, the minute I saw that this recipe called for 2 cups of heavy cream I completely forgot about the fact that I’d have to make a big floury mess. Heavy cream will make me do crazy things.

This dough comes together pretty easily. Dump everything into a bowl, give it a stir to make sure all the flour is moist, and then dump it out onto a floured countertop. Knead it for a few minutes and then seperate it into three balls of dough.

The dough balls easily smoosh out into circles that you can then cut with a pizza cutter. Brush the tops of the scones with melted butter and sprinkle with a bit of sugar before baking.

These scones were just delicious. They were nice and moist and all that heavy cream really gave them a great texture and flavor. These weren’t too sweet at all and I think they’d go perfect with a nice hot cup of coffee or tea or a big ol’ glass of icy cold milk.

Chocolate Chip Scones
Adapted from Hershey’s

Heat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease two cookie sheets.