Creamy Banana Bread

As Christmas draws closer with each passing day, if you’re like us here at ABridetoBee.com you’ve probably found yourself headed towards the kitchen with your baking shoes on. The challenge however, before jumping into your mixing bowls, is to find this years perfect recipe! After searching through every magazine and cook book published within the last fifty years, we’ve found some secret recipes (old and new) that are absolutely to die for! We’ll post more recipes over the next few days that have been ‘kid tested-mother approved’ and will surely be a hit with all your friends and family!

Here’s another one we found on our quest to come up with a more moist banana nut bread and something that was easy to make and ship to our friends.

Creamy Banana Bread-from allrecipes.com

INGREDIENTS

• 1/2 cup margarine, softened
• 1 (8 ounce) package cream cheese, softened
• 1 1/4 cups white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1-1/2 cups mashed bananas (@ 3 banana’s)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 cup chopped pecans (optional)
• 2 tablespoons brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

DIRECTIONS

1. Cream the butter or margarine and cream cheese together. Gradually add the white sugar, and continue beating until light and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in the mashed bananas and vanilla. Add flour, baking powder, and soda; mix until batter is just moist.
2. In a small bowl, mix together chopped pecans, 2 tablespoons brown sugar, and cinnamon.
3. Divide 1/2 batter into two greased and floured 8×4 inch loaf pans. Sprinkle pecan mixture over batter in pans, and top with remaining batter.
4. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for 45 minutes, or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
5. *When we made this recipe we did it without the pecans for those of our friends who have nut allergies. And we tried the recipe with the original one cup of (2) banana’s and it was not banana enough for us, so we added 3 and made a difference. We also only baked the bread for 40 minutes instead of 45. But make sure you use an oven thermometer to test your oven for accurate temperature. We found out ours was off by 10 degrees!  

Triple Chocolate Cookies

After numerous requests for homemade cookies from my little honey bees I cooked like Betty Crocker this weekend. Over 15 dozen cookies to be exact, 15 loaves of creamy banana bread and carrot cake and I was also on the quest to come up with a gourmet cookie better than the toll house chocolate chip cookie. Anyway, during my research on whether to use butter or shortening, why I should use salt and how to make a thick gourmet cookie, l I found this awesome recipe for triple chocolate cookies from a website called, expertvillage.com, they promote themselves as the world’s largest how-to video site. It’s pretty cool.  Anyway, I made these cookies below and I read through the transcript and wrote out the directions and sharing them with you. You should check out their website, it’s amazing what’s on there. Enjoy! My friends and family loved them.

TRIPLE CHOCOLATE COOKIES BY COOKIESCOUTURE.COM

Preheat oven to 350* bake cookies for 10-12 minutes

Ingredients:

2 Cups Flour

1 Tsp Baking Soda

1/2 Tsp Salt

1 Cup Softened Butter Room Temp (2 sticks)

3/4 Cup Brown Sugar

3/4 Cup White Sugar

Sugar

2 Eggs

1 Tbsp Vanilla

1/2 Cup Dutch Cocoa

2 Cups Chocolate Chips

Cream the butter and the sugar on Medium speed, cream for about 2 minutes. Add eggs and vanilla and scrap down sides of bowl and give it one more good mix. In a separate bowl mix 2 cups of flour and add 1 teaspoon of baking soda and 1/2 teaspoon of salt and then add 1/2 cup of cocoa. Use a wooden spoon make sure it is dry incorporate all the dry ingredients.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients. Start on low speed so the dry does not fly out the sides. Mix for about 3 minutes. Do not over mix. Stop mixing  then add chocolate chips and mix for about 30 seconds until you see the chips mixed throughout the dough.

Get a scoop and dip in water to prevent sticking and scoop out dough on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. Then place in freezer for 5 minutes. This prevents the dough from spreading. Bake for 12 minutes at 350*. Remove from oven and remove parchment paper with cookies off hot pan to a cool surface.

Free E-book for Holiday Gifts and Decorating Ideas

I was staring at my 9 1/2 foot christmas tree and all my holiday decorations this morning before work and I started to think, “this is beautiful but I am going to hate taking this stuff down”.  As I walked into the office and began answering the stream of phone calls, I got to thinking about all the customers that call us for product information and those that ask us for free advice and ideas. I came across this site a while back and thought this would be wonderful for those of you who are looking to expand on your DIY holiday gifts and decorating. 

This site is moplants.com and the writer Maureen “Mo” has created some free E-Books that I wanted to share with you.
   The book is in PDF format, so make sure you have adobe to view it. I hope you enjoy this free Ebook. Print it out and have fun.

Bridal Beehive - Homemade Gifts

21 days until Christmas, just in case you haven’t been counting! If you’re like us here at the Bridal Beehive, this is the time of year where we can’t decide if we want to cut back on calories eating all the delicious holiday foods and desserts or just letting ourselves indulge without the guilt. We’ve decided… we’re going straight for the Buffet! And hey, Christmas only comes once a year.
This is also the perfect time of year to bring out the old family recipes and bake someone you love a homemade gift. Whether that’s cookies, candies or nearly a traditional dish for your holiday dinner. Homemade gifts can be given to family and friends who live near or far or placed in hotel rooms for out-of-town guests who would appreciate the comforts of home. And for those of you deciding on what to give your guests at their wedding for a take home favor, homemade gifts are sure to be a gift that will always be remembered.

You can customize your containers, gift boxes and favor bags with personalized gift tags personalized labels or and for an added touch, personalized ribbon.

Appetizers

Well the holidays are upon us. Christmas music is now on select radio stations playing 24/7, your lists of things to do has just gotten bigger and now you’re wondering, “How can I get all of this done?” As many of you already know, planning a wedding can be very stressful and then on top of that now you have the holidays to shop and plan for. As difficult as it may seem, it doesn’t have to be this way. With a little organization and delegation on your part, you can make things happen according to plan.

If you’re not already using a planner, get one or use the one on your email account. Many programs like gmail, yahoo, ical from mac and outlook express have daily calendars that you can load with all of your activities and even have them forwarded to your phone. This will make things much easier so you can view everything at a glance and know when to make or not make appointments.

Start on To Do Lists. Maybe you can’t get to everything in one day, but at least you have it written down and you can mark as you go. Whatever you have not completed, put it on the next day’s list until it eventually gets checked off.( I love to check off things on my list, it makes me feel like I’ve accomplished something!) Don’t forget to pass on things to your partner from your lists too. Remember you don’t have to do it all, maybe you don’t trust them to get something done, just give them small tasks to build up their confidence and then move to larger tasks as the days and weeks go by.

Planning activities and shopping for food, especially for parties or potluck dinners can be challenging if you don’t do a lot of cooking. One of our favorite new websites to shop for appetizers is appetizerstogo.com. I know, sounds crazy to order food and have it shipped. But they have such delicious appetizers and its so easy. With over 150 hors d’oeuvres to choose from, you are certain to find the right appetizer for every occasion. Great for any party: Weddings, Cocktail, Birthday, Kid’s Birthday, Anniversary, Engagement, New Year’s Eve, Halloween, Holiday, Superbowl, and other special events. They also make a unique holiday gift, hostess gift, or corporate gift. And just think when you bring them to your next party, just tell everyone you made them, it’ll be our little secret!

Here’s an example of what you can get, mmmmmmmmm