Chocolate Gooey Butter Cookies by Paula Deen

I made these for our BIG family gathering yesterday. They are easy AND delicious!!

For those of you looking for a HEALTHY recipe... Paula Deen's are not your best option. Note the BUTTER and CREAM CHEESE... that you don't taste, but they doe make a marvelous cookie that doesn't go hard on you!! I know, you may imagine your arteries clogging as you down these scrumptious morsels of yumminess... but I didn't notice... or mind... ;p  oh, and to make sure we had plenty, I doubled the batch!!

Ingredients

• 1 (8-ounce) brick cream cheese, room temperature
• 1 stick butter, at room temperature
• 1 egg
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 (18-ounce) box moist chocolate cake mix
• Confectioners' sugar, for dusting

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl with an electric mixer, cream the cream cheese and butter until smooth. Beat in the egg. Then beat in the vanilla extract. Beat in the cake mix. Cover and refrigerate for 2 hours to firm up so that you can roll the batter into balls. Roll the chilled batter into tablespoon sized balls and then roll them in confectioner's sugar. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet, 2 inches apart. Bake 12 minutes. The cookies will remain soft and "gooey." Cool completely and sprinkle with more confectioners' sugar, if desired.

You can find this recipe and more at FoodNetwork.com

"Dan's" Chocolate Cake from Am @ The Family Trifecta

Right from the top, this is NOT MY post!!

We have AMY at The Family Trifecta to thank for this lovely post.

Thanks for letting me share, Amy!

Now everybody thank her by checking out her AWESOME blog! ;D

Dan’s Chocolate Cake

Many of you have commented on how delicious Dan’s cake looks and wondered if it was as tasty as it was beautiful.  The answer is yes.  And the best part about it is that it is super easy to make…

1. Use any chocolate cake recipe (Dan used a devil’s food boxed cake mix) to make two 9″ cakes. 
2. Create four layers by slicing each cake in half. 
3. Spread seedless raspberry jam on each layer 
4. followed by a thick layer of chocolate ganache 
5. use whatever bittersweet chocolate you prefer and heat half as much cream, 
6. add the broken chocolate to the hot cream and let it sit until melted, 
7. when all melted stir together. 
8. Spread the ganache over the top and sides of the assembled cake. 
9. Grate white chocolate and coat sides of cake. 
10. Add fresh berries and a sprig of mint as a garnish. 
11. Top each slice with fresh whipped cream.

So, there you have it.  Easy and Yummy.
~Amy @ The Family Trifecta