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From the Yahoo Tipline: 3 Ways to Upgrade Store-Bought Pies

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Yahoo Food has launched something they’ve brilliantly named “The Tipline.” The Tipline is a video series which offers up great tricks, easy tips, and fun hacks to help you be on your A Game this Thanksgiving – not to mention Christmas, Hanukkah, New Year’s and all the other holidays and reasons to celebrate.

After all, as any good foodie knows, it’s all about the food.

To kickstart the series, Senior Editor Stephanie Smith provides us with three easy (as well as beautiful and delicious) ways to improve a store bought pie for Thanksgiving that is sure to these desserts to the next level.

A few of my own personal tips from my pre-Gluten Free days:

  • Most delis have great pies, but before you serve a particular store’s pie for a special day, test it out for yourself. Just because Store X makes great doughnuts doesn’t mean they necessarily know their way around a pumpkin pie.
  • If the tin pan bothers you, sit it inside a towel-lined glass dish. Use a colorful, festive towel and no one will be the wiser – as long as you don’t have Nosy Parkers around while you’re slicing!
  • If, like me, you actually love making your own pie crusts and pies. However, if you’re like me, you are also human… on most days….  so mistakes happen. On Thanksgiving it’s a brilliant idea to have at least one deli pumpkin or pecan pie on hand. You know… just in case.

Another wonderful video (and talk about timely) from Yahoo Food is How to Make Delicious Gluten Free Stuffing. I can’t wait to try this one out. If time is of the utmost importance (and when is it not?), you’ll also like 10 Microwave Hacks to Help with Thanksgiving Dinner!

Click through for more great food videos and recipes.

Creative Holiday Desserts: Quick and Easy Two-Ingredient Recipes

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The holidays often conjure up memories of our mothers or grandmothers making delicious homemade treats.  They spent hours making batches of goodies for the family to enjoy and everyone appreciated the scrumptious fruits of their labor.  Many of us would like to continue that tradition of holiday baking, but the hustle and bustle of the season can sometimes get in the way.  From wrapping gifts and writing Christmas cards to trimming the tree and attending neighborhood parties, it can be tough to find the time to even get dinner on the table, much less try to make time-consuming, difficult desserts.  Fortunately, there are simple shortcuts you can use to make the holiday sweets your family and friends love without all the usual time and hassle.  Here are some creative holiday dessert recipes with just two ingredients each:

1. Fudge

Fudge is the treat everyone wants, but no one wants to take the time to make it.  The traditional recipe can require nearly a dozen ingredients as well as multiple pots and candy thermometers.  It takes hours to prepare and if you don’t have much candy-making experience, the end result can be a sticky, clumpy disaster.  Instead, skip the intensive process of old-fashioned fudge and opt for this quick and easy stand-in.  For classic chocolate flavor, all you’ll need is a can of chocolate frosting and a bag of chocolate chips.  Melt the chips in the microwave and stir in the can of frosting until well-blended.  Spread the mixture into a lined pan and chill until set.  Now it’s ready to be cut into bars to give in your holiday treat bags.  This recipe can also be used to make other fudge flavors.  Vanilla frosting and white chocolate chips will make decadent vanilla fudge.  Strawberry frosting with white chocolate chips makes sweet and fruity strawberry fudge.  You can even make peanut butter fudge by swapping out the chips for a jar of peanut butter and stirring in a can of melted vanilla frosting.  No matter what flavor you choose, you’ll have creamy and delicious fudge in minutes rather than hours.

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2.  Holiday bark

This is another perennial favorite at many holiday family gatherings and parties.  Simply melt a bag of chocolate chips (or your choice of flavor) and combine with your favorite mix-ins.  Spread the mixture into a lined, shallow pan and allow it to chill in the fridge.  Once it’s set, lift it out of the pan and break into jagged pieces.  Having a variety of sizes will allow each guest to choose how much of this holiday treat he or she wants to indulge in.  Chocolate almond bark is a classic and vanilla bark with crushed candy canes or holiday sprinkles is always a hit with the kids.  However, why not try something new this year?  Pair white chocolate chips with chocolate sandwich cookies for the delicious flavor of cookies and cream.  Combine peanut butter chips and peanut butter sandwich cookies or chopped peanut butter cups to please all the peanut butter lovers in your life.  You could even use butterscotch chips with pretzel stick chunks for a sweet and salty experience that’s sure to be the hit of any holiday get-together.  With such quick preparation and only two ingredients, you can whip up holiday bark all winter long.

3. Cake

You might be wondering how you could possibly bake a cake with just two ingredients, but it’s easy if you take a couple of shortcuts.  Melt a pint of your preferred flavor of ice cream, add it to your choice of boxed cake mix and you’ve got instant cake batter.  Just pour the batter into a cake pan or some cupcake holders and bake according to the package instructions.  Soon, you’ll have a delectable dessert to cap off any holiday party.  Mix and match different flavors to come up with your favorite holiday combination.  Try white cake mix with peppermint ice cream for candy cane cake.  Pumpkin or spice cake paired with butter pecan ice cream is a great alternative to the typical pumpkin pie.  Red velvet with rocky road is the perfect way to get your chocolate fix as well as give your dessert table a pop of holiday color.  Your holiday cakes will impress all your guests and only you will know just how simple they were to prepare.

This may be the most wonderful time of the year, but it can also be the busiest.  If you find yourself with no time to make goodies amidst the Christmas chaos, give one of these quick and easy ideas a try.  With only two ingredients per recipe, you can create fun and tasty holiday treats that your family and friends will love. To read more about the latest in the food service industry check out the Instawares Food and Restaurant Blog.

16 Tasty Year Round Uses for Candy Coated Almonds

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I recently had the pleasure of reviewing a bag of Oh Nuts Candy Coated Almonds.  Being a complete nut fanatic, I couldn’t wait for the bag to arrive in the mail. When it did, it took me all of 2 seconds to tear into it. I was probably on my third candy coated almond before the mail carrier was off of our street.

I have no shame when it comes to nuts, coffee, chocolate, or catfish. No shame whatsoever.

My mind has been buzzing over the many uses for these wonderful and beautiful candy coated almonds. I’m afraid that the pictures here just don’t do them enough justice. They’re so bright, shiny, and colorful!

Below are just some of the ways I’ve come up with for enjoying these little lovelies.

  1. Celebrate March Madness with your favorite team’s colors. I bleed UK Wildcat’s blue and white, so I use the blue and white ones for gameday snacking. Leave the delicious candy coated almonds in candy dishes, throw them in a bowl with fresh popcorn, or use them to spell out your team’s initials on top of a cake.
  2. Use colorful candy coated almonds in Easter baskets and/or as Easter decorations.
  3. During baseball season, choose the colors of your favorite team. I’d have St. Louis Cardinals’ colors in baskets, candy dishes, bowls, etc.
  4. These beautiful candy coated almonds would make excellent wedding favors. There are countless wedding favor bags and boxes available.  Simply order candy covered almonds in the chosen wedding colors and fill the bags/boxes.
  5. These are perfect for snacks at the office. Keep the bag in your desk drawer and you’ll have healthy snacks readily available throughout the day.
  6. Fourth of July? Red, white, and blue candy coated almonds would be gorgeous on cupcakes, cakes, and cookies.
  7. You could use these almonds as favors at a baby shower, much as you would a wedding.  There are colors available that make me instantly think of baby showers: pink, blue, yellow, white…
  8. Speaking of pink, activities and fund raisers for breast cancer awareness would be a perfect fit for the beautiful pink candy coated almonds.
  9. A bag or two of candy coated almonds would be delicious additions to gift baskets, whether it’s for Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, birthdays, or Christmas.
  10. Send a few bags to your favorite college student.  We all love to send treats to those we love and, quite frankly, Oh Nuts products are PERFECT for this. Nuts travel well and won’t spoil or get “messy” like a lot of other treats. As a bonus, they’re as healthy as they are delicious!
  11. Use beautiful red and white candy coated almonds in heart-shaped candy dishes as part of your Valentine’s Day decor.  Give some as gifts to your favorite valentine as well.
  12. Choose red, green, white, gold metallic or silver metallic  for Christmas decorating. They’d be beautiful additions to fruit baskets.
  13. Orange and Black Candy Coated Almonds are perfect for Halloween!
  14. St. Patrick’s day cupcakes call for green candy coated almonds.
  15. NFL fans can choose their team’s colors for tailgating snacks.
  16. The metallic colored almonds (see #12) are also ideal for New Year’s Eve AND silver or gold wedding anniversaries.

White Candy Coated Almonds

Health Benefits of Almonds:

  • Since almonds are a plant based food, they contain no cholesterol.
  • Almonds are loaded with protein, fiber, calcium, magnesium, potassium, vitamin E and other antioxidants and phytochemicals.
  • Studies show that just 3 ounces of almonds a day can actually lower a person’s cholesterol by 14 percent. 14 percent!
  • When we munch on healthy snacks, like nuts, we stay away from unhealthy and harmful snacks like chips. That, alone, makes them worth their weight in gold.