Jolene's Recipe Journal

We recently met some of my husband's friends for Happy Hour and they're all very into beer. I'm not going to lie, I'm not a fan of that or wine, I tend to stick to drinks centered around rum, vodka and liqueurs.   I studied the cocktail menu a while and decided on a Ciderhouse. The ingredients were cider, caramel vodka and butterscotch liqueur. I wanted to take a picture but it was my first time meeting these particular people and I felt too awkward doing it.   It's fall in New England so cider is pretty easy to find. You can substitute unsweetened apple juice or hard cider if you can't find it. I played around with ratios for a few days, and the end result was 2 parts apple cider, 1 part caramel vodka and 1 part butterscotch liqueur.    The restaurant's version came with a drizzle of caramel around the rim.  I decided to put mine inside of the glass and then popped them in the freezer but it still pretty much disappeared once I poured the cocktail in.  ...

Fall is an amazing time in New England. To me, the season kicks off when I see that first notification that honeycrisp apples are ready. It's like Christmas morning! I went through the recipes I'd earmarked to try and decided on Glazed Apple Maple Blondies from Taste of Home. This one comes together quickly.  If I'm prepping a lot of apples I'll break out the KitchenAid Spiralizer but for this I just used my Titan hand peeler.  It's 20 years old and it works just as well as the day I got it. The recipe didn't specify size, so I cut my apples into 1/2" dice. Instead of a metal pan, I used a 13x9 glass pan and coated it with nonstick spray before I poured the batter in. It took about 45 minutes for it to test with some soft crumbs clinging to the toothpick.   I made the full glaze recipe with another of my New England staples, real maple syrup. I do not believe pancake syrup would give the same results. It is a lot of glaze.  I probably used about a little ...