Accidental Whoopie Pies

I'm still adding a few last-minute recipes to my cookbook that I'm planning on self-pubbing by Christmas.

Imagine my surprise and joy when trying to develop the "perfect" chocolate brownie cookie I accidentally whipped up my grandmother's old Whoopie Pie/Moon Pie recipe.  It wasn't planned as I haven't had her recipe in my hands since I was a Tween.  I was simply fiddling with a cookie recipe, and accidentally had these come out of the oven.

Maga (my grandmother) made hers with Carob powder, I made these with Cocoa powder, but either way works wonderfully.  My "tasting crew" at my favorite local diner all gave me thumbs up on these, so I figured it's worth posting here.  Pictures will come later.

The key to these is the way they are mixed, so read the instructions before you start pouring stuff into the bowl.

What you'll need for the cookies:

          1 cup butter, softened (nuked in the microwave works too)
          1 cup Cocoa powder (I prefer Nestle or Hershey's_
          1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
          2 eggs
          2 teaspoons vanilla
          2 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
          1 tsp. baking soda
          1/4 tsp. salt  (optional)
          Parchment paper
          Wax paper (just a little piece will do)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cream the sugar and butter really well. Turn off the mixer, add in the Cocoa powder and mix on low/medium speed until really well mixed then increase the mixer speed. Add in the eggs and vanilla, mix until "fluffy" or well blended.  Add in the baking soda, flour and salt and mix well BY HAND, until all the flour is incorporated.

Roll into balls and place on a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper (non-stick may work too).  Place wax paper over the cookies and press flat using the bottom of a glass (if you don't have waxed paper, you can dip the glass in some cocoa powder to keep it from sticking).

Bake for 8 minutes, remove from the cookie sheet after a few minutes and let cool completely.


What you'll need for the icing:

          3 cups powdered sugar
          1/2 cup melted butter
          2 tsps. vanilla
          2-3 tablespoons milk

Place all of the ingredients in the mixing bowl. Start out slow, scrapping the sides until it is all incorporated, it will be thick at first. Add 1 tablespoon of milk, increase the mixer speed and continue mixing, continue adding milk until the icing is of the right consistency (thick but spreadable). When it looks "right" whip it for a few minutes more until it gets fluffy.

Place the icing in a frosting bag or baggie that you will cut the end off of and pipe the frosting onto a cookie bottom and top with another cookie. If the frosting is a bit loose, place the cookies in the freezer or fridge for a few minutes and it will firm up.  I would not suggest spreading the icing on as you would a cake, the cookies are a bit too fragile to hold up to that.

Serve with milk and don't worry about the calories!

The Liebster Blog Award

Had anyone bothered to ask me four or five years ago if I'd ever write a book, let alone a work of fiction, I would've told them they were nuts. It was never my dream to be a writer and it would never have dawned on me that I'd ever write a novel or even a blog. Then Jess popped up and I wrote my first draft of my first book in less than a month. 

After submitting the first book to a few agents, I realized I would need more help if I were to ever get this thing published so I checked out a few local groups. They didn't like Jess, because she swears, and the first book is a bit dark in spots. (How can you not get dark when writing about a dead child?)

I then found Grand Rapids Region Writers Group and emailed then-president Cheryl Sterling about whether or not I might fit in their group, given Jess' penchant for swearing like a drunken sailor and having a BFF that is a Drag Queen Diva. The very first meeting I knew I found a new home.

Fast forward a year, and here I find myself the recipient of the Liebster Blog award courtesy of Patricia Kiyono, a fellow author/crafter/seamstress/procrastinator (I especially love that last one). Patricia Kiyono has fun blog Creative Hodgepodge – complete with cute grandbaby pictures - and is the author of three current titles at Astrea Press: Aegean Intrigue, A Chrismas Phoenix, and The Legacy. You can check them out at her site or purchase them directly from Astrea Press.

The Liebster Blog award is supposed to be given to "up and coming bloggers who have fewer than 200 followers". Thank you Patricia for granting me this honor! And now it's my turn to pass it on.

All that's required to accept this award is:

1. Thank the person who gave it to them and link back to that person's blog.

2. Copy and paste the award to your blog. (It's up at the top!)

3. Choose 5 blogs to award in kind and break the news by commenting on those blogs.

4. Hope those people pay it forward in turn by accepting and awarding "The Liebster Blog Award" to blogs they'd like to honor.

I'm choosing these five bloggers:

Erica Clodig at The Pen is Mighter than the Darkness. Erica is the one who introduced me to NaNoWriMo, where Collie was “born” and has an amazing number of books in progress and who, like me, is not yet published. She inspired me to keep working on my writing and gave me my first introduction into the writing world.

Jennifer Armintrout at Sweaters For Days And Moves Like Jagger . Jennifer is the USA Today best-selling author of several paranormal romance novels and makes me laugh often. She's also the one to get me into my first real critique meeting which has been hugely beneficial and loaded with lots of much needed advice and suggestions for improvements.

Mia Watts at The Art of Seduction is Watts Beneath the Covers. Mia is one of the writer's I connected with at the first meeting and assured me that Jess' swearing really isn't an issue. She also is a prolific romance author who appears to have book releases every week!

Tanya Eby at www.tanyaeby.com. Tanya is my mentor and writes fun, quirky characters that I can totally relate to. She has an amazing sense of humor and continues to keep my faith up by allowing me to see her own struggles with getting books published.

Andrea Dickinson at Diary of a Romance Writer.  Andrea writes some amazingly hot, quick romance reads and has a similar appreciation of the LGBT community. She also makes me laugh often and I could easily spend a day having fun with her and feel like we'd barely gotten started.

So those are my 5 nominees, now to finish up the comment/contact instructions!

You know, for being currently unemployed I seem to have tons of work to do.

Researching self publishing via B&N's PubIt!

I've been playing around with the idea of selling my book electronically for some time now. And I just found out about the Barnes & Noble's PubIt! service. Basically, you write and edit your book, get some cover art made up (wonder if I can convince the aunt to do something for free?) and upload the entire shebang to the PubIt! service at Barnes & Noble.

They have their own pricing scheme for which the majority of books will fall in the "we get 65%, you get 35%" category. The other category is they get 40% of the take. Not sure how they worked all that out or if that's kind of "standard", but it is an option to not having an agent. They'll even accept short stores, which may be where I start at...if I do this at all.

There are restrictions (of course) on what is acceptable material, and sad to say MaryJanice Davidson's Betsy series wouldn't make the cut as they would consider it "pornographic" in nature (due to the number of times Betsy gets graphically laid). I think Jess will fit into their requirements okay, but I still have to wade through all of the legalese and FAQs on the site before submitting anything.

And I'm not sure how the copyrights will work either and that's the stuff I'm the most concerned about. I want to make sure I'm not signing over control to B&N. Jess has her own strong opinions about who can/can't modify her language; she does have quite the repertoire of swear words, many which I don't use and end up with a headache as a result.

I'll be better about updating as I find out more about this potential option to get my book(s) published. I'm very intrigued by this new service and B&N says it will put the manuscripts into a common eReader format, but I'm not 100% convinced of that just yet.

In case you haven't heard about this service yet, here's the link to the B&N PubIt! service: Note: the link feature on blogger seems to be borked up on my blog atm

http://pubit.barnesandnoble.com/pubit_app/bn?t=pi_reg_home

I'm also looking into what it would take to publish electronically via Amazon, and all the legalese that goes along with their service as well.

And I've been debating about chasing after MaryJanice's agent...if he can keep up with her, I wonder if he could handle another one that goes off on tangents at random times. Hmmm...... oh well, back to the day job.

Agent Hunting

I did it!  I found the agent information I was looking for...now I just need to get the letter drafted and off to him.  Patience will be much needed as their lead time for a response is anywhere from 6 to 8 weeks.  I'm hoping that because he has an author that is in the same genre that he might be piqued...especially since she's one I read anytime a new book comes out.

MaryJanice Davidson doesn't use an agent, she represents herself, but she's also well published.  So I decided to follow Victoria Laurie's route and get an agent.  And it will be her "fault" if I end up with the same agent; as it was in one of her books that had lots of links to my life that she mentioned her agent by name in the forward.  I took it as a sign.

I have to, don't I?  After all, my main character has similar abilities to one of her main characters...not the one in the book I was reading, but still it's the thought.

I was perusing another blog today that led to a link that points out the odds of being able to be a successully published author (meaning you earn enough on your books to just be a writer and nothing else) are somewhere between 1 in 200 to 1 in 500.  Here's to hoping my luck holds out!  I was accepted to the only university that I applied to (much to my mother's anguish...that I only applied to 1 university, not that I was accepted).

Wish me luck!  Mostly to getting the agent letter done...then luck that he'll pick me up...and then luck we'll find a publisher to find it.

And once I get those agent letters shipped off, I'll try to introduce you to the ladies, as well as the new Miracle Max and Fairy series children's book ideas I have.