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Maple Bacon S’mores by Kitchen Konfidence

Wow. What a week.

Last week contenders in the Marsh Madness West Coast bracket posted their unbelievable recipes, each one just as creative as the last. Our partners Serious Eats have the recap, and you can scope out links to all the entries (plus a bonus!), below.

Kitchen Konfidence: Maple Bacon S’mores

Love Veggies & Yoga: Peanut Butter Cocoa Krispie S’mores

Teenie Cakes: Chai-Spiced Pistachio Marshmallows

Kitchen Parade: Orange-Kissed Marshmallows

And although she wasn’t in the official bracket, Sweets by Sillianah’s custom Blood Orange Marshmallows are just fantastic.

Check back here and on Serious Eats come Monday for another recap, and make sure you’re following the #MarshMadness hashtag on Twitter.

Are you ready… for Marsh Madness?

No, that isn’t a typo. Starting today, we’re kicking off Marsh Madness with Serious Eats. It’s our version of March Madness, only we’re replacing basketballs with marshmallows .

We’ve created four brackets with sixteen super sweet bloggers, and each food blogger is crafting his or her own unique marshmallow. The recipes start with the original vanilla mallow recipe in Shauna Sever’s Marshmallow Madness, and then the sky is the limit.

At the end of the tournament, Shauna will select her favorite of the bunch, and we’ll award that food blogger with a Quirk Books cookbook library and $100 gift card to Williams-Sonoma.

We’ve got the full schedule and the entire bracket below. Check back regularly on Serious Eats for recaps on the marshmallows, bookmark the blogs and keep up with Marsh Madness on Twitter via #marshmadness.

Last year, while I was busy doing blogger research for The Cookiepedia, I stumbled upon a lot of outrageous macaron recipes. There were plenty of wild flavor combinations, from the subtle like lavender and vanilla bean to the adventurous like pistachio with vanilla raspberry & rhubarb jam.

I felt bad for Quirk’s Margaret McGuire (editor) and Katie Hatz (designer) during this process, as I was filling their inboxes with link after link. So, here are my favorites from those days of assaulting their email accounts.

Read on to scope out the recipes, for a chance to share your favorites, and an opportunity to win a copy of The Cookiepedia! Oh and Margaret? Katie? I apologize for nothing.

When someone says barbeque, there’s always a brief moment of panic for me. As the dessert go-to girl, I will be ostracized for not bringing some sweets. But the idea of desserts in the heat just gives me melted nightmares… that is until I discovered upside down cakes.

Most of us are very familiar with the traditional pineapple upside down cake. They’re so popular, I distinctly remember being able to make one in my friend’s toy oven. However, there are many other great kinds of upside down cakes. The final product is a sturdy, beautiful cake with intense flavors that doesn’t dissolve in the sun.

Especially since plums and raspberries are in season, this is my new favorite summer cake. Take the ripest, dark plums and combine with the tartest of raspberries (use golden for a little extra flare) to make the flavors really pop against the cinnamon and nutmeg in the cake.

In 1984, President Ronald Reagan designated July as National Ice Cream Month and the third Sunday of the month as National Ice Cream Day. Reagan wanted everyone to honor the fun and nutrious food that is enjoyed by a full 90% of the nation’s population. This is actually a real proclamation and the President called for all people of the USA to observe these events with “appropriate ceremonies and activities.” See the archived proclaimation on the American Presidency Project.

Well, I always try to fulfill my civic duties and do what is expected of me as a citizen of this nation. In keeping with this proclamation, I quickly got busy in the kitchen and whipped up my own Strawberry Ice Cream. It was so good, that it almost never made it to the freezer! The strawberries, which I cooked in sweet syrup and swished around in creamy yogurt, were simply sublime.

Now it’s time for YOU to do your part. Take this recipe and get started. It’s your duty.

If the amount a person loves sprinkles directly corresponds to how adult someone is… I miserably fail at being grown up. I pay my bills on time, I go to work every day, and I don’t eat cereal for dinner. However, give me a bowl of sprinkles and the part of me that’s still five and attracted to shiny things explodes.

It’s hard not to love the white background of cake flecked with tiny bits of color. As I folded the sprinkles or “jimmies,” I thought of what kind of frosting would go well. A simple chocolate was too easy. A little lemon clashed with the happiness that the sprinkles gave me. I rifled through my various bottles of extracts and flavors like a witch preparing a cauldron when my fingers brushed the top of a still sealed container, slightly hidden. In that moment, I realized how I could mature a cake with sprinkles in it—rosewater.

This combination of cake and frosting prevents the rose from overpowering and brings out the delicate flavors of the vanilla cake subtly flavored with lemon. Bring these cupcakes to a birthday party for young or old and be prepared for rave reviews.

Hit the jump for an explosion of sprinkle colors… as well as the recipe.