Friday, June 24, 2016

Wookie Cookies

(Adapted from the Star Wars Cookbook)


-2 1/4 cups flour
-1 tsp baking soda
-1 tsp salt
-1 tsp cinnamon (I like to put a little extra, but it's up to you)
-1 cup unsalted butter, softened (not melted)
-1 cup packed brown sugar
-1/2 cup granulated sugar
-2 large eggs
-1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
-2 cups milk chocolate chips (we usually put 1 cup milk chocolate and 1 cup semi-sweet)
-1 pkg (6 oz) instant chocolate pudding


Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Mix flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and pudding.  In another bowl mix butter, brown sugar, and granulated sugar until smoothe.  Mix in eggs and vanilla extract.  Add the flour mixture and stir until blended.  Add the chocolate chips and mix.  Scoop dough on an ungreased cookie sheet leaving 1" between each scoop.  Bake for about 10 minutes.

Thursday, April 28, 2016

Bath Bombs

1/4 Cup: Baking Soda
1/8 Cup: Espom Salt or sea salt
1/8 Cup: Citric acid
1/8 Cup: corn starch
1.5 teaspoons vegetable oil or castor oil
12-15 drops food coloring and a squirt of liquid hand soap to make bubbles
1 teaspoon water

mix dry. mix wet. 1/2 teaspoon essential oils (lemon, eucalyputs, etc)
15 drops red
stir while adding wet to dry
shakein a tupperware
embroidery floss with knoat at the bottom
line toilet paper tube with paper
spoon misture into tp tube, one spoonful at a time
near top compound with battering ram
make hole and put fuse in and ram it around
freeze 10-15min

Thursday, March 17, 2016

Lemon tarragon pasta salad

Knock off of plates and palates pasta salad

1 (16 oz) box of bow tie noodles
2 cups red grapes
1 cup celery
1/2 cup slivered almonds
1 bunch green onion

Dressing: 
1 1/4 C regular mayo
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 tsp onion powder
2 lemons juiced and zested
1/2 tsp salt
2 TBLs fresh tarragon, minced
1 TBLS sugar
2 TBLS honey

Sunday, February 21, 2016

Swig Sugar Cookie Copy Cat

Swig Cookie Copy Cat Recipe

I combined two of them together and man these cookies are good!!! If you do a normal size cookie dough ball, (the second size scooper) it makes 4 dozen. If you made them Swig size it'd make 2 dozen.  DON'T cook them longer than 7-8 min. You don't want any brown

Ingredients
  • Dry ingredients:
  • 6 cups flour
  • 1 teaspoon salt
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ teaspoon cream of tarter
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder



  • Wet ingredients:
  • 2 sticks (salted) butter (1 cup), room temperature
  • ¾ cup vegetable oil
  • 1¼ cup sugar
  • 1 cup powdered sugar
  • 2 tablespoons water
  • 2 eggs, room temperature (important)
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • For the Icing:
  • 1 stick (salted) butter, room temperature
  • ⅓ cup sour cream
  • ¼ teaspoon salt
  • 2-3 tablespoons milk
  • 4 cups powdered sugar
  • ¼ teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 – 2 drops red food coloring
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
  2. In a mixing bowl with a metal whisk, mix together flour, salt, baking soda, and cream of tarter. Set aside.
  3. In the bowl of a standing mixer, cream together the butter and sugars for 2 minutes. Slowly stream in the oil while beating. Add the water and vanilla and then beat the eggs in one at a time until combined. Now add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients a little at a time, mixing until combined (scrape down the sides of the bowl as needed).
  4. Using a 1½inch ice cream scoop, scoop out the cookie dough into uniform sized scoops onto a parchment lined baking sheet pan. 12 cookies per pan. With this size of ice cream scoop, you can get about 40 to 48 cookies from this recipe.
  5. Place 2 tablespoons sugar in a small dish with a pinch of salt, use more if needed. Take a drinking glass or something about 2 inches in diameter (I used an empty Star Bucks frappuchino glass…you know the kind shaped like an old fashioned milk glass?…it worked great!). Dip it into the sugar (you may need to press the glass into the first cookie dough scoop to grease it up for the sugar to stick to the glass). Press the glass into the cookie dough scoops to form a jagged edge around the cookie. The dough will spill past the edge of the glass. You might need to use your fingers to press pieces of the dough back into the cookie. Repeat this process of dipping the glass into the sugar and pressing it into each scoop of sugar cookie dough.
  6. Bake the cookies for only 8 minutes. You don’t want to over bake. You can either let them cool right on the pan (because they are not baked that long in the oven, that is if you have enough baking pans for the rest of the cookies…this is what I did), OR you can gently move the cookies onto a cooling rack and let them cool completely this way.
  7. For the Icing:
  8. Cream the butter, sour cream, and salt together. Add powdered sugar a little at a time, alternating with adding the milk. Add extra milk or powdered sugar if needed to reach your desired consistency. Add food coloring and vanilla and mix until combined. Using a rubber spatular add a big dollop of icing onto each cookie. With the backside of a spoon, spread the icing over the center circle of the cookie. Let the icing dry and set to the touch and then store in an air-tight container in the fridge. I used a 9×13 glass pyrex dish with plastic wrap over the top and parchment sheets between the stacked cookies, and it worked great.These cookies are served chilled because of the sour cream in the pink frosting.

Friday, January 29, 2016

Salted caramel butter bars


    R E C I P E

  • 8 sticks salted butter, room temperature
  • 2 cups sugar
  • 3 cups powdered sugar
  • 4 tablespoons vanilla extract
  • 8 cups all-purpose flour
Preheat the oven to 325°. 
Generously spray a large rimmed cookie sheet (jelly roll pan) with cooking spray
In your mixer, combine butter and sugars & mix on medium speed until creamy. 
Add the vanilla and mix until incorporated 
Slowly add the flour to the butter mixture on low speed 
Mix until soft dough forms
Press 1/3 of the dough into the prepared baking pan
Bake 20 minutes or until the edges are a pale golden brown
Refrigerate the remaining 2/3 of the dough as you prepare your caramel.

{you can do the Caramel part a few different ways- 
to each their own, no bad choices here friends}
  • 2 cups of your favorite salted caramel sauce 
  • Pour onto baked crust and continue on with the recipe
  • {or}
  • 2 (14 oz) bag caramel candies
  • 2/3 cup half and half or cream
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 2 tablespoons coarse sea salt
  • Unwrap caramels, place in microwavable bowl with half and half/cream and microwave one minute (more in 30 second intervals if needed)
  • Stir in vanilla. Pour over baked crust.
  • Sprinkle with Sea Salt
  • {or} 
  • -this is what I like best-
  • about 1/4 a loaf of Peter's caramel
  • 1/2 cup cream
  • and 1-2 tablespoons of sea salt flakes
  • Pretty much, I kind of eyeball the whole thing
  • microwave caramel and cream for one minute 
  • Microwave longer in 30 second intervals if needed
  • Stir
  • Pour over baked crust
  • Sprinkle salt flakes until your little heart is content
After your crust is baked, your caramel is poured and your salt is sprinkled, crumble the remaining dough on top, sprinkling little pieces here and there until the pan is covered.

Continue baking 25-30 minutes
Caramel should be bubbling &
 the topping lightly golden in color

Cool bars before cutting 
if you'd like them to hold together nicely
or 
slap some vanilla ice-cream on that warm goodness 
& call it a day