Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Ok... sorry again I'm not done with the peanut butter - I had to use almost a whole jar. This might be my new favorite cookie. They're chewy and slightly crunchy and I loovveeee oats. (They look weird in my photo because I flattened them out right when they came out of the oven.)

Chocolate and Pecan Cookies

This is another recipe to use the huge bag of pecans I bought to make the german chocolate cake. This is Dorie's Best Chocolate Chip cookie. That would be Dorie as in Dorie Greenspan. There's a great group of blogs that makes a new Dorie Greenspan recipe every Tuesday (known as Tuesdays with Dorie). A good way to learn how to bake although sometimes the recipes are beyond difficult.

Now the blogger I got this from tested various resting times and temps for the dough so I decided to pop my cookies in the freezer for a bit before baking. It seemed to work- I didn't have time to freeze the last batch and they spread out into thin (and burnt) cookies.

Oatmeal Cookies

I know, I know- not like I've never made an oatmeal cookie before. But these are different- I usually use the oatmeal cookie recipe on the Quaker Oats box or a crispy oatmeal cookie recipe, but this is different. They are both crisp and chewy, without falling apart in your hands. They have a lot of butter though which you can feel free to decrease. I added raisins because I have a big bag of raisins to use and they're good for you.

Samoa Bars

I have a hate-love relationship with Girl Scout cookies. a) why aren't they available year round? b) why are the boxes SO SMALL.

Well now you can make your own- except they'll be called "bars" because you are much too lazy to cut out donut shaped cookies and they're delicious as is.

I made very messy cookies- I don't know how the blogger was able to have crumb-less bars. Mine were falling apart as I dipped them in chocolate so I had to freeze them for a bit. This was very helpful in using all the leftover coconut from the german chocolate cake.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Skillet Cookie

Your eyes do not deceive you, this is a whole wheat pizookie. Even though I accidentally dumped in 1/2 a cup of flax seed it still ended up being very moist and delicious. This is a great way to use your cast iron skillet by the way! My skillet is on its way to being very well seasoned so I'm excited to use it for a dessert recipe.

This was good even a week later, toasted briefly in the oven. The texture is a bit cake-y so I guess you can't really call it a cookie, maybe a cookie bar? But it's easy to make, goes in one pan and you can pretend it's healthy because it uses whole wheat flour. Win, win solution!

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Whoopie Pies

check out the silpat! I love it.

Another whoopie pie, this time chocolate with a peanut butter filling. I really love chocolate + peanut butter. I'm so excited every time a recipe calls for cocoa because instead of Kroger's cocoa, I have VALRHONA COCOA. YES! If you're going to make this- use less butter in the frosting, maybe 3/4 less or even maybe 1/2 the amount- you really don't need it. The full amount makes it too buttery and rich. The cookies are so fluffy and not-too-sweet.

Chinese Almond Cookies

Happy (belated) Chinese New Year! I decided to celebrate by making some almond cookies. I used Marcona almonds to top the cookies. I had these for the first time around a year ago and I'm HOOKED. They're a bit softer than regular almonds and normally served lightly coated in oil and crunchy salt. Get them at Trader Joe's!

For some reason my cookies didn't quite have the crunchiness of a regular almond cookie, but I'm guessing thats because I used a mish mash of flour. A bit of leftover cake flour, a bit of whole wheat, a bit of all purpose and almond meal (not almond flour).

Perfect chocolate chip cookies

Another great recipe from America's Test Kitchen. These cookies are perfect because there is a freakish amount of butter in these and I am not normally shocked by butter, but this is like 1.5 tablespoons of butter per cookie. EH I'd like to live to 50 at least so I took out 2 tablespoons of butter, substituted whole wheat flour for 1/3 of the total flour and added some more flax seed. Verdict? Delicious- probably because of brown butter. I love brown butter, it smells amazing.

look how shiny the batter is!

Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

This recipe can be found on the box of Quaker Oats' oats. They are really good and truly, vanishing. I used a few tablespoons less butter, used 1/3 whole wheat flour and added some ground flax seed to make up for all the junk we've been eating and they tasted the same. Amazing. They are awesome.



I made these for a cookie delivery to my friends in Ohio along with brown butter chocolate chip cookies and snickerdoodles. I'll post the recipe for the brown butter chocolate chip cookies later- they were buttertastic.

Thomas Keller Oreos

Another recipe from Thomas Keller. This time it's his version of an oreo. I didn't have a fluted pastry cutter so I ended up using an old plastic wine glass I had, which worked out pretty well. The shortbread is salty- so good with the white chocolate cream. I had an issue with the white chocolate being too viscous so I let it rest in the fridge for a day instead of the 6 hours and that seemed to solve it. Also thank goodness the blogger mentioned that the dough will at first look like sand because it did and I wasn't sure if I was making it correctly. But just keep mixing and it will eventually come together.

Momofuku's Compost Cookie

It's the one and only compost cookie from David Chang's Momofuku (well... actually Christina Tosi since she's the pastry chef). It is a delicious use for all your leftover baking bits and salty snacks. The annoying part is that you have to refrigerate the dough for a few hours before baking AAHH! Does anyone ever bake 6 hours before they crave a cookie?

The first time I made it with potato chips, honey wheat pretzels, a skor bar and chocolate chips.


The second time I made it with regular kettle chips, thin pretzels, chocolate rice crispy cereal and chocolate chips.

The first batch I made still had some large pieces of chips and pretzels left so there were some bits of salty, chewyness. EH not the tastiest cookie, but I made sure to bash the chips and pretzels properly for the second batch. The only complaint (if you are a butter hater) that I heard was that it was "too buttery" so I'll decrease the butter by a tablespoon or two for the next batch.

Double Tree Cookie and a Brussel Sprout Pizza

I had no idea Double Tree gave out cookies when you check in until Joanne told me and she says they're good, like one of the best (I don't remember their exact ranking...). I haven't had the chance to stay at a Double Tree yet, but I found this recipe online which is supposed to be the real thing. They were.... okay. I think I had too much stuff for the amount of dough- they were bit crumb-ly and dry. I really like the shredded oats though, I haven't seen/tasted that in a cookie before. Next time, I'm using 3/4 of the "stuff" and keeping the same amount of dough.





And another pizza- I am slightly obsessed with pizza right now (pizzas are the new burgers) and I really really want a brick oven in my backyard when I (if I ever) own my own home. This time it is a brussel sprout pizza. The original recipe is brussel sprouts and pancetta, but I substituted peas since this was on a veggie night. I really like brussel sprouts on pizza- the leaves are crisp and charred and soft when stuck half in, half out of the cheese.

Green Tea Ice Cream and Shortbread cookies

My favorite ice cream is probably green tea ice cream, with taro a close second (not sure where to get taro powder in the US though...). This recipe is awesome- it tastes exactly like the ice cream you get in the stores, but you can make it for half the price! Just make sure you go to a Japanese supermarket to get the green tea and not somewhere like Whole Foods where it's $30 for a tiny container. Also this ice cream doesn't have any egg yolks in it so it's thankfully not as rich as the other ice creams I've made.


Another favorite of mine is Pepperidge Farm Chessman cookies. These are so freaking good and buttery. But this recipe for a green tea shortbread beats it. The only cookie cutters I have are candy cane and stocking shaped so I used those. These cookies disappeared in a few days (good thing one batch makes a ton of cookies!).

Still using my trusty salt shaker as a rolling pin.

The underbelly full of nooks and crannies.

Oatmeal cookies & Oatmeal cream pies

I love oatmeal raisin cookies... kinda feels like eating a healthy cookie, no? Today there are two recipes: one for plain oatmeal raisin cookies and another for oatmeal cream pies. The oatmeal raisin cookie recipe is a great solid, basic cookie recipe.

I used a great vanilla extra that Joanne got for me somewhere in the Caribbean- it smells amazing, nothing like the fake vanilla extract you get from Ralphs. This actually smells like vanilla and it has a hat, so you should try this if you see it.


I didn't flatten out the cookies on the bake sheet so they're round little lumps- not my favorite kind of cookie. But they were chewy and just buttery/sugary enough. Not teeth-achingly sweet.

Look how nice and flat they are! I didn't even have to flatten them.

The second recipe is for oatmeal cream pies, a childhood staple thanks to Little Debbie. There's something deeply satisfying about making something from scratch even though you can buy one for less than a dollar at your grocery store or vending machine. The homemade version doesn't to whatever Little Debbie has in her cookie sandwich. I should mention that the cream involved shortening ): AAGGHHH. I avoid using shortening at all times- all my pie crusts are butter crusts, never shortening. But the blogger noted that she tried using butter and it just didn't work... so I used vegetable shortening. ugh. (but it was so delicious)


It's definitely still very sweet, but the cookie is dangerously tender. The marshmallow fluff holds the cookies together- they fall apart easily in your hands. These are so good, just amazing. Although I am a big big marshmallow lover, this was my first time using marshmallow fluff. It kinda freaks me out. I'll probably just make my own marshmallow fluff next time so it's completely home made.

The only photographic evidence of marshmallows.

I made marshmallows before, but of course I forgot to take a picture of them after I cut them up and dusted them with powdered sugar. They're surprisingly easy to make, but you need a stand mixer for it. The recipe is here. The recipe makes a ridiculous amount of marshmallows- be prepared to have hot chocolate every day, every meal.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love chocolate chip cookies, but I've given up trying to find the "best." There is no best- there are just different kinds. The NY Times cookie is good, it's a sweet-savory satisfying cookies with slivers and chunks of chocolate. This cookie recipe is a buttery, crispy at the edges, chewy towards the middle type of deal. It's not fancy, it's just delicious.

I like more dough to chocolate, so I typically only put half of the amount of chocolate in a cookie. I had a few macadamia nuts leftover so I added chopped, toasted macadamia nuts to this batch.



Compare that cookie with "The Chewy" recipe by Alton Brown. It's a very similar recipe, but the portions are different. The first recipe is chewier, this one is a bit puffier.

Shrimp Creole & White Chocolate Chip cookies

One of my favorite things to eat is the jambalaya at Disneyland. I don't remember the name of the "cafe," but it's so freaking good. I love the seasonings and oh yeah, the cream. This is kinda like that, minus the cream, so I'm going to call it healthy. Here's the recipe. I agree with the reviewers- this would taste better with rice. It's not very soup-y so it doesn't really flavor the noodles enough. (Although if you added cream it'd probably be awesome as a pasta dish)

I ended up buying "cajun seasoning" and I'm not sure what's in it, but it's good. I put it on fries and chicken too. I omitted the mushrooms- that just didn't seem right. And even though I followed the recipe, it wasn't "super-hot," I think I'll add more red pepper flakes next time or some Tabasco.


I was also craving white chocolate macadamia nuts. There's a store in Westwood called Diddy Riese and it's famous for its cheap cookies and ice cream sandwiches (and hot dogs too). As much as I love cheap and ice cream sandwiches, I am not in love with their white chocolate chip and macadamia nut cookie- it's not chewy or crunchy. It has this perma-stale texture to it. BLEGH. I was so happy to find this recipe. This is truth in advertising- you will make chewy, buttery cookies.

And the recipe makes a TON. You probably notice dark brown specks? This is what happens when I mix by hand and get lazy. Yep... I decreased the amount of white chocolate chips + macadamia nuts because I like more dough in my cookies. Also I chopped up my macadamia nuts to sort of match the size of the chips.

Macaroons are coming! I'm determined to make macaroons this month.

Snickerdoodles

I've had this recipe bookmarked for awhile, but I didn't have cream of tartar. I finally picked some up at Ralphs and I'm so happy I finally made these! These are SO GOOD. There's nothing bad I can say about them... they baked perfectly and the recipe makes A LOT. I made 3 dozen. Go ahead and click the first photo, look at the cookie up close.


They are very butter-y and kinda hard to roll out, so a quick stay in the fridge will help you roll them out. I don't know what else to say besides make these, you will love them. It's a foolproof recipe. I made these in the afternoon and by the next day they were gone. Seriously.

NY Times Cookie

It wasn't until I had a Kayak cookie at Teaism in D.C. that I realized salt on cookies was THE BEST THING EVER. Then I flew back to LA where there are no Kayak cookies (plus they're pricey. You can purchase a 6 pack for $15.95 online + shipping). I looked and tried every recipe I could find online. There are rumors that rice flour is the key. I never made a good duplicate...Months later there was The New York Times Cookie. It was blogged everywhere and I had to make it.

I didn't have the "1 1/4 pounds bittersweet chocolate disks or fèves, at least 60 percent cacao content (see note)" so I used chopped Valrhona 65% cocoa instead and I even refrigerated it for 36 hours. It was really good. I don't know if the resting did anything, but... it was good. It browned much faster then a regular cookie.

Next time I'm going to use the chocolate disks and some fancy fleur de sal. It's not a kayak cookie at all, but it satisfies my salt+sugar craving.


*sorry for the blurry, weird colored, not so great photos. I will work on it!