Too Much of a Good Thing

My boyfriend has two simple favorites when it comes to food: peanut butter and bacon. In fact, he was the person to introduce to me the Peanut Butter and Bacon sandwich. As the girl that bakes for him on a regular basis, I am always trying to find more recipes that he will go nuts over. This cookie meets both of those qualifications.



Although I also really enjoy both peanut butter and bacon, I did not enjoy these as much as he did. I felt like the bacon added a somewhat unpleasant meaty flavor to the cookie, as opposed to a more smoky accent. This could also be due to the fact that I used extra bacon to make it extra bacon-y delicious.



Peanut Butter Bacon Cookies
Makes 1 1/2 dozen cookies

1 cup chunky or smooth peanut butter
1 cup sugar (1/2 cup brown sugar and 1/2 cup granulated sugar)
1 egg
1 teaspoon baking soda
6 to 8 slices of bacon, cooked, cooled and dices

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a skillet over medium high heat, fry up bacon until cooked through and let cool on paper towels until cool enough to dice. Dice up and set aside.

Grease a baking sheet with butter and set aside. In a mixer combine peanut butter and sugars until well combined, about 2 minutes. Add egg and baking soda and mix for another 2 minutes. Fold in cooked bacon. Roll into large walnut sized balls, roll in granulated sugar, and create a criss-cross pattern with a fork. Bake for 10 minutes, until lightly browned. Cool on a baking sheet for five minutes.

Informative and Delicious

I took Advanced Composition this semester, a required class with a misleading name; instead of composing essays, we composed memos, business letters, resumes, and a big informative presentation. The basis of the presentation was that it needed to focus on someone or something who/that has been extremely influential in the field you plan to go into. Thus, I chose Martha Stewart.



Part of the project included bringing in handouts for everyone in the class - a piece of paper with trivia or a pie chart on it - to supplement your presentation. After sitting through about fifteen of the presentations, I decided to make my handout into a little ray of sunshine. I baked cookies, placed them in cute, individual treat bags, and handed them out along with the recipe. Needless to say, I made an A.



These cookies are really basic and have an after-school feel to them. They are just another kitchen sink cookie recipe for your never-ending cookie-book. My never-ending cookie book.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Makes 2 dozen cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup smooth peanut butter
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup dark-brown sugar, tightly packed
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips
2/3 cup roasted peanuts, chopped

Heat the oven to 350 degrees. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream butter, peanut butter, and sugars together until light and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla, and mix on medium speed until combined. Sift flour and baking soda together, and add to the butter mixture, beating just to combine. Fold in chocolate chips and peanuts.

Using a large spoon, form dough, and place on a baking sheet linedwith parchment paper, pressing down slightly to flatten. Bake until golden brown, 18 to 20 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Store in an airtight container up to 1 week.

Peanut Butter Lovers

I found the recipe for these Peanut Butter Bars somewhere online the summer before I went to college. I remember the first time I made them; our friends had organized a potluck picnic and I had nothing to do all day before it began. So, I looked up a recipe and found this one; they were a huge hit. One guy in particular ate half the pan.



On repeats of this recipe, the same thing always happens; everyone tries one and one person in particular eats five or six. The point is, they're very good and fairly easy, although I don't make them very often. These bars are dense, chewy, creamy, and above all, very very peanut butter-y.



Peanut Butter Bars
Makes 8 large or 16 regular bars

1 1/4 cups creamy or crunchy peanut butter (I usually do a combination of the two)
1 1/2 cups firmly-packed brown sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 cup butter, extrememly softened
4 large eggs, room temperature
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Heat oven to 350 degrees and grease the bottom of a 13-by-9-inch baking pan.

Combine peanut butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and butter in a large bowl; mix until smooth. Stir in eggs and beat until well mixed.

In another bowl, combine cinnamon, flour, baking powder, and salt. Stir flour mixture into peanut butter mixture until completely combined.

Pour into prepared pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until brownies begin to pull away from sides.

Something About the Kitchen Sink

I've been a Girl Scout for 14 years, and recently have been promoted to being a leader. We have meetings once a month, on the first Wednesday and the person supplying snacks is in constant rotation. The one consistent thing about our meetings is that I almost always bake something.



This month, I made cookies because...just about everyone loves cookies. The recipe I settled on was found in a cookie book I got for my birthday last year.



The recipe here is a little different from the one found in the book: I added vanilla, cinnamon, coconut, and peanuts. Those can all be taken out if you'd like, but I recommend keeping the cinnamon, just because it really helps bring out the milk chocolate. Plus, I made a half recipe because 5 dozen cookies is a lot. When cooked for 12 minutes, these cookies were chewy on the inside and crunchy on the outside - perfect.



Milk Chocolate Peanut Butter Cookies
Makes about 5 dozen cookies

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnnamon
1 cup unsalted butter,
softened
3/4 cup creamy peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
3 cups milk chocolate chips
1 cup sweetened shredded coconut (optional)
1 cup peanuts, chopped or whole (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Combine flour, baking soda, and cinnamon in a small bowl; set aside.

In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter, peanut butter, vanilla, and granulated and brown sugars until light and creamy, about three minutes.

Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. On low speed, graduallly add flour mixture, beating until blended.

With a wooden spoon, stir in chocolate chips and coconut.

Drop dough by tablespoonfuls about 2 inches apart on cookie sheet. Bake for 11 to 15 minutes or until light golden.

Cupcake Army

The cover of the February edition of Martha Stewart Living featured a bunch of cupcakes with varying shades of fluffy frosting all displayed in the shape of a heart. This was probably done to get ladies (and guys) all pumped up to make cupcakes. Naturally, after seeing the cover, I was all pumped up to make cupcakes.



I had a Girl Scout meeting coming up, so I decided to make basic yellow butter cupcakes and top them off with the peanut butter frosting that was featured in the cupcake article. The original recipe called for a dollop of grape jelly on top, but I decided to use a different method. I picked out one large, pretty frosting tip and piped it onto the cupcakes. Then I added various things I found in the cabinet - basically, Reese's Pieces and giant milk chocolate chips. I even brought chopped nuts to the meeting as an option.



Overall, these were some pretty good cupcakes. The actual cake part was tender, springy, and buttery. The frosting, however, had a very unique taste. I was skeptical to begin with about the combination of cream cheese and peanut butter. The result was good, but it took a little getting used to. A lot of the girls who ate them loved it, but it took me a while to realize the depth of the flavor.



Yellow Butter Cupcakes
Makes 3 dozen regular-sized cupcakes

3 cup cake flour, sifted
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/4 cups (9 ounces) unsalted butter
2 1/4 cups sugar
5 large eggs, plus 3 large yolks, room temperature
2 cups buttermilk, room temperature
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners.

Whisk flours, baking powder, salt, and baking soda in a large bowl. In another bowl, cream the butter and sugar with a mixer until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition.

Reduce speed to low. Mix buttermilk and vanilla with butter mixture. Add dry ingredients to butter mixture in 3 additions, alternating with wet ingredients, and ending with dry. Scrape sides of bowl, and divide batter among muffin cups, filling each 2/3 full.

Bake cupcakes until testers inserted into centers come out clean, about 20 minutes.


Peanut Butter Frosting
Makes about 1 1/2 cups

6 ounces cream cheese
1/3 cup confectioners' sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup creamy peanut butter (not natural!)
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup heavy cream

Beat cream cheese and confectioners' sugar with a mixer on medium speed. Add salt, then peanut butter, then vanilla.

In another bowl, whisk cream until soft peaks form, then fold into peanut butter mixture. Use immediately, or cover and refrigerate for up to 2 days.

A Baker that Doesn't Bake

My no-bake cookies are pretty awesome. I owe this mostly to the use of peanut butter and old-fashioned oats, as opposed to just cocoa and quick-cooking oats. The PB adds some depth and variety to the flavor and the old-fashioned oats help with thickening the mixture up.



I made these for my cookie boxes for Christmas, and they were well-received. This is a good throwdown cookie recipe, as they only take a few minutes to make and a couple of hours to harden.



Chocolate Peanut Butter No-Bake Cookies
Makes 3 dozen cookies

1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup butter
4 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter
1 2/3 cups old-fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups quick-cooking oats
1 teaspoon vanilla exttract

In a medium sauce pan, combine sugar, milk, butter, and cocoa powder. Bright to a boil and cook for about 2 minutes.

Remove from heat and stir in peanut butter, oats, and vanilla until completely combined. Add more oats if cookies seem runny.

Drop by teaspoonfuls onto wax paper and let cool until hardened.

Spectacular Contraption

On top of being allergic to milk, which excludes a lot of extraneous ingredients from cookies, my boyfriend tends to like only certain types of cookies. A few days ago, I was really getting the urge to bake, so I asked him what he would want that would be new and different. He suggested a combination of peanut butter cookies and snickerdoodles.



Now, if you read faithfully (ha), you'll remember the last time I made peanut butter cookies, I didn't really like them, but the recipient said they were good and I decided I just didn't like peanut butter cookies. After making a different recipe from a book that has yet to steer me wrong, I realized that I do actually like peanut butter cookies, just not Martha's.



The most important aspect of this recipe is timing; you want to pull the cookies out a little bit before they actually look ready, but not too early because then they'll be extra crumbly and fall apart.


Peanutdoodles
Makes 2 dozen if you don't eat half of the dough

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup sugar (preferably superfine)
1/2 cup light brown sugar (preferably unrefined)
1 egg
1 cup peanut butter, crunchy or chewy
Pinch of salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tablespoons sugar

Sift the flour and baking soda together. In a separate bowl, beat the butter and sugars until soft and creamy. Combine the egg, flour mixture, peanut butter, and salt. Add the butter and sugar mixture until smooth.

Wrap the dough in foil or parchment and refrigerate for at least two hours. Meanwhile, make the cinnamon-sugar topping; combine ground cinnamon and sugar together in a small bowl with a fork. If you run out, make more in the same ratio. Remove from the refrigerator and preheat oven to 325 degrees.

Shape the dough into 1 1/4-inch balls and roll completely in cinnamon sugar mixture before placing at least two inches apart on baking sheets. Flatten slightly with a fork and use fork to make classic criss-cross patter. Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden.

Criss-cross

Working at a coffeeshop offers ample oppurtunities to meet all kinds of people; if you're lucky, you'll come in contact with some that aren't completely insane (yet). Instead of focusing on the crazies who either like you a lot (for no real reason) or hate you so much (for no real reason), it's easier to thank the customers who are pleasant to be around. When one of these regulars remarked that his favorite cookie was homemade peanut butter and that his birthday was in a week, I accepted the challenge.

Usually when I put peanut butter into a cookie, it's combined with something else, like oatmeal or chocolate chips. Honestly, I don't have much experience with classic peanut butter cookies. Obviously, I turned to the master for help: Martha. Surely, I thought, she will not lead me astray.



All in all, I thought they were kind of...forgettable. Believe me, they were peanut-butter-y and crunchy and chewy, and the customer was really happy with them. I guess I just don't like plain peanut butter cookies.



Peanut Butter Cookies
Makes 4 dozen cookies

1 1/2 cups crunchy peanut butter
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 large egg
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour and baking powder; set aside.

In a large bowl, beat peanut butter, sugar, and butter until smooth. Beat in egg. Gradually add flour mixture, beating to combine.

Pinch off dough by the tablespoon; roll into balls. Place 2 inches apart on parchment-lined baking sheets. Using a fork, press balls in a crisscross pattern, flattening to a 1/2-inch thickness.

Bake cookies, rotating halfway through, until lightly golden, 18 to 22 minutes. Cool cookies on a wire rack.

Chewy and Egg-Free

In case you haven't noticed yet, some of my favorite things in cookies include oatmeal, peanut butter, and nuts in general. So, when I stumbled across these Peanut Butter-Oatmeal cookies, I began salivating immediately. Not only do they contain all three of my favorite cookie ingredients, they're also vegan, which is a field of baking that I have been wanting more experience in. Also, I bought a big thing of soy milk and vegan butter to make gb's frosting and now I need to use all of it up as quickly as possible.



I added butterscotch chips to mine because those are my favorite chips, and these cookies were going to be just for me. (Don't worry, I ended up sharing a couple of them.) Unfortunately, the butterscotch was a little more sugary than I remembered and ended up being the lower point of the cookies.



Overall, these cookies were so good. It was my first experience of baking without eggs (with one exception of some brownies), and I was quite impressed. I definitely recommend these if you want a small batch of thick and chewy cookies.



Gigantoid Crunchy Peanut Butter-Oatmeal Cookies
Makes about 1 dozen large cookies

2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups rolled oats
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoons salt
3/4 cup canola oil
3/4 cup natural crunchy peanut butter
1 cup granulated sugar
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup vanilla soy milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate or butterscotch chips (optional)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees; lightly grease two cookies sheets. Stir together the flour, oats, baking powder, and salt in a medium mixing bowl. In a large mixing bowl, mix together the oil, peanut butter, sugars, soy milk, and vanilla.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet and mix. Stir in chips, if using. The dough should be extremely difficult and moist. Pack a 1/3-cup measuring cup with dough, pop out and roll into a firm ball. Flatten just barely on a prepared cookie sheet, spacing the dough balls well apart.

Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until cookies have puffed a bit and are lightly-browned. Allow to cool for at least two minutes before moving off the cookie sheet.

Supercalichocalicious

One of the gifts that I received for my birthday was a book of cookie recipes (Cookies by Jill Snider). It is my favorite kind of cookbook - filled with pictures and alterations and easy-to-read instructions. Plus, lots of the cookies seem to include nuts and oatmeal, both of which I really enjoy in cookies.



The other day, I really had a cookie itch and as I rarely get those and have thousands of books filled with cookie recipes, I decided to finally put one to use. So I went through Cookies and finally settled on a cookie that I already had all the ingredients for onhand and that sounded like they would be quite tasty.



I settled on Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies, for obvious reasons. What else can you ask for in a cookie? There are only two things I would change about this recipe if I made it again: I would use extra peanuts and old-fashioned oatmeal.



Speaking of peanut butter, my grandma gave me this really cool device for measuring peanut butter, crisco, and other sticky things that are not particularly enjoyable to clean out of measuring cups. I highly recommend it, but I don't know what it's called.



Chocolate Peanut Butter Oatmeal Cookies
Makes about 4 dozen cookies

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup butter
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs'
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups quick-cooking rolled oats
1 1/2 cups chocolate-covered peanuts, chopped (I substituted 1 1/4 cup of chocolate chips and 2/3 cup chopped unsalted peanuts)
1/2 cup crisp rice cereal

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on medium speed, beat butter, peanut butter, and both sugars until smooth and creamy, about 3 minutes. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla and mix.

On low speed, gradually add flour mixture, beating until blended. With a wooden spoon, stir in oats, chocolate (and) peanuts, and cereal.

Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls about two inches apart on cookie sheet. Press flat with a fork dipped in flour (I forgot to do this on the first batch and the second batch, I just pressed it down with my fingers; honestly, I preferred the ones that weren't pressed flat.)

Bake in preheated oven for 11 to 13 minutes or until crisp and golden. Cool for 5 minutes on sheet before transferring to a rack to cool completely.