White Chocolate Cranberry Cookies

It's a perfectly fall day in Illinois.  The air is cool and crisp, the leaves have turned orange... And what am I doing? Making these mouth-watering cookies.  Try eating them without saying, "Mmmmmm." Go on.  I dare ya.

Ingredients

• 2 3/4 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 large eggs
• 1 1/2 cups white chocolate chips (about 1 small bag)
• 1 cup dried cranberries

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375° F.
2. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg - set aside.
3. In a large bowl, cream butter, sugars, and vanilla.  Add eggs, beating well until incorporated.
4. With the mixer on low speed, gradually add the flour mixture, blending until a very stiff dough forms.
5. Using a wooden spoon, stir in the chocolate and cranberries until evenly distributed.
6. Drop inch-sized balls onto ungreased cookie sheets and bake for 7-10 minutes, or until lightly golden brown on top.
7. Serve with ice cold milk.

Snickerdoodles

Yes, funny name, but serious cookie.  My mom made these with my niece and nephews the other day and after trying one (and another.... and then another) I couldnt help but ask for the recipe.

Ingredients

• 1/2 c butter
• 1/2 c shortening*
• 2 c sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 3/4 c flour
• 2 tsp cream of tartar
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 4 tsp cinnamon

Directions

1. Set your oven to 400 degrees.
2. Get your cookie sheets out, but unlike most baking, you do not need to grease these.
3. Mix together cream of tartar, baking soda, salt, and 1 1/2 cups sugar.
4. In a separate bowl, mix butter, shortening, and eggs.
5. In a third, smaller bowl, mix the remaining 1/2 c sugar and your cinnamon.
6. Mix them together, then add the flour in a little bit at a time until you have a nice batter.
7. Roll the dough into 1 inch balls, then roll them in the cinnamon/sugar mixture.
8. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until cookies are slightly browned.

*According to Andrea's Recipes, "shortening was once quite popular in cooking. I generally prefer unsalted butter for baking, and you can substitute equal amounts here, just keep in mind that butter has a liquid content of around 20% and shortening has no liquid. Because of the liquid content, cookies made with butter tend to spread more, making them thinner and crispier than cookies made with shortening, but they also taste better. Freezing the formed dough for a few minutes before baking will help the butter melt slower thus retaining the cookie shape better in the oven."

   Thanks also, to Andrea, for her great picture. :)

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

I've been trying to get a hold of this recipe from my mom for ages.  It is by far, the best oatmeal raisin cookie recipe I've ever come across.  According to her, it was passed down to her from her Aunt Jewel, so you know it's a keeper.

Ingredients

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup regular sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2  flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 cups raisins
• 3 cups oatmeal

Directions

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Begin by blending butter, brown sugar, white sugar, vanilla, and eggs together.
3. In a separate bowl, blend flour, salt, and baking soda.
4. Combine the two bowls together, then add raisins and oatmeal.
5. Grease a cookie sheet, then mold the dough into 1 inch balls.
6. Bake for 10-12 minutes.

Chocolate Peanut Butter No-Bake Cookies

Mmmm... chocolate... I am in dire need of a batch of these delicious no-bake cookies.
The nice thing is, if you don't have all the ingredients, it's easy to replace some of them with others--for example, you can use flaked coconut instead of oatmeal.
You could also add some chopped peanuts to the mix, or add some chocolate chips for that extra chocolately goodness.

Ingredients

• 2 cups sugar
• 1/2 cup milk
• 1/2 cup cocoa
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup butter
• 1 cup peanut butter
• 3 cups quick-cooking oatmeal

Directions

1. In a large saucepan, combine sugar, milk, cocoa, salt, and butter and mix well.
2. Bring to a boil and cover saucepan for 30 seconds to allow steam to wash sugar crystals down sides of the pan.
3. Stir mixture and bring it to a boil that can't be stirred down for 1 minute*
4. Remove from heat and stir in peanut butter until smooth.
5. Add oatmeal and mix well.
6. Let the mixture stand for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally to let the oatmeal absorb some of the liquid.
7. Drop mixture by the spoonful onto wax paper or parchment paper.
8. Let cool until you can touch the mixture, then reshape the cookies to make them into balls.**
9. Let cool completely; store at room temperature.

*Make sure that the sugar mixture boils hard for at least 1 minute, otherwise the cookies will be sugary instead of creamy.

**You can also pour the mixture into a 9x9 baking dish and allow it too cool--then cut into pieces.

Oreo Truffles

I know, right?  I went to a football party thing a while back, and one of the girls brought these.  The container was empty about 20 minutes later.  Wow. 

Healthy?  Probably not.  Delicious?  You bet your boots they're delicious.
Thanks to Bakerella for the picture and the recipe. :)

Ingredients

• 1 Package of Oreo cookies, crushed
• 8 oz cream cheese, softened
• 1 bag chocolate chips, melted or 2 packages of dipping chocolate (white, dark, milk---which ever you prefer)

Directions

1. Mix the crushed Oreo cookies and cream cheese together in a bowl.  Use a food processor or blender to speed up this process.
2. With your hands, roll Oreo and cream cheese mixture into small balls.
3. Place on a baking sheet lined with wax paper.
4. Chill in the freezer for 30 minutes.
5. Melt chocolate chips or dipping chocolate in the microwave untiil melted
   Note: only melt for 10 seconds at a time, stirring between meltings
6. Using a toothpick, dip the Oreo balls into the melted chocolate. Cover well.
7. Let the Oreo balls harden on the cookie sheet in the fridge or freezer for about 15 minutes.
8. Serve cold.

*To make a healthier version, you could try using low fat cream cheese, but really--does it make that big of a difference?

Makes about 25-40 balls, depending on how big you make them.

Cookie Dough Pie

I just came across this awesome recipe from Big Red Kitchen and thought it was perfect for a starving student. Just imagine--you'll be the life of the party when you show up to a kegger toting this awesome pie for a bunch of drunk people. And it's so easy, it's almost embarrassing.

I made a special trip to the grocery store for these ingredients, but don't worry. I only spent about $8.00 total. I literally went through my jar of change to come up with the money. So, a couple hours later, here I sit--eating my cookie dough pie, and let me just say--it is divine.

Serves 8

Ingredients

• 15.25 ounce package Chips Ahoy Cookies (Original kind)
• 12 oz Cool Whip
• 2 cups milk
• Chocolate syrup (optional)

Directions

• Quickly dip cookies in milk, shake off excess liquid, and layer in 9 inch pie plate, breaking cookies to fill any gaps.
• Once the first layer is complete, top with a thin layer of Cool Whip.
• Repeat twice more making last layer of Cool Whip a bit thicker.
• Garnish with chocolate syrup if desired.
• Place in freezer 2-3 hours before serving.
• You can also use 1 C. strong coffee mixed with 1 C. milk for dipping instead of plain milk. Very nice.
• Note- You must dip quickly or your pie will be very soggy. Make sure to shake off excess milk as well so that you do not have a puddle of milk in your pie. You will have leftover milk but you do need that amount to get the cookie completely immersed. The final product will be like a soft cookie dough-like consistency.