Where did November go?

Gosh, it is nearly the end of November. December is right around the corner and the year is almost over. How can this be?

I haven't been too great at posting lately. I'm so irregular when it comes to posting. Here's a little Pinterest love and recipe that worked BEAUTIFULLY! Thought I'd share. I'll post some more later, after the house is clean. Wait, that chore will never be done. So I'll just post soon, promise ok?

Thin Mint Cookies (Think Girl Scouts, only cheaper)

Got this recipe from Pinterest.

Source: loveveggiesandyoga.com via Char on Pinterest

It worked great!

Ingredients:
1 roll/sleeve of Ritz Crackers
1 tablespoon Shortening
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
3/4 teaspoon mint extract flavoring **Measure carefully. A little too much and you have cough syrup tasting, YUCK!

Melt chocolate and shortening. Shortening helps chocolate stay smooth and not get hard when melting. Once melted add in mint flavoring. Measure careful!! Dip crackers into chocolate and set aside to dry/cool. If you have enough room in your freezer I would suggest setting cookies on a plate to cool quickly in there. If you live in warm climates (Hello, I live in 115 degree desert Arizona!) I would NOT suggest doing this in the middle of July. The freezer helps.

I promise, these don't taste like Ritz crackers. Chocolate helps!

Hope this makes your weekend better!

Maple Chocolate Chip Bars

I know it's been a while since I've posted any cooking or food. When you're 9 months pregnant and it's 112+ degrees outside, the creativity to come up with something to cook isn't always there. A lot of what I've made lately has been regular stuff and has been last minute. However, tonight after I got home from work I wanted cookies...after dinner of course :) I made a little twist to the recipe and actually made bars instead of cookies. Who says you can't have dessert first?!

Also, I'm linking up with my good friend and fellow blogger {bouffe e bambini} for her linky party the handmade hog. She hosts this almost weekly, if not more often, and I've been wanting to link up for a while!

Enjoy!

Maple Chocolate Chip Bars
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup white sugar
1 cup shortening
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon maple extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
2 1/2 cups flour
12 oz chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a mixer (this is the method I used) cream together sugars and shortening. Next, add eggs, vanilla and maple extracts. In a separate bowl, sift together flour, salt and baking soda. Add the dry ingredients to the mixer. The batter will be pretty sticky. Mine stuck to the mixer paddle. Add in chocolate chips.

From here, you could make cookies on a cookie sheet if you prefer. I thought bars sounded better. I spread the batter into a 9x13 ( i think that is the size?!) casserole pan/enchilada pan/cake pan. Get the idea? Put in the oven for about 15 minutes, check after 10-12 minutes to make sure not to burn, after all every oven is different.

Man oh man were these good! I bet they would be good with some ice cream on top too :)

Christmas Time Goodies & Sugar Rush

I absolutely love making cookies at Christmas time. I can remember lots of years baking with my mom, putting all those wonderful cookies that I never remember until this time of year into tins with foil hiding them away. It's funny how talking about a snickerdoodle cookie any other time of the year makes me draw a blank as to what they taste like, but the minute we make them in December I recall exactly how they taste--and I love them!

The last few years I've been able to bake with my sister (in law, but she's just sister to me!) Steph and we've made a list of all the goodies we want to make and make a day of it. I think that will be a new tradition for us...except this year since she's in CO and I'm in AZ. Baking from a distance though, right?!


I look up to my mom and grandma when baking, since most of my recipes come from these two lovely baker ladies. Just last night I was making peanut butter fudge, having never made fudge before in my life, I called them and asked some questions. I pretended that the whole time I was baking they were in the kitchen with me, helping me taste test. This year I made some goodies all by myself, way to go! I made fudge, first timer, some haystacks that Steph and I made last year, some new Swedish Spritz cookies with the recipe from Taste of Home but I made a huge twist on it (as you could usually guess), and some chocolate chip blondies. Can you feel the weight gain yet?! I might have to dish some of these out so the hubster and I don't gain 50 lbs from all the sugar.



Chocolate Chip Blondies





Haystacks or Butterscotchie's--Next time I'll use more chow mein noodles and not so many marshmellows.



These started to not work using the cookie press, but I switched to the "frosting" setting. So I made my own shapes!





Swedish Spritz Cookies--Vanilla-Maple flavored shortbread cookie!





Peanut Butter Fudge--with a handfull of chocolate chips thrown in to give it a slight hint of chocolate!

 I had a blast baking and cooking all this up. There is one more thing I want to make and will likely make it tomorrow on Christmas eve, since I got that day off, woot! Josh and I will spend our Christmas just the two of us this year. We were both lucky enough to get Christmas eve off so we're going to spend the day together. The gifts under our tree are growing and Lucy even has her stocking full. She can't wait to open her gift from Grandma!