Stuffed Chocolate Chip Cookies

I was reading my feed one day and saw that someone had made chocolate chip cookies filled with an rollo- how awesome is that? I folowed to the original recipe and found all sorts of variations, oreo filled cookies, brownie filled cookies - so much yumminess. I knew I had to make these. I decided to try two combinations - oreo (regular not double stuffed) and brownie. I followed the original recipe and formed the cookies around either an oreo cookie or one of my fudgy brownies. Unlike the original brownie filled cookie - I cut my brownies to about the size of an oreo, I needed a cookie that could be eaten in one sitting. The other fun part about this size is I mixed all the cookie together so you wouldn’t know what filling you were getting until you bit into them.

I didn’t change anything in the recipe and the instructions on Picky Palate are fantastic, so i am just going to tell you to go there and check out her recipe.


Reviews:
The dough seemed a little dry when I was working with it, but it worked great. These were delicious and stayed soft while the oreo in the center stayed firm, how awesome is that?

The cookies were a big hit and were loved at my house, my work and O’s office! Only three people have been lucky enough to pull out both an oreo cookie and a brownie stuffed cookies. It was mixed on which was better, it was said that the brownie cookies were better as there was “more love” to them.

Butterscotch Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

I had some butterscotch chips in the cupboard to use, and what better way to use them than feeding them to the hockey team? The bars worked so well for them last week that I decided to do a bar again (well that and it takes so much less time to bake when I am in a hurry.)

I looked for butterscotch bars and decided to try the Nestle TollHouse version of Butterscotch Brownies (although they were really just like cookie dough), and decided to add some chocolate to it.

Butterscotch Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars
Ingredients:
2 ½ cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 cup margarine softened
1 ¾ cup packed brown sugar
1 tbsp vanilla
2 large eggs
2/3 to ¾ package of butterscotch chips
1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:
1. In a bowl cream the margarine/butter, then cream in the sugar, eggs and vanilla.
2. Mix the flour and baking powder together, then slowly add to the sugar/butter mixture.
3. Fold in ¾ of chips (both butterscotch and chocolate). Spread the batter into a 9x13 baking pan (I lined mine with parchment paper).
4. Sprinkle the remaining chips on top of the batter.
5. Bake at 350F for 25 to 35 minutes (30 min was a bit too long in my oven, they will be soft in the middle at the end, but set).
6. Cool on a wire rack, and cut into squares.

Reviews:
These were tasty, especially if you like butterscotch or chocolate chip cookies. I actually had members of the Bulldogs stopping to thank me for them this week and tell me they really liked them. The goalie said they were a little heavy for before the game, but he couldn’t stop eating them! I would say that it is a good review anytime someone makes themselves sick because they were couldn’t stop eating it.

The Score:
The Bulldogs beat the Gators 4-2 and are now in second place in their division! Hopefully they keep up the good work, as playoffs are only about a month away.

Peanut Butter Fudgey Brownies

This week the Bulldogs had a late game (10:45 pm start time, nice right?), and so I thought I had tons of time on Saturday to figure out something. Turns out I got a lot busier than I thought that day, and when I realized we would be leaving for the game in 3 hours, I still hadn’t even thought of anything to make. A quick look in my cupboard revealed a bag of peanut butter chipits, hmm what to do with those? I decided on brownies, as I needed it to get done quickly and cool so I could get them to the game, and still had to make some supper.

Fudgey Brownies with Peanut Butter
Ingredients:
1 cup margarine
2 cups brown sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
2/3 cup cocoa powder
1 cup all purpose flour
peanut butter chipits (I used ½ a package but would up that to ¾, do what you like)

Directions:
1.In a medium saucepan melt the margarine and remove from heat. Stir in the brown sugar until smooth.
2.Add in the eggs and vanilla once the mixture has cooled so it will not cook the eggs.
3.Stir in the cocoa powder and all purpose flour until just combined. Fold in the peanut butter chipits.
4.Pour into a 9x 13 inch pan ( I line mine with parchment paper)
5.Bake at 350F for 25 minutes, cool on a wire rack.
6.Enjoy!

Reviews:
The boys loved these brownies (and I must admit that I stole a few before they made it to the locker room). The peanut butter cuts the sweetness of the brownie just the right amount, and what goes together better than peanut butter and chocolate? When asked what they wanted next week, I was told these brownies (or the oreo cookies). Too bad for them that isn’t happening, I can’t have these things around too often!

The Game:
They won 10-4 against the Canadians! Way to go boys! They play again Saturday evening, and hopefully I will have post up a little quicker this time.

Bulldogs Week 4

FALL BROWNIE PIZZA

The bulldogs played on the weekend ( I know really late update, sorry guys), O was in attendance and that means cookies! I needed a “novembery monster cookie” the included carmel and marshmallow (I made a second cookie with the cornflakes). Well when I think fall I usually think chocolate, nuts and warm comfort food. I had some hazelnuts my Mother in law had sent me that were waiting to be used and thought they would go great with this cookie.

Owen said it looked a lot like a treatsa pizza from Dairy Queen, so that is were the name comes from.

Not a “treatsa-pizza” (makes 1 regular sized pizza cookie)

Ingredients:
½ cup margarine
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2/3 cup flour
¼ tsp baking soda
1/3 cup cocoa powder

½ cup hazelnuts roasted and crushed
2 tbsp caramel sauce
¼ cup mini marshmallows
1/8 cup powdered sugar

Directions
1.Melt the butter in a sauce pan, then add the sugar followed by the egg and vanilla (make sure the butter/sugar is not too hot before adding the egg, or you will cook the egg).
2.Mix in the dry ingredients and spread on a pizza pan to about 1 inch from the edge (the cookie expands as it cooks). I lined my pan with parchment paper and had no problems with sticking.
3.Bake the cookie at 350F for about 15 minutes until set in the middle. Set on a wire rack to cool.
4.Sprinkle chopped hazelnuts on the cookie. Warm the carmel sauce so that it runs easily and drizzle on top of the cookie and nuts.
5.In a microwave safe bowl heat the mini marshmallows for 10 – 20 seconds until melted. Add the powdered sugar to cut the stickyness and then pull and stick to the cookie in strings.
6.Let the toppings set, then cut into the pizza wedges and enjoy!


The second cookie was a little less sugary and sweet and incorporated the cornflakes. I just used a recipe I had found on recipe zaar for what I wanted to make. I boiled the sugar a little too much and cookies got really hard. Other than that though, they were great.

Bulldogs:
Sadly the bulldogs lost 6-5 this week. They played a great game considering they had a 9 person turn out and a couple of injuries during the game. I blame the horrible road conditions and early morning for the low turn out.

Reviews:
Everyone loved and raved about the Pizza cookie, it was a big hit. Sadly the cornflake cookies were not only hard from being a little overcooked, but also from being cold and were difficult eat. Lesson learned.

Mars Bar Brownies

I admit it, my favorite part of Halloween is the cheap minature candy for the days after Oct. 31. This year I hit the stores and came home with a large box of mini mars bars. Why didn’t I get a box that had a few kinds in it? I don’t really know, but that large box of mars bars called to me, it wanted me to bring it home.

So now, rather than just chew my way through the box of 70 chocolate bars in the weekend, I decided maybe I should try and do something with them. The natural and most obvious choice was Brownies.

Mars Bar Brownies:

Ingredients:
½ cup margerine (1 square)
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup cocoa powder
½ cup all purpose flour
about 12 mini mars bars

How to:
1. In a saucepan melt the margerine., remove from heat.
2. Add the brown sugar and stir until smooth. Check to make sure that the mixture is now cool enough that it won’t cook the egg, if it is too warm let it sit for a minute.
3. Add in the egg and vanilla, mixing until smooth.
4. Add the flour and cocoa powder, mixing until just mixed.
5. At this point you could cut up the mars bars and add them in, but I decided to go a more interesting route. I poured just enough batter to cover the bottom of my 8x8 pan, then set the bard in lines in my pan.

I then marked the edges of the bars, and covered them with the remaining batter.


6. Bake at 350F for 20 mintues, they will still be very gooey when removed from the oven, don’t worry about it. Let cool in the pan for 5 -8 mintues them remove to a wire rack (I like the parchment paper for this as you can just grab the sides and pick the brownies out of the pan.).
7. Once the brownies are cool, but at the marked lines. Hopefully the bars didn’t shift and the brownies will look like a fudgy brownie along the cut lines. Then when you bite into the middle, you get a caramel and nugout surprise!

Reviews:
I love these brownies, I hate easily ½ the pan of these in a single sitting. I could not stop myself from picking up a new one everytime I went near the kitchen. O said they were allright, but a little too rich for him as he wasn’t able to sit down and eat a bunch of them all at once.

Cookie Dough Topped Brownies

Cookie Dough Topped Brownies

I saw these on My Kitchen Café (how on earth I didn’t find this fantastic sight sooner is beyond me) and thought it looked like a great idea. We were heading out to a friends cabin, and they had requested that I bring “anything chocolate” so naturally I decided it was a good time to try these with some fresh guinea pigs.

I used my own brownie recipe, but My Kitchen Café’s cookie dough recipe.

Brownies:
½ cup margerine
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
½ cup flour

1. In a saucepan melt the butter over low heat. Once the butter is melted stir in the brown sugar, stir until smooth.
2. Add in the egg, vanilla and cocoa powder, stirring until smooth.
3. Add the flour and mix until combined (no lumps). Pour into a lined/buttered 8x8 pan.
4. Bake at 350F for 20 to 23 minutes (they will be very soft coming out of the oven but will firm up as they cool).
5. Let the brownies cool while you mix the cookie dough.

Cookie Dough
1/2 cup (1 cube) butter, softened
1/2 cup dark brown Sugar
1/4 cup granulated sugar
3 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
pinch of salt
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1. Cream the butter and sugars together until they are light and fluffy. Add the milk and vanilla.
2. Gradually add the flour into the dough until it is combined.
3. Mix in the chocolate chips (I used chocolate chunks)
4. Spread on the top of the cooled brownies. (I know that this amount of cookie dough was originally used on a 9X13 pan of brownies, but I wanted a nice thick layer of cookie dough and used the full amount on the smaller pan of brownies.)

Reviews:
These took my back to my youth when I would sit in the kitchen waiting for my cookies to bake while eating the dough by the spoonful (alight so maybe that was just last month).

Anyways, when told what I was making I got the comment “you can do that?” and lots of “That is fantastic”. The brownies lived up the expectations and I heard raves all weekend. These will be made again, and I have a feeling that friends will be requesting them as word gets around – lets just hope that the hockey team never hears of these marvelous creations!

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Cherry Chocolate Brownies

Alright, so coming home from the inlaws I brought with me a few pounds of cherries. Alright is was probably 10 to 15 pounds of cherries, but they were oh so good. Upon making both myself and O sick from eating cherries I decided I needed to get some of these things out of my fridge to remove the temptation and give my poor stomach a break.

I have done a few things with the cherries, but I will start with the brownies. My inspiration came from watching the Cherry episode of Unwrapped on the Food Network. They featured a cherry brownie, and I thought that was a great idea. I got to work on google and didn't come across a recipe that caught my fancy, so decided to try my own.

A quick note - the cherries I used are a very dark and sweet cherry. I don't know what kind they are, as around here we just call them BC cherries - I doubt everyone in BC growns the same cherries, but hey what do I know.


Ingredients:
½ cup butter
3 oz dark chocolate (I used and 85% cocoa chocolate bar)
1 cup sugar
½ tsp vanilla extract
¾ cup flour
~1 cup fresh cherries, stemmed and pitted ( I pulsed these in the food processor so they were anywere from 1/4 to ½ of a cherry.)
½ cup chocolate chips

Directions:
1. Melt the butter and chocolate together in a saucepan over low heat. Once it is smooth add the sugar and vanilla removing from heat. Then add the eggs, stirring to avoid cooking the eggs – no one wants chunks of scrambled eggs in their brownie!
2. Stir in ½ cup of the flour. Depending on how juicy your cherries are you may not need the other ¼ cup of flour.
3. Fold in the Chocolate chips, followed by the cherries. If your cherries were quite juicy and the batter became thinner, add the ¼ cup of extra flour and fold in.
4. Pour into an 8x8 baking dish (I line mine with parchment paper, alternatively you could butter and flour the dish) and bake at 350F for 35 minutes.


Reviews
This was a moist brownie somewere between a my fudgey brownie and a cake like brownie. O enjoyed them and they smelled great.

New Cookbook Trial: Baking, From my home to yours

One week when I was looking for a recipe on something I came across the Tuesdays With Dorie group, and upon looking at some of the recipes they had done, I decided I needed to look into this cookbook (Baking, From my home to yours, by Dorie Greenspan). I was at the library before leaving to visit my inlaws, and saw the book there, so I grabbed it and took it with me on my vacation - I mean what says relaxing time better than baking? (Oh and it wouldn't hurt to impress the inlaws a little).

I ended up trying two recipes while I was at the inlaws. The first was the Raspberry Blanc-manger.


I picked this recipe as I was told there were raspberries in the fridge that needed to get used, and it required no baking - keeping the oven off is a bonus when it is 36C outside!

The recipe is great and really easy to make. I didn't have a single problem making it and everyone loved it. It really didn't last long before it was all eaten. It was a great light and creamy dessert, especially for the heat of summer.

The second recipe I tried was the Caramel-Peanut-Topped Brownie Cake on page 264.

O discovered a picture of this in the book and immediately wanted it - he loves almost anything to due with brownies.



The recipe was fairly easy to make, although it was difficult to tell when the caramel was done and I ended up with a darker caramel than I would have liked. Note, that if it looks like a semi golden colour to take it off the heat Now! It gets too dark really quickly.

The cake got lots of people walking through the kitchen asking when it was going to be done, and lots of people staring at it before it was ready to be served. No one else seemed to care that the caramel was too dark and it quickly disappeared.

I liked the recipes I tried from this book and will hopefully be trying more. My inlaws loved that I brought the book and didn't want me or the book to leave. It is getting added to my cookbook wishlist, so for now I will just keep taking out the library copy and trying a few more recipes.

Chocolate Chip Blondie

My husband is a huge brownie fan, and try as I might to convert him to cookies or cupcakes he is still stuck on brownies. He loves marshmallow brownies - I don't get it, they are good, but I don't get the love affair he has with them. When browsing around on allrecipes.com one day I came across a recipe for Disappearing Marshmallow Brownies. I thought it would be interesting to try a new marshmallow brownie recipe for O.

Anyways, I would not call these brownies, in my mind a brownie is chocolate and a nice rich brown. These however are a butterscotch flavour and a golden color - and while they are very tasty and I can't bring myself to call them a brownie, so I will henceforth refer to this yummy square as a chocolate chip blondie.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter
1 cup butterscotch chips
2/3 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 1/4 cups miniature marshmallows
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

How to:
1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Line a 9x13 inch pan with parchment paper (or grease it).
2. Using a microwave-safe bowl, melt the butterscotch chips and butter together in the microwave, stirring occasionally until chips are smooth. (The recipe said it should be smooth, but I didn't get all my butter to work in, and was left with a layer of butter on the top. It didn't seem to hurt anything though, so don't worry about it too much). Set aside to cool.
3. In a large bowl, stir together the brown sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Mix in the melted butterscotch chips, then the flour, baking powder, and salt until smooth.
4. Stir in the marshmallows and chocolate chips last. Spread the batter evenly into the prepared baking pan.
5.Bake for 15 to 20 minutes in preheated oven. Cool, and cut into squares.

Reviews:
I took 1/2 of these to my friends cabin when we visited on the weekend and they didn't last long! Everyone loved them, and couldn't seem to get enough. The second half went with my husband to work - weeks later I came by and people were still telling me that they were amazing. I don't know if these will replace the marshmallow brownies my husband so loves, but they might give them a run for their money.

Peanut Butter with Chocolate - Brownies

So after the cookies, I was trying to figure out what else I could do with the peanut butter with chocolate, and someone suggested brownies. I used my Fudgey Brownie recipe and swirlled in 3 heaping tablespoons of the Peanut Butter with Chocolate before baking. These were pretty good and didn't last long in the house!

A Quick Catch Up

So, my picture taking has not been able to keep up with my H’s ability to quickly finish all my baking. If I don’t get a picture before he knows that it is around, it isn’t likely that I am going to get one. Along those lines, I have also been really busy with work and haven’t been as on top of picture taking and writing up the recipes as I would like, so I am going to do a quick review of what I have been making for the past little while.
1. I did make some actual food this week! In flipping through my old posts one day, I found Chicken Lasagna and then wondered why I hadn’t made this again (now I remember why I do this blogging thing). Anyways, I made this earlier this week and it turned out fantastic. Removing the milk from the recipe was a great idea, it wasn’t soupy at all this time. Oh, and I substituted the mozza cheese for some swiss, which was also great.
2. Nutella Cupcakes from I Heart Cuppycakes. Alright, so this is midstream in my campaign to prove to my H that cupcakes are good. Apparently he has never been a cupcake fan and I just had to set him straight. He thinks they are boring as it just cake and icing, and he also doesn’t like all the icing piled up on top (he doesn’t really have a big sweet tooth), so I wanted to make something I knew he couldn’t resist. Now who can resist Nutella? I had a bunch left over from the brownies, and so rather than just pig out with a spoon, I decided to make these lovely cupcakes. They were fantastic, although my mixing in of the nutella could have been better. Oh and Clara, you are right, I didn’t even need the icing.
3. Apple dumplings. So someone not to long ago pointed me in the direction of The Pioneer Woman. I don’t know how I have not come across this before, but hey, at least I am catching up now. I have made these twice now, once for a surprise for the guys that my H’s work (they had been having a slow week) and once for my Dad’s 50th birthday. They worked fantastic and everyone raved about them (actually the guys that H works with almost swarmed me when I brought them in, and it took them no more than 1.5 minutes to polish off the whole batch). At my Dad’s party, a couple people took one look at them and asked if they were from Pioneer Woman, apparently they had been meaning to try them for a while. These were fantastic, a big hit, and are a keeper for those days when I need a quick dessert to take somewhere, thanks Pioneer Woman.
4. Chili Brownies. I love chili and chocolate, and I love the gooeyness of brownies. So I decided to try and make come chili chocolate brownies. I found this recipe on Rachel Ray’s site and decided to try it, it had all the elements I was looking for. I used a yummy 72% cocoa bar instead of the bittersweet baking chocolate, which worked great. The brownies were delicious and gooey, but sadly there was not enough chili powder (or my chili powder is old and needs to be refreshed with I am thinking is a contributor). Everyone liked them, but no one noticed that they had any heat to them. I will have to try again on this one.

Nutella Brownies

While doing some brownie searching I came across a delicious idea - nutella in brownies. Now, I am a lover of Nutella, and don't really need anything to eat it with (spoon and occasionally fingers are all I really need), and do to my lack of self control there is rarely Nutella in the house. What better excuse for picking up a nice big jar of the chocolate goodness than "But I need this for a recipe".

The recipe I found and used (For the most part) was Nutella Chocolate Fudge Brownies. I modified the recipe by cutting it in 1/2 and cooking it in a 8x8 pan instead of the full 9x13 recipe. With all the baking that goes in my house this is usually essential, if I made full batches of everything I would either be 300lbs or tossing a lot of perfectly good baking.

Now, in the intro they said they swirled Nutella into the batter, but in the instructions I did not see this, so of course I swirled Nutella into the brownies. I swirled about 1/4 of a cup of nutella into the batter before baking (I didn't really measure, just kept plopping tablespoons in until I thought it looked good).

I did follow the instructions and spread Nutella over the top as well, mmmmmm, so good.

These turned out great, albiet a little overcooked (the Nutella can make it a little deceiving about when they are finished apparently, so watch out.). Everyone loved them and only one person besides myself (that would by my lovely H) figured out I had left them in the oven a little longer than I should have.

I will have to try these again.

"Mississippi Mud" bars

So I am a major chocoholic and every once in a while I have to give in and bake myself some brownies or something equally full of chocolate. Yesterday as I was killing time at work I came across a recipe for "Mississippi mud bars" on allrecipe.com that had some good reviews, so I thought i would give it a try. After making a couple of changes based on some of the reviews, this is what I came up with:

Ingredients:
1 cup margarine or butter
1/3 cup coco powder
4 eggs
1 1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 1/2 cup flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp vanilla
1 pkg mini marshmallows

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350F.
2. In a saucepan over medium low heat, melt the butter or margarine. Then remove from heat.
3. Mix in the coco powder until smooth. Add the eggs, sugar, salt and vanilla. Once the sugar is mixed in add the flour.
4. Fold in the mini marshmallows.
5. Pour into a 9X13 pan (I line mine with parchment paper rather than greasing and it works extremely well).
6. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until the brownies pull away from the pan.

The original recipe also had a recipe for a frosting to go on top, but I didn't bother with it. I tend to like my brownies best without a frosting, and these did not disappoint.

Reviews:
Hubby: He loved these brownies and ate almost half a pan when he discovered them!

The Baker: While these aren't what I normally think of when I think Mississippi mud bars (I usually think marshmallows on top), I thought that these were delicious and they satisfied my chocolate craving.

Other: The girls at work also loved these, and the guys were so disappointed that they missed out on getting some that I had to promise to bring more in.

Orange Brownies

So I was grocery shopping last weekend, and upon getting the checkout I was informed that I got a free box of oranges. Now thinking that this was free and as such would only be 5 or 10 oranges, I gladly accepted my free oranges. Then I I get the oranges and find that it is a rather large box with at least 25 oranges in it. Now I love oranges, but there is no way I can eat that many. Upon looking in a couple of my cookbooks for some baking that I could do with them I found a recipe for orange brownies, now this recipe uses a boxed mix, but I thought I wuld give it a try as I had a box mix in the cupboard and I couldn't think of anything else I would use the mix for.

Orange Brownies:
INGREDIENTS:
1 box of fudge brownie mix
1 whole orange

DIRECTIONS:
1. Cut the orange into quarters and remove the seeds. Place quarters (including the rind) into a blender/food processor and blend until smooth.
2. Mix the box of mix together as directed on the box, leaving out the water. Instead of adding water, add the processed orange.
3. Follow the box instructions for baking.


These brownies were delicious - they tasted like a Terry's Chocolate Orange. I will definately make this again ( or maybe I will try to make a non box version of the brownies.)

Butter Free Brownies

I have been searching all over to find some brownie recipes to try that will reduce the amount of fats - Less butter, marg and oil, and finding it rather difficult to find any good recipes. So in playing around on the web this weekend I stumbled across a brownie blog - Brownie or Die! And what do I find on it but a yummy looking butterless brownie recipe, with coffee. Now I am not a huge coffee fan, but I love a hint of coffee in my chocolate occasionally. I did reduce the amount of coffee grounds in the batter to 1/2 tbsp, as I didn't want an overpowering coffee flavour.

Update: These were really good, especially for a lower fat version! Cutting the coffee was great for me, as it was just a hint of coffee flavour, however if you are a fan of coffee go for the full amount. Oh, and I did make one alteration to the recipe, instead of bittersweet chocolate I used 5 ounces of semisweet chocolate and 1 ounce of unsweetened chocolate.

Owen even liked them, but said that he could feel the caffeine after a couple brownies (neither of us usually have much caffiene in our diets).

I will be making these again - thanks to Brownie or Die!

Cheesecake Brownies

I found these on April's blog and they looked so good I had to try making them.

Recipe: http://wineloverscookingdiary.blogspot.com/2007/11/chunky-cheesecake-brownies-jfacie-baked.html

These were absolutely delicious, and everyone loved them. They have become my H's favourite brownies.