Peanut Butter Cup Cookies

On December 16, 2008 · 5 Comments · In recipes - dessert

These are little pieces of peanut butter heaven. I’m just telling you upfront: You’ve been warned.

This recipe appears right on the side of the bag of Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups (well, it’s at least on the holiday bag–I can’t vouch for the others). When I was searching Google, I found the recipe on this blog, with slightly adapted instructions. I liked the way her cookies looked in comparison to the other ones I have seen, where the peanut butter cup sticks out more from the top of the cookie. She also altered the amount of ingredients, just slightly. So I tried her method, and it worked really well. Delicious and really good looking cookies.

Two things: 1) Make sure you build in enough time to be able to refrigerate your dough for at least couple of hours. 2) Refrigerate your Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, too. You’ll want to keep them in the fridge right up until you have to use them.

Peanut Butter Temptations (aka Peanut Butter Cup Cookies)
(Source: http://www.hersheys.com/, adapted by Love and Cooking)

Ingredients:

– 1/2 cup butter or margarine, softened (I actually used I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter Light, and it worked out just fine for these. I don’t usually substitute it for real butter, but did this time.)
– 1/2 cup granulated sugar
– 1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed
– 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
– 1 egg
– 1 tsp. vanilla extract
– 1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
– 1 tsp. baking soda
– a pinch of salt, or a little more if you used unsalted butter
– 2 bags Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Miniatures (you’ll likely have some leftovers)

Directions:
1. Combine butter and sugars in mixing bowl. Beat with mixer until light and fluffy.

2. Add peanut butter, egg, and vanilla. Mix until combined well.

3. Add the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, and salt). Mix on low speed at first, then medium speed for a minute or so (or until combined). Batter will be fairly loose. Chill batter for at least two hours. (Remember to put the peanut butter cups in the fridge, too!)

4. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

5. Bring dough out of the refrigerator. Using a tablespoon or a cookie scoop, scoop one level tablespoon of dough into each cup of a mini muffin pan.

6. With the pads of your fingers (or thumb), make an indent in the center of each cookie. (See pic below.)

7. Bake for 6-7 minutes, or until the cookies get slightly brown around the edges. During baking, remove peanut butter cups from the refrigerator and unwrap.

8. When the timer goes off, remove pans from the oven. The cookies will have puffed up. Push a peanut butter cup down into the center of each cookie. Cookie edges should be even or above the top of the peanut butter cup.

9. Place pans back in the oven and bake for an additional 45 seconds – 1 minute (no longer!). Remove and cool on wire racks for quite a while. The chocolate takes forever to reset. If you rush it, you will smoosh the cookies, or they will fall apart.

Once the peanut butter cookie part is stable (cooled), you can remove the cookies to a cookie sheet to finish cooling, and move on to the next batch!

Makes about 4 dozen cookies.
 

Packing Up & Shipping Out

On December 15, 2008 · 6 Comments · In holidays

Cookies, of course. And cupcake bites. Lots and lots of cupcake bites.

Today, I braved the post office on the busiest day of the year to ship out some very special packages to a handful of family and friends–both near(er) and far.

Those cupcake bites that I made on Friday night? Last night, I packed most of them in little candy boxes so that they can hit the road… out of our house, and out of my sight! Eight of them fit perfectly in every box. I was really happy with how these turned out, and I hope our recipients will be happy, too!

I tied each box up with a festive ribbon. I also tucked them into a gallon-size ziplock bag to keep them fresh until they get to their destination.

But wouldn’t you know it? Those Priority Mail boxes had a lot of room in them. So I couldn’t just let the cupcake bites go off on their own. After all of the baking I did over the weekend, I wanted to share some of the other goodies, too.

Each shipment included a box of the cupcake bites, two sugar cookie cutouts, and two peanut butter cup cookies (I will post that recipe tomorrow!). Oh, and a shitload of packing peanuts. You know, for protection. Each cookie was bagged and tied with more holiday ribbon. And again, I stuck the cookies in a ziploc bag to further help keep them soft and chewy.

The dining room table (and kitchen!) were definitely messy throughout this whole process, but in the end, with major help from my husband, we got it all cleaned up. After all of that baking craziness, the house is back to normal.

I was happy to drop those boxes in the mail today, and I’ll be even happier when they start arriving and being enjoyed. Because I’ll tell you… all of the Christmas spirit?

I think I might be running out of it.

I have just enough time to recharge before next week.

 

I’m a machine.

On December 15, 2008 · 10 Comments · In family, holidays

A baking machine.

This weekend, I never even left the house. My baking marathon actually began on Thursday. When I got home from work, I baked a cake to make cupcake bites, and also made sugar cookie dough. All before heading out the door to kickboxing!

I continued after work on Friday. Baked another cake for cupcake bites, made royal icing for sugar cookies, then made and coated all of my cupcake bites.

Saturday, we started off the morning making a meat sauce for lasagna. We put it on early so it could simmer all day.

Then I rolled out and baked sugar cookies, colored all of my icing, then spent a long chunk of time decorating. I had to stop around 4:30 p.m. because we were expecting my in-laws for dinner and the house was still a mess and I hadn’t even showered. Oh, and we still had to put together the lasagna!

Once my in-laws arrived, I did get a little reprieve from all of the work. We entertained and enjoyed the company. (Tessa did, too. She was particularly fond of my father-in-law.)

This morning, I was up and at ’em again. Peanut butter cup cookies, macaroons, and a bit more decorating. Packaging, wrapping, tying ribbon. I pretty much worked nonstop until 8:00 p.m. tonight.

Whoa. It’s been a lot of baking. A lot of work.

I’ll be posting more of my work and another recipe or two over the next couple of days. But for now… this is the cookie platter that my husband is taking with him to work for a potluck lunch tomorrow. Sugar cookie cutouts, macaroons, the peanut butter cup cookies, and cupcake bites. Quite the variety.

P.S. The lighting for all of my photos is just a crying shame. Unfortunately, I didn’t get everything done until after dark and couldn’t wait until morning to pack everything up. So, oh well. But I do apologize for such crappy photos.

 

Almond Macaroons

On December 14, 2008 · Leave a Comment · In recipes - dessert

This recipe was featured in my local newspaper a couple of weeks ago, as part of a series they called “12 Days of Holiday Cookies.” They looked and sounded good, so I decided that they would be part of my baking marathon (more on that later).

My macaroons came out thinner and crispier than I was expecting, but they have a really good almond flavor. Definitely a tasty cookie.


Almond Macaroons
(Source: Christmas Cookies by Lisa Zwirn)

Ingredients:
– 10 ounces (about 2 full cups) blanched whole almonds
– 1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
– 3 large egg whites
– 1/2 tsp. pure almond extract
– 6 ounces good quality bittersweet chocolate, chopped (optional)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line one or two cookie sheets with parchment paper. Combine the almonds and 1/4 cup of the sugar in a food processor and process until the almonds are finely ground. Add the egg whites and almond extract and process until blended.

2. Add the remaining 1 cup of sugar and process until thoroughly combined, about 15 seconds, or until the dough is a thick, sticky paste.Drop the dough by level tablespoonfuls, arranging about 2 inches apart on the prepared sheets. (Warning: Definitely space them out. They expand a lot.) Using a pastry brush lightly moistened with water, brush the tops and sides of the macaroons, gently pressing down on them to form smooth rounds about 1/2 inch thick and 1 3/4 inches in diameter. (I skipped this step. Mine seemed to flatten out just fine by themselves.)

3. Bake for about 15 minutes or until the macaroons are pale golden. They should feel crisp on the outside but still soft inside. (If using two cookie sheets, rotate them from top to bottom and front to back about halfway through baking.) Remove the sheets from the oven and slide the parchment onto racks. Cool for about 5 minutes, then use a thin metal spatula to remove the macaroons from the paper. Place on rack to cool.

4. For chocolate-dipped macaroons, melt the chocolate in a metal or glass bowl set over a pan of barely simmering water, stirring frequently, until fully melted. Alternatively, melt it in a microwave-safe bowl in microwave, using 20-to-30-second bursts at medium power, stirring well after each interval. Line baking sheet with wax paper. With a silicone pastry brush, brush the melted chocolate on half the cookie, both top side and bottom, in a semicircle. Let the excess drip off or gently scrape it off the bottom using the brush. Place the macaroons on the wax paper and let stand until the chocolate is completely set.

Store macaroons in an airtight container, layered between sheets of wax paper, for up to five days at room temperature. Macaroons without chocolate can be frozen for up to two months.

Makes about 32 macaroons.

 

Um, wow.

On December 12, 2008 · 2 Comments · In operation baking gals

I am seriously impressed by all of the responses I’ve received about Operation Baking Gals. And I’m guessing (it’s just a hunch!) that once sign-up information is up and actually available, I might get even more of you signed up to help. So, thank you.

Just as an FYI, I’m thinking that sign-up info is probably not going to be available until mid-January. They are planning to have a little bit more time between Rounds 5 & 6 than usual, just to give people a little break after the holidays.

It seems that when things get moving, they really move. Basically, you just sign up and then bake almost right away. But I promise I will post the sign-up info as soon as it is available, so as long as you keep coming back to visit, you’ll know about it. I think I’m probably just going to call our team “Team Heather Drive” so when you go to the website, it’s pretty obvious which team is ours.

Here’s the thing. As of now, we have so many people committed that we can actually help two soldiers at a time. Baking Gals asks that there is a minimum of 10 people on each team. As of now, I think we have at least 25 people! So seriously, if you have soldiers you want to help, please e-mail me their info as soon as possible. I’ll want to have our soldier(s) chosen before I begin the sign-up process. Then, once sign-up begins, I’ll ask that you split yourselves pretty evenly among the two teams. We’ll just have “Team Heather Drive – Soldier #1 Name” and “Team Heather Drive – Soldier #2 Name.” :)

If you’re interested, and haven’t let me know yet, please go back to my original Baking Gals post and leave a comment. The more people I get committed to helping, the more soldiers we can help for each round. If we get up close to 40 people, I’ll probably even split our team into three parts. THREE soldiers! Wouldn’t that be amazing?

I figured there would be people who want to help, but I had no idea the response would be so good–especially within the first 24 hours! I’m so excited for Round 6! I’ll make sure to keep you posted.