Monster Cookies

When my husband was in PT school, we made some great friends with another couple and she is a great cook. She taught me so many things. I am so grateful to her for all she imparted. One of the recipes she gave me is for an amazing cookie. My favorite cookie ever. I can eat these until I am sick I love them so much. But I figure they are a little healthy because they have peanut butter and oatmeal. (Smile.)

Monster Cookies

1 c. brown sugar

1 c. white sugar

1 cube butter

3 eggs

1 1/3 c. peanut butter

1 c. M & M's

1/2 t. vanilla

1 T. corn syrup

1 c. chocolate chips

3/4 c. flour

2 t. baking soda

4 1/2 c. oatmeal

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Combine sugar and butter and mix until blended. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing after each addition. Add peanut butter, vanilla and corn syrup. Add M & M's and chocolate chips. add dry ingredients and mix completely. Scoop onto cookie sheet with large ice cream scoop and flatten slightly. top with additional M & M"s to make it look good. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Remove from oven and move to cooling rack.

Tips:

-I use butter, but you can use margarine.

-I use crunchy peanut butter, I love the little pieces of nuts, great texture.

-I use the large scoop from PC, but my friend always made them with an ice cream scoop to make them true Monster cookies. I love the bigger size but I make them smaller to help them last longer. I would make them huge if it were for a special occasion.

-Try them with a scoop of ice cream smashed between two cookies. The best ice cream sandwich EVER!

Thanks to Melissa for this amazing recipe. It is a favorite in our house.

Chicken Caesar Salad Pizza

I love Chicken Caesar Salad. It is one of my favorites. I found this recipe in a Pampered Chef cookbook and modified it to work for my family. I make my own crust and try to make it easy to assemble. And it is a great way to sneak veggies in for my kids who do not realize that there are red peppers all through it. I think you could sneak others in too, I just have not tried.

Chicken Caesar Salad Pizza

Crust:

1 c. hot water
1 T. sugar
1 T. dry active yeast
2 T. olive oil
1 c. flour
1 T. Italian seasoning
1/2 t. salt
3-4 c. flour or 1 cup wheat flour and 2 c. white flour

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Pour hot water into mixing bowl. Add sugar and stir to dissolve. Sprinkle yeast on top. Let soak and start to grow. Add olive oil and flour. Mix with dough hook for 1 minute. Add seasoning and salt and 1 cup flour. Start mixer and gradually add remaining flour until dough pulls away from the side of the bowl and no longer sticks to the bottom. Let knead with mixer for 2 minutes. Remove from bowl. Sprinkle pizza pan, or stone with cornmeal. Roll dough out to large circle. Pierce crust with fork a lot to keep crust from bubbling up. Bake at 375 for 20 minutes. Remove from oven and cool.

Topping :

3 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1-2 8 oz. pkgs. cream cheese, softened to room temperature
3/4 c. Caesar Dressing
1/2 c. Parmesan cheese
1 red bell pepper
Romaine lettuce, torn

Cook chicken breasts until done. You can grill or bake in oven. Let cool slightly. Put cream cheese in mixing bowl. Chop bell pepper finely and add to cheese. Chop chicken finely as well and add to cheese and pepper. Add dressing and Parmesan cheese. Mix until well blended. Spread evenly on crust. Top with lettuce. Cut and serve. You can sprinkle with more Parmesan cheese and top with additional chicken and Caesar dressing if desired.

Tips

-My kids make a mess if I put too many things on top, they just fall off. So I opted to put it all in the spread. To make it more fancy for adults you can certainly put more chicken and peppers on top.
-For the crust I use hot tap water. I let it run to the hottest it gets and pour immediately into my Kitchen aid mixer. The cool bowl and the stirring in of the sugar help the water to cool slightly making it the perfect temperature for the yeast.
-We talked about it and are thinking of adding bacon next time we try this to jazz it up. Bacon makes everything better right?
-Often I will not top the entire pizza. I will cut the crust and top each piece individually, so then my left over crust can be used the next day for lunch and will not be soggy. And my kids then get to top it themselves and food always tastes better if they get to do it themselves! You could also make smaller pizzas.

I hope you enjoy this as much as I do. It is a great summer recipe! Nice and cool and not too hard to assemble. You will not be stuck in the kitchen for hours instead of playing in the yard with the kids!

Homemade Gourmet Cookie Collection

When I was growing up my mom had big parties all the time. She made food for two days and bought an assortment of fancy foods (brie, special crackers, pate) to serve to her guests. One of those items was the box of assorted cookies from Pepperidge Farm. You know the ones. The box is full of paper liners and fancy little cookies in all shapes and sizes. I LOVED THOSE!!! It was such a treat to eat the left overs and I still consider Milanos my favorite store bought cookie ever.
A group of friends and I did a cookie exchange a couple of years ago and one gal gave me a great recipe for shortbread cookies with chocolate chips in them. They are so fabulous and when I made them last week I kept thinking that they tasted a lot like the Milanos.
So I thought what if I changed these up and rolled the dough out and sandwiched them with chocolate truffle sauce? Maybe I could make my own Milanos. Then as I worked on them I thought that I could also make more of the varieties of cookies and create my own gourmet cookie collection.

Here is what I came up with.

Shortbread Cookie Recipe

1 1/2 c. butter, softened to room temperature
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
4 t. vanilla
1 t. salt
4 1/4 c. flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In mixing bowl, beat butter until creamy. Gradually add sugar and mix until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, mixing completely after each addition. Add vanilla. Add dry ingredients. This will make a soft dough. Shape into two balls and roll each out separately. Roll to 1/8 inch thickness. Use cookie cutters to cut shapes. Bake at 350 for 8-9 minutes. Remove from oven. Let cool on pan for 2-3 minutes and remove to cooling rack. Cool completely before topping.

Chocolate Truffle Sauce

3/4 c. whipping cream
2 T. butter
12 oz. bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips

Heat cream and butter until the butter is completely melted, careful not to boil the cream. remove from heat and add chocolate chips. Let stand for 1 minute and whisk until smooth. Let cool for about 30 minutes before using to decorate cookies.

To decorate:

For one type I frosted the cookies with the truffle sauce and then sandwiched another cookie on top.

For the next one I frosted and them topped with chopped pecans.

The last one I pulled some of the truffle sauce and flavored it with orange extract. I then frosted the cookie.

Tips:

-If you are going to sandwich the cookies make sure you turn some of your cookies over before baking to ensure the can be flipped over. You want the pretty side to be up on both sides.
-You can use any type of flavoring to flavor the chocolate. I used orange, but mint, raspberry or blueberry would be delicious too!
-I used pecans because I love them, but you could also use peanuts, or almonds and even cashews.
-Use a small bite size cookie cutter. The ones I used were larger which resulted in a larger cookie. (Someone told me this was good because it meant they only ate one instead of more than one!)
-I think I am going to try topping them with a little caramel and them frosting them. Yummy! Also I am going to try the dough in my cookie press.

Thanks Jenn for the amazing recipe! And for letting me use it to make these wonderful cookies!