Banana Cookies

Have you ever bought bananas thinking "oh yeah! Those are going to be delicious in my tummy." Then a few days pass, and they are slowly dying. Yep, that has happened to me! Today, in fact, I had some aging bananas giving me the stink eye for leaving them to sit. So, I decided to make something out of them, give them new life so to speak. Haha.

I didn't want to do yet another banana bread, so I went on the lookout for an alternate recipe to use my brown bananas. Well, guess what I found? *Drumroll please* a banana cookie recipe! I was very excited, I have never made banana cookies before...could it even be done? What is this sorcery?

So I set out to make them and oh my goodness! These little bite size cookies are delish! They are moist, banana-y, and very easy to make.

I found the recipe on Pots Pans & Parkers, there is even a delicious looking frosting that goes on top. I didn't want these to be too sweet so I omitted the frosting, but, head on over there if you want to try it out.

Banana Cookies
yield 45 cookies (1" cookie scoop)

3/4 cup    Shortening or Butter
3/4 cup    Sugar
1    Egg
1/2 tsp.    Vanilla
2    Mashed Bananas
1/4 tsp.    Baking Soda
2 cup    Flour

Place shortening (or butter) and sugar into a bowl.

Mix until creamy and combined.

Add the egg, bananas (as you can see I did not mash mine, they were pretty soft), and the vanilla.

Mix together, doesn't that look yummy? :P

Add in the flour and baking soda in a few additions. Mix until combined.

Using a 1" cookie scoop, I put 15 on each sheet pan (I sprayed my pans with cooking spray, feel free to use parchment). The cookies don't spread too much.

Bake at 350F for 8-10 mins. Bottoms will be golden brown, like the picture below.

Enjoy!

Easy No Rise Pizza

I came across a recipe a little while back for an easy 2 ingredient pizza recipe, yesterday I finally decided to try it out...Unfortunately I didn't have either ingredient! The recipe calls for self-rising flour and greek yogurt, luckily there was a substitution for all purpose flour right on the website.

This recipe will make 2 personal size pizzas or 1 med/large pizza. The sky is the limit with your toppings, create savory or sweet pizzas!

No Rise Pizza Dough
altered slightly from The Slow Roasted Italian

1 1/2 cups    A.P. Flour
1 1/2 tsp.    Baking Powder
3/4 tsp.    Salt
1 cup    Sour Cream

Place flour, baking powder, salt, and sour cream into a bowl.

Mix together (I used a wooden spoon) until combined.

Knead, by hand, on a floured counter for about 7 mins. Add flour as needed to keep dough from sticking.

Split dough in half, and roll out. I put cornmeal on the bottom of the pans, but you don't have to.

Top as desired, here is my pepperoni pizza.

and my cinnamon sugar one (of course).

Bake at 450F for 10-12 min. 

*Note dark pans will take about a min longer than light colored pans*

My pepperoni pizza (in a light pan) took 11 min, I rotated it at 5 min. 

My cinnamon sugar pizza (in a dark pan) took 10 min, I rotated it at 5 min. (I also topped with a powder sugar glaze)

Enjoy!

Peanut Butter Bars

So, I was perusing pinterest the other night and came across "lunch lady peanut butter bars" . From what i've heard school lunches use to have desserts that came with them! Unfortunately, my schools were not the kind of school that gave out delicious desserts with lunch. :,(

Now, these bars tasted great, and they even tasted better the next day! If you love peanut butter then you'll love these. I altered the recipe a bit, the original recipe was very sweet, with two types of sugar, and peanut butter in the bars, then another layer of peanut butter, then (finally) the chocolate frosting on top! Whew...they were way to sweet for me, but head on over to the original link if you like it that way.

Peanut Butter Bars

Yield 1 cookie sheet

Bars

1 1/2 cup    Flour

1 1/4 tsp.    Salt (omit if using salted butter)

1/2 tsp.    Baking soda

3/4 cup    Butter

1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp.   Sugar

1/4  cup + 2 Tbsp.    Brown Sugar

1 1/2 tsp.    Vanilla

3/4 cup    Peanut Butter (original recipe used creamy, I used crunchy)

2    Eggs

1 1/2 cup    quick oats

Topping

3/4 cup    Peanut Butter

Frosting

1/2 cup    Butter

3 1/2 cup    Powdered Sugar

2 Tbsp.    Cocoa Powder

1/4 cup    Milk (I used almond milk, you can use whatever milk you have)

1 tsp.    Vanilla

Let's get started!

Place peanut butter, sugar, brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, and butter into a bowl and mix until smooth.

*Note: as you can see above I did not use butter in this section, I used mashed banana as a substitution. If you would like to use this substitution just be aware that the bars will come out chewier. The substitution is 1:1, so use 3/4 cup mashed banana for 3/4 cup butter*

(if you used crunchy peanut it will not be smooth)

Not shown: Mix together flour, salt, and baking soda in a separate bowl.

Add dry ingredients in 3 additions, mix only until incorporated.

Fold in oats.

Spread onto a greased cookie sheet.

Bake at 350F 12-15 min (or until golden). Rotate halfway through. 

Mine took about 16 min because of the mashed banana.

Golden and delicious! Now onto the PB Spread.

All you do is place peanut butter into a small bowl and whip it until lighter in color.

When the bars have cooled for at least 10 mins. Spread the peanut butter on the top of the bars.

Next, we have the frosting!

In a sauce pan, melt the butter.

Add in the milk, and the cocoa powder.

Mix until combined, cook over medium heat until boiling, stir constantly. 

Remove from heat, mix in vanilla. Then add in the powdered sugar in about 4-5 additions, make sure you use a whisk, otherwise you will get lumps like in my picture lol. :) Stir until thickened.

Spread immediately onto the peanut butter layer.

Cool completely before cutting into them.

Enjoy!

Sweet Buttermilk Cornbread

Let me start this post by saying that I never liked cornbread when I was younger. Something about the crunchy corn kernels inside just didn't do it for me. Lately I have been trying "new" things that I hated when I was a child.

This is where cornbread comes in...Now, when I found this recipe on allrecipes, I was quite surprised. It had 3,661 reviews and it was still given a 5 star! I immediately decided to try it out. This recipe is ah-mazing! It is sweet and moist, not at all dry with crunchy bits of corn in it! I was converted, I am happy to say that I am a cornbread eater now. :)

I did want to note, this is a sweet cornbread, if you are looking for a more authentic southern style cornbread you will probably be disappointed.

Sweet Buttermilk Cornbread
Yield (1) 8 or 9" square pan

1/2 cup    Butter
2/3 cup    Sugar
2    Eggs
1 cup    Buttermilk
1/2 tsp    Baking Soda
1 cup    Cornmeal
1 cup    A.P. Flour
1/2 tsp    Salt

Grease (and flour if you'd like) square pan

Melt butter in a pot.

Remove from heat and add sugar, stir to combine.

Add eggs, mix well.

(not shown: mix together buttermilk and baking soda)

Pour buttermilk mixture into pot, stir to combine.

Add cornmeal, flour, and salt, mix until only a few lumps are left.

Pour into prepared pan. 

Bake at 375F for about 30 mins

It will be a nice golden color on the outside, and a toothpick will come out clean when tested.

Enjoy!

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

Now we get to my favorite type of cookie. The chewy kind! I think there is nothing better than biting into a soft, gooey chocolate chip cookie, no crunching involved. Well, I meant for these to be spider chocolate chip cookies but the spidering of the melted chocolate chips didn't work out as well as i thought it would. I'm not sure if you have seen the post on pinterest but they look super creepy! I love it. I am going to practice a little and hopefully I can post the finished product for you!

So, I whipped up a batch of these yesterday and I think I ate about 6 of them! I had to tear myself away from these bad boys before I ate all of them! Definitely try these out, let me know what you think of them.

Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies
Adapted From: The Girl Who Ate Everything

Yield: 4.5 Dozen (with a 1" cookie scoop)

2 Cups    A.P. Flour
1/2 Tsp.    Baking Soda
1/2 Tsp.    Salt (omit salt if using salted butter)
3/4 Cup    Butter, Melted
1 Cup    Brown Sugar, packed
1/2 Cup    Sugar
1 Tbsp.    Vanilla
1    Egg
1    Egg Yolk
2 Cups    Chocolate Chips

Sift together the flour, baking soda, and salt (if used)

In a separate bowl mix together the brown sugar, melted butter, and regular sugar.

Mix well. It will look like this.

Add in the egg, egg yolk, and vanilla.

Mix until light in color. (it won't take long).

Add the dry ingredients, I mixed it in with a spatula.

Add in the chocolate chips, mixed in with a spatula.

Parchment line your baking sheets, and place 1" cookie dough balls. I put 12 on each pan. Make sure to space them because they will spread.

*Because this made a ton of cookies, I ended up having to do 3 different batches of cookies*

Bake at 325F for 11-14 min (mine took 12). Rotate halfway through.

Take out when the edges look done. The middle will still be soft and puffy, they will finish up in the pan while cooling down.

Cool cookies until you can transfer them without breaking, cool the rest of the way on a cooling rack.

Enjoy!

Blueberry Buttermilk Breakfast Muffins

I have been pretty busy for this last week, I am in the process of making my husbands halloween costume and it is coming along great! I know, I am starting really early but I am just really excited! I love halloween! It is my favorite holiday, I love dressing up, I love all the sweets (thus my baking blog), I love all of the scary stuff!

I am going to start doing some halloween baking tutorials soon, so stay tuned!

But for now, here is a delicious blueberry buttermilk breakfast muffin!

Blueberry Buttermilk Breakfast Muffin
Adapted from Alexandra Cooks
Yield about 8 Muffins or 1 (9") Square Pan

1/2 Cup    Butter, room temp
Zest from 1 Large Lemon
3/4 Cup + 2 Tbsp    Sugar
1    Egg
1 Tsp    Vanilla
2 Cups    Flour (keep 1/4 cup out to mix with the blueberries)
2 Tsp    Baking Powder
1 Tsp    Salt (omit if using salted butter)
2 Cups    Blueberries
1/2 Cup    Buttermilk

Mix together the butter, lemon zest, and sugar.

(doesn't this look yummy?!)

Add the vanilla and egg, mix until combined.

Toss the blueberries with 1/4 cup of flour.

With just a spatula, mix in the flour, baking powder, and salt (if using), and the buttermilk.

*I messed up at this point, the original recipe says to mix in the dry mix (flour, salt, baking powder) and the buttermilk alternating, I did not do this and mine came out perfectly fine, just a little bit small, because I under filled my liners. You can try either way.

Mix gently, so you don't crush the blueberries.

Fill the liners with the batter, the batter is not runny, it is a thicker batter. Sprinkle a little bit of sugar on each one.

Now I filled 12, but as you can see below they turned out small, I think that if you do 8, they will be nice and big.

Bake at 350F for about 15-20 min, toothpick inserted into center should come out clean. 

Enjoy!