Con or Bust Benefit Auction: Roar of Sky ARC
I don’t have my galleys of Roar of Sky yet, but I’ll get them soon. And someone else out there in the country will get a special copy, too. That’s because I’m donating one of my ARCs (Advance Reader Copies) to raise money for Con or Bust.
Click here to read the auction details, and look at the other great books and items up for offering, too! The auction runs now through Sunday April 22nd.
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Read MoreBready or Not Original: Vanilla Granola Cookies
Vanilla Granola Cookies! Because granola makes everything healthier, right?
The clearance aisle at the grocery store bequeathed me with super-cheap vanilla granola with a close expiration date, so I decided to make cookies with it.
Weirdly enough, there weren’t many granola cookie recipes out there–and certainly none that appealed to me. I decided to greatly modify a couple oatmeal cookie recipes to get what I wanted.
I was most worried about getting the balance of sugar just right, since granola is already sweet on its own. Keep that in mind when you make this, too–granolas vary a lot, so tweak the sugar as necessary!
These cookies have a great, unique texture. I tried not to break up granola clumps too much, and the mix of granola throughout creates sporadic crunchiness in otherwise soft cookies.
Notice the different backdrops for my food pictures? That’s my new Shotbox in action! Most of my new recipes from here on will include at least some pictures from the Shotbox. It’s a cool, collapsible, and portable photo light studio.
I love my Shotbox. (And no, I’m not being paid anything to say that. I bought this during a Kickstarter and I had to wait a long time for the product to arrive. Totally worth the wait.)
Bready or Not Original: Vanilla Granola Cookies
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup unsalted butter 1 1/2 sticks, room temperature
- 3/4 cup brown sugar packed
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 1 Tablespoon pure vanilla extract
- 2 eggs
- 2 cups vanilla granola
- 1 cup white chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325-degrees. Line cookie sheet with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, mix the flour, baking soda and salt; set aside.
- In a large bowl, cream together the soft butter, brown sugar, and white sugar until fluffy. Beat in the vanilla extract and two eggs until the mix is light. Gradually stir in the flour mixture. Gently blend in the granola, trying to not break apart all of the clumps, and the white chocolate chips.
- Place tablespoon-sized dollops of dough on the ready sheet, spacing them out to allow for expansion. Bake for 10 to 13 minutes, until the edges are slightly brown and the middle is still soft. Let the cookies rest on the cookie sheet for 10 minutes before transferring to a cooling rack.
- Cookies keep for days in sealed container at room temperature.
- OM NOM NOM!
Sunday Quote will post a Vanilla Granola Cookies recipe on Wednesday
Read More“Don’t spend time beating on a wall, hoping to transform it into a door.”
~ Coco Chanel
Bready or Not Original: Cookie Butter White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Bars
Cookie butter makes everything better. This is a maxim of life. It is proven true yet again with these Cookie Butter White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Bars.
Cookie butter is found by the peanut butter in most grocery stores in the US these days. The most popular brands are Biscoff and Speculoos, but Walmart, Kroger, and Sprouts even have their own jars now!
What does cookie butter taste like? Well… rich, buttery cookie dough rendered into peanut butter-like form. That’s the only way to describe it.
In this recipe, the cookie butter flavor amps up the inherent baked-good yumminess of these bars. Add white chocolate and macadamias along with that? Oh yeah.
You end up with a ribbon of cookie butter through the middle and swirls across the top. These effectively acts like a thin frosting, as these otherwise aren’t heavy duty on sweetness.
The bars rise a lot as they bake and end up quite cakey. They hold together well, so you can cut them small, if you want.
I want to mention macadamia nuts again. They are lovely in this recipe, adding a sporadic crunch and buttery flavor that goes oh-so-well with everything else.
Bready or Not Original: Cookie Butter White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Bars
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups unsalted butter 3 sticks, softened
- 1/2 cup white sugar
- 2 cups brown sugar packed
- 4 large eggs room temperature
- 1 Tb vanilla extract
- 4 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 cup white chocolate chips
- 1 cup macadamia nuts chopped
- 2/3 cup + 1/2 cup creamy cookie butter spread divided
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350-degrees. Line a 9x13 pan with aluminum foil and apply nonstick spray.
- In a large bowl, cream butter until light and fluffy. Add in both sugars, followed by the eggs one by one, then the vanilla.
- In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder. Gradually mix into the wet ingredients until just incorporated.
- Spread half of the dough in the bottom of the pan. Mixture will be thick. Use an uneven spatula to spread 2/3 cup cookie butter in an even layer over the dough.
- Top with remaining dough and spread to edges. Dollop the 1/2 cup of cookie butter here and there over the top, then use a butter knife to swirl it into the dough.
- Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, until the top is golden brown and the middle passes the toothpick test. Dough will rise a great deal.
- Cool completely in pan. Use the foil to lift up bars for easy cutting. Store sliced pieces in a sealed container at room temperature for as long as a week.
- OM OM NOM!
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