Easy Criss Cross Peanut Butter Cookies

If you’re looking for the perfect, good old fashioned criss cross peanut butter cookies, this is it.  I first made these cookies back in 2008 not long after I started blogging.  That old original post is here.  I decided to post them again with updated photos and to bring attention back to them.  I believe everyone needs recipes for all their favorite cookies, like my favorite chocolate chip cookies.  These would fit the category of favorite peanut butter cookies.

I don’t take any credit for these cookies as I got the original recipe from Anna at Cookie Madness.  Long ago she raved they were her favorite peanut butter cookies, which is why I made them back then.  After I started blogging, Anna’s blog was probably the first one I discovered and loved.  Still to this day, I check her blog daily to see what she is up to in the kitchen.  Not only that, I’ve been lucky enough to meet her and spend the weekend in San Francisco at BlogHer Food 2009 with her and I chat with her frequently via email and Facebook.  She is great and is a great resource and authority to turn to for any of your baking questions or for whatever you might be looking for.  That link for her blog takes you right to the recipe for these cookies. 

I’ve really only made some small changes, here’s how I made them.

Easy Criss Cross Peanut Butter Cookies, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!, adapted from Anna at Cookie Madness

1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup light brown sugar, packed

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 cup peanut butter, smooth or crunchy

1 large egg

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1  1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup semi sweet or milk chocolate chips, optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

In the bowl of a mixer, combine the butter and sugars and cream together until smooth, about 2 minutes.  Add the peanut butter and combine until mixed.  Then add the egg and vanilla and beat until well mixed.  In a small bowl, combine the flour, salt and baking soda and whisk together.  Mix the dry ingredients into the creamed mixture just until combined.  Stir in the chocolate chips (or peanut butter chips, too), if using.

Scoop dough onto baking sheets about two tablespoonsful each, spaced about two inches apart.  Bake for 12 minutes.  Let cool on baking sheets for a couple minutes, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.  Makes about 2 dozen or more if you make them smaller, then only bake about 10 minutes.

Fresh from the oven they are a little puffy, but flatten to a perfect thickness as they cool.  With some of the cookies I stuffed the insides with chocolate chips and didn’t put the criss cross on them.

 I sent this entire batch of cookies over to Kevin’s niece who watched the boys for us last week.  Try these perfect peanut butter cookies!

 

Chocolate Strawberry Dessert Bars

After making these Raspberry Streusel Dessert Bars back in April and then making them at least 3-4 times since, I kept thinking about chocolate (surprise!).  After making some homemade strawberry jam a few weeks ago, it came to me that these bars would be so good made with chocolate and strawberry jam—like a chocolate covered strawberry in dessert bar form.  So I set out to see what I could come up with.  And I love it when something turns out great on the first try!

I just made these yesterday after taking a Facebook friends poll over which kind of chocolate people prefer on chocolate covered strawberries.  Dark, semi-sweet or milk?  Then I started having some say their favorite is white chocolate on strawberries—okay, I’ll have to try another bar, but for now, for these bars, I went with semi-sweet.  They are sure easy to make and certainly taste like chocolate and strawberries.  I call it a win!

Chocolate Strawberry Dessert Bars, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

2 cups (240 grams) all purpose flour

1/2 cup (40 grams) natural cocoa powder

2/3 cup (133 grams) granulated sugar

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 cup strawberry jam (homemade is best!)

1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Ganache:

3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips

2 tablespoons strawberry jam

3 tablespoons heavy cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Line a 9 inch baking pan with non-stick foil.  Spray lightly with cooking spray.  In the bowl of a food processor, add the flour, cocoa, sugar, and salt.  Pulse to combine.  Add the vanilla and pieces of butter.  Pulse until it is all combined and resembles coarse, wet sand.  Put about 2/3 of the mixture into the baking pan and spread evenly, pressing down slightly.  Spread the strawberry jam over the bottom crust.  Then sprinkle the chocolate chips over the jam.  Finish with sprinkling the remaining crumb mixture over the top and press down slightly.  Bake for 40 minutes.  Remove from oven and let sit until cool.

Remove the bars from the pan using the overhanging edges of the foil.  Cut into 16 bars.

Make the ganache.  Put the chocolate in a medium sized heatproof bowl.  Put the jam and cream in a glass measuring cup or bowl and microwave on high for 30 seconds, just as it begins to bubble up (watch that it doesn’t bubble over, could do in 15 second intervals if you’re worried).  Pour the cream mixture over the chocolate chips and let sit for a minute.  Stir the now melted chocolate and strawberry cream together until smooth.  Let the ganache sit for 20-30 minutes so it thickens slightly.  Put the ganache into a zip top plastic bag, then snip the corner off and drizzle over the bars.  Let sit until somewhat hardened on the bars.

These would be good and pretty with a fresh slice of strawberry on the tops of each, but I didn’t have any fresh strawberries at the time. 

Coconut Lime Cranberry Pecan Bars—Secret Recipe Club

These Coconut Lime Cranberry Pecan Bars that I made for the Secret Recipe Club were a perfect pick to make.  I made them for the monthly book group I’m in and also gave some to one of the boys’ bus drivers to thank her for the year of rides home from school.  They really are good!  The blog I got them from was my assignment for June, Anna’s blog, bcmom's kitchen.  Anna’s blog was a new one for me and I really enjoyed looking through her recipes.  Yum!

Anna got this recipe from her local newspaper’s food section that was posted in a cookie contest.  I made a few little changes to the recipe.  The filling has some cranberry juice in it and while I was at the store to get some, I saw some cranberry lime juice and thought that sounded really good.  So I decided to use that and lime zest instead of orange zest that was also in the recipe.  That cranberry lime juice was really good, it was from Ocean Spray.   Other than that and some slight changes to the icing recipe, I followed Anna’s recipe.

Just for the heck of it, I only iced about half the bars.  They are good both ways.  I put some lime zest in the icing, so there is a little extra kick in that.

Coconut Lime Cranberry Pecan Bars, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!, adapted from Anna at bcmom's kitchen

Crust:

1  1/4 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup packed light brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup unsalted butter, cold, cut into pieces

1/2 cup finely chopped pecans

1/4 cup finely chopped dried cranberries

Filling:

2 large eggs

1 cup granulated sugar

2 tablespoons cranberry lime juice (or cranberry juice)

1 teaspoon lime zest (about half a large lime or all of a small lime)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 cup finely chopped pecans

1 cup chopped dried cranberries

1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut

Icing:

1 cup powdered sugar

1/2 tablespoon cranberry lime juice

1/2 tablespoon lime juice

1 tablespoons heavy cream

1/2 tablespoon milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Line a 9x13 inch baking pan with non stick foil (or don’t, you don’t have to).  For the crust, put the flour, sugar and salt in a food processor and pulse to combine.   Add the cold butter and pulse until well combined.  Also combine the pecans and cranberries.  Press the mixture onto the bottom of the pan.  Bake for 12 minutes.

While the crust is baking, make the filling by whisking together the eggs, sugar, cranberry-lime juice, lime zest and vanilla.  Stir in the pecans, cranberries and coconut.  Pour evenly over hot crust (spreading it carefully).  Return to oven and bake for 25 minutes.  Let cool on wire rack.

Make icing by combining all ingredients in a medium sized bowl and whisking together until smooth.  Remove bars from pan by lifting the foil edges.  Set on a cutting board and slide the foil out from under the bars (that’s what is so great about non-stick foil and you don’t have to cut bars in the pan).  Cut bars into desired sizes.  Drizzle icing over as many bars as you’d like.  (You can drizzle the icing before cutting the bars if you’d like, but I like having icing dripping down the sides of each one.)  Let icing dry for 20-30 minutes to harden if you want to stack the bars for storage or serving.

Being a chocolate gal, these are still great as is, but I also can’t quite thinking that they’d be good with some mini chocolate chips in the filling or possible drizzled with melted white chocolate.  Ooh, yum.  Great blog, Anna.  Thanks!

 

 

Buckwheat Oat Chocolate Chip Cookies (Whole Grain, Could Be Made Gluten Free)

Love these cookies!  One of our grocery stores recently remodeled and added a nice bulk section and natural foods aisle.  I love it.  While looking over the new things, I saw that they had buckwheat flour and decided to get some.  They also had oat bran which I have wanted to get a few times but never found it readily available around here without having to make an hour drive.. These are the cookies I came up with and I’m super happy with how they turned out on the first try.  

Besides being made with all whole grains, they are also made with natural cane sugar (and a little molasses to make homemade brown sugar) and coconut oil instead of butter.  Since coconut oil is used instead of butter, the dough can be made in a bowl with a spoon—a mixer is not necessary.  The dark chocolate chips do have a little sugar (I used Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Chips, you can use any chocolate you’d like.  They also have some unsweetened coconut.  You might be thinking they don’t sound sweet enough, but they certainly are!

Buckwheat Oat Chocolate Chip Cookies, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

2/3 cup coconut oil

1 cup natural cane sugar and 1 teaspoon molasses, mixed with a fork and/or your fingers until all combined (Homemade Brown Sugar!)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 large eggs, room temperature

1 cup buckwheat flour

1 cup old fashioned oats

1/2 cup oat flour (made by grinding oats in food processor until finely ground)

1/2 cup oat bran

3 tablespoons nonfat dry milk powder

1  1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup dark chocolate chips (I chop them up a bit since the Ghirardelli chips are larger)

1/2 cup walnuts, toasted and chopped

1/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut (don’t want coconut, leave it out)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.  Line baking sheets with parchment paper. 

In a large sized bowl, combine the cane sugar and molasses.  Mix it together with a fork, then rub the sugar between your fingers until it all becomes moist, like brown sugar.  Add the coconut oil to the sugar and stir with a wooden spoon until combined.  Add the vanilla and eggs and stir until well mixed.  In a separate bowl, combine the buckwheat flour, oats, oat flour, dry milk powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt.  Whisk it together to sift.  Add the dry ingredients to the wet mixture and fold together until all combined.  Stir in the chocolate chips, walnuts and coconut.  Scoop dough (about 2 tablespoonsful) on to baking sheet spacing about 2 inches apart.  Bake for 9-10 minutes.  Let sit on baking sheet for a couple minutes the move cookies to a wire rack to cool completely.  Makes 24 cookies. 

I love these cookies and that they are much healthier, so I don’t feel as guilty eating 3, 4 5, 6 of them. (ha)  They have a great chewiness and wonderful nutty flavor—and chocolate! ;)

Mildly Wild Salsa, The Best Homemade Salsa

I recently made what is now my favorite homemade salsa and I’ll most likely make it this way from now on.  I couldn’t think of a fun, clever name to call it and asked my mom for ideas.  So I credit her with what is now called Mildly Wild Salsa.  It’s got a great, spicy kick to it, but is not-too-hot to enjoy.  That is one thing I don’t like about some hot salsas—they are just too much to actually eat and like.  I don’t like chunky salsa, mostly because I strongly dislike onions, especially in any recognizable form. ;)  This has the perfect hit of flavor you need from onions (though I used shallot), but the real flavor punch is from the jalapeno and cilantro.  Can’t forget about the garlic and fresh lime juice either. 

There are a couple of Mexican restaurants where I love the salsa, I always say I could almost drink it.  I also like to say I love the smell of April Fresh Downy so much that I could drink it, too, but that’s a totally different story (and no, I haven’t and won’t drink Downy). ;)  Sometimes when we’ve tried making it at home, it has seemed a bit acidy.  We’ve tried putting a little sugar in it and that helps a bit, but this time when I made it, it was just too hot, even when I removed most of the seeds and ribs from the inside of the jalapeno.  We have also found over time that we like using canned tomatoes rather than fresh ones.  Many like a fresh, chunky salsa with lots of cut up veggies, but that brings up the whole raw chunks of onions that I can’t handle again.  After making this as I most often do and deciding it was much too spicy, I decided to add a can of tomato sauce—and it is so good!  It added just the right amount of sweetness that helps cut the acid and made it so it was perfectly spicy but definitely not too spicy.  Try it!

Mildly Wild Salsa, The Best Homemade Salsa, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!

1 jalapeno, ribs and most of the seeds removed (but leave some!) and cut into 4 pieces

1 shallot (or about 1/4 cup onion), roughly chopped

2 cloves garlic

1/4 cup cilantro leaves

1/2 teaspoon granulated sugar

1/4 teaspoon ground cumin

1/8-1/4 teaspoon salt (to taste)

juice of half a lime (or more to taste)

14 ounce can of diced or whole tomatoes (not drained)

8 ounce can of tomato sauce

In the bowl of a food processor put the cut up jalapeno, the shallot, garlic and cilantro.  Pulse a few times.  Add the sugar, cumin, salt and lime juice.  Pulse until all is finely chopped.  Scrape the sides of the bowl.  Pulse again.  Add the tomatoes and tomato sauce and pulse until  tomatoes are well chopped and almost smooth.  Serve with chips.

Perfect for snacking, lunch, dinner, snacking…….heck, it would work great for huevo rancheros for breakfast, too, or any other type of Mexican breakfast!

No Bake Peanut Butter Chocolate Energy Bites

These are perfect little bites of energy and deliciousness that are great when you don’t want to turn on the oven (or like me, have a broken oven)!  Never fear, a new one is on the way.  I love that these are healthy with mostly all natural ingredients (except the chocolate, though it is dark chocolate so is definitely on the healthier side anyway).

Super easy to make!  I formed them into to little one and a half inch disks, but they would be easy to just for into to balls.  I found these on Maggie’s blog, Smashed Peas and Carrots.  I made a few little changes to how I made them, besides forming them in to disks instead of balls.  The recipe used ground flaxseed and I only had half of what was needed for that, so I also used some wheat germ.  Her recipe also doesn’t say more than “coconut flakes”, I used the unsweetened ones and instead of mini chocolate chips, I used some chopped dark chocolate.  You could actually make these with all kinds of flavors, using different nut butters and putting dried fruit in them. 

No Bake Peanut Butter Chocolate Energy Bites, by Katrina and Baking and Boys! adapted from Smashed Peas and Carrots

1 cup old fashioned oats

1/2 cup natural peanut butter

1/3 cup honey

1 cup unsweetened coconut flakes

1/4 cup ground flaxseed

1/4 cup wheat germ

1/2 cup (3 oz.) chopped dark chocolate

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Combine all the ingredients in a large bowl and mix well.  Refrigerate for 30 minutes or so, which helps make the mixture easier to form into bite sized pieces.  Scoop out tablespoonsful with a small cookie scoop and put them into a 1  1/2 inch round cookie cutter (these would even be fun to use different cookie cutter shapes!), Pack the mixture down into the cutter.  You can also form them into balls, packing the mixture before you roll it.  Place them on a wax paper lined baking sheet.  Refrigerate again.  (Although you may find them getting eaten before the make it back to the refrigerator.)  Store in an airtight container.  Makes 24-28 cookies, depending on size.

These really are fun, easy, delicious bites of energy!  Try not to eat too much before you even get them shaped.  I dare ya!

I have some almond butter.  I think I’ll try that next with some chopped almonds and maybe some dried cranberries. 

English Muffin Bread and Very Little Bother Bread—Secret Recipe Club

I love this bread!  I made this for the Secret Recipe Club from my assigned blog this month.  I seriously don’t eat white bread, like almost never.  I just know that whole wheat bread is much better for me and I most often prefer it, especially over store bought bread.  When I saw this bread on Shannon’s blog, Searching For Dessert, I remembered seeing it before other places online and wanting to make it, but never had.  Kevin likes English muffins so I figured he’d like it, too.  The loaf of bread was eaten pretty quickly and I have to admit, I ate more slices of it than I thought I would—a couple pieces one day, a couple the next. 

I love the denseness of it and all the little nooks and crannies that perfectly hold melting butter and my other favorite, honey. 

While I certainly think the bread is good freshly sliced (and it slices so nicely), my favorite way to have it is toasted, with the aforementioned butter and honey.

Love the crispy crust and still tender middle.   I adapted Shannon’s recipe ever-so-slightly.  Check out her English Muffin Bread, she added a little cinnamon to it.  I decided this first time to leave it out.  I also needed more flour than she used.

English Muffin Bread, by Katrina, Baking and Boys!, adapted from Searching For Dessert

3  1/3 cups all purpose flour (I used unbleached)

2  1/2 teaspoons active dry yeast (which is the same as one packet)

1/8 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup milk (I used 2%)

1/4 cup water

1/2 tablespoon granulated sugar

1 teaspoon salt

In a large bowl, whisk together one and a half cups of flour, the yeast, and baking soda. Heat in a small saucepan over medium heat the milk, water, sugar and salt just until warm.  Stir to combine the sugar and salt.  Remove from heat before it is hot.  Stir the wet ingredients into the flour mixture and combine well.  Stir in one and a half cups of flour.  If the dough is still quite sticky, add some of the remaining 1/3 cup flour to the countertop and put the dough on top of it and begin working in some of the flour, adding more of the remaining 1/3 cup until it isn’t too sticky.  It only needs to be kneaded just until it all comes together and isn’t too sticky to shape. 

Shape it into a loaf and place it in an 8x4 inch loaf pan that is greased.  Cover the pan with plastic wrap sprayed lightly with cooking spray and let it rise in a warm place for about 45 minutes.  After about 30 minutes, preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.  Bake the bread for 25 minutes.  Remove the bread from the pan and let it cool on a wire rack until you just can’t stand it anymore and need to slice in to it. ;)

Ready to bake with no kneading and just 45 minutes rise time.

Perfect in just 25 minutes.

I also made this bread from Shannon’s blog, Searching For Dessert because I love the name of it and the idea of it being easy!  Very Little Bother Bread  The recipe makes enough for two loaves, so I halved it and only made one loaf.  It was good and easy.  The mixer does the short time of kneading.  The dough then goes through two 30 minute rise times, then is shaped and put in the pan for one more 30 minute rising.  Baked, then—with very little bother, you have a great homemade bread.  I used about half whole wheat flour and half all purpose flour.

Very Little Bother Bread

Other recipes I printed out from Shannon’s blog and plan to try soon are---

Southwest Quinoa Sliders

Crisped Rice Cookies

Banana Brownies with Peanut Butter Drizzle  (Shannon loves creating all kinds of different flavored brownies, so do I!)

There is so much more deliciousness on Shannon’s blog.  Check it out, especially if you are Searching For Dessert. ;)