TWD--Fifteen-Minute Magic: Chocolate Amaretti Torte

Woohoo!  Today's Tuesday's With Dorie recipe as we bake our way through her wonderful baking book, Baking From My Home To Yours was chosen by Holly at Phe/MOM/enon.  Thank you, Holly!  I made this torte yesterday and served it up for Family Home Evening.  Bob and Tes always join us on Monday nights and besides everyone having a piece, two pieces went home with them and the torte is gone.   I rejoined The Biggest Loser online program today and am proud to say I only had one little bite of Kevin's piece of this delicious chocolate torte.   And I finger licked a couple of the lovely drips of glaze that pooled on the cutting board while the torte set.   Sigh.  I wanted more.  But I refrained. 

This really was quite simple to make and so good.  I'm still finding it hard to LOVE the bittersweet chocolate taste, rather than something a little sweeter, but this was still de-licious!  I chose not to have whipped cream on top, but would have liked a little almond extract in the glaze.  It was rich and we didn't think it needed whipped cream or anything else.  GREAT pick here from Holly.  You can get this awesome recipe on Holly's blog, Phe/MOM/enon.  Browse around her blog if you've never been there, she's "phenomenal" and so are all her yummy posts!

Oh, oh, I almost forgot.  I made homemade Amaretti cookies for this!  I could only picture these cookies on Giada's Food Network shows and I know they were darker in color and I never thought they were so meringue-like, but I went with it anyway, rather than searching high and low in the "little" town we live in and also having never seen this torte of Dorie's before, I don't even know if it looks "correct", but it doesn't really matter.  We all liked it--even Kevin! ; )   And instead of baking this in an 8 inch round pan, I used a springform pan because that is the only pan I have that is 8 inches.  And for the record, I didn't set the pan on a baking sheet either.  I baked it for 27 minutes.

The Amaretti cookie recipe I used, after searching the internet and looking at several recipes--all of which were different from each other--was a recipe I found on Martha Stewart's website and when I saw that it was a Mario Batali recipe, I decided you can't go wrong with him!  I followed the recipe completely, but decided not to sprinkle them with extra sugar.  They look a little different from the picture on Martha's site, but they were crisp and almond-y so I called it good.  I didn't read some of the P&Q's until writing this to see that Dorie suggested 2.75 oz. of cookies in place of the suggested Amaretti di Saronno ones.  I just used 18 cookies since mine were small.  I have no idea how much they weighed.

I took a bunch of pictures of the torte in process, but for some reason the color was way off on my camera and they don't look that great.  BUT, when it really mattered, I got some nice shots of the finished product.

Chocolate Amaretti Torte, anyone?

 

Just a small slice?  Okay.

  

I actually wanted everyone to have a good size piece because I wanted the thing eaten and gone! ; )

Thanks again, Holly.  This month IS gonna kill me.  Two more weeks and two more very chocolaty, NOT "light" desserts coming up.  I am gonna stick to this Biggest Loser thing and plan to only have a bite of each.  Sigh. 

I wanted to mention a quick THANKS to everyone who visits my blogs and comments, especially on Tuesdays.  I really enjoy this  TWD group and find it hard with all the other things I do, i.e.--BOYS and such, to get to all the blogs I want to see and comment on.  Just know that I do throughout the week get over to a lot and at least peek at what ya'll have been doing! ; )

Happy Easter = Yummy Food!

Whew, what a day!  I must take a a moment today as I relax briefly now that the boys are in bed, to think about the real reason we celebrate Easter which is to remember and celebrate that our Savior, Jesus Christ 1) died for all of us and 2) that he was resurrected and lives!  I'm thankful to have the knowledge I do and am grateful for my Savior!

I wasn't able to go to church today, as Taylor has had a fever for going on 4 days now, which kind of makes my Easter Sunday seem a little "different".  Anyway, I enjoyed the day cooking and baking in the kitchen, in between playing with the kids with things they got for Easter, oh and picking up lots of plastic eggs and candy wrappers!  Sigh.   It was a good day.  I'll leave out the kid's fighting and throwing fits part--you're welcome. ; )

I found these two recipes in the April issue of Good Housekeeping.  I bought the magazine because Michael J. Fox is on the cover and I've always loved him!  Family Ties was one of the BEST 80's sitcoms and I even had posters of Michael on my walls way back when.  Great article about him and I can't wait to read his new book.  What a guy!  Oh, back to the veggies.  I thought their Easter menu in the magazine looks really good.   Today I made the Spring Garden Saute and Spring Pea Soup.  I followed the recipes exactly and they were both really good.

The sauteed veggies were great.  I had never had or made cooked radishes before and they were pretty good, but I love asparagus and sugar snap peas and they were certainly the star of the show.   

I made the pea soup knowing that Kevin would have some just because I went to the trouble of making it, that the boys wouldn't really eat any of it and that I would really like it--and I did.  It even had two shallots in it--I know, the onion family.  I went ahead with it anyway, and even though I loathe onions and I did taste the shallots a bit, the soup was quite good.  This also had fresh mint leaves in it, which I've never cooked with.  All in all, it was a great meal with ham, low fat cheesy potato casserole, cooked carrots, the veggies and soup.  Mmmm.  I also made some yummy carrot cake cupcakes that I'll share with you another time soon.

  

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter Sunday!

High Octane Energy Bars and Giveaway Winner Announced!

Winner, winner, winner!  This morning we picked a winner for my dark chocolate, brownie pan, cinnamon chips giveaway.  We did it the way we always do here at our house.  Each of the four boys and Kevin pick a name from the pot (bowl), then I blindly pick one of those five to be the big winner!  It's fun to get everyone involved, except that I was going to have a fun picture of each of the boys holding their piece of paper out for the camera, but alas, one certain young boy wouldn't participate.  Sigh.  We won't mention any names, but I decided to just post THIS revealing the winner.

CONGRATULATIONS, Pamela at Cookies With Boys!  Not that it matters, but Sam picked your name.  Pamela has a great blog and as soon as I found it a year ago or so, I quickly gained that "never met you, but think you're great" feeling for her.  Check out her great blog and look at her yummy food and cute boys!  I love giving away stuff and also wanted to take a moment to thank ya'll for visiting my blog.  I don't always get to visit as many as I'd like--I want to see them ALL!!  But I love having you come by here and love the comments you leave.  So, thanks!

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Now, on to some amazing energy bars and a recipe---

These Energy Bars are delicious!  I love snacks like this.  Healthy and full of flavor and goodness.  I found these bars on Jennie's blog, Losing Myself & Loving It.  I recently posted some other homemade granola bars that are also SO good.  I am so excited to have found these recipes and will be making both of these time and time again and can't wait to "play" with the ingredients and make all different flavors!  Go see Jennie's post about these bars and read her blog.  She has recently started blogging again after some time off and posts some pretty great stuff, not to mention, her posts are fun to read!

 

High Octane Energy Bars, adapted by me from Jennie at Losing Myself & Loving It

1 cup old-fashioned oats

1 cup crunchy grain cereal, crushed (I used 3/4 cup Multi-Grain Cheerios & 1/4 cup Wheaties, as that is what I had)  Any healthy grain cereal would work.

1/2 cup slivered almonds (I chopped them a bit)

3/4 cup dried cranberries (use a different variety of dried fruits, Jennie's recipe has 2  1/2 cups of fruit in it!)

1/2 cup wheat germ (Jennie used wheat bran)

1/2 cup protein powder (I used soy)

1 tablespoon vegetable oil (or butter)

1/2 cup honey (see * below) 

1/4 cup agave nectar  (*you can use 3/4 cup of maple syrup or brown rice syrup, I want to try it with all agave next!)

1/2 cup natural peanut butter (I used Naturally More)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (I omitted this)

Toast the oats, crushed cereal and almonds in a 350 degree oven for 10 minutes, stirring halfway through.

Place these ingredients in a large mixing bowl.  Add the wheat germ and protein powder.  Mix together.

In a saucepan over medium heat, combine the oil, honey (syrup, agave, etc.) and stir until bubbly.  Stir in the peanut butter (and cinnamon) until combined.  Mix constantly.  Remove from heat and add vanilla extract.  Pour over dry ingredients, and stir together.  Stir in dried fruit and combine.  Press mixture into a 9 inch pan lined with foil and sprayed lightly with cookie spray.  (Jennie's recipe uses a 9x13 inch pan, which I couldn't spread the mixture over without it being really thin, so I just spread it to a thickness I liked and measured it--it was 9 inches!  Maybe it's because I didn't use as much dried fruit in mine.)  Pat the mixture evenly using wax paper so it doesn't stick to your hands. 

Refrigerate for a good four hours.  Remove from pan using foil edges and cut into bars on a cutting board.  (I cut the 9 inch pan of bars into 20 bars.)

Be careful not to eat too many all at once.  I might have been having issues with that.  They're really good!  Thanks, Jennie.

TWD--Banana Cream Pie---AND a GIVEAWAY!

Banana Cream Pie--yum!  I'm all about all things bananas.  I wasn't too sure about liking this custard/pastry cream and really wasn't wanting to make something with six egg yolks.  I also thought I'd just skip this week, with our plans to go out of town for Kevin's Grandma's funeral, but that didn't work out (see my last post).  So, not being able to get bananas out of my thoughts (hehe, jk) I decided to make the pie.  I planned to only make half the custard and make a pie that wasn't so thick.  I've used Dorie's pie crust recipe before and whipped it up for this pie. 

Dorie suggested that if you use frozen butter you can skip the chilling, so I did that.   The dough turned out beautiful and rolled out great.  I did the whole foil with beans as weights and baked it off.  Well, my crust shrunk.  I HATE it when that happens.

Not a pretty sight.  Sigh.

I went about my many other things of the day.  Chilled and rolled out the scraps of dough that were leftover and decided to see how it would bake up.  While the dough originally came nicely to the edges of the dish, it also shrunk.

Oh well, you can't win them all.  I decided to forge on with the custard. 

Set the half recipe of milk (lightened up the pie by using 2% milk!) to come to a boil, mixed up the egg yolks, brown sugar (oh, see, now I just realized I didn't press the brown sugar through a sieve, hmm), cornstarch and salt in another pot and tried whisking it together.  It was a big clump of sandy goo.  I was worried.  (I also left out the cinnamon and nutmeg--but I did that on purpose.  I just didn't want the cinnamon taste in my banana cream pie.  I may try it someday.)  Anyway, I kept whisking that clump and hoping and added the little bit of hot milk to temper the eggs.  It finally began thinning out and into the pan and off my whisk.  Whew.  I had a little more hope.  Added more milk and kept on whisking.  Once all the milk was added, I don't think it was even a minute until all the sudden that milky mixture turned right into a lovely thick custard.  It was so simple.  I was happy.

Chilled the custard as I went about more things of the day.  As Dorie suggested, I also assembled the "pie" not long before serving it. 

I love that this was layered with custard then bananas, more custard, MORE bananas and a little more custard.  You can't make something too banana-y, banana-ish, whatever--for me! ; )  I was beginning to wish I'd made a full pie, this was lookin' good!

Whipped up some REAL cream (although I still admit to liking Cool Whip better), but aren't you proud I did the real thing (but left the sour cream out)?  Then I piped it on with a pastry bag.

  

We had company over for dessert tonight.  Besides the banana cream pie, I'd made a few other things.  The pie was well liked by everyone who had some.  I liked it!  Is there a way to make fat free eggs?  Can you make fat free custard?  I'm sure some have done it.  I'm glad there is none of this left.  I would just keep eating it, telling myself it was lower in fat because I didn't use whole milk. 

GREAT pick this week, chosen by Amy of Sing For Your Supper, you can get this recipe on her blog.  Lovin' this book by Dorie Greenspan, Baking From My Home to Yours.   Go get ya a copy!  Check out all the other Banana Cream Pies out there in TWD land.

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It's giveaway time!  Why?  Because I feel like it.  Some may recall that a few months ago I had a giveaway for the Chop Wizard and a bunch of chocolate.  An old friend of mine from high school won the giveaway.  I had asked everyone to comment about what their favorite kind of chocolate is.  Shari forgot to answer in her comment, so I asked her in an email.  Well, turned out she doesn't like dark chocolate.  That's what MOST of my chocolate giveaway was.  I didn't want to send her something she doesn't like, so I got her a bunch of other yummy milk chocolate things. 

THEREFORE, I still have more chocolate I'd like to giveaway. 

You think that's all?  Well, I found THESE at the local Michael's Craft Store and loved them. 

Brownie Silicone Molds from Wilton.  There were actually all kinds of things, including a book full of recipes and ideas for cool, cute, yummy brownies.  I didn't get the book, but I got one lucky winner one of these molds and some sticks.  (Okay, I got me one, too.  The one I got makes square brownies.)

 

Go to your craft store or look on the Wilton site and see all the things they have for these!

Well, just because I know so many can't find these little gems in their area, I'm throwing in a few bags of these, too.

Leave me any old comment you wish on this post by Friday, April 10, 2009, midnight, CST and I'll do a random drawing  with my boys to see who the winner is.  (Sorry, this one is limited to those in the U.S. only.)  Tell your friends, this is a good one! ;)  Good Luck!

Hello--Not From Utah! Warning--Very Long Post, Don't Miss the Awesome Cookies and Cream Rice Crispy Treats at the End!

Well, here we are back in Kansas.  We weren't supposed to be in Kansas right now.  We were supposed to be in Utah.  Kevin's grandma died last week.  She was 101!  (HUGE side track from my story so I can write about Grandma.) 

Here's Great Grandma (Relia Cooley Smith) about 10 ears ago, when she was 90!  Scott and I (that's Scottie and me in the picture with Grandma, Scott was SO little!--Okay, really he was a BIG baby, but I mean, I can't believe Scott is almost 11 now!  I really wanted to crop myself out of this picture, but decided not to.  Holy cow, I look young!)  Anyway, Scott and I used to go see Grandma every day and make her lunch and get her meds and hang out with her.  It was fun to be there with her as she still lived on her own then and needed a little help remembering a few things, like eating and taking medication!  She LOVED Scottie and Scott actually talks about remembering a little bobble-head turtle she had at her house.  He wasn't even two, probably age 1-2 while we were going over every day.  Cool that he would remember something like that.  Even "back then" no one would have ever guessed that Great Grandma would live to be 101!

 

Grandma was so funny.  She wanted me to make her a bacon sandwich EVERY DAY.  Heavy on the "strong" cheese, she would say (extra sharp cheddar).  I would present her with a nice big sandwich, lettuce, tomato, the works, with a little something on the side.  She would "complain" that there was no way she could eat it all and then proceed to eat every last crumb of it.  She gained a few pounds back then, her doctor said "So what, she's 90 years old, let her eat whatever she wants."  For a time while I was visiting her, she was receiving Meals On Wheels.  She would open the lunch, usually complain about the food, freak out that she certainly couldn't eat all that gross food, and then eat every last bit of it.  So funny!  Kevin, Scott and I would also go visit Grandma every night during that time (Kev's parents were away as mission presidents (for our church) then and his dad used to go over every day and check on "Mother" and be with her.  While they were gone, Kevin and I kind of took over that role for a while.  We loved being with Grandma every day.  She loved singing and having people sing to her.  I am not a great singer, but Kevin brought over his friend, Alberto a time or two and the two of them would sing a duet together for Grandma.  

 

Here's Grammy in 2005 at a Smith Family Reunion.

Also in the video is Kevin's dad, Jay, and one of Kevin's  sisters, Relia (named after Grandma Relia.)

Here's Grandma singing at the Smith Family Reunion 2005.  She was singing clear up until she left us.  And she really loved hearing others sing.  The last time I saw her, we were visiting in Utah two summer's ago and took the boys to see her.  She was in a care home then.  She wasn't fully awake that day, but Kevin's dad was there with us and every time he'd say, "Mom, sing something with us for Kevin, Katrina and the boys."  We'd start singing, "She'll be coming 'round the mountain"...without fail, Grandma would sing and add in real loudly, "When she comes" at just the right times.  Never missed a beat.  We sang lots of songs with her that day.  I hope the boys will remember her.   Oh, Gram, until we meet again!  I LOVE her!

You can read more about Grandma's passing on Kevin's sister's blog.  Such touching stories of our wonderful Grammy and how Kevin's dad got to say goodbye while they are on a mission in Hong Kong.  Check it out when you get a second at Nutrition Momma's blog post about Grandma.

We decided after much deliberation to all go to Utah as a family to be there for her funeral and to be with family.  Apparently it wasn't to be.  You see, on Friday we started our drive "out west".  We planned ahead to have the boys out of school Friday, and next week (Monday is no school anyway), then Tuesday and Wednesday.  Kevin worked out having someone teach his class on Tuesday and I did A LOT of laundry, house cleaning and packing to get us all out the door EARLY Friday morning.  We were on the road by about 7 a.m.!  That's really good for me.  We always drive for a day and stay in Denver, then drive on to Utah the next day--8-9 hours in the car is a long drive for us with the boys.  Sam especially does NOT like being in his car seat that long.  I also especially don't like being in MY car seat that long.

We knew Denver was going to have a snow storm and we were praying all would work out.  When we got to Denver about 4 p.m., we went to the Aquarium as something fun to do.  It was fun and is now the ONLY highlight of our trip.  In fact, we'll now be joking for years that we took quite a long, expensive trip to an aquarium!

Here's some pictures of us at the aquarium.

Scott

Parker.  Love his hands!

 

Kevin

Katrina

Man, there are some strange creatures under the sea!

Kevin loved some of this stuff, as he recently started his own salt water fish tanks.

We found Nemo!

Stingrays!  Pretty cool, up close and personal.  Parker was the only one who was not afraid to touch them.

Taylor and Parker got a little face painting.

But the BEST part of the whole thing, the thing we all agreed was the coolest was a 4D movie with SpongeBob Squarepants that was showing at the Aquarium.  Besides 3D glasses, you sit in a chair that moves like you're moving along with the video, swooshing down into the depths of the sea, etc.  It was fun and rockin' and Scott, Parker, Taylor and I loved it.  (It was only about a 10 minute video.) 

The passes we paid for allowed everyone to go to the movie twice.  So I went first while Kevin stayed with Sam--the movie would have scared the pants off him!  Then the boys were more than excited to see it again with Kevin.  

Go ahead, laugh at my boys and their unkempt hair, raggedy clothes, etc.  We'd just driven 9 hours and went straight to the aquarium.  That is why you won't see any pictures of me!

After the aquarium, we drove a good 40 minutes to Loveland where our hotel was.  Kevin wanted us to be just that much closer to Utah on our next day's drive.  In the SpongeBob pictures, it was just starting to rain.  The DARK clouds were ominous.  We knew in making this trip that Colorado was supposed to get snow.  It was coming!  It was actually supposed to snow that night anywhere from 4-10 inches in the Denver metro. 

We made it to the hotel after grabbing some Subway sandwiches.  Oh, the hotel!  Great room, two queen sized beds.  The biggest problem--one word--SAM!  He  was in to EVERYTHING.  There were two phones in the room--he would NOT leave them alone.  The lamps, the refrigerator--that's right, this room had a fridge, the ironing board in the closet, the dresser drawers, the tv and remote, hmm, let's see, what else?  I'm sure there's more, but Sam would not leave anything alone.  I understand the exploration of a 2 year old and dadgumit, he is cute--but we just about when nuts.  At one point of Sam's frustration after having been told to stop doing something, he grabbed Taylor's GameBoy and ran to the bathroom as fast as he could and threw it in the toilet!  I got it out of there fast, and after drying out, it is working okay.  With no nap (okay, a short one in the car), Sam just needed to go to bed!  Normally, when we go on trips, we take the playpen for him to sleep in, but WHERE IS IT?  We could not and cannot find it--anywhere!  It's gone.  We last used it in May of last year--when we went to Nauvoo, IL with Cindy and family.  Did we leave it at that house we rented?  Dunno.  Anyway, Sam slept on the floor next to our bed at the hotel. 

There it was, only 9 p.m., but we WERE tired and REALLY tired of dealing with Sam in the hotel room, so we made everyone go to bed, including us.  Lights out, night night.  It. was. a. very. long. night!

We also kept checking on the snow situation.  But by morning, it had not even snowed an inch.  We got up a little after 6 a.m.  We decided to hurry and get ready and get going to make the trek to Utah.  Kevin checked all the weather and road conditions on I-70 through Wyoming and I-80 through the Colorado mountains and it did not look good!  I-70 was closed!  I-80 had gotten up to 20 inches of snow that night!  And it was beginning to really snow in the metro. 

Kevin does not like driving in rain let alone SNOW.  We really didn't know what to do.  We thought about just staying in Denver an extra day and trying to drive on to Utah today, but we decided and just felt right about turning around and going home.  Back to Kansas.  Sigh.  I was/am deeply bummed that we could not make it for Grandma's funeral!  So is Kevin. 

We got back on I-80 and headed east back towards Kansas.  It was snowing and VERY windy.  It seemed to take forever just to get out of the Denver area.  We were driving 30 mph for quite a while.  We also were slowed down by and saw three nasty accidents within about 5 miles near Aurora.   As he was driving, Kevin said it felt like he was literally being pushed by the wind on the icy road.  I swear we drove about two hours at a very slow pace.  Sam, once again, was NOT happy to be strapped in the car.  I thought I was going to die from the pain of constantly turning around to deal with the boys.  My neck and back were killing me. 

We drove on.  It was windy the whole way home and snowing off and on even through a good part of Kansas.  Finally about 2 hours from home, it was clear and sunny--but still a little windy.  The day was SOOO long.  I think we left Denver (8-9 hours normally) around 8:30-9:00 and got home at 9:30 p.m.  Thank you Kev for getting us all home safe and sound.  I often would rather just "face the storm" and in this case, we still wouldn't have made it to Utah and could have been seriously hurt.  I know we made the right decision.  When we got home last night, Kevin checked the road reports and also this morning.  I-70 through Wyoming was/is still closed.  He read all kinds of reports about accidents and pile ups on I-80 in the mountains.  Who knows what could have happened to us.  We know that we were truly blessed and said many prayers along the way and are very grateful to Heavenly Father for blessing us.

Enough said!  We'll miss ya'll Smith family!

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I know, I could and probably should post this recipe on a new post instead of at the end of this very long one, but this is just the way I like doing it and it's my blog, so ppppbbbtttt! ;)  jk

You have got to make these Rice Crispy Treats!  I found these on yet another yummy blog, Cast Sugar, a few months ago and have had them in the back of my mind since.  I whipped them up today--love Rice Crispy Treats, they are so simple and tasty!

These treats have chopped up Oreo cookies in them.

    

Looks great, but that's not all.  After the treats set up, you cut them into squares and dip them into melted chocolate and add more Oreo on top.  Hello?  Heaven!

   

The recipe on Cast Sugar is with white chocolate on top.  I actually like that, but Kevin doesn't care for white chocolate, so I did half with white and half with a semi sweet chocolate. 

These are good.  Very good!

Want the recipe?  You can get one version on the link to Cast Sugar above and I did it quite similar, but here's the recipe as I  made it.

Cookies and Cream Rice Crispy Treats

3 oz. (about 1/2 cup) semi sweet or dark chocolate (I used Hershey's Special Dark chips)

4 tablespoons unsalted butter

10 oz. marshmallows

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

6 cups crisp rice cereal (I used Rice Krispies)

6 ounces mini Oreo cookies, cut in half (you could use 15-20 regular sized ones chopped)

4 ounces white chocolate, chopped

4 ounces semi sweet chocolate, chopped

2-3 ounces more mini Oreo cookies, crushed and crumbled

Melt the 3 oz. of chocolate in a microwave safe dish in 20-30 second intervals.  Stir until smooth.  Set aside.  Line a 9x13 inch baking pan with foil and spray lightly with cooking spray.  Set aside.

Melt the butter and marshmallows in a large pot over medium heat, stirring constantly until melted.   Remove from heat and stir in the melted chocolate and vanilla and stir to combine.  Gently stir in the cereal and chopped cookies and combine well.  Press into the baking pan using your hands.  (I always spray mine lightly with cooking spray, or use a spatula.)  Allow to cool completely.

Once cooled.  Remove from pan using the edges of the foil.  Remove foil and cut into squares.  Melt the white chocolate and semi sweet chocolate in separate microwave safe bowls.  Crush the cookies in a plastic bag (or use the bag the mini Oreos come in) with a blunt object, like a rolling pin.  

Dip (or spoon and spread)  each square into the chocolate.  Sprinkle with some crushed cookies.  Set aside to cool and set completely.  Eat them or store in an airtight container.

TWD--Coconut Butter Thins

This week's recipe from Dorie Greenspan's Baking From My Home to Yours awesome baking book was chosen by Jayne of Barefoot Kitchen Witch.  She chose Coconut Butter Thins, found of page 145 of the book.  A great little shortbread-like, buttery (hence the name), coconut cookie with a hint of lime.   Dorie suggested using macadamia nuts in the cookie, but I decided not to pay for them and used almonds instead.

The dough was to rest in the fridge in a gallon size plastic bag, after it was rolled  to a 9x10 1/2-inch rectangle, 1/4 inch thick.  Turned out this method worked pretty perfectly, although I still wonder if just rolling it out between wax paper would also work just fine.  I decided to make these cookies for a baby shower that I was bringing some goodies to that evening and as I worked on some things that afternoon, I quickly made the dough and didn't realize it was supposed to be refrigerated for a few hours.  I needed them made right then.  Sigh.  So much for reading all through the recipe before starting.  Well, I set the dough in its plastic bag on a baking sheet and threw it in the freezer.  Went about my many other tasks and about 30 minutes later, I got the dough out, let it rest (it was quite frozen) for a short time, removed it from the bag, measured my 1  1/2 inch squares, cut it and set the cookies on the sheet and baked them.  I only baked them for 16 minutes and not Dorie's suggested 18-20 minutes.  The only thing I'm not sure of is what the cookies are supposed to look like as I haven't yet seen anyone else's.  Mine are not real thin, but they also aren't too thick.   I do know that however they are SUPPOSED to look, these taste great and that's really all that matters.  Right.

I actually thought as good as they tasted that they weren't that pretty on a plate for a baby shower.  So I dressed them up a bit.

A little white chocolate drizzle and some pink sprinkles (it's a girl!) never hurt anything!

These are good.  But they are the kind of cookie you have to put away or you'll find yourself just nibbling on one too many here and there and not realizing you just finished off 6-12 of them.  No--I didn't do that!  Seriously, I didn't!   But my son, Scott, did after I did this with the leftover scraps the next day.

Cute flower cookie cutter with a Hershey's Kiss on top while they were still just slightly warm.  That's not just any Hershey's Kiss though.   Have you seen these?

Coconut Creme Hershey's Kisses.  They are good.  Scott loved them on the lime induced Coconut Butter Thins.  I'm not kidding, he ate a good 98% of these. 

Thanks for the yummy cookie this week, Jayne.  You can get the recipe on her blog.  Be sure to check out the other TWDers' cookies at the Tuesday's With Dorie blog.

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How cute is mah sleepin' bebe?

I go check on him at night before I go to bed.  A few nights ago he had his blanket wrapped up on his head.   It was too cute and I had to go grab the camera.  After the picture, I moved the blanket off his head.  Sam has been sick this week with a nasty cold and cough with fever.  Hope he's feeling better SOON!