Twix Bar Cookies

One of my favorite and least favorite things about the holidays is that my shows go on a little break. It's my least favorite thing for obvious reasons but at the same time, I also don't mind it because it that means I don't have as many shows to catch up on over the weekend. This leaves me with free time to bake if I want to. And after making the Milky Way cookie bars for Thanksgiving, I still had a lot of leftover Halloween candy so with only a couple shows to catch up on over Thanksgiving weekend, I decided to bake for my co-workers. There was no way I was going to get rid of my 3 Musketeers and M&Ms just yet so Twix was the only option. After looking at the Twix recipes I'd bookmarked, I decided on the cookies from Your Homebased Mom. The recipe is similar to your basic chocolate chip cookie recipe but also very different. Plus, they'd be easy to take into work.

Milky Way Magic Bars

I had a very interesting first Halloween in my new apartment. And by "interesting" I mean "quiet." Yes, it seems that the young kids in my complex trick-or-treat while it's still light out and I get home just as it starts getting dark. So the only person who came to my door was the pizza delivery guy (it was, after all, a Friday). Meaning I was stuck with 250 pieces of candy (yes, I overestimated by A LOT. Next year, I'm getting a smaller bag and leaving the bowl out before leaving for work with a note asking the kids to take 2 each).

After pulling out the Snickers minis for my dad, I started snacking on them and sticking them in my lunch bag. Still, I wanted to bake with the leftovers (this has helped tone down the snacking part of my solution) so I asked my mom which one she wanted me to use for my Thanksgiving dessert. She chose Milky Way. While I found a lot of recipes on a variety of sites, I finally settled on these gooey bars from Wine & Glue. They were quick and easy to make (which was good since I had to make them the night before and did so while watching NBC's The Making of Peter Pan Live! special) and very similar to the gooey Girl Scout cookies bars I've made before with Thin Mints and Tagalongs. Sounded like a win-win to me.

Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies

Over the last few years I've lost interest in using box mixes to make cakes and brownies. Sure they're good in a pinch but why not make something from scratch? That's why I try to save recipes and buy cookbooks that embellish the box mixes. And when I decided earlier this week that I wanted to make peanut butter brownies to "break in" my new KitchenAid stand mixer and bake for the first time in my new apartment, I ended up finding a recipe similar to what I wanted in Betty Crocker's Fix with a Mix Desserts cookbook. It's not exactly what I wanted but I couldn't find that. And as I've said before, I'm no good at creating recipes on my own.

My new toy. Isn't it purrty?

Triple Chocolate Chip Cookies

As I've said before, sometimes you just gotta bake for fun. And other times, you gotta bake because you semi-promise a co-worker at your new job that you love to bake and you'll bring in treats the following week. I was determined to follow-through too.

Despite the heat.

Yup, Seattle and it's surrounding cities (including my hometown of Kent, just south of Sea-town) has been experiencing somewhat of a heat wave over the last couple weeks. We're talking 80s and 90s temps, something we're not used to. And definitely not weather I've ever baked in. Still, I wanted to make sure I kept my semi-promise.

I also wanted to get the jar of dry cookie ingredients off my desk. At my last job, my manager had received the jar as a gift from a vendor who wanted to work with us. I went into her office to ask her something and commented on the jar. So she gave it to me. When I took a closer look at it, I realized it wasn't just a homemade gift; it was from a company called SistersGourmet, which specializes in these mixes-in-a-jar gifts (if you want to make your own, though, just pick a recipe, layer the dry ingredients in a clean jar, screw on the lid, decorate, and attach a copy of the recipe).

Cheesecake Brownie Bars

Easter dinner is usually the same every year: at my aunt and uncle's house with ham, potatoes, deviled eggs, rolls, Jell-O jiggler eggs, and green beans for dinner with frosted sugar cookies and chocolate bunny cakes for dessert. This year, Auntie Vicki wanted us to do something different than the bunny cakes. My mom was already going to do a two-toned pink cake that she found in a recent issue of Family Circle and she (or Auntie Vicki) suggested that I make the cheesecake brownie dessert that I made a few years ago for Memorial Day. A Google search found that the dessert was also in Family Circle (which I somewhat remembered from the first time). Unfortunately, the FC website wouldn't let me view the recipe so I just grabbed it from one of the food blogs that posted it (my mom later told me where to find the hardcopy that I had used 4 years ago. I have yet to locate it).

Tagalong Cake Bars

Sometimes you gotta bake something that you're not gonna eat. Like yesterday: I had the random urge to bake and decided to use the for-baking Tagalongs I'd bought last year. Despite the fact that I gave up chocolate for Lent and wouldn't be able to have whatever I made until Easter. Still, I've baked with chocolate during previous Lents and had a much harder time not licking the spoon than I did this time. So I did a little searching and came across the Tagalong version of the Thin Mint Gooey Cake Bars I had made last year for Kevin's birthday. Apparently the food bloggers who posted the recipes are friends who had gotten together and made some delicious magic. (I do at times wish I had a friend like this.)

Savannah Smiles Zesty Lemon Streusel Bars

Last year during Girl Scout cookie season I bought two of my favorite flavors: one for eating and the other for baking with. I used the for-baking Thin Mints last year but I've been a bit stumped about what to bake with the Savannah Smiles and Tagalongs, especially the Savannah Smiles since they just came out last year. I guess I should've waited a year since last weekend I decided to bake with them and came across this recipe on the Little Brownie Bakers website for Savannah Smiles Zesty Lemon Streusel Bars (according to their About Us, they are an authorized Girl Scout cookie baking company).