Happy Friday to you!  Another week gone by and it is Friday the 13th.  Good luck for some bad luck for others.. lets hope for some good luck.  So let me start into a little story behind these cookies. A while back we attended a benefit dance/bake sale on  for a colleague of Mrs. Zesty and well of course I get somewhat excited when I hear bake sale.  We chatted about it and tried to come up with some fun ideas on what to bring to the “table”.

It turns out we came up with a few ideas:

• Double Chocolate Chunk Brownies
• Toffee Bit Chocolate Cookies
• Sweet & Salty Cookies

As you can guess from the title of the post I decided to share the Sweet & Salty morsels of goodness.  These fellas were delicious ( I had to taste test just to ensure quality).  Packed with pretzels, m&m, smarties and a few potato chips… I could eat these all day.   Super easy to make and check out my packaging idea(s) – Mrs. Zesty really thinks I am a bit over the top sometimes. Ha!  We sold each for for $40.  Totally joking… not even sure what the amount was but I had fun making them.

Ingredients

• 1 Cup unsalted butter
• 3/4 Cup Granulated white sugar
• 3/4 Cup Brown sugar
• 2 Eggs
• 1 Tsp.  Vanilla
• 2 1/3 Cups All-purpose flour
• 1 Tsp. Baking soda
• 3/4 Tsp. Salt
• 1 Cup chopped candy coated pieces
• 1 Cup crushed or jumbled savoury snacks such as pretzels and potato chips

Method

1. In a large bowl, beat butter, and both sugars until fluffy.
2. Beat in eggs, one at a time; beat in vanilla
3. Whisk together flour, baking soda, and salt; stir into butter mixture.
4. Stir in candy and crumbled snacks.
5. Drop balls onto parchment paper- lined baking sheets
6. Bake in oven at 350 degrees for about 10-12 minutes  rotating the pan halfway through.

1. Makes about 30 cookies
2. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip: Make these cookies ahead and store in an air tight container for up to 3 days.  Good luck having them last that long.

Alright, I hope you have a great start to the weekend and I really hope you give these cookies a try.  I think we can call these cookies…. “clean out your pantry with whatever goodies you have cookies”.  I will talk to you all on Monday.

Take care

zesty

Download my Free Recipe Book: Simply Zesty

Momma zesty has baked her fair share of blueberry muffins and all of them inspire this post.  I love blueberries and as you likely heard before anything like “bread” I adore.  Some years when I was smaller we would pick and freeze blueberries in the summer, then take them out of the freezer and jam as many blueberries as we could in each muffin.  For this batch, we bought some blueberries off a local organic farmer and went too work – minus my mom.

There is nothing better than a warm soft muffin from the oven with a pat of butter the top. YUM.  These are simple to make and pay close attention to the tip at the bottom.  I made many a “tough” muffin in my day until I realized the science behind flour.

Ingredients

• 2 1/2 Cups All Purpose Flour
• 2 Tbsp. Baking Powder
• 1 Tsp. Nutmeg
• 1/2 Tsp. Salt
• 4 Eggs
• 1 Cup Brown sugar
• 1 Cup Milk
• 1 Cup melted butter
• 1 Tbsp. Vanilla
• 2 Cups Blueberries, frozen or fresh
• 1/4 Cup White sugar

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400 F.  Light oil or butter the cups and top surface of a standard 12 – muffin pan
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, nutmeg and salt.  In a separate bowl add the eggs, brown sugar, milk, butter and vanilla.
3. Pour the wet into the dry mixture.  Stir together with a few quick strokes until a lump batter forms.
4. Spoon the mixture into the muffin cups and top with some white sugar.
5. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean after insertion.
6. Rest on a rack for a few minutes.  Serve with butter and your favorite liquid.
7. ENJOY!

Zesty Tip: Beating a batter until a form of smoothness develops strong gluten in the flour.  This will cause your muffins to be tough.  By just applying a few strokes and leaving the batter lumpy, this will allow the muffins to be tender.

Can you believe it is 2012? The time is flying but all we can do is embrace it.  If you are a regular reader of zesty, sit back and get ready for some interesting happenings for 2012 and if you are new to the zesty world.. welcome aboard.  No need to fasten your seat belt, we operate pretty slow and safe but hang in there and have fun.

I will be back on Wednesday with … well I don’t know yet.  Depends on what I cook in the next couple of days.

Take care

zesty

Download my Free Recipe Book: Simply Zesty

Hi ALl, I have a repost for today.  Just traveling back home from Philly this morning and I really didn’t have much time to prepare anything new and fun.  The conference was very busy but enjoyable, however looking to get back home to see the little turkies and Mrs. Zesty.  Enjoy the sugar cookies and I will see you on Monday.

Do you like cookies?  I love them and these may be the best darn sugar cookies you ever sunk your teeth, gums or dentures into.  Now I can not take full credit as it is my Mom’s recipe but when these sugar cookies are cooked right – these are definitely super star cookies.

These sugar cookies are not difficult to make and I love how chewy they are.  Have these along side a tall chilled glass of milk and you’ll never turn back!

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 Cups butter, softened
• 2 Cups white sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 Tsp. vanilla extract
• 5 Cups all-purpose flour
• 2 Tsp. baking powder
• 1 Tsp. salt

Method

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth.
3. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Stir in the flour, baking powder, and salt.
4. Cover, and chill dough for at least one hour.
5. Roll out dough on floured surface 1/4 to 1/2 inch thick.
6. Cut into shapes with any cookie cutter.
7. Place cookies 1 inch apart on ungreased cookie sheets.
8. Bake 6 to 8 minutes in preheated oven.
9. Cool completely.

Zesty Tip: When asked to preheat your oven in the recipe, ensure you follow those directions and do not start the baking process before the oven is preheated.

Things are looking up. I hope you have a great day and let me know what you think of these cookies.

Take care

zesty

Download my Free Recipe Book: Simply Zesty