Reese's Pieces Peanut Butter Cookies

BriBri was basically harassing me because I was a little late with my weekly bakes. What? Sometimes a girl gets really busy living her life so baking has to wait. I prefer to bake when I can enjoy it and not rush it.

Anyway, I finally had time Thursday night before catching the newest ep of Vampire Diaries on my DVR (OMG. So good as always!).

I have been in cookie mode lately, so please excuse me (in advance) if the blog is cookied out for a while. I might try to trick y'all by just posting out of order. You don't own me, it's my blog, I do what I want. (Cartman inspired).

Reese's Pieces Peanut Butter Cookies

1 c shortening                   

1 c brown sugar                 

1/2 c granulated sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs 

1/2 c peanut butter (add 1/4 more if you like loads of pb!) 
1 tsp. salt             

2 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda

12oz  Reese's Pieces 

1. Heat oven to 350*
2. In a large bowl mix shortening and both sugars together.
3. Mix in the vanilla & eggs...then the peanut butter.
4. in a separate bowl sift together the flower, salt, and baking soda
5. Slowly combine the dry ingredients into the batter.
6. With your mixer on low slowly pour in the bag of Reese's Pieces. ( I didn't use the whole bag, I added them in until I noticed they weren't mixing into the batter because I was on over load. So use your judgement here!)
7. Drop batter from a spoon/cookie scoop onto a baking sheet and pop it into the over for 10-12min.
8. Let cool and eat!

Oreo Crusted Mini Cherry Cheesecake

I'm not a big cheesecake fan. I usually will try a bite out of curiosity, but I'm rarely wanting to have another. This is even the case with my own cheesecakes. Trust that those are delicious, or so I'm told by people that like cheesecake. So me liking cheesecake is a personal problem and not one to be blamed on the cake itself.

UNTIL I made this. It's the simplest of simple twists on the mini cheese cakes that I usually make. Just swap out the vanilla wafer for an Oreo. bada-bing. bada-boom. A cheesecake that I actually wanted more than one bite of!

Oreo Crusted Mini Cherry Cheesecakes

2 eggs

3/4 c. Sugar

16 oz. cream cheese

2 tsp. vanilla

16 vanilla wafer cookies

1 can pie filling (I used cherry)

1 bag Oreos (I used double stuffed)

cupcake liners

1. Preheat oven to 375 and place liners in cupcake tin. Drop 1 Oreo into bottom of each.
2. Beat eggs with sugar.
3. Break cream cheese into pieces, add to eggs and sugar and beat until smooth (10 min) then mix in vanilla.
4. Fill liners 3/4 full with cream cheese mixtures and bake 10-12 minutes.
5. They will look pale and sink in the middle after cooking.
6. Top with Tbsp of pie filling and refrigerate.
7. EAT!

M&M Peanut Butter Cookies

I love m&m cookies and peanut butter cookies, so I decided they should get married.


So they did while Drake serenaded them in the background. And they had a very productive honeymoon because 10 min after they returned my oven birthed this:

So good. So good.

M & M Peanut Butter Cookies

1 c shortening                   

1 c brown sugar                 

1/2 c granulated sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2 eggs 

1/2 c peanut butter (add 1/4 more if you like loads of pb!) 
1 tsp. salt             

2 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp. baking soda

12oz  M&M's (Medium bag should do the trick)

1. Heat oven to 350*
2. In a large bowl mix shortening and both sugars together.
3. Mix in the vanilla & eggs...then the peanut butter.
4. in a separate bowl sift together the flower, salt, and baking soda
5. Slowly combine the dry ingredients into the batter.
6. With your mixer on low slowly pour in the bag of M&Ms
7. Drop batter from a spoon/cookie scoop onto a baking sheet and pop it into the over for 10-12min.
8. Let cool and eat!

Pancakes & Waffle Cakes

Honestly, I'm more of a waffle person. But last summer Jes made Pan-kits, and it got me back into pancakes...plus I don't have a waffle maker.

I had some time on my hands in between my morning run and late morning bodypump sesh and I was hungry! I was all out of Pan-kits, so I figured it was time to channel my inner wife skills and whip up some pancakes from scratch. And you know what? That shiz was super easy and the most delicious pancakes I have ever had!

Pancakes

• 1 1/3 c all-purpose flour
• 3 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tbs sugar
• 1 1/4 c milk
• 1 egg
• 2 tbs butter (melted)
• 2 tbs vanilla extract

1. In a large bowl mix all dry ingredients (you can sift it, but who has time for that?)
2. Slowly mix in everything else.
3. Heat skillet over medium. 
4. drop 1/4 cup of pancake batter, flip once it gets really bubbly, cook a while longer. eat!

Easy as that!

BUT if you do prefer something more waffley...then just add an extra egg and BOOM. Waffle Cakes!

Ok, it looks the same, but this is totes a Waffle Cake.

Hot Chocolate

Growing up I spent a lot of time at Grandma's house (as I'm sure you can tell because I think I write about it in almost every entry). One of the things that I loved to do was drink her hot chocolate! It's way better than a mix you buy at the store, and warms more than just your body, it warms your heart and soul. How is that even possible? Because it's made with love, duh.

I like to mix mine with milk and leave enough room at the top of my cup to overflow it with marshmallows!

So Delish! Even when you are out of mallows.

Hot Chocolate

* Powdered Milk - the side of the box will say how many quarts the powder mix makes. get enough for 12-16 quarts.

Serve: Heat mug of milk, add appx 1/4cup of mix, marshmallows (optional). enjoy!