I know, it’s been like an eternity since I posted anything on here. Do me a favor, and don’t look back at the last post to see just how long it’s been. Life got crazy busy, with plenty of good things, and sadly, this is one of the things that suffered.

What better reason to re-enter the blog world than with a pumpkin recipe in October? I came across a pumpkin chocolate chip cookie recipe while browsing the endless pumpkin recipes on Pinterest awhile back. It claimed to be a soft but chewier cookie than most of the cake-like pumpkin cookies out there. I pinned it right away and knew it would be at the top of my fall baking to-do list.

I followed the original recipe, that you can find on Tessa’s blog, Handle the Heat, right here. I only made one little tweak along the way. I replaced all the ground cinnamon, ginger, and clove spices with doTERRA essential oils. I made a double batch of the recipe, using 1 drop of Clove Bud, 2 drops of Ginger, and 4 drops of Cinnamon Bark.

Our family jumped into the world of essential oils a little over a year ago, as a way to cut back on some of the synthetic products we were using in our house, and they’ve quickly found their way into every nook and cranny of our lives, even what we eat. I love that these oils are so safe that we can ingest them. I can’t say the same about all brands of essential oils. Do your research first!

I highly recommend that you make these cookies and even better if you can make them with these oils! If you want to know anymore about other uses for essential oils, I’d love to share, but didn’t want to bore everyone here for a cookie recipe with that. You can find me on Instagram at @oilsallthetime or on Facebook at Oils All The Time to learn more about them or get in touch with me about how to order some of your own oils to use in your home.

love and butter,
amy

One of my first Christmas seasons as part of the Gunther family, I was introduced to a very sweet tradition. They have a long time neighbor, Barbara, that bakes up a bunch of DELICIOUS gingerbread men. They are adorable, and simple, and everyone gets one. Got that? ONE cookie, each year. I’m pretty sure the first year Tim somewhat reluctantly (and I don’t blame him at all) shared his cookie with me. Now, I usually get my own and let me tell you what, I’ve looked forward to that cookie every year since the first.

A couple of years ago, dear Barbara shared her cookie recipe with us, and now I’m sharing my version with you. I have to say, Barbara makes her cookies in little gingerbread men shapes, with multiple colors of icing, lots of details, and they’re just adorable. Something you’ll come to learn about me, is that, while I do love for the food I make to look good, I don’t usually have the patience and attention to detail required to really decorate sweets well. So, these are my simpler version, with a much more forgiving decor. I actually made some snowmen, along with the trees and candy canes, but I had such trouble decorating them, that they will not be making an internet debut anytime soon. Now for the cookies…

Gingerbread Cookies

2 3/4 cups Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
3 teaspoons Baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon Kosher Salt
1 teaspoon Ground Ginger
1 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon Ground Cloves
1 Egg
2/3 cup Molasses
2.5 oz Brown Sugar (about 1/3 cup, packed)
1/2 cup (1 stick) Melted Butter (I always use salted)

1. Whisk together the flour, baking powder, salt, ginger, cinnamon, & cloves, in a medium bowl. Set aside.

2. In the bowl of a stand mixer or in a large bowl, combine Molasses, Brown Sugar, and Melted Butter. Mix on medium for about 30 seconds to a minute. You just want it to be thoroughly combined.

3. Add the egg and mix just until thoroughly combined.

4. Add the dry ingredients, about 1/3 at a time, mixing between additions.

5. Cover the dough, and stick in the fridge to cool for about an hour.

6. While the dough is chilling, line your cookie sheets with parchment paper, and preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.

7. Roll out the dough, to about 1/3 of an inch thick, depending on how thick you like your cookies. You can roll them out using a little flour to keep it from sticking everywhere, but I like to roll it out between 2 sheets of parchment paper. Then I don’t have to worry about adding too much extra flour to the cookies.

8. Cut with cookie cutters, and transfer to parchment lined cookie sheets.

9. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until set. These are one of those cookies that’s a little trickier to know when it’s done. They don’t brown until they’re over-baked. You can lightly touch the top of the cookie, and make sure it’s solid, and not doughy any longer.

10. Allow to cool completely, then decorate to your heart’s desire. Here’s the frosting recipe I used, except I only used vanilla extract (1 teaspoon), instead of the almond extract. I put my frosting into a disposable piping bag like these ones, with a tip in the bottom like this one.

11. Let the cookies sit for several hours before attempting to stack them. This is a softer frosting, and while it does setup some, it’s never super hard. I prefer the taste of a buttercream like this on my cookies, but it doesn’t make for the easiest cookies to stack or send in the mail. I think it’s worth it.

How about making some yummy gingerbread cookies for a Christmas party this year? You’ll be the hit of the party.

love and butter,
amy

A little over a month ago, I came across the website for a food blogger cookie swap and I thought to myself, bake a few dozen cookies to send to other food bloggers and get a few dozen cookies in the mail from other food bloggers? Yes, yes I think I can get on board with that. So, I signed up, got a list of bloggers to send cookies to, and started on my mission of a good cookie to mail. I wanted something Christmasy, something yummy, and something that would ship well. I didn’t want cookies showing up broken into pieces.

My first plan was to make some gingerbread cookies, iced with buttercream frosting. I actually made them (and will blog about them soon, promise!) and they were delicious. The only problem? The icing didn’t set up as much as I wanted it to, for shipping across the country. I didn’t want to use a royal icing, because I prefer the flavor of a buttercream. So, I had to come up with another cookie.

I thought back to a cookie I had made several months ago, these cardamom cookies. They were yummy, but I wanted to tweak them a little bit. I made them with whole wheat pastry flour, bumped up the cardamom (which I made sure was freshly ground), and skipped the lemon peel & sprinkling of sugar. When I made the first test batch, they were yummy, but the dough was so sticky and hard to roll out and get onto the trays. That was even after chilling the dough for a long time.

Second time around, instead of rolling out the dough, I scooped it with my favorite cookie scoop and flattened it with the bottom of a mason jar. Much less mess, which is always good, and the cookies tasted just as good. They have a good, strong cardamom flavor, which I love. You could always cut back on the cardamom if it isn’t your favorite.

Cardamom Cookies

2 cups Whole Wheat Pastry Flour
1 cup Granulated Sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons Freshly Ground Cardamom (Freshly ground makes a HUGE difference. If you can’t make it happen, I would at least double the amount you use.)
1/4 teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/2 cup Ground Almonds (I used almond meal)
1 cup (2 sticks) of Butter (I always use salted)
2 Eggs (room temperature)
4 teaspoons Milk (I used whole milk)

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper.

2. If you’re using whole cardamom, grind it up in a coffee or spice grinder. I use my magic bullet.

3. Whisk together flour, sugar, cardamom, cinnamon, and ground almonds.

4. Cut butter into small cubes, add to the dry ingredients, and cut in with a pastry cutter or with your fingers. I usually choose to use my fingers and work the butter in that way. Just squish it between your fingers until it’s almost completely incorporated into the dry ingredients. It’s a little messy, but that’s half the fun of baking, isn’t it? I guess that’s only true if someone else is doing the clean up.

5. Whisk together the eggs & milk, until they’re completely combined.

6. Add the milk & eggs to the rest of the cookie dough, and mix until thoroughly combined.

7. Scoop the cookie dough out onto your prepared cookie sheets.

8. Flatten with a small mason jar.

9. Bake for 6-8 minutes, until just barely golden along the edges.

I don’t know about you, but I love giving away cookies at Christmas time. Maybe it won’t be these cookies, but bake something up to give away this year. If you’re looking for a good gingerbread cookie recipe, come back soon. I’ll be posting my favorite in the next week!

love and butter,
amy

.

It’s been too long since I’ve had a chance to bake something up in my kitchen and share it with all of you. Last week this recipe came through my blog reader, and it immediately went to the top of my “must make” list. All I needed was a reason, make that a chance (because who needs a reason for cookies?) to try them out.

Earlier this week, I got just that chance when a few friends were getting together for a little class about essential oils (more about that another time). My dear friend, Laura, offered to host us at her house, and since she doesn’t eat anything with gluten, I knew these were the PERFECT cookies to bring along.

Before we get to the recipe, a couple notes…

Oat flour is the backbone of this cookie recipe. You can certainly purchase oat flour, but I keep rolled oats on hand, for making granola and overnight oats. So, I just threw some oats into my Vitamix (best blender ever, by the way) and, in less than a minute, I had oat flour. You could also use a food processor to make oat flour, although you might not be able to get it quite as fine as if you were using a high speed blender.

Bridget calls for a teaspoon of potato flour to add to the tenderness of the cookies. After discovering that a bag of potato flour was $6 at my local market, and doing a little bit of internet research, I decided that she might have meant potato starch and that cornstarch was a similar ingredient. So, I went with cornstarch.

There are several yummy spices in this recipe. One is allspice, which I happened to be out of. So, these cookies didn’t get any allspice. Adding that to my grocery list now to make sure I’m restocked for the next fall baking that’s guaranteed to happen soon. The other spice I want to mention is the freshly grated nutmeg. If you’ve ever grated nutmeg for a dish, you’ll know what a difference it makes. It’s so much more fragrant, and so easy to do. All you need is a grater and some whole nutmeg. The other great thing is that this allows you to grate just what you need for the recipe you’re making, and the whole nutmeg stores and lasts much longer than grated nutmeg.

The original recipe calls for 2 sticks of salted butter. If you know anything about me, you know I’m not afraid of butter. That being said, I was curious to see if I could sub out some of the butter for something a little lighter. Really, I just wanted to be able to eat more cookies without feeling quite as guilty about it. I did a little more internet research and decided to try greek yogurt, because I had a bunch in my fridge already. I’m sure the original recipe with the full amount of butter is even more decadent, but these did NOT taste like they were missing anything.

Finally, I wanted to use some brown sugar in addition to the white sugar, just to add a little more depth. So that’s what I did.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

adapted from this recipe
makes approx 40 cookies

2 cups Oat Flour
1 teaspoon Corn Starch
1 & 1/2 teaspoons Cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon Ground Ginger
1/2 teaspoon Freshly Grated Nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon Ground Cloves
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
3/4 teaspoon Kosher Salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) Salted Butter at room temperature
4.75 oz Brown Sugar
4 oz Granulated White Sugar
1 Egg at room temperature
2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
1 cup Canned Pumpkin (not pumpkin pie filling)
2/3 cup Semisweet Chocolate Chips

1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Prep your cookie sheets with parchment paper.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, corn starch, spices, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

3. In a large bowl, or the bowl of your stand mixer, cream together the butter, greek yogurt, and both sugars. Because of the greek yogurt, it doesn’t get super fluffy, but make sure to let it mix together well.

4. Turn off the mixer, add the egg & vanilla extract, and beat to combine.

5. Turn off the mixer, add the pumpkin, and beat to combine. I noticed here that the texture definitely didn’t look like normal cookie dough. It almost looked a little curdled? I hate to even use that word, and I was nervous, trust me. I’m blaming it on the greek yogurt, but don’t worry, it gets better.

6. Turn the mixer off, add the flour mixture, and mix on low until thoroughly combined.

7. Turn the mixer off, add in chocolate chips, and incorporate with a spatula.

See, much better?

8. For evenly sized cookies, use a scoop to measure dough onto your parchment-lined cookie sheets. My scoop made about 40 cookies, and I put 12 on each tray to give them enough space to spread a little when they baked.

9. Bake for 8-12 minutes. Because of the color of these cookies, it can be a little bit difficult to know if they’re done. You can tap the top of one to make sure its not super squishy still.

10. Allow to cool for a few minutes on the cookie sheet. Then move to a cooling rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container for a few days, if they last that long!

I tell you what, these cookies do NOT taste like they’re gluten free and they do NOT taste like they’re missing any butter. They’re soft, almost a little cakey, and they really do melt in your mouth. I will definitely be making these again before fall is over. I love having a super yummy gluten free cookie in my arsenal too. They aren’t always easy to come by. If you love all things pumpkin like I do, I hope you’ll give these cookies a try.

love and butter,
amy

Some people know all the right things to say. That’s not me.

Some people are great at making things happen. That’s not really me, either.

When times are tough and things are sad, all I know is food. I feed people. I might not even have the opportunity to cook at home, but I’m always thinking about making sure people have something to eat. I don’t know about you, but when I’ve had a long day, making a fresh batch of chocolate chip cookies is a great way for me to unwind. Is it a good idea to eat your feelings? No, probably not, but that doesn’t change the fact that food is comforting.

This past week, my grandpa passed away. He had been fighting a hard battle for the past several months. On Tuesday night they brought him home to keep him comfortable, and he passed away very early on Friday morning. We spent most of the week at my grandparents’ house, talking to grandpa, sharing memories about grandpa, and just being together. It was one of those times when it just felt better to be with family, even if we couldn’t do anything to help.

On Thursday morning, Liam and I made cookies to take over to share with everyone. What I really wanted was chocolate chip cookies, but the weather hasn’t been oven friendly, especially in our no a/c house. We ended up making a batch of no-bake chocolate, peanut butter, oat cookies. I know it’s not a new recipe, or a fancy recipe, but it’s actually a recipe that I learned from my grandma. It seemed like a good fit.

Chocolate Peanut Butter No-Bake Cookies

2 cups Granulated Sugar
1/2 cup Butter (I always use salted)
3 tbspn Cocoa Powder (I have typically used the natural kind, but had dutch process in my pantry and tried that. It made a darker, richer cookie)
1/2 cup Milk (I used whole)
1/2 cup Peanut Butter (I’ve made them with natural, peanut-only kind & the kind with added oils, sugars, etc)
3 cups Rolled Oats
1 tbspn Vanilla Extract

• Before starting these cookies, be sure to measure all of your ingredients out and line a couple of cookie sheets with waxed paper. There are a couple of time sensitive steps and you’ll want to be prepared.
• In a medium saucepan, combine sugar, butter, cocoa powder, and milk.

• Over medium heat, bring to a boil and allow to boil for 1 minute. If you allow them to over cook, they will set up too dry and crumbly later.

• As soon as the minute is up, remove from heat and allow to cool for 1 minute.
• Add the peanut butter, rolled oats, and vanilla to the pan, and mix to combine.

• Scoop the mixture out onto your waxed paper lined cookie sheets. You can use a teaspoon, a tablespoon, a cookie scoop, or whatever size cookies you want to make.

• Allow the cookies to cool and setup for at least an hour.
• Store in an airtight container for a few days.

A couple of variations that you could make on this recipe…other kinds of nut butters (maybe even nutella), adding a couple of tablespoons of instant coffee, adding chopped nuts, etc.

So, next time someone is having a rough day (even if it’s you), maybe you can make them some of these cookies. Or if you don’t have time to make them cookies, you can always buy them ice cream. On Friday, we took some pistachio ice cream to great grandma, because it’s her favorite.

love and butter,
amy

Has anyone introduced you to Shauna Niequist? If not, I am THRILLED to be able to do so. I was first introduced to Shauna at a creative arts conference a handful of years back. It was right around the time that she had come out with her first book, Cold Tangerines, which she talked about at the conference. I was hooked right away. I bought the book while we were there and had probably finished it by the time we got home. Shauna has a way of writing that speaks right to me. She’s honest, vulnerable, and willing to admit to spending entire days in yoga pants and a comfy t-shirt. I can’t really relate to that last part though. I’m always dressed to the nines, especially when I’m at home all day, with the boys. Shauna also loves cooking and food and feeding people. And I am right there with her. One of my most favorite ways to spend a day is tinkering in the kitchen all day, in preparation of having friends or family over for a meal. I dream of having a house big enough for a dining table that can fit 20. For now, our 700 sq ft back house doesn’t even come close, but we’ve dragged our expandable Ikea table into the backyard, added a card table, and managed to squeeze quite a few people around it.

Since Cold Tangerines, Shauna has written Bittersweet and most recently Bread & Wine. I love Bittersweet and I have loved browsing Bread & Wine, but I hate to admit, I’ve had trouble finding the time to read it from cover to cover. Finding time to sit & read with a 7 month old & 2 1/2 year old has been a good challenge. I probably need to break down and buy the audio version so I can listen on my commutes to and from work.

Now, just because I haven’t read it all yet, doesn’t mean I haven’t loved flipping through all the yummy recipes that Shauna included in this latest book. I’ve tried a couple already, most recently the breakfast cookies. How on earth could I pass up an opportunity to make cookies for breakfast without feeling guilty about them? These were so yummy, not too sweet, and even gluten free & vegan. I did leave out the shredded coconut and swapped the coconut oil for olive oil, though. Not everyone in our house is a fan of coconut. I thought about posting the recipe here for all to try, but I really want to encourage you to buy this book or borrow it from a friend. I think we can all learn from it and be spending more time around the table, with the people we love.

One more order of business, for anyone still reading this. The other night, when I was getting ready to make these cookies, I started listening to a podcast from Willow Creek Community Church’s midweek service. Would you believe it if I told you it was Shauna speaking on the one I started??? Well, it was, and it was really good too. Her message was called “What it means to change the story” and she was talking about how we all live stories that we’ve been told about ourselves, but they aren’t always true stories or good stories. Some of the work that we have to do, as we become adults, is working to tell new stories that God wants to tell in and through us. I would highly recommend listening to it. You can find it to watch or listen to on Willow’s website here, or you can get it through iTunes in the podcast section. Here’s a link to the iTunes version here or you can search for the Willow Creek Midweek Service, and it’s from 8/14/13.

I hope you check out some of Shauna’s work, even if it’s just on her blog. I hope you listen to the podcast, and I hope it inspires you to think about the stories you’re living. And most of all, I hope you make some cookies for breakfast, because of course.

love and butter,
amy

When I started to think about what the first recipe I wanted to share with the world(or more likely all five of you that read this) was, I knew it had to be a cookie, because of course. And when I started to think about *the* cookie, I instantly thought of this recipe. Is it my favorite cookie in the whole entire world? Probably not. But this is one of the first cookies that I can remember making on my own, and it’s probably the recipe I’ve made more than most other cookies. I can’t take much credit for this cookie, though.

The first time I ever had this cookie was at Brooke’s house. I’ve known Brooke since we were younger than I can remember. She stood next to me as I married my best friend six years ago and I can’t wait to watch her marry hers next May. Brooke’s mom, Tanya, has whipped up many a sweet treat over the years, all of it delicious. This cookie is just one of the sweets I enjoyed at their house. I’m fairly confident that you could always find some of this cookie dough in the freezer, because you never know when you’re going to need a hot-out-of-the-oven cookie or let’s be honest, some cookie dough in all its raw goodness. Growing up, I burned my mouth on plenty of these cookies in the McLeod house, we just couldn’t wait. So, thanks, Tanya, for baking cookies for us, for french braiding my hair every time I slept over(my head hurts just thinking of how tight you pulled those braids), and for starting me on the road to this little blog.

A couple little disclaimers before we jump into the real reason you’re reading this…to get the recipe for these yummy cookies! I don’t know about you, but when I’m trying out a recipe for the first time, I want it to turn out well. If I can get super detailed and specific instructions, I’m thrilled. I want to be told what tools to use, how things should look, smell, feel, taste, etc. As I pass along recipes to you, I hope and plan to give as much information as I would hope to find in a recipe myself. Also, I don’t know how you usually measure your dry ingredients(flour & sugar), but after hearing & reading about weighing them instead of the scoop & level method, I’m a firm believer in the weigh method. In a nutshell, the way that you measure out flour can result in varying amounts of it, ranging by an ounce or more in either direction. To keep things as controlled as possible, when you weigh, you always know how much flour you have. Unfortunately there are also different opinions of how much a cup of flour weighs. Unless a recipe tells me how many ounces or grams it requires, I use the standards from America’s Test Kitchen of 5 ounces for a cup of unbleached all purpose flour and 7 ounces for a cup of sugar(brown or white). I use this scale, although there are lots of options. Just be sure it has the option of grams or ounces.

Now, let’s get to the good stuff.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Makes about 4 dozen cookies

1 cup Softened Butter (I always use salted)
1 cup Peanut Butter (I grew up using creamy Jif, Skippy, etc, but now the only peanut butter in our house is the kind that’s made with only peanuts, and it’s crunchy. The cookies were just as delicious, and with a tad less sugar)
¾ cup Sugar (5.25 ounces)
¾ cup Firmly Packed Brown Sugar (5.25 ounces)
2 Eggs (room temperature is best, helps them incorporate better. I try to at least get them out of the fridge as soon as I start making cookies, so they can warm up a bit)
2 teaspoons Vanilla Extract
2½ cups Unbleached All-Purpose Flour (12.5 ounces)
1 teaspoon Baking Soda
½ teaspoon Kosher Salt
1 cup Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips (This amount is definitely up for interpretation if you love a loaded cookie)

• Preheat your oven to 350º (I always, always, always have a thermometer like this in my oven because it can’t be trusted. When I set it to 350, it ends up around 375.)
• Prep some cookie sheets with parchment paper or a silicone mat. I always use parchment paper and I needed 4 trays for this batch of cookies.
• Measure or weigh out your flour, baking soda, and salt into a medium bowl. Whisk them together and set aside.
• Add both sugars and both butters to the bowl of your stand mixer or a large bowl.
• Cream together the butters & sugars on medium speed for 1 minute.
• Turn the mixer to low and add in the vanilla and 1 egg. Once incorporated, add the other egg and mix just until combined or you don’t see any super shiny streaks of egg left.
• Turn the mixer off and add in about a third of the flour mixture, turn the mixer on low, just until mostly combined.
• Add the rest of the flour in two more batches, just the same way.
• With the mixer off, again, add in your chocolate chips and mix on low until evenly disbursed.

• In order to get uniform cookies, use a cookie scoop to portion out dough onto the trays. I use a scoop like this, which got me 52 cookies that weighed 1 ounce each. I want to make sure my cookies have plenty of space to bake evenly, which means 12 cookies per tray.

• Bake for about 8 minutes, 2 trays at a time, or until just barely starting to brown on the edges, which yields a soft cookie. Again, interpretation is up to you on how well-done you like your cookies. I’m always an advocate of under-cooked cookies.

• Allow cookies to cool on the trays for a few minutes, and then move to cooling racks until completely cool.

One other option with these cookies is to scoop out the dough as individual cookies on the tray, then throw the tray in the freezer until the cookies are frozen. Once they’re frozen, you can put them in an airtight ziploc bag and back in the freezer. Bake them just the same way, adding only an extra minute or two. Perfect for those moments when you just HAVE to have a fresh out of the oven cookie.

love and butter,

amy