It's a Perfect Time to Make Some More Cookies

It's Cookie Time

  

Now that you've already been given a taste with my Toffee Bar review, let's take a look at the rest of the dessert cart from the cookbook that is all about the cookies. Chewy, Gooey, Crispy, Crunchy Melt-in-Your-Mouth Cookies. 

 

 

The author, Alice Medrich, has won more best cookbook-of-the-year awards and best in the dessert and baking category than any other author. She is self-taught but improved her skills by attending L’Ecole Lenotre in France. She opened the dessert shop Cocolat in Berkeley, California in the 1970’s. She is known for her meticulous testing of recipes and commitment to quality ingredients.

Toffee Talk: These Bars are Like Buttah

Chewy, Gooey, Crispy, Crunchy
Melt-In-Your-Mouth Cookies

by Alice Medrich
ISBN: 978-1579653972 

Here is a recipe for a treat I took into work a few weeks ago. 

These were very easy and very tasty. There aren't a lot of ingredients either. Just make sure you have enough butter though. This recipe calls for a total of 2 and 1/2 sticks. And please, do use real butter. 

I only had chopped pecans when I made these and I don't think it makes any difference. I sprinkled the chocolate chips over the top and spread them around once melted. After it cooled I thought the bars looked a little plain so I used some of the leftover white chocolate chips from the taste test. I just melted them in the microwave, spooned them into a zipper bag, cut off the corner and drizzled the white chocolate over the bars.

Near Perfection: Rich, Chocolaty Cookie Bars

"Is it possible to have too much chocolate?  Nahh."

 

You can thank me later for passing along the recipe of these are very rich, chocolaty cheesecake bars. The only thing that would make this even more decadent would be to add chocolate chips to the mix. 
 

Happy Sundae

Did you notice today's Google Search Easter egg image?  It's in the place of honor today to mark the 119th anniversary of the first documented ice cream sundae.  If you click on the image, it will take you to their results page about everything sundaes.  

Ya Gonna Keep Yourself Closer to the Farm?

This old WWI song, first performed in 1918, keeps going through my head lately:

How ya gonna keep ‘em down on the farm after they’ve seen Paree?

But moreover, how you gonna keep us out in the burbs after we’ve experienced the farm? Following the farm visit, we all have been consumed by farm related literature, fiction and non. 

I started listening to Animal Vegetable Miracle in audio-book form, which is read by the authors, and using the book as a ready reference backup. It is written by Barbara Kingsolver with separate factual insights by her husband, Steven Hopp. Her then-nineteen year old daughter Camille also shares her perspective on their one year venture to sustain the family on locally grown food. Even Lily, the youngest member of the family and budding poultry expert, shares her experiences. They began as part-time summer season residents and finally exchanged their more full-time desert lifestyle of Tuscon, Arizona, with all its arid wonders, and relocated to a verdant little valley permanently. At first they lived in a rustic log cabin before moving into the farm house on the small farm that Stephen had owned for more than 20 years. Along with the move to rural Appalachia they made a family pact to live a more responsible existence and reduce their carbon footprint.

 

Quidquid Latine Dictum Sit, Altum Videtur

Being a "method reviewer", I woke up at 4 AM just as our amateur private investigator so often does, to tell you about this book Heavenly Pleasures by author Kerry Greenwood.  (Will be great practice for waking up on time stateside for the Royal Wedding coming up.)

No cheating or April Fool's here, as the auto-post feature doesn't seem to want to work around here. I will dutifully be taking a nap here very soon  and while I am waiting to drift off into dreamland I will be trying not to think about what practical jokes and what other possible nonsense may befall me today. (Last year's April 1st brought me the worst day of my life so I'm wary of the anniversary.)