Vanilla Pudding Experiment

I was  determined to make a yummy batch of vanilla pudding.

It took me over a week to accomplish.

Three batches of pudding AND chocolate meringues later, I have a favorite recipe! And I am officially sick to death of chocolate meringues. No more egg whites please. For a very VERY long time!

The Final Banana Bread Recipe

A few weeks ago I made a couple of batches of banana bread, attempting to improve it but ultimately deciding that the first recipe had been the best. You can recap that experiment here. Still convinced that I could improve the recipe, I made another batch with a couple of changes, and LOVED IT TO PIECES. So this morning I attempted to recreate the amazing version so I could share that recipe with confidence.

Homemade Wheat Thins

Wheat Thins! Wheat thins make me think of my mom :) When I saw this blog with the recipe, I was super excited. Bonus-- they're REALLY easy to make!

Oil Chocolate Chip Cookies

This is my second attempt to find a delicious chocolate chip cookie that uses less butter-- not because I've suddenly stopped loving my beloved, mind you, but because of the incredible rise in price lately. So I checked out allrecipes and found a recipe that used vegetable oil! My sister makes (healthy) cookies with olive oil all the time, so I had high hopes for these cookies.

Here we go!

Fat Pizza

Some days, when nothing I make is turning out right, I just need to make a pizza.

Ricotta Gnocchi: Another Learning Experience

Confession: I've never tried Gnocchi. The first time I saw it I was 21 years old and it was in my sister's freezer. I went and looked it up online later. I've since heard of it and seen it too many times to count, but until a couple of weeks ago, had yet to try it. I should probably say that I still haven't really tried it, since I've only had my own.

When King Arthur Flour Co posed this recipe for potato gnocchi, I bookmarked it and told myself I'd get to it soon. When I found myself in the possession of a cup of ricotta cheese that was soon to go bad, and came across this recipe from Three Many Cooks for ricotta gnocchi, I made my decision. I printed the recipe and left it on the kitchen counter to stare me in the face when dinner time came around. 

Crunchy Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

Has anyone else noticed the rising cost of butter lately? Butter was on sale for $1.50 a box at Walmart a few weeks ago, and I went twice and both times there was an enormous gap on the cooler where it should have been. Hmph. This is seriously putting a damper on my dessert-making.

So I went in search of a cookie recipe that calls for shortening, even though the stuff seriously grosses me out. An easy solution-- the recipe on the oatmeal carton! That is, if you can really call it a "carton" when its cylindrical. Not only did this recipe use shortening, but it used (surprise, surprise) old fashioned oats, which I had accidentally bought a few weeks ago, intending to get the quick-cooking kind because they're much more cookie-friendly.

So off I went, scaling back to only 1/4 of the recipe, because I just couldn't stomach putting a full cup of vegetable shortening in something I was going to eat later. I'll post the full version though and let you make your own decisions.

I won't bore you with pictures of measuring ingredients and beating them together, but I will leave you with one important tip: these are very crunchy cookies. Not in the difficult-to-get-your-teeth-through way, but in a very crumbly way. They taste GREAT, but I highly recommend undercooking them.

Exhibit A:

These pictures are of the exact same cookie. After the first picture, I DID NOT put the cookies back in the oven. I let them cool until they looked like the second picture, then I moved them to a rack to cool completely. The first picture looks extremely undercooked, I know, but the cookies that looked like this had a slightly chewy center that was immensely satisfying. So please remove your cookies before they look fully cooked!

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
Courtesy of Walmart brand Old Fashioned Oats

1 cup Vegetable Shortening
1 cup Sugar
1 cup Brown Sugar, firmly packed
2 Eggs
2 tbsp Milk
Note: I omitted the milk and used a full egg
1 1/2 tsp Vanilla
1 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 tsp Salt
4 cups Old Fashioned Oats
1 cup Chocolate Chips

1. Preheat oven to 375 F
2. Cream shortening and sugars together
3. Add the eggs, milk, and vanilla, and beat well
4. Add the rest of the dry ingredients and beat well
5. Stir in the oats and chocolate chips
6. Drop by the spoonful onto ungreased cookie sheets
7. Bake for 13-15 minutes or until bubbly and deliciously undercooked
8. Remove from oven and let stand for 5 minutes
9. Remove and cool them completely on a wire rack