Cookie Morning and Two Princesses on a Pig

Today seemed like a cookie type of morning. I make cookies at least once, or twice, a month. More often than not I go with tried and true chocolate chip cookies. Sometimes I go off book and get totally wild and put things like coconut or nuts in there. I know how to par-tay.



Usually the girls are interested in helping. I now have this process down to a beautiful dance. I let the girls help. Elise likes to mix. Cordelia pours pre-measured bits into the bowl. Then, when it is time to turn on the mixer I have the girls hop in their seats and then give them each a beater to like clean. I use that opportunity to get the first batch in the oven and clean up the mess.





Here is my cookie recipe if you are interested.

Also, on an unrelated note, there is this

Vegan Chocolate Chip Cookies

I recently had someone tell me that vegan calories didn't count....hmmmm.....I am not really sure about that, but I suppose that you can feel a little bit better about vegan chocolate chip cookies than the alternative.

I posted the recipe a while back, but I have been messing with it some more. Here is the chocolate chip cookie recipe I have been fiddling with for ages:
2 1/4 c. flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
3 tsp. EnerG Egg Replacer +4 Tbs. warm water (whisk together separately and then add). A box of this stuff lasts a long time and it works in place of eggs. Best stuff I know of...no they didn't pay me for that.
1 c. vegan margarine (easy to find, my favorite is Earth Balance)
3/4 c. brown sugar
3/4 c. sugar
2 1/4 tsp. vanilla extract
1-2 c. vegan chocolate chips (you could also mix in oatmeal, pecans, raisins, or whatever sounds good to you just no more than two cups of chips and other stuff total).

Pre-heat oven to 375 F. Mix the flour, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Cream the sugars and the vegan margarine. Add the vanilla and egg replacer to the sugar mixture, mix it all together. Combine the wet and dry and mix thoroughly. I like to use a hand mixer. Once all combined add the chocolate chips and anything else you want.

Drop by rounded spoonful on an un-greased cookie sheet and bake for 9-12 minutes (or just keep peeking until the cookies are golden, that is how I roll).


Eat with a glass of soymilk, or if you aren't hardcore enough for soy milk I recommend vanilla almond milk.

Saturday Vegan Sugar Cookie

I think this morning I need to make some sugar cookies. What about you?
Here is my vegan sugar cookie recipe:

• 2 3/4 c. all purpose flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 c. softened vegan margarine
• 1 1/2 c. vegan sugar
  
• 1 1/2 tsp EnerG egg replacer + 2 Tbs. warm water
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• Optional: Colored sugar for the top of cookies

1. Heat oven to 375 F. Mix together the dry ingredients in a small bowl and cream the wet ingredients in a larger bowl. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the wet, mix until thoroughly integrated.
2. Put rounded teaspoonfuls of dough onto an ungreased cookie sheet (now is the time to dip the top into colored sugar if you so desire).
3. Bake for 8-10 minutes, or until they are a bit golden.

Makes a lot of cookies, maybe 3 dozen.

Sweet Teeth

Yesterday was very productive. I spent my morning in a cleaning frenzy. When I say cleaning frenzy I think you might be aided in the mental image of me mopping the ceiling. Yes, I did it, I mopped the ceiling. I only stopped in my frenzy to take a call from my Mom. A friend of hers had seen a stray basset and was afraid we'd lost track of Bumblebee. My Mom called, just to be sure, but mentioned that when she'd told my father about the stray he said something along the lines of, "That would be impossible." It would take something extraordinary for us to lose track of Bumblebee, we're diligent dog parents. I think it stems back from a childhood spent chasing my beagle who had a penchant for running away. Thankfully Bumblebee was lounging lazily on the floor when the call came in, only lifting her head as if to ask,"You gonna get that?"

After the completion of my cleaning frenzy, a lunch break, a walk with Eric and Bumblebee I decided it was definitely time to make vegan peanut butter cookies from this book. You know, just 6 months ago I was a girl who ate very few sweets. I would say I had less than 4 cookies in all of 2008 and even that might be an over-estimation. Now, this pregnancy has me craving sweets all of the time. I have the sense to share the sweets, rather than consume them myself. The weather was cool enough that I wasn't troubled by the heat of the oven.


When the cookie making was complete and sampled we decided to head out and get busy on a baby registry. There is something so gratifying about walking through a store with a scanner gun. I was armed with a list and Eric and I carefully went over the necessities, weighing heavy decisions like rectal or temporal thermometer. Later, we were at the grocery store and I couldn't help but feel a little sense of loss when I realized that I no longer had a scanner.


After the completion of our outing we came home and had some dinner. We had planned to go to the baseball game with the hopes of a local newscaster sighting, but we were suddenly hit with a major storm. I called my Mom and mentioned that it was like a typhoon. She agreed, but said that it must be the mythical Canadian typhoon because it was coming from the north. Anyway, the storm only lasted long enough to end our plans to see the game.


So, I set to work on making more sweets. No, I hadn't eaten all of the peanut butter cookies. I was just eager to try out a cupcake recipe from this book. The cupcakes are for the 4th of July barbecue we are having at my parent's house. I am bringing dessert (cookies and cupcakes). Anyway, I think this may actually be the first time I have made vegan cupcakes and they turned out wonderfully.