Nothing Says Lovin' Like Chocolate Chip Cookies In The Oven

My Grandma S. always arrived for a visit with a pan of homemade, baked from scratch goodness in her hands. Growing up, we visited my grandparents on Vancouver Island every summer. There was always dessert after lunch and dinner. Always. Whether our grandparents were visiting us, or we were visiting them, we always hoped it involved my grandma's chocolate squares or her chocolate chip cookies.

Both are manna from heaven.

When I was betrothed, those were the first two recipes that I copied and put in my recipe box. Those two recipes have been made countless times in my past 20 years of marriage. The Boy is always begging for chocolate squares. I am always begging for the chocolate chip cookies.

And so, I give you,

Dorothy's Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 cup shortening or 2/3 cup margarine (I always use margarine)
1 cup white sugar
1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
2 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup raisins (optional....I never put these in, but if you're serving them to my dad, you'll hear about how they are not really his mom's cookies without raisins in them)

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Mix margarine and both sugars together until creamy and light.

Add vanilla and eggs. Beat well.

In a separate bowl, mix flour, salt and soda together.

Add dry ingredients to wet. Mix well.

Stir in chocolate chips (and raisins if you're baking them for my dad).

Eat copious amounts of cookie dough.

Drop rounded spoonfuls of the dough that you haven't eaten onto cookie sheets.

Bake for 10 minutes, until lightly browned.

Cool on wire racks.

I've tried a lot of different chocolate chip cookie recipes. For me, this one is the perfect marriage of sugar, salt and chewiness.

And when you eat one, you'll feel like this:

Enjoy!

Cranberry Orange Scones

It's time for another episode of:
Cranberry Orange Scones

I've looked at and tried out quite a few cranberry scone recipes. It's hard to find recipes that call for fresh cranberries. Also, I wanted a recipe that wasn't fussy. This house hasn't seen parchment paper or zest of anything since, well, several children ago.

So I ended up conglomerating several recipes into something pretty easy and not too time consuming. Cutting up fresh cranberries takes some time, but you can use a handy tip that my mom taught me. Say a prayer while you're doing something that is mindless and takes a bit of time. Like cutting up lots of little cranberries.

Enjoy!

Cranberry Orange Scones

Ingredients:

2 cups flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

2 Tbsp sugar

1/2 cup butter, cut into small pieces

1/2 cup fresh cranberries, chopped

2/3 cup orange juice

2 tsp orange zest (if you've got it and have the time. I never add it.)
















Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Mix dry ingredients together.

3. Add butter and mix until the texture of coarse crumbs.















4. Stir in cranberries, using a spoon.















5. Add orange juice and mix with spoon just until mixture comes together.

6. Empty onto counter and gently form into a rough ball.

7. Press ball into a thick circle.

8. Cut circle in half, then each half into three.

9. Place on doubled baking sheet.

10. Sprinkle with sugar (optional.....I like them iced, but they're great with sugar, too).

11. Bake for 22 minutes, until a light golden brown.

12. When cooled, ice with a thin vanilla or orange glaze if you haven't sprinkled them with sugar.

I always double the recipe and use margarine instead of butter. They're best when made with butter, but at $4 a pound out in these parts......margarine it is!

And now, I'm moving on to start perfecting some lemon scones. I don't think I'll be able to get away with 'zest free' for those.....

Recipes anyone?

** and is anyone else out there having major problems with spacing on blogger? No matter what I do, it won't save the changes I make with the spacing....I give up!!**

300 Christmas Cookies

I need some help.

Every year at Christmas, the girls in this family whip up a few batches of cookies for the Husband to give to all the wonderful employees at his place of work.

This many cookies:



















These lovely gingerbread stars were made two Christmases ago. Last year we made whipped shortbread. I have pictures of those, too, but since they're trapped in the recesses of our other computer that is in for repairs, you'll have to imagine those photos. I assure you, they made quite a sight all lined up on the counter. It was the only time I can ever say that I spent $30 on butter in a one week time span.

This year's cookie baking will be a little different. I'm going to bake cookies for the staff at two facilities, not just one. Which means about 300 cookies.

Which is where you guys come in. I'm looking for some suggestions for Christmas cookies.

Do you have a family favourite? Something that's not too fussy and doesn't use fancy, expensive ingredients? I'd love your suggestions. I want to try some new recipes during this month, so I'm all prepared for the Christmas rush.

Thanks!

"This is THEEE Best Recipe EVER, except..."

I'm researching cranberry orange scone recipes online. I figure it's time to expand the whole 'scone' repertoire.

I love reading the recipe reviews. They're hilarious. Especially the 5 star rating ones. They go something like this.

"No wonder you have a little weight problem. Do you know how many calories are in those scones?"

"This is THEEE Best recipe EVER!!! Except I put in Bing cherries for the cranberries, doubled the sugar, used half the salt, doubled the glaze, added some orange flavouring, used three times the zest called for and cook it for less time than called for."

Come again?

Another good one was, "I substituted chocolate chips for the cranberries."

Haven't found 'the one' yet, but I'll let you know when I do.

I will post my own review. With pictures.

If I can find some batteries for the camera.

Have I Mentioned How Much I Hate HTML?

I want to change the look of my blog and have been 'researching' how to customize it. I shut it all down last night when my eyes started to bleed and I swore no less than 3 times at some lady blogger who told me it was as easy as pie (that should have been my first clue. Have you ever actually tried to make pie crust that didn't turn out to be 2 inches thick and tasted like you were eating gluey flour and water baked on high for 15 minutes? Easy as pie my a...).

I've been on all sorts of blogs that look like their owners most likely have 38 scrapbook photo albums for each of their children. (I have none....scrapbook albums, not kids. I have plenty of those.) And these bloggers swear they haven't paid someone to make their blogs all perfectly wonderful. I admit it. I have blogger's envy. Argh. They probably have perfect houses and perfect children too.

What have I gotten myself into? I started blogging as an outlet for frustrations, connect with family and friends, and just to be able to write and have some 'me' moments in my hectic life with four kids, two dogs and a husband (not necessarily in order of importance there). And now I'm worrying about 'my blog isn't as nice as her blog'?

Okay. Breathe. I do not want to change the look of my blog to compete with the 10 million other blogs in cyberspace. I want to change the look of my blog because I want to. I can picture it in my head but can't make the computer believe that's really what I want to do. The computer keeps laughing at me and thinks it's a game. "Oh, really? You want to widen those margins? 'Kay.....but that must mean you don't want this pesky side bar, here, so I'll just get rid of that for you."

Stupid HTML.

I'm begging for help. Don't make me have to go to blogging rehab. Don't make me take up scrap booking. Please....send me your links to stress free blogging designs. Send me info on how to have the upper hand with my computer. Is there a secret swear word I don't know about?

Epiphany. There's an underground secret code that all you HTML lovers know about, isn't there! All you HTML lovers know just where to insert that little code in amongst all that HTML gibberish. And then the computer sees that little secret code and says, "Ah, crap. Gotta listen to this one. They know what they're doing."

Give me the code. I won't tell anyone. Promise.

I'll bake you some pumpkin scones??

Pumpkin Scones

I decided to make pumpkin scones today. (Exciting! I know you've all been on the edge of your seat waiting to hear about the latest crazy moment of my life.)

I just realized that I make pumpkin scones on Tuesdays. (ANOTHER exciting bit of info for you....I'm sure you're hyperventilating by now.) I had no idea until today. Am I a nimrod for not realizing this until today or just a closet organizational freak who is so closeted that she doesn't even know it? Am I just an insane creature of habit? Maybe it's the sleep deprivation of the past 2 years that have caused me to not notice until today. I'm starting to feel a bit loopy.

I dunno....with four kids and a busy household I was under the assumption that apart from Monday meaning lots of loads of laundry and Friday meaning a trip to Stupidstore, I kinda went with the flow and 'planned' things by the seat of my you know what.

I'm so tired. I feel like I've been awake since 5:30 am Saturday morning. And Keeley is still sick. I don't know where I'm going with this. I cannot type three letters without making a mistake. Must go put on coffee. This whole scone epiphany must go on a shelf somewhere to be pulled down later.

Fortunately for the family, I can make pumpkin scones with my eyes closed. And they go GREAT with coffee.