thin mint stuffed cookies!

Everyone has bad days. You know, days where you find yourself listening to Adele on repeat, and generally doing nothing but eating and crying...

Self-pity is a natural feeling, and no one should feel bad about it! Yet there are probably 3 solutions to this situation, and the route you chose to take could very easily determine the type of person you are.

You could either: a), go out and solve whatever is bothering you. b), go onto pandora to create a coldplay station and brainstorm, or c), bake something, and completely avoid the outside world. 

Well obviously I went with choice C. It was one of those nights; where I simply couldn't handle anything anymore, and on top of that I was both incredibly hungry and bored. Thank god for girl scout cookie season, cause I had half of box of frozen thin mints in the freezer! (the other half was obviously eaten already)

So I went with my best instinct and decided to make some thin mint stuffed cookies! I decided to go with the typical chocolate chip cookie recipe, however, we were all out of chocolate chips. Luckily, I had some WHITE chocolate chips in the pantry, and I gotta say...white chocolate and mint=VERY GOOD COMBO.

I was a little nervous because the baking time called for 10 mins, but after that time, the cookies were no where near being finished. That was probably because of their colossal size! I hesitantly left them in for a bit longer (you know under baked cookies are my weakness!), and I gotta say...they came out pretty perfect.   

Imagine biting in to this puppy....the cookie is warm and doughy, the white chocolate chips melt in your mouth. The thin mint itself is soft and warm, but it still maintains most of the satisfying, minty crunch you get as you bite into this multi-textured cookie. I MEAN ITS HEAVEN. I HAD THESE FOR DINNER! Soooo worth it!

So remember this little life lesson: whenever you find yourself sitting through yet another self pity fest, go through the list in your mind. Should I solve this problem? should I sulk? should I rely on Adele or Coldplay to take the pain away?

The answer is NO...get off your butt and bake! Bake away, eat it all, and forget about everyone else, because you know you want to. 

Stressed

When I get stressed, I get hungry. And so I bake. I haven't baked in quite a while, i have had little homework (actually, i just haven't been doing it all...), I have been managing well at gymnastics and the fall play had not yet taken over my life.

Fast forward to right now. I have an AP environmental science textbook open in a vain attempt at note taking, my math homework and all of it's imaginary numbers make me want to be imaginary, the fall play is in two weeks so I will be having 14 hour school days, we are learning a new tense in spanish, I have two books (one of which I have no started) due for AP english, my drama teacher expects me to be choosing a monologue for an upcoming competition, I am signing up for next semester classes tomorrow and my intra-squad meet for gymnastics is coming up in less that six weeks.

I would say my stress level is pretty high. And so, instead of dealing with these issues and, oh, I don't know...doing my homework, running lines and working out, I decided to make cookies.

Milk chocolate walnut cookies made out of pancake mix. Pancake mix? Yes, pancake mix.

Loosely inspired by this http://newhopemills.com/pages.php?page_id=6, my recipe is as follows (makes about 2 1/2 dozen):

1. Preheat oven to 375 and spray baking sheets (mine weren't non-stick, lame)
2. Cream 1 1/3 cups packed brown sugar, 2/3 cup unsalted butter and 4 tsp vanilla (I ALWAYS make my cookies extra vanilla-y)
3. Add 2 eggs and beat
4. Add 3 cups of, wait for it... PANCAKE MIX!
5. Beat on medium until well incorporated, and this means well, NO LUMPS.
6. Taste your batter...just to make sure its not poisonous(:
7. Fold in desired amounts of goodies--I used 1/2 bag of milk chocolate chips and 1/2 cup walnut pieces but feel free to experiment.
8. Place rounded teaspoon-fulls on baking sheets
9. Bake for 12-15 minutes, shoot for slightly underdone and just let rest before you remove 'em from the pan.
10. Don't tell your little brother the cookies are done until you have eaten the biggest one, enjoy!

And here they are in all their glory, fresh out of the oven and just dying to relieve my stress.




ps, is that not the most excellent apron you have ever seen? Yeah, I thought so.


pps, these would be even more excellent if i had my bff forever to share them with...

bi rite creamery

There's something so ridiculously addicting about bi rite creamery. Their sundaes are just...I CAN'T GET ENOUGH OF THEM.

browine sundae: vanilla ice cream, spiced pecans, housemade brownies, chocolate sauce and whipped cream!!!

I will literally have my brother drive me across town at 9:30pm, on a school night, just to go have one of their sundaes.

see this sundae right down here? it's the s'mores sundae (a special!)

are you ready for this? it's toasted MARSHMALLOW, atop chocolate ice cream, house made graham cracker pieces and caramel sauce. 

...and I am so very proud to say that last week I finally made it through their whole sundae menu--that's right folks, I've tried every sundae on the bi rite menu. And then some!!

banana split: caramelized bananas, toasted walnuts, malted vanilla ice cream, chocolate sauce and whipped cream!