A tweaked cookie

I'll tell you making healthier food choices in the Bacon house is easier than finding time to blog about them. But I haven't left you all out.  I have hundreds of pictures on my camera just waiting to post on here!  In our quest to better food, I'm happy to have tweaked the good ol' chocolate chip cookie!  I've searched and tried several recipes in the past few months and this one the judges, aka Mr. Bacon and the kids have approved of. FINALLY!  This eating better and healthier stuff isn't that hard to do. Honestly!  For those who are starting out on this journey to, what have you though?  I'm finding it easier to just substitute healthier ingredients in many of our favorite dishes.  Baked goods is one of those areas this works pretty well with.  So here is my "bacon approved" whole wheat chocolate chip cookies for everyone to try!

"Bacon Approved" whole wheat chocolate chip cookies:

 1 cup white whole wheat flour
1/3 cup oat flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick cold butter (yes we only use real stuff!)
1/4 c up white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup almond milk (or any milk)
1 tsp vanilla or almond extract. (we prefer almond)
1 cup chocolate chips (not one bag)

 What I think makes this cookie so great is the white whole wheat flour I found . And guess where I picked it up- Walmart. Are you surprised?  Sure it's not organic, but we buy what we can afford and it's better than white flour! And for $3.50 for a 5 pound bag it's not bad.   Also if you are curious about oat flour it's nothing fancy.  I took my box of oatmeal and tossed it in my Ninja blender and gave it a whirl.  Once you have something that resembles flour (I blended mine for about a minute) I poured it back in the container to use for baking.  Super easy! 

Preheat your oven to 350*.  Now it's time to mix everything up. In my kitchenaid mixer I placed my cold butter and my sugars.  Beat until well combined. This is important because if you don't mix all the cold butter you'll have chunks that melt in the cookies when they bake.  Next add in the egg, milk, extract of your choice and mix well.  Then add in your dry ingredients- flours, soda and salt. Combine it well and mix in chocolate chips.

Now some of you might be second guessing only 1 cup of chocolate chips.  Again this is a compromise, Mostly good ingredients and a few not so good. These would be great with dark chocolate chips too!  Really the kids and Hubby didn't miss the extra chocolate chips in the cookies, and one bag can now make 2 batches unlike my old recipe. 

 Place your cookies by teaspoon full on the baking tray.  I get about 2 dozen cookies out of this recipe.  And they're not super small cookies, but not huge either.  Bake them in the oven for 9-12 minutes, or until golden brown.  Let them cool on a wire rack and enjoy your healthy cookies!

While I was baking those I made up something else for dessert that night.  I had a container of heavy whipping cream in my fridge that needed to be used up (from my homemade healthier coffee creamer- more to come on that in another post!)  I already had my mixer out so I cleaned up the bowl and tossed in 1 cup heavy cream.  With the whisk attachment I started mixing.  Making homemade cool whip is super easy.  I beat the creamer for about 5 minutes our until firm peaks formed. Be careful not to mix too long or you get butter! 

 Once it's forming peaks add in 1/4 cup sugar and 1 tsp vanilla and mix just to incorporate it.  There you have it, super easy homemade cool whip! 

 Next I tossed about a cup of frozen strawberries in my ninja blender. Have I told you how much I LOVE my ninja blender?  Mr. Bacon and the kids got it for me for Christmas and it' was my favorite gift!  I use it almost every day.  I blended up the frozen berries (which came from my garden last year. I froze them to enjoy later on!) and it resembled crumbles. 

 Then I mixed the two together.  This is heavenly!  Strawberry fluff. Try not to eat the whole bowl at once!  It's a much lighter texture than ice cream and only 4 ingredients!  Not too bad for a healthy dessert. 

 I did take a little of the extra and stick it in these cute ice Popsicle molds I bought. They'll make a great after school treat for the kids!

So tell me what you think when you try these healthier treats for your family! I love to hear back from my blog followers!

Ever heard of a healthy cookie?

I can't say I've been ignoring my blog, but I had taken a break for a bit.  Mr. Bacon and I have had some serious discussions lately about food.  Good, bad and nasty discussions actually.  We've also been doing some reading, video watching and blog reading about how unhealthy some of the foods we had been putting into our family really are.  No we're not super health nuts now, but lets say we think a bit more before dumping a lot of chemical rich or refined that into our belly and the bellies of our Bacon kids.  Because lets face it, there are LOTS of 'healthy' recipes out there, but some do take just like cardboard!  I'm happy to say I'm ready to share some of our tried and true recipes with you.  And no, we're still not using a lot of 'weird' ingredients because well, I have kids and a budget!

One that we have found to love is the healthy cookie. There I said it, there is a healthy cookie out there, several in fact.  I knew if I was to clean up our eating I needed to still have treats be a part of it, and this is one that even Little Miss Bacon approves of.  And to say that is a lot because well, there isn't much she does like these days.  Show of hands who else has a picky eater? Ugh, good I'm not the only one!

These cookies were not entirely thought up by myself, however the original recipe did taste like cardboard, ok that was a stretch, but it did taste like beans. Perhaps because that's one of the main ingredients, but if you're a going to make a cookie, it should taste like a cookie!  These little cookies remind me of a cross between a cookie and a brownie after I fancied up the original recipe. 

Now I'll say, I couldn't seem to find my camera while I was making these, but I promise next time I make them, I'll get more pictures.  None the less, these are super easy to make. Here is what you need.

Ma Bacon's Healthy Cookies:

1 cup Pecan halves
1 can rinsed and drained Garbanzo beans
3 TBSP ground flax seeds
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp sea salt
1/3 cup cocoa
1 tsp vanilla
1/3 cup honey
1/2 cup peanut butter (I use smucker's natural but any will do)
1/4 cup milk
1 cup chocolate chips (mini are the best!)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. 

Place beans and pecans in blender or food processor  and mix until fine and crumbly. I mixed mine about 2-3 minutes. Add in flax, cocoa, sea salt and baking powder and blend some more until all is mixed in.  Dump in a bowl. Add in vanilla, honey, peanut butter and milk and mix well.  I actually use my hands for this job.

You could just dump the wet ingredients into your blender or food processor too if it's got enough power to mix it all in.  For some reason my ninja doesn't mix it all that together well so I just use my hands.  When everything is mixed, add in the chocolate chips. 

Now you could just eat this dough this way. it's actually really good.  Or roll them into small balls and dip in chocolate like a truffle!  Humm.. I'm going to have to try that next time.  But this time I took out a teaspoon full at a time and rolled it in a ball, then flattened it with my hand when I placed it on the baking sheet.  You can also place the dough on some wax paper and roll it into a log. Place the log in the fridge for an hour or so and slice the log into cookies.  Either works great.  See how easy this eating healthier thing is!
 Once they are on the cookie sheet you can toss them in the oven.  Oh and you can load up your cookie sheet if you'd like, these cookies don't rise or expand so you don't have to leave a lot of room for them to grow.   Bake them in the oven for 10 min and cool on a wire rack.  That's it.

 Now they do taste great just this way.  Or you can make them fancy by drizzling them with a little melted chocolate (dark is my favorite!) or lightly dust them with some powdered sugar like Mr. Bacon likes them.  Any way you eat them, you can feel a little less guilty about having that second cookie!

One lonely cookie

The other day I made Mr. Bacon's favorite cookies. Little boy Bacon and I were home all by ourselves (ok so Bacon bit was here too, but napping for once!) and we wanted a special project for just the two of us. All the kids love baking with me and even more when they can do it one on one. So we decided Daddy's favorite cookies were the thing to make, despite the lack of chocolate in them! I tried to remind myself that I needed to take a few pictures of them so everyone could see them. Guess what, I forgot! By the time I remembered to go back to take some pictures, this is what I found! One lonely cookie! So I ate it! But not without taking it's picture first. Can you guess what kind it is? Snickerdoodles! And by how fast they were gobbled up, you can bet they are good!

Mr. Bacon's Snickerdoodles:
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup shortening (like crisco)
1.5 cups sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
2 3/4 cup flour
2 tsp cream of tater powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 tbsp sugar
2tsp cinnamon

Heat your oven to 400*. In a bowl mix butter, shortening, sugar until mixed. Add in eggs and vanilla and mix again. Add in flour, cream of tater, baking soda, and salt and mix well. Shape the dough into 1-2" balls, I just take a tablespoon full and form it into a ball- no measuring for Ma Bacon!

Now comes the fun part for the kids, Combine the 2 tbsp sugar and 2 tsp cinnamon in a bowl. Place dough ball in the sugar mix and roll it around to completely cover it. Set the cookies on a baking sheet about 2" apart, they will spread a little. Bake for 8-9 minutes. Make sure not to over bake these, part of making snickerdoodles is making sure they are soft in the middle and not dry. As soon as you take the cookies out of the oven, move them to a cooling rack. This step is important. If you leave the cookies on the pan to cool they will continue to bake since the pan is hot making your cookies hard and dry.

Next step, ENJOY! These are wonderful dipped in your morning coffee too! Just don't let your kids (or mine!) know you are eating cookies for breakfast.

I also make a batch of chocolate chip cookies this past week. The same one's I blogged about here. I have to say they disappeared just as fast as the snickerdoodles. But I was smart with those, I only baked half the batch. The other half i put on a cookie sheet and they went right into the freezer. After a few hours I moved them into a container for another night. There is nothing better than fresh baked cookies and this way I can pull them out and pop them in the oven after I pull our dinner meal out and by the time dinner is over, fresh baked cookies!

A back up to Valentine's day

Why is it that just because February has fewer days in the month it has to go by twice as fast? Those days have been ticking by at the Bacon house. I haven't forgot about my awesome readers here, just been side tracked with kid events. Also there is a big change happening at the Bacon house that involves bring home the bacon, and it's taking a lot of my time. But I will try to catch up on a few posts and update more routinely.

So lets start with backing up to your Valentines day? Did your sweetie get you something special? Even though it was our 10 year anniversary from the day Mr. Bacon asked me to spend forever with him (P.S. I said yes!) I believe once I started having kids Valentines day moved over to a kids holiday. I love planning some sweet and red surprises for them. So what did we do this year?

To start how about some pink heart pancakes? I used my mix recipe from here. Added pink food coloring and a bit of creative work pouring the batter on my griddle and the kids had the best breakfast to start their Valentines day.

(since we are taking about the day of love... this griddle was my first Christmas present from Mr. Bacon.... Nothing says romance better than a griddle for your girlfriend. I'm happy to say the griddle and the two of us are still working out!)

Lunch was the traditional heart shaped PB&J sandwiches. I wonder if the Bacon kids will get bored of heart sandwiches when they are teenagers? .... And what do you make your sweethearts for dinner? Why.. Heart shaped homemade pizza of course! One pepperoni for the kids, one pepperoni, sausage, & mushroom or Mr. Bacon and me. Everyone loved it so much I'm happy to report we didn't have leftovers!

Now you know Ma Bacon better than to just leave the day as that... So in the afternoon I baked up my other treat for the kids. I've been waiting for a while to put this recipe on here. It's a household favorite and it's highly requested by everyone who eats them. These are THE BEST sugar cookies I've found!

Ma Bacon's Sugar Cookies
1 cup butter softened (the real thing makes these amazing, but margarine works too)
1 cup sugar
1 egg
2.5 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 Tbsp Orange Juice
1 tsp vanilla (or almond- my favorite) extract

In mixing bowl place butter and sugar and mix together. Add in egg and mix. Add in baking powder and flour next, the dough will be thick. Next add in the extract and orange juice (this is the magic secret ingredient!). Mix all together. Now it's time to make cookies!

Get your work area ready. I use my good ol' cutting board for rolling out cookies. It saves my counter top some wear and tear. Place about 1/4 cup of flour on the board and spread some of it out to work into the dough. Take 1/2 the dough and roll it into a large ball. Then kneed it a few times in the flour on your work surface. Roll out your dough, keeping it thicker will help makes these cookies remain soft after baking. You can see how thick they are in the picture below. I roll my dough between 1/4-1/2 inch thick!

One big tip on rolling out the dough, is to only roll it out 3 times, then set it aside. (check out my scrap pile on the cutting board above.) Once you've rolled all the dough out 3 times and cut out your cookies, then you can roll the scrap pile out and cut cookies out of it. This also helps keeps the cookies super soft.

Once you get a pan full, they are ready for the oven. Bake 375* for 7-9 minutes. With sugar cookies you want to make sure they are not all brown like other cookies. You just want them baked though. the bottoms will be slightly brown but until you take them off the pan you won't be able to see this. I have to say finding the exact baking time is a bit of trial and error but it 's worth it when they melt in your mouth! Let them rest on the pan for no more than a minute and then remove them to a cooling rack. If you leave them on the pan they will continue to cook and become hard.

Next comes the fun part.. frosting! Here is the basic icing recipe I use.
Ma Bacon's Sugar Cookie Icing:
2 cups powdered sugar
1 tbsp butter softened
1 tsp vanilla or almond extract
2 tbsp milk

Mix all together. Add more or less milk to make icing spreadable. If it's too runny, add more powdered sugar.
The pink frosting on these cookies is from the recipe above. I took half the batch and let the kids decorate them how they'd like with the sprinkles... they were gone too fast to for me to get a picture of them! But decorating is their favorite part about these cookies besides eating them! As for the white frosting I used the butter cream recipe here (half batch)and put it in my decorator bags and got creative!

YUMMY! Thick delicious better than any store bought sugar cookies!
Even though Valentines day has come and gone... you can still show some love with a 'hearts' day or just because I love you day. How about some shamrock pancakes, pizza and cookies tinted green for St. Patrick's day? Heck these cookies don't need a special occasion to make! But I'll warn you - they don't last long! (hint you can put some unfrosted one's in the freezer for a later treat if you'd like. I actually like eating these just as much unfrosted too!)

Hope you enjoyed these- And Happy Belated Valentines day from the Bacon Family!

Happy Halloween treat

It's all the buzz around the Bacon house today, in case you didn't check your calender, tomorrow is Halloween! The kids can not wait to put on their costumes and get themselves some treats. I decided to make Mr. Bacon and I a treat too. (Of course we'll sneak some out of the kids buckets after they go to bed tomorrow, but how about a treat for during the day!!) One of our local grocery stores each fall has pumpkin spice cookies for sale, $4.99 for TWELVE cookies! EEK. I've been searching high and low for a recipe that matches these cookies and I've finally found it. I couldn't wait to share it with everyone here. So Trick or Treat, Here's a yummy recipe for your Halloween that you can enjoy the rest of fall too!

Pumpkin spice cookies

3/4 cups butter softened (1 1/2 sticks)
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup molasses
2 1/4 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp pumpkin pie spice
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground all spice or ground cloves

extra sugar for rolling cookies in

Mix butter, sugar, egg and molasses in bowl or mixer. Add in spices, baking soda, and flour. Mix well. Roll 1 tbsp dough into 1" balls and roll in sugar. Place on baking sheet. Bake at 350* for 10-12 min. They should get cracked and puffy in the oven. Don't over bake them! They'll turn into rocks.

Once again these don't take that long to make, so bake some up for a great Halloween treat for yourself! I hope you enjoy them.
(and they go very well with a cup of coffee with some pumpkin spice coffee creamer!)

You're crazy right? .........Homemade cookies

 Check out the new improved healthy whole wheat chocolate chip cookie recipes that all the Bacon kids approve of!! CLICK here! 

The other day we were at the store doing shopping and the kids were asking for cookies. Of course it was right as we hit the bakery. Just out of curiosity I checked out the prices that the store wanted for them. I about fell over, $3.99 for 12 'bakery' cookies! Of course I didn't buy them. I told the kids we'd bake up a batch later in the week and that's just what we did. Don't they look yummy? Fresh baked warm gooey chocolate chip cookies. I had to take a picture fast because they just don't last at our house. Our batch of cookies made 4 dozen cookies (That's $16 worth of store bought cookies! Maybe I should get into a new line of work...) And they only took about 30 min from start of mixing to first bite. So you want to whip up a batch today? Here is the recipe.

Chocolate Chip Cookies:

1 cup butter or margarine softened
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
2.5 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1-12 oz package (about 2 cups) chocolate chips
1/2 cup coarse chopped walnuts (optional)

Preheat oven to 375*. Combine butter and sugars in bowl. Mix well. Add in vanilla and eggs and mix until creamy. Mix in flour, baking soda and salt until well combined. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts. Drop by teaspoons full onto ungreased cookie sheets. Bake 9-11 minutes or until edges of cookies are slightly browned. Remove from pan and cool on wire cooling racks.

Some tips I've picked up over the years: I find this goes really fast to mix up in my mixer (i have a kitchenaid mixer but any mixer will work, of course mixing with a good ole' bowl and spoon works just a well) When baking the cookies keep an eye on them, every oven bakes different. Take them out of the oven when the edges are slightly browned not the whole cookie brown to get soft chewy cookies. Remove the cookies from the cookies sheet after 2 or so minutes onto cooling racks. This way the bottoms don't turn hard from continued cooking on the hot pan. Feel free to try being creative to make them to your liking. This batch I made up I added in 1/2 tsp of cinnamon, they were delicious! I also like to change extract flavors, my favorite is almond! You can also omit the nuts, or add different kinds (peanuts, pecans, ect) or try adding M&M or white baking chips (or a mix of several) instead of the chocolate chips. Or press these into a greased 9x13 pan for cookie bars. It's great to have a recipe that you can change up for lots of yummy possibilities!

Now go bake :)