Oatmeal Sprinkle Cookies

These cookies are one of the adaptations I made to Jenica's Chocolate Chip Cookies. I know you're wondering why I would substitute sprinkles for chocolate chips... It's because they look adorable! The sprinkles add a fun touch to the cookies, and they taste fabulous, even without chocolate chips!

And believe it or not, there are some people who don't really like chocolate. I know, it's hard to believe. Erin is one of those people, so this variation would be right up her ally! (Although, I think since she's lived in Brazil, she has learned to like chocolate. Finally, she understands what she's been missing out on).

The only change I make for these cookies from the original chocolate chip cookie recipe is not adding chocolate chips. That's it. After rolling the cookies into balls, I dip the tops into a bowl of sprinkles. They spread out along the entire top of the cookie as they bake and they come out looking so cute!

 
This method is great to use when planning themed parties: blue and white sprinkles for BYU football, purple and gold for Westminster. The options are endless.

And of course, the best way to rinse down a delicious treat like this cookie is with a tall glass of ice cold milk. It doesn't get much better.

Jenica's Chocolate Chip Cookies

These are the very best chocolate chip cookie I have ever eaten. And I've eaten a lot of chocolate chip cookies in my day. Jenica first introduced the recipe to us when they were living up in Idaho for a few months. It was love at first bite. Not only are they chalk-full of chocolate chips, but they have a nice salty bite to them that helps break down the sweetness to a form of perfection that not every cookie has. Yum.

This recipe is so versatile. I have used it to make the original chocolate chip cookies with semi-sweet chocolate chips, as posted here. But I have also used M&M's, sprinkles, white chocolate chips, and butterscotch chips. You can basically put whatever you want in and on these cookies!

As I mentioned previously, these cookies ask for 2 teaspoons of salt per batch. DON'T DECREASE THE SALT! When we first made them, I thought that that was way too much salt. But no, it is a necessity to making these the best chocolate chip cookies you'll ever eat.

One way I like to make my cookies look more presentable...and who am I kidding, add more chocolate!...is by hand-placing additional chocolate chips on top of the cookies prior to baking them. It's not a necessary step...

...But who doesn't like a few more chocolate chips! Plus, after they bake, they look perfect with the hand-placed chips on top of a hot bed of cookie.

Besides the sweet, salty, chocolatey goodness of these cookies, the reason they are the VERY BEST is the texture. If they're baked just right, you will bite into a crispy shell covering a gooey, melty interior. It doesn't get any better than that.

From Brazil: Homemade Pizza

Sister Clark and I made homemade pizza with salads last Monday.  I made a basic white sauce with sauteed garlic in oil, added flour, then added milk. We stirred in oregeno and Tony's Creole Seasoning. Sister Clark sauteed the chicken and the onions. We cut up tomatoes and put on corn. It was DANG good. 

We ate it with mayo and ketchup (all the Brazilians eat everything with mayo and ketchup.)  

We also made salads to eat with it.  I made a dressing with oil, lemon juice, salt, honey, oregano, and whatever else we had.  We found a crouton type thing at the supermarket (had a strange flavor, but oh well.)  We also found these sugar coated crisps we at the supermarket (when we warmed them up they had a flavor kind of like an elephant ear.) 

It´s fun to teach people how to cook and at the same time use the things that we have here in Brazil.  Next Food Network Star, here I come!!!  (I´d like to do something with traveling and cooking with the ingredients of that country.)

Fresh Garden Salsa

There's only one thing better than fresh salsa in the summer, and that's fresh salsa FROM THE GARDEN in the summer! Wait, there is one more thing: fresh salsa, from the garden, IN NEW MEXICO! This year, I was very fortunate to have a successful garden. Having not lived in New Mexico my whole life, I have had to learn about the native traditions, languages, and tastes. One of those tastes that my family and I have grown to love is that of salsa. Not just any salsa. Green Chile Salsa!

Green chilies grow wonderfully in this part of the country. This year, we planted three chili plants (one Anaheim and two Sandias), one jalapeño plant, and a bell pepper plant. To go along with the peppers in our "salsa garden", we grew four huge tomato bushes, a few rows of onions, and some cilantro!

I am planning on canning most of the tomatoes as tomato sauce, salsa, and marinara sauce, but at the beginning of their ripe season, there are not enough for a whole batch of canned goods. That's where the beautiful fresh salsa comes into the picture.

We like to have friends over for occasional barbecues, dinners, and football parties. At one such even, someone brought some AMAZING salsa over. Of course, I asked her for the recipe and have since thrown in my own twist. Mainly, substitution of fresh produce.









Zucchini Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Oh boy. If you are looking for a delicious way to use up some of your zucchini, try these zucchini chocolate chip pancakes! I found a recipe for Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread Pancakes the other day, and pinned it to my "Garden" board on Pinterest. I eventually got around to actually looking at the recipe - as is typical with Pinterest pins - and thought I'd make some healthier changes to the recipe.

Now, don't get me wrong, I did NOT leave out the chocolate chips. I consider those the added bonus for eating vegetables for breakfast. What I did do, however, is leave out the butter and the sugar. Using applesauce, sweetened or unsweetened, is a perfect way to get the same result in certain recipes, while cutting back on the added fat and calories.

 Here is my revised recipe: