oreo cheesecake cupcakes

I made these cupcakes for a BBQ because they looked nice and portable, and as it turns out, they're AMAAAAZING!!  Plus, they're super quick to make!

Cookies and Cream Cheesecakes

(from Martha Stewart's Cupcakes)

42 Oreos, 30 left whole and 12 coarsely chopped

2 pounds cream cheese, room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

4 large eggs, room temperature, lightly beaten

1 cup sour cream

pinch of salt

Preheat oven to 275º.  Line standard muffin tins with paper liners.  Place 1 whole cookie in the bottom of each lined cup.

With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat cream cheese until smooth, scraping down sides of bowl as needed.  Gradually add sugar, and beat until combined.  Beat in vanilla.

Drizzle in eggs, a bit at a time, beating to combine and scraping down sides of bowl as needed.  Beat in sour cream and salt.  Stir in chopped cookies by hand.

Divide batter evenly among cookie-filled cups, filling each almost to the top.  Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until filling is set, about 22 minutes.  Transfer tins to wire racks to cool completely.  Refrigerate (in tins) at least 4 hours (or overnight).  Remove from tins just before serving.

day forty-eight: making cookies

We have an FRG meeting tonight and I volunteered to bring a snack so this morning Ben, Lexie, and I made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies.  We moved the mixer down to their kitchen table and it was much easier to let them help that way.

Ben had fun adding ingredients and then watching everything mix.

Little Miss "I don't want my picture taken"

And then she FINALLY decided to help.

YUM!!!  These cookies are good!!!

She wouldn't cooperate for pictures AT ALL today!

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

1/2 cup shortening

1 1/4 cups sugar

2 eggs

1/3 cup molasses

1 3/4 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

2 cups rolled oats

2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Mix shortening, sugar, eggs, and molasses.  Stir dry ingredients together and blend in.  Stir in rolled oats and chocolate chips.  Drop onto greased cookie sheet and bake 8-9 minutes.

homemade bread

In an effort to eat less processed foods, part of my New Year's Resolution was to make my own bread. We have not bought store bread all year (except for a bag of rolls, which I could make....). So, I have been making bread by hand every week! I do have a breadmaker, but it's not really that hard to make it by hand and it's a great stress reliever!

Yummy homemade bread