Week 45: Chocolate Chip Cheese Bars

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Chocolate-Chip-Cheese-Bars

Super easy and uses very few ingredients. It uses store bought refrigerated cookie dough, a pack of cream cheese, one egg, and 1/2 cup sugar. I forgot to take the picture before digging in. Not a bad dessert, but I'm not sure I liked the Great Value cookie dough that I used. There is a note that you can use 2 cups of your favorite cookie dough. It would probably be much better with a better quality cookie dough.

7 cookies to go!

week 44: Date Drops

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Date-Drops

I found a good deal on a box of dates at Walgreens, but then I realized that they were whole dates, and I had to chop them up. Other than chopping up the sticky dates, they were very easy to make. I like dates because of their nutty texture and flavor. I baked two cookie sheets at once, and one sheet, as you see above, stayed in a little mound and browned on the bottom, while the other sheet spread out. They were all pretty good. My husband asked what page this one was on. He has memorized the pages of his favorite cookies. :)

8 cookies to go!

Week 43: Chippy Blond Brownies

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Chippy-Blond-Brownies

Finally, a successful bake! It has been awhile since I've liked any of my cookies! These are simple and yummy. I was out of semi sweet chocolate chips, so I used milk chocolate chips. They are almost as good. I prefer full sized semi sweet or dark chocolate chips. They look a little overcooked, but I like them that way. I like a crunchy edge to my bars.

9 cookies to go!!!

Week 42: Coffee Shortbread

http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/Coffee-Shortbread

These were just OK. I didn't care for them. I have seen several recipes that use instant coffee, so I thought I'd give it a try. I like real coffee, not really instant coffee. I think if these cookies were just coffee flavored, they would be better. I really didn't like the bitter chunks of instant coffee granules. I planned to drizzle them with white and dark chocolate, but the white chocolate would not melt and ended up burning. I think my burner was on too high, and I wasn't patient enough. I did use more of those pesky mini chocolate chips. They do have a purpose after all. Melting!

Counting down! 10 cookies to go!

Week 41: Praline Brownies

I knew that this was a bad recipe when 1) I followed the directions twice and burned it both times, 2) I couldn't find the recipe on the Taste of Home website, and 3) there is no picture in the book of what it should look like. So far, all of the recipes I have gotten from my Taste of Home Cookies book have been on tasteofhome.com. "Praline Brownies" were no where to be found.

First the recipe tells you to cook the brown sugar, butter and milk until melted in a sauce pan. Next it says to pour it into a baking pan and sprinkle with pecans. Then you put the brownie mixture over the praline layer and bake it in the oven. Well, the problem is that the praline mixture is already cooked before it makes it into the oven, and the oven just burns it. Maybe if I tried to cook the brownies, and then pour the praline mixture on top, then that would work. It sounded like a good idea, because I love pralines! BTW, it pronounced praw-leens, I don't care what anyone else tells you. :p

Here's a few pictures of my second try: