A Homemade Life in Fast Food Time
These are a much requested cookie in our house. Todd likes them with Pecans as well as Walnuts – so choose whichever you like. They freeze, transport and mail quite well. They don’t get super brown – so don’t overbake waiting for them to brown up!
In some cookies, it is okay to substitute margarine – but these just dont taste or turn out the same if you do substitute. They’re not bad, just not as good…so use the real stuff.
We are big fans of the cranberry/orange flavor combination – especially around the holidays. The sweet and tart also lends itself to an amazing scone recipe – which I’ve adapted from a few I’ve used over the years into this one, which is easy to put together if you have a food processor!
So this recipe went around Facebook and I tried it – and then realized that I had to tweak it because a) I don’t keep buttermilk in the house; and b) it needed salt. These are Todd and Aerik’s favorite biscuit and they are yummy fresh and plain, under your favorite sausage gravy, or with a bit of butter and jam. Just the perfect, simple and delicious side to any meal, weekend or week night.
I found this recipe and modified it a bit, and although I think it’s VERY good – it feels weird to call it a “crisp” when it contains no oatmeal. Apple crisp – growing up, anyway- always had oatmeal.
This recipe is great because it only takes 4 good size apples, 5 if they’re smallish – and cooks in an 8×8 pan – so its a good way to use up fruit without making a giant pan of something. Good for small dinner parties or potlucks too. Enjoy!
I got one of those donut pans for Christmas – the baking pans that you fill and hope it doesn’t overflow. Well, they do overflow if you overfill, but they still taste fabulous. Todd loves the powdered donuts that have the cinnamon powdered sugar on the outside – but lets face it – donuts are not really healthy and anything fried should be a treat, not a regular breakfast. This baked cinnamon spice donut recipe is definitely a keeper
So a note on donut pans. Don’t expect these donuts to look like something from your local Timmy’s or Dunkin’ Donuts – they’ll likely bake over the hole in the middle – like mine did in the pic. But here’s the deal…they’ll taste better – so who cares? You could also make these in your mini-muffin tin and have a donut-hole type treat.
This recipe made almost 2-dozen donuts in my pan – which took awhile because I could only make 6 at a time – but they are SOOOO worth it! You could use plain powdered sugar if you like, but the cinnamon powdered sugar is pretty special.
We are big fans of cranberry orange walnut bread here – and while perusing Pinterest during a recent outpatient procedure recover, I came across this Cranberry Bread recipe that features pecans – another fave – and had to try it. This was a pretty simple quick bread, and tasty. I kind of missed the orange though – maybe next time I’ll try the cranberry orange walnut bread with pecans instead of walnuts? Let me know what you think of this one!