Thick Mint Cookie

“When you own your breath, nobody can steal your peace.”

— Unknown

My idea behind this was short and sweet—I love Thin Mints, I love all things chocolate and mint, it’s the holiday season, why should I have to wait for it to be Girl Scout cookie season, so let’s make a thin mint! But then, I was like OH NO, let’s make a THICK mint. A big, big cookie, single serve if you want, so instead of sitting down to eat an entire sleeve of Thin Mints, you can just eat one cute little skillet cookie!

As my husband isn’t the biggest fan of the chocolate-mint combination (crazy, right?!!??) and my 10-month-old son is too young to eat chocolate (I just read that it is recommended to wait until they are TWO to eat chocolate…), I got this baby all to myself! There is just something about the way that anything chocolate and mint tastes in the winter, as you listen to holiday music for 2 months, wishing snow was trapping you inside instead of a pandemic… it all sounds so dreamy. Unfortunately, it’s still in the 60’s here in Atlanta and the only reason we aren’t going anywhere is because it’s too dangerous to!

BUT! Let’s just enjoy these moments that we are forced to stay home, watch all of the cheesy Christmas movies on Hallmark and Lifetime, eat delicious food, light all of the balsam scented candles, listen to Michael Bublé Christmas for the millionth time, and eat a giant single-serve cookie because why the hell not! If 2020 has taught me anything, it’s that enjoying a THICK MINT cookie to myself is MORE than okay, as there will be zero guilt here in the KBemBakes household! Now back to dancing to my regularly scheduled holiday music with my son while my husband both laughs at us and looks like we are slightly nuts!

ingredients

Butter, room temperature—4 oz, or ½ C

Brown Sugar—6 oz, or ¾ C

Eggs—1

Vanilla Extract—1 tsp

Peppermint Extract—1 ½ tsp

Flour—6 oz, or 1 C

Cocoa Powder—2.25 oz, or ¾ C

Baking Powder—2 tsp

Salt—½ tsp

Chocolate Chips—3.75 oz, or ½ C

process

In the bowl of your mixer, combine the butter and brown sugar, cream until light and fluffy, about 10 minutes.

Add the egg and both extracts. Mix until combined, making sure to scrape down the sides of the bowl.

In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and salt.

Slowly add this to the creamed mixture in the mixer, making sure to scrape down the sides and bottom of the bowl.

Add in the chocolate chips.

Preheat your oven to 350˚F.

Butter a small cast iron skillet.

Press the cookie dough evenly into the pan and allow to firm up slightly in the fridge while your oven preheats.

When ready to bake, bake for 15 minutes, rote the pan 180˚, and then bake for 12 minutes.

Remove from the oven and allow to cool for about 10 minutes.

Optional Topping: melt together about ¼ C of chocolate chips with 1 TBL of coconut oil for about 30-45 seconds in the microwave (stirring every 15 seconds), drizzle on top of cookie skillet.

Dig in with a spoon for maximum deliciousness!

If you want to make individual drop cookies, bake for 7 minutes, rotate, 7 minutes.

Bon Appétit!

Peanut Butter S'more Bites

“Maybe 2020 isn’t so much about specific goal setting as it is taking care of our mind, being kind through our thoughts, fine tuning our daily mind set, and seeking to uplift ourselves and others. Perhaps everything from there with naturally find its course.”

Here’s the deal: since having a baby 3 months ago (what!!??) and now being at home with a new appreciation for all things parenting, I’ve decided to pick this blogging thing back up! I needed a ‘me’ activity. Yes, I do consider my workout time me time, even with little Oliver sitting right there watching and giggling at me the entire time! That aside, unless you want to consider showering my personal time, I don’t have too much of it. My incredible husband (like, seriously, out-of-this-world-amazing. Does middle of the night wakeups, the bad diapers, knows when to refill my wine glass when I haven’t said a word…) suggested that I start to do something that is truly me time. While I LOVE a good workout and am so excited that we just got a lawn mower, this blog has been on the back burner (hah!) for quite some time. I’m ready to pick it back up with some TLC!

So, in quick mom fashion, here’s the DL. Having Oliver is probably the greatest thing to happen to me, to us, ever! I can’t even begin to explain the love I have for him – if you’re a parent, you know what I’m talking about. Like, right now at 9:45pm, while he is asleep, I just watch him on the monitor and want to cuddle him!! Obsessed is an understatement.

Anyways, I could ramble about him for dayssssss. Seriously. Little did I know that being a mom would take up every breathing moment of mine. Feeding him alone is a full-time job! Oh, and then my husband and I are both in graduate school. LOL. We love to take on as much as possible, clearly! With all of that + my husband working like crazy from home, I didn’t think I should get any down time, so I totally just shut off any part of my brain that wasn’t related to baby / dog / school / scheduling. But hey, guess what? Mental health needs some lovin’ too there, mama! Which is where I was like dang, I miss that blog. I’ve put so much time into this baby and then I just stopped writing. Stopped baking. Stopped experimenting. So, boom, I’m going to wipe the dust off of this thing!

I then started to write down recipes like crayzee! But not just any recipes. Healthy ones. Quick ones. Parent-friendly ones. Cause here sits a mom who has anywhere from 15 minutes-2 hours when babe is napping that I can do things. Sure, I love to let him do independent play, but I also love to play with him and watch him grow every single second! So, these recipes are a mix of healthy and slightly not, simple and quick, hell, a lot of them will probably even be raw and frozen because helloooo timesaver and what’s up Atlanta summer from March-November!

Recipe #1. Peanut butter s’mores. An eggless PB cookie + a 10-minute marshmallow + a simple chocolate dip. What more could you want!? Not your traditional s’more setup, but peanut butter is my jam – and it’s a top allergen so I should just be consuming it by the jar, right?! And I am storing these babies in the freezer, which is my place of choice to keep desserts. Something so decadent about a frozen treat to me! Also. Still no dairy for this gal, so ice cream is not an option. Probably ever again. Eye roll.

How many times have I said that I’M BACK!!? Let’s try this again. Get ready for parent-friendly, quick, minimal ingredients, healthy, TASTY snacks/goodies/what have you. This mama is making her comeback!

peanut butter cookie ingredients

Peanut Butter—4.75 oz, or ½ C

Honey—1.5 oz, or 3 TBL

Vanilla Extract—1 tsp

Coconut Sugar—1 TBL

Flour—3 oz, or 2/3 C

Baking Powder—½ tsp

Maca Powder—1 tsp

process

Preheat your oven to 350˚F.

In a medium sized bowl, sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder and maca.

In another small bowl, combine the peanut butter, honey and vanilla extract.

Add the wet into the dry, mix until combined.

Roll into balls, about 1 tablespoon in size.

Flatten each cookie and, if you wish, make a crisscross with a fork (in true PB cookie fashion!).

Bake for 10 minutes until they just begin to brown around the edges.

Remove from the oven to a cooling rack.

marshmallow

Recipe can be found here! I have cut this down into a quarter of the size, as you do not need that much!

chocolate dip ingredients

Semisweet Chocolate Chips—¼ C

Coconut Oil—2 tsp

process

Combine the chocolate and oil in a heat safe bowl.

Melting this for 20 second increments in the microwave is the quickest/easiest way to do so!

assembly

Once the PB cookies have cooled, spoon a dollop of the mallow on top.

If you have a torch, light these babies up! It’s a fun ‘indoor s’more’

Put these into the freezer to set up slightly while you melt the chocolate.

Once the chocolate is melted, dip each cookie halfway into the chocolate.

When you are finished coating in chocolate, place the tray in the freezer.

I have found that there store best in the freezer, as they are a nice refreshing treat!

Recipe makes 16 PB S’mores

Bon Appétit!

Chai Spice Snickerdoodles

It’s holiday baking season!!! The best time of the year!!!

Yeah yeah, I have been nonexistent on this bad boy for a majority of the year, but that’s life! When you buy a house, change jobs AND find out you’re pregnant, my little passion project that is this blog seems to go to the backburner. Or, well, into storage, where it gathered a lot of dust and you only remember it when you’re busting out the Christmas decorations mid-November…

All of this being said, I’m going to do my best to post on here as often as I can! Seeing as I am no longer working in a bakery, I actually miss doing it a lot! I’m no longer drained from 2am wake ups, my feet don’t hurt from standing on them all day long in a bakeshop, and I actually have true weekends now, so I’m going to enjoy this life as long as I can until the baby boy comes in February, and get back into this wonderful world of baking! 

Now that y’all are up to speed with my personal life, let’s talk COOKIES! I love a cookie, especially a holiday one. The flavors are incredibly inviting, the options are endless, and they are simple. That’s exactly what I love around the holidays. You can bake up a million different types of cookies, fill platters with them, gift them, bake them all day long and feel accomplished, plus, they’re easy! Sure, if you’re hand cutting them and decorating them with piped icing, that takes some time, but overall, they’re the most loving and forgiving of desserts!

 I first made these chai spiced snickerdoodles for my work Halloween party (and won 1stprize I might add!) and decorated them with some buttercream and spooky eyes for that mummy look. When I put these out, all I could think of was uhhh HOLIDAY COOKIE STAPLE! They’re soft, they’re filled with the perfect blend of spices, they’re cozy, I could go on. These chai spiced snickerdoodles are also light enough to not give you that belly ache when you eat a few after dinner, or for a snack…see, perfection.

The recipe is a nice creamed cookie method, and you have TOTAL control over what spices are added! Also, black pepper? Yep—that’s in chai! So it’s in these babies, too. If you want more or less of something, of course, that’s up to you and your taste buds. Also, the chocolate drizzle is another optional addition to these, but it’s a nice touch to the sweet outside of the cookie to put something slightly rich yet not overwhelming on them, so I promise that you won’t regret that drizzle!

WELL! Happy holiday baking season, let’s spend this next month turning up in the kitchen, belting out your favorite holiday tunes, putting lights in every open space, and just being full of joy and happiness (and cookies…)!

ingredients

Butter—13 oz, or 1 ½ C

Brown Sugar—8 oz, or 1 C

Eggs—2

Vanilla—2 tsp

Flour—15 oz, or 3 C

Baking Soda—1 tsp

Baking Powder—1 tsp

Salt—½ tsp

Cinnamon—2 tsp

Black Pepper—1 tsp

Maca Powder (optional)—1 tsp

Sugar—½ C

Cinnamon—1 ½ TBL

Ginger—1 tsp

Cloves—½ tsp

Nutmeg—1 tsp

Black Pepper—¼ tsp

Semisweet Chocolate—8 oz, melted

process

In the bowl of your mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy.

Add in the eggs and vanilla, and mix until combined. Scraping down the sides of the bowl is necessary for this step.

In a separate bowl, sift together all of the dry ingredients (from flour-maca powder).

With the mixer on low, slowly add in the dry ingredients to the creamed ingredients.

Mix until combined, scraping down when needed.

Wrap and transfer cookie dough into the refrigerator for a couple of hours.

When you are ready to bake cookies, preheat your oven to 350 F.

In a small bowl, combine the sugar and spices.

Roll your cookie dough into 1.5 oz balls, or about 2 TBL worth of dough—of course you can make these as small or as large as you’d like!

Roll each ball into the sugar spice mixture and place on a baking sheet lined with a Silpat or sprayed with nonstick spray.

Bake cookies 12-15 minutes. They will be slightly browned on the edges, with a nice soft center, this will be what keeps them so soft.

Place on a cooling rack until ready to coat in chocolate.

When you are ready to drizzle chocolate on these cookies, melt your chocolate (I like a nice 70%-80%) either in the microwave or in a double boiler over the stove.

To drizzle, you may either use a piping bag, a spatula or a spoon to drizzle as much or as little chocolate as you’d like over these cookies.

Allow to cool before storing. These can be stored at room temperature up to a week!

Recipe makes 2 dozen cookies.

Bon Appétit!

Whole Wheat Cookies Stuffed with Dulce de Leche

Happy New Year!

How were everyone’s holidays?!

I hope that they full of lots of family, friends, love, excitement—now let’s make 2017 even better than last!

Ohh 2016, you were quite a sassy little thing weren’t you, so moody, yet so wonderful. While there were many ups and downs, full of pounds of butter and sugar and chocolate chips, some loss, lots of growth and gain, quite a few running blisters, a wedding, a move, a new puppy, some really tough moments, followed by many unbelievably beautiful ones…I’d say 2016 is a year that will never be forgotten.

But the obvious question here: are y’all big New Year Resolution people?!

I used to be, always the normal “go to the gym more often,” “eat more whole foods,” “be more positive.” But I’ve slowly strayed away from that and moved more into the self-love: respecting yourself and your body, finding happiness, etc. One huge thing that I learned over the last year was that you can’t always control what happens, but you can control how your react to it, which is how I try and stay most centered.

So there. Voilà. My updated life outlook!

Along with that, baking will always be my most relaxing activity…I mean unless you want to include cuddling on the couch the pup and Roberto an activity…

I want this year to include a lot more wild experiments in the kitchen, whether it’s testing a recipe 500 times, or seeing how huge I can make a cookie and what silly thing I can stuff it with next, or how tall I can stack a cake, who knows—there will be no fear this year!

The first recipe of 2017 is a more simple one, slightly healthy (what’s up, whole wheat flour?!), but also packed full of homemade dulce de leche and dipped in chocolate…so nevermind with the H word.

As you know, I get random cravings, then I need to get into the kitchen and just bake until they are satisfied! Remember the caramel corn? All started with my need to go to an amusement park…sometimes I even surprise myself… Anyways! This recipe was exactly that: I wanted something salty dipped in chocolate, and a pretzel or a chip just wouldn’t do! Then it was something like oh, a cookie? But hmm, I bet it would be great stuffed with caramel, so let’s make dulce de leche! But still, hello, where’s the covered-in-chocolate part?! Right, a cookie, with all sorts of chocolate chips, a gooey inside, dipped in milk chocolate, sprinkled with salt, AND SPRINKLES!

Oh. Whole wheat flour for a slightly different taste, texture and maybe added nutrients?! It is the New Year isn’t it?           

It’s always fun to read my ridiculous thoughts, isn’t it? I did happen to bring a test batch of these cookies (that’s 30 of them…) to a relatively intimate NYE party, and they were all eaten! So, if that’s not proof that these are addicting and delicious, go grab a bottle of Champagne, then you’ll definitely be convinced!

ingredients

Butter (room temperature)—12 oz, or 3 sticks

Brown Sugar—12 oz, or 1 ½ C

White Sugar—4 oz, or ½ C

Eggs—3

Vanilla—2 tsp

Baking Soda—1 tsp

Salt—2 tsp

Whole Wheat Flour—17.5 oz, or 3 C

AP Flour—10.25 oz, or 2 C

Chocolate Chips—14 oz, or 2 C

Dulce de Leche—recipe here

Milk Chocolate Chips (melted)—2 cups

process

In the bowl of your mixer, cream together the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy.

Scrape down the sides of your bowl.

Add in the eggs and vanilla, mix until combined.

In a separate bowl, sift the flours, baking soda and salt.

With the mixer on low, slowly add in the dry ingredients.

Add in your chocolate chips.

Mix until all is combined.

Wrap the cookie dough in plastic wrap and allow to chill for at least an hour or two, until it has firmed up a bit.

While the dough is chilling, you can make your dulce de leche sauce—found here! This will take between 2-3 hours, so it’s a great time to get it done!

When you are ready to bake your cookies, preheat your oven to 350˚F.

By this time, your dough should have firmed up, and your dulce de leche should be finished and cooled.

Make dough balls that are about 1 oz, which is around a tablespoon—this can be eyeballed!

Flatten them out and make them into little “bowls” so that the filling will have a nice place to sit.

Put about a ½ tsp of dulce de leche in the middle.

Take another ball that is the same size, flatten and make another bowl out of it, this will be the top to your filled bottom cookie bowls.

Cover the filling with this second flattened piece, press the edges so that it seals in the dulce de leche, and then gently roll it in your hands so it makes a completely closed cookie dough ball.

This is one!

Do this with the remainder of your cookie dough and filling.

Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through.

It will be hard to tell when they are finished baking due to the color of the whole wheat flour, but they should be completely set on the edges and just slightly underbaked in the centers.

Allow to cool completely before dipping them in chocolate!

To make the chocolate for dipping, make a double boiler and melt about 2 cups of chocolate chips.

When the chocolate is completely melted and smooth, remove from the heat (make sure to wipe the bottom of the bowl to remove any of the warm water!), and dip each cooled cookie about halfway with chocolate.

Before the chocolate sets, sprinkle with just a little bit of salt and some sprinkles for extra color, crunch and excitement!

Whether or not you allow to chocolate to cool and set entirely…

Bon Appétit!

Candy Cookie Cake

Happy Halloween, my friends!

What are your plans?! Trick-or-treating? Passing out candy? Ridiculous parties? Or, if you’re like me, you'll be devouring all of the candy you had to buy, knowing that no one will come up to your apartment door ringing the bell…

Yes. That’s me. I can’t resist the candy aisle for any holiday, and when you can get an assorted bag of all of the best mini-size chocolates, you go for it! As a chocolate-obsessed gal, I just can’t help myself and I’m not ashamed. Funny story—I recently did a small “about me” for my job’s website and had to write about my favorite foods…all I could think of was, well, chocolate…

Yes, Katie’s favorite food is chocolate…who am I?!

ANYWAYS! Back to this glorious cookie cake. As I mentioned in my post here, cookie cakes are just like a dream of mine—and I always am tempted to buy one when walking past Mrs. Fields. So, of course, challenge accepted, and I had to make this, especially since I’m trying to use the pounds of Halloween candy that I bought so I don’t binge eat it every night.

I also feel like, if I was to get actual Trick-or-Treaters and if handing out baked goods was acceptable, this would be the most incredible treat ever!! Like, oh yeah, if you go to Katie’s house, you can get slices of a cookie cake that is stuffed with candy…basically a 2 for 1! Ahh in my wildest dreams…

AND what I love so much about this is that you can put anything you want in it—yum! I mean, Kitkats, Twix and Snickers are the best chocolates to choose, but I won’t judge if you chose something a little less exciting and wonderful. So, if you’re like me and you bought way too much candy, this is a perfect way to use it! Bake up a few of these cakes, invite over some friends, watch Hocus Pocus, or even Saw, drink so wine—really there’s nothing you can do wrong with this candy-filled cake. While I do sometimes miss the weeks of costume making and end up wearing basically a black dress with cat ears, this new tradition I have of putting on big sweats and stuffing my face with candy and wine (maybe “Crazy Dog Lady” is this costume?) is something that I can get on board with!

cookie ingredients

Butter—4 oz, or ½ C

Brown Sugar—3 oz, or 1/3 C

Sugar—1 oz, or 2 TBL

Eggs—1

Vanilla—½ tsp

Flour—6 oz, or 1 C

Salt—½ tsp

Baking Soda—½ tsp

Halloween Candy, chopped—3 oz, or ¾+ C

process

In the bowl of your mixer, cream together the butter and sugars until light and fluffy.

Add in the egg and vanilla.

Sift together the flour, salt and baking soda. Slowly add this into your creamed mixture.

Scrape down the sides of your bowl.

Add in your chopped candy (reserve a small handful)—whatever you like best!

In terms of Halloween candy, I chose chocolate because, to me, that goes yummiest with this cookie cake! From there, pick your favorites. Mine happen to be Twix, Snickers and Kit Kats, but the candy aisle is your oyster!

Spray a spring form pan or a tart pan with nonstick spray.

Press the cookie dough in the pan, leaving about ½ an inch around the edge so that the cookie can spread slightly.

Sprinkle the remaining chopped candy on top of the cookie dough.

Refrigerate for at least 30 minutes so that it will firm up.

When you are ready to bake, preheat your oven to 350˚ F.

Bake your cookie cake for about 20 minutes, until the edges are slightly golden.

The center may look underbaked, but it will finish baking from the heat of the pan outside of the oven.

Allow to cool completely before decorating!

buttercream ingredients

Butter—2 oz, or ¼ C

Shortening—0.5 oz, or 1 TBL

Confectioner’s Sugar, sifted—5 oz, or 1 C

Cocoa Powder, sifted—0.5 oz, or 2 TBL

Milk—0.5 oz, or 1 TBL

process

In the bowl of the your mixer, cream the butter and shortening until smooth and fluffy.

Sift together the confectioner’s sugar and the cocoa powder.

Slowly add this into the mixer, scraping down the sides when necessary.

Add the milk in about a teaspoon at a time—you may need more if you want it a little creamier.

Scrape down the sides of the bowl, and then turn the mixer up to medium-high to give the buttercream a nice, final whip.

When your cake is completely cooled, you can begin to decorate with the buttercream!

Put it into a piping bag with whichever tip you’d like to use—a star tip will make nice rosettes or a rope, but it’s whatever look you’re going for.

Pipe around the outside boarder, decorate with some sprinkles or some more candies of your choice, and devour!

Bon Appétit!