Recipe: Desserts

It has been a couple of crazy weeks- but the deadline has passed and life is calming down beautifully.

We had a family BBQ last weekend, and we were assigned to bring a dessert and help my dad bring all my siblings (my mom and sister were out of town). Since my youngest sister can't have wheat, I choose to do the family classic: Monster cookies!

The name comes from the original recipe, which made a huge amount of cookies. 12 cups of oatmeal makes a lot of cookies. I don't know how old the recipe is, but my mom's side of the family has had these at every family reunion I remember, including the ones with distant cousins. So I cut down the recipe and tweaked it to fit the random bits of sugar I had in the house.

Monster Kisses
1 mixing bowl
1 stirring spoon (you can use a mixer if you'd like)
measuring cups and spoons
cookie sheet (sprayed or very lightly greased)
cookie disher (those awesome spring loaded scoops!)
***

1/4 c. butter (that's half a stick), melted
1 c. brown sugar
1 c. peanut butter (don't skimp, it's better to have too much than not enough)
--
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 & 1/4 tsp. baking soda
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3 to 3 & 1/2 cups oatmeal (quick cooking or rolled)
About 24 Hershey's kisses and/or a smaller bag of M&Ms

***
1. Mix the melted butter, and brown sugar together until it becomes crumbly. Then add the peanut butter and mix well.
2. Add the eggs, vanilla, and baking soda. Beat the mixture until it becomes smooth and looks like just a lot of peanut butter. This is the glue of the cookie, and you don't want it to be grainy or not well mixed.
3. Add the oatmeal and mix it in until all of the little flakes of oatmeal are covered in the peanut buttery batter. If you put too much oatmeal in, you end up with peanut butter granola, not cookies.
4. Scoop the cookies onto the cookie sheet. Unwrap your Hershey's kisses and put one in the middle of each cookie. You'll probably need to help the dough form around the cookie, so make sure your hands are clean. If you don't have Kisses, shape each ball of cookie dough into a nest and put 3-6 M&Ms inside.
5. Bake at 350 degrees for 9-11 minutes and let them finish baking on the cookie sheet. They're supposed to look gooey and bubbly. Let them cool on the cookie sheet or they'll fall apart.
If the cookies are golden brown when you pull them out of the oven, they'll be burnt by the time you can get them off the cookie sheet without falling apart. When the cookie sheet is cooled completely, pull the cookies off and put in an airtight container.
They'll keep for up to a week. My family takes them backpacking and camping.

BONUS~
This weekend was my anniversary, so I made my husband some baby cobblers. Cobbler is my husband's favorite dessert.
Baby Strawberry Cobbler
1 cup chopped strawberries (we just used the fresh ones in the fridge)
1/4 cup or so of sugar
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
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1/4 cup graham cracker crumbs
1/2 Tbsp. brown sugar
1 Tbsp. oatmeal
1 tsp. spreadable butter

In one bowl mix the chopped strawberries with the sugar and lemon juice. Let it sit while you mix the graham cracker topping in a small ziploc bag.
Spray two little ramekins (the 7 oz. ones).
Sprinkle just enough graham cracker topping to cover the bottom of the ramekin. Add half of the strawberry mixture to each ramekin. Sprinkle the rest of the topping over the top. Bake at 350 degrees for 3-5 minutes (just long enough to cook the oatmeal). Cool in the fridge.
Serve with whipped topping!

Meatloaf

Sorry about being late- our basement apartment flooded last night. Thank goodness for good weatherstripping and a drain 3 feet inside the door. Nothing was harmed but my pant legs.

So for those nights when I really don't want to cook much of anything, or when I'm teaching kids to cook, one of my favorite meals to throw together is meatloaf. You really can't do much to ruin it. In fact, it's so easy, I never bother to measure.

Meatloaf
mixing bowl
spoon/really clean hands
casserole dish
***
roughly equal parts hamburger/ground meat and oatmeal
1 egg
4 tsp. Worchestershire sauce (I love this stuff, so I tend to add a lot).
ketchup
BBQ sauce
garlic salt
pepper
any other seasonings/sauces that smell good (I used oregano and sage last night, but I've even put jam in it. Grape or Apricot Jam work best. Dried mushrooms or onions also work well. Experiment! As long as it smells good, it will taste good. Besides, drenching the finished product in ketchup or BBQ sauce will cover any mistakes you made).
***
1. WASH YOUR HANDS! Especially if you're planning on mixing it with your fingers (fun, but I personally hate the feel of it on my bare hands). Then set the oven to 350 degrees to preheat.
2. Put the meat and the oatmeal in the bowl. Mix together until it forms one gloopy mess. (Eventually, you won't be able to tell the difference between the oatmeal and the meat).
3. Add the egg and sauces to the meat mixture and mix it in thoroughly. You don't want any spice hotspots.
4. WASH YOUR HANDS if you were mixing with your fingers. Then spray a casserole dish with non-stick spray and dump in the meatloaf. Spread it out evenly across the bottom of the dish. If you want, use the ketchup to write your initials on the meatloaf before you put it in the oven.
5. Put the meatloaf in the oven and bake for 25-45 minutes. Thicker meatloafs take more time than thin ones.

Make sure to cook up some vegetables and add some fruits to make it a complete meal. It tastes meaty, but fills you up like oatmeal. And it's made from things you normally have in your house, so it's an easy meal anytime. It's also really easy to swap out ingredients- no hamburger? Just use other ground meat. Turkey works well with rosemary, oregano, and thyme. No oatmeal, use breadcrumbs (although why you would have breadcrumbs but no oatmeal- let's just say it never happened at my house). Mix and match the spices to find the blends your family enjoys. Enjoy!