Luella’s Perfect Chocolate Cookies

I finally started my Christmas baking. Now if you like soft chocolate chip cookies, that will not harden when they cool or even if they happen to last a day or two in the cookie jar, then you will love my mom’s perfect recipe. She use to make each of us kids, that’s right 5 of us at least three to five dozen of these a piece at Christmas time, along with many other goodies. She would start baking very early and bag them up and freeze them until she was ready to make up our Christmas plates, these cookies were just as soft upon Christmas Eve as they were the day she took them out of the oven.

• 2 1/4 cup flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 cup butter softened
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 3/4 cup brown sugar
• 1 small box instant vanilla pudding
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 12 0z chocolate chip
• 1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Combine first three ingredients in a small bowl. Beat butter sugars, pudding and vanilla in a mixing bowl, add one egg at a time, mixing until well blended. Slowly add flour, baking soda and salt, mix until well blended. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts.
Bake in a 375 degrees oven for 8 1/2 minutes.
Enjoy!

More Yummy Cookies

Before starting back into the deep cleaning, I thought a batch of cookies were needed to set the mood. I had pulled out some of my banana the night before, and had looked through many recipes for banana cookies. Some called for allspice, some for ginger, some called for baking soda and no baking powder, while others called for baking powder and no baking soda. I finally decided since we loved the pumpkin cookies so well I would just go with that recipe and substitute the pumpkin for the banana. You can find that recipe here.

 

I was not in the least disappointed in how they turned out. To be honest this recipe was just perfect for these delicious cookies. From all the other recipes I found I was afraid that with the different spices we might loose the true flavor of the banana. This recipe was perfect. You walk by my cookie tin and you can just smell the most wonderful aroma of banana. It makes you stop and just want to grab one right there on the spot.

Selena thought they were pretty yummy too!

Then with these all baked, and the mess cleaned up, I was off to wash mini blinds. Fun, oh so much fun but a task that truly needed to be done.

Pumpkin Cookies

Last night I decided to finally get in and bake some pumpkin cookies. This was a new recipe I found, and I must admit they were really good. Soft, not too sweet, truly my type of cookie. They reminded me of a good spice cookie with the flavor of pumpkin.

Pumpkin Cookies

2 1/2 cups flour                                                                                                      

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 cup pumpkin

1 egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cream butter and sugar in large mixing bowl. Mix in pumpkin, egg and vanilla until smooth. Gradually add dry ingredients. Batter will be very light and fluffy.

Drop by teaspoon onto cookie sheet and bake at 350 degrees for 15 minutes.

Allow to cool.

Drizzle with glaze:

2 cups sifted powder sugar, 1 tablespoon melted butter, 3 tablespoon milk, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract.

My family truly enjoyed these, but my family isn’t that hard to satisfy when it comes to cookies. I am the picky one when it comes to sweets, so I will say they were very delicious.

 

 

 
 

How To Make Homemade Bread Like It Came From The Store

One of the things that many in my family ask all the time is, “How do you make your homemade bread so it is as light as the bread you buy in the store? What is your secret?” I thought this would be a good time to address my tips of making homemade bread. I use a basic recipe but make many changes that I have found to be successful.
Here is the recipe then I will describe what I do as I walk you through the steps of how I make my bread.

• 2 packages active dry yeast or 4 1/2 teaspoons yeast
• 1/4 cup warm water (105 to 115 degrees)
• 2 cups lukewarm milk (scalded then cooled)
• 3 tablespoons sugar
• 3 tablespoons shortening
• 1 tablespoon salt
• 7 to 8 cups four
• margarine or butter, softened.

Heat oven to 150 degrees with a pan of water on bottom rack.
My first secret is to make sure my water is exactly 115 degrees. My milk, I only scald about 1 1/2 cups of milk, then cool it down with another 1/2 cup of milk, but I make sure it is 105 degrees instead of lukewarm.
Dissolve the yeast in warm water, Stir in milk, sugar, shortening, salt and 4 cups of flour. Now here I do not just stir these ingredients in, but I beat them in with a wooden spoon for 15 minutes. I mean I beat it in, I have actually punctured a hole in the bottom of a plastic bowl before during this process.
Now here is the time I put the spoon away and start adding the flour. I do not add all the flour, let’s see since I already used 4 cups I probably only add about 2 1/2 to 3 cups more flour, just to where the dough is no longer sticky to my hands. I am truly only using 6 1/2 to 7 cups flour and this truly has a lot to do with the humidity in your kitchen, the higher the humidity the less flour you will have to use. I will a lot of times turn on my dishwasher and do this part during the dry cycle, this is providing more humidity, or I might put a pan of water on the stove on low to steam.
Turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface, I only use a few tablespoons of flour for this and kneed. I kneed for another 15 minutes.
Grease a glass bowl with shortening, Rub the dough around the bowl so dough is greased. Cover with a towel, turn off oven and put bowl in on middle rack for one hour for the dough to rise double it’s size. To know that it has doubled in size poke lightly with two fingers, indentations should remain in dough.
Remove from oven, along with water, turn on Oven to preheat to 420 degrees. Flip dough out on counter, and cut in half. Roll each half out with a rolling pin to measure about 18 x 9 inches. Roll from small end, pinch loose end into dough. Tuck the sides in with a little flip under the loaf. Place in greased pans. Cover with a towel and allow to rise for an hour. Bake in oven for 25 minutes, NO LONGER. Remove from pans onto cooling rack. Brush top with softened butter.
Now you know how I make my bread so that it is as light as store bread. Enjoy!

My Favorite Peach Cobbler

Selena wanted to bake something today. I decided it was a good day for Peach Cobbler. I got this recipe from my mother-in-law, it is so simple and delicious.
1/4 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1/4 tsp salt
Mix all ingredients in a bowl with a hand mixer.
In a square baking dish pour in one large can of peaches with juice. (now I like more peaches so I use two cans of peaches making sure to drain the juice off one can) Sprinkle 1/4 cup sugar over top of peaches.  If you desire a thicker sauce add 1 tablespoon of flour.
Using a large table spoon drop the batter mixture over the top of peaches, do not smooth it out it will be more like biscuits dropped on top.

Bake for 45 – 50 minutes at 375 degrees.


I like to serve mine warm. You can top it off with ice cream, that is really yummy but all we had was chocolate ice cream in the freezer, I didn’t think that would be very delicious. What did Selena think?

Obviously you can tell from her body language she didn’t really care for it, which I truly didn’t think she would since she doesn’t like peaches. Papa and I sure loved it though.
One hint, do not double this recipe, it will not bake properly. When I have doubled the recipe, I make two separate batches of the topping. We have never been able to figure out why doubling the batter at one time results in it not baking correctly.