Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Bars

Chocolate Chip Peanut Butter Bars

Ingredients: 

1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce 

1 cup peanut butter

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 tsp baking soda

1.8 tsp salt

1/4 cup + 2TBSP flour

2/3 cup sugar

1/4 cup chocolate chips

2TBSP milk (*if needed)

1.) Preheat oven to 350  degrees. Grease 8 inch pan or line with parchment. 

2.) Gently heat peanut butter then add in applesauce and vanilla. 

3.) In separate bowl, stir baking soda, salt, flour, sugar and chocolate chips. Pour dry ingredients into wet and continue to stir. It will seem very dry at first. If needed, add in 2 TBSP of milk. It will eventually become gooey like cookie dough (patience 😀).

4.) Transfer batter to prepared pan. Bake 10 minutes. When you take bars out of oven, the top will look set but very undercooked underneath. This is OK! Leave them to cool for at least 20 minutes to allow time to firm up (trust me...this part is HARD...).

Lemonies

My son LOVES these and has recently requested them so I thought I would go ahead and post the recipe while it's on my brain. Full of yummy lemon flavor and oh so moist, these lemon "brownies" are just what you need to satisfy your sweet tooth! But hard to eat just one so might want to plan to make these for a party or family get together so you don't devour them all......or not. 😜

Lemonies



Ingredients

1 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tbsp lemon zest
3/4 cup butter, melted and cooled
2 eggs
3 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp vanilla
Lemon glaze (recipe follows)

1.) Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease an 8-inch square pan or line pan with non-stick foil.

2.) Mix flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and zest together using a wire whisk.

3.) Add melted butter, lemon juice, eggs and vanilla and stir until completely combined.

4.) Pour batter into pan and bake for 20-25 minutes or until knife inserted in center comes out clean.

5.) Remove from oven and cool.

6.) Pour glaze over lemonies and allow to set before cutting into bars.



Lemon Glaze

1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar
2 tbsp lemon juice
1 tsp lemon zest

Sift sugar into a medium bowl. Add lemon juice and zest and stir until combined and smooth.

Fudgy Cocoa Brownies

Haven't really cooked much this week. Been cleaning out the freezer of leftovers.....again. Seems to be the case just about every other week. Get groceries, cook big meals, freeze leftovers, re-heat and eat leftovers the following week. Hey--it saves on the grocery bill! Plus, who doesn't like making one meal and getting one or two more out of it? So here's sweet treat for now. Not healthy at all but I had a mad hankering for them and they definitely satisfied my sweet tooth!

Fudgy Cocoa Brownies

1/2 cup butter, melted
1 tbsp cooking oil (coconut oil works great too)
1&1/8 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
dash salt

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Lightly grease an 8x8 inch square baking pan with cooking spray. Line with parchment paper; set aside. 

3. Combine hot, melted butter, oil and sugar together in a medium bowl. Whisk well for about a minute. Add the eggs and vanilla; beat until lighter in color (another minute).

4. Sift in flour, cocoa and dash salt. Gently fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until JUST combined (do NOT over beat as doing so will affect the texture of your brownies).

5. Pour batter into prepared pan, smoothing the top out evenly. *I love to add extra chocolate chips on top....IF I can get it into the pan before my hubby licks the whole bowl of batter....

6. Bake for 20-25 minutes or until center of brownies in the pan no longer jiggles.

7. Remove and allow to cool to room temperature before cutting into squares.