Healthified Cosmic Brownies

February 19, 2021 Amanda Plott

So… I’ve been missing for 3 days now. I live in Texas and in case you didn’t hear the news, the entire state was basically without power for the most of this past week - during some of the coldest weather we’ve had in decades. It wasn’t fun. On top of being without power, we were also put on a ‘boil water’ notice. Anyone know how to boil water when you don’t have power? It’s tricky.

Thankfully, my home got it’s power back yesterday morning. And we’re (so far) one of the few houses to have both heat AND running water for the time being. I’m still being cautious with how much electricity being used as we try and keep the grid stable, but as soon as the lights and heat came on, I was ready to get baking. Nothing much is more comforting than chocolate. And these Healthified Cosmic Brownies are chocolate on top of chocolate and rainbow bits!…

Honey Tea Loaf Cake

February 15, 2021 Amanda Plott

When it snows. I bake. Okay, okay. In all honesty, I planned on making this Honey Tea Loaf Cake long before there was confirmation of snow in the forecast. But, it was a really nice treat to get to enjoy on a frosting winter' morning. And goodness gracious is it frosty today! Seriously. We have the coldest ‘high’ temperature on record today in Austin.

This Honey Tea Loaf Cake is… amazing. The pictures just don’t do it justice. The texture is very much so akin to a pound cake in that it’s dense, moist, and also somehow light. This loaf cake is par-baked before being finished off baking with a honey drizzle soaking into the loaf. The end result is this delicious cake with a natural line of honey ‘filling’…

Circus Animal Cookie Blondies

February 7, 2021 Amanda Plott

If you love blondies and you love circus animal cookies then you are going to go nuts over these Circus Animal Cookie Blondies! Blondies are basically a vanilla (non-chocolate) version of brownies. So they’re a bit more dense and moist than cake.

These blondies are super easy to make and are whipped up all in one bowl. Plus, look at how colorful they are! With circus animal cookies baked right in, they have that frosted cookie crunch among the sprinkles and blondie. It’s basically heaven on a plate for me since circus animal cookies are one of my favorite guilty pleasures…

Giant Chocolate Chip Unicorn Cookies

January 28, 2021 Amanda Plott

Immediately after I made my last batch of GIANT cookies, my kid was already asking me to make some more. Of course, I didn’t want to do them exactly the same, so today I decided to go with just colorful sprinkles and a variety of chocolate chips. That’s right, a variety. Big, regular, small. Some dark, some semi-sweet.

The end result was some more amazingly delicious GIANT cookies that had something different in every bite. Some bites were full of chocolate, others of sweet candy sprinkles, and then others were a delicious cookie.

Triple Chocolate Cheesecake (Instant Pot)

January 22, 2021 Amanda Plott

So, here’s the thing. Sometimes when you’re trying to eat better, feel better, and be better… you need to indulge a little bit. One of the many mantras that I try to keep in my own mind is that you can ‘eat whatever you want so long as you cook/make it yourself.’ I think the idea behind it is that you would burn off as many calories in making your food as you would eating it, or at least enough to counter balance it.

That means, today we’re having a Triple Chocolate Cheesecake and I’m not going to feel guilty about eating it. Why? Because I made it from scratch and I did my very best to make it better-for-you while still tickling that chocolate craving itch with all the richness and decadence that comes along with it….

Giant Valentine Cookies

January 8, 2021 Amanda Plott

Nothing says ‘I love you’ quite like a GIANT cookie. these big cookies are about 4-5 regular sized cookies in ONE. BIG. COOKIE. And do you want to know a secret? They’re made with HALF the amount of sugar as the originals. That’s right, I was able to shave off half the sugar by making a couple of simple swaps.

The first swap that I made was subbing in a brown sugar/stevia blend for the regular brown sugar. I also swapped half of the original sugar for a granulated stevia. the important part here is the granulated part. While you could use any other natural sweetener that measures cup for cup like sugar, I prefer the granulated one since it doesn’t have the usual fake sweetener taste…