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Tina

Double Mint Cookie Bars

As St. Patty’s Day approaches, I’m seeing more green colored food online (i.e. pinterest.com and all the various social media outlets). I simply can’t go there. Not for the lack of spirit, but because it looks unappealing to me. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind a little green color in my food, but I’ve never been one to want green eggs and ham. I do, however, love mint and mint is notoriously green colored (even if not naturally so).

In honor of the one day a year when everyone is Irish, I was inspired to create these bar cookies which are loaded with mint chocolate chips and mint flavored wafer cookies.

Double Mint Cookie Bars Recipe
(Makes 16 servings)

Ingredients:

1 and 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
7 tablespoons butter
1/3 cup white sugar
1/3 cup light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
3/4 cup semi-sweet mint chocolate chips (I used Nestle Dark Chocolate & Mint Morsels)
1/2 cup crushed mint cookies (equivalent to about 7 cookies) (I used Keebler Grasshopper Mint & Fudge Cookies)

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
Line a 8 x 8 baking pan with tin foil, grease it, and set it aside.
Whisk together the flour, baking soda, and salt. Set aside the dry ingredients.
Cream the butter, white sugar, and light brown sugar.
Mix in the vanilla extract and egg.
Gradually mix in the dry ingredients.
Mix in the mint chocolate chips and crushed mint cookies.
Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake it in the preheated oven for about 23 minutes or until a tester inserted comes out clean.

Store it in an air tight container at room temperature or in a freezer friendly bag in the freezer.

I love cookies, but I think I love bar cookies even more because they are much faster to whip up.

I had very strict requirements for these bar cookies.

1. They must tasty minty, but not too minty. I don’t want it to seem like you just rinsed with minty mouth wash.

2. The cookie base must be less sweet than a typical chocolate chip cookie because the mint chocolate chips and mint wafer cookies will add a lot of sweetness. I like sweets just as much as the next person, heck probably even more, but I don’t want it to feel like a cavity just formed by eating one.

3. I loved the idea of adding mint flavored wafer cookies to these bar cookies. They add a great crunchy texture and they make them taste more minty. The trick here is to not add too many wafers to the batter or to beat them up too much so they end up lost as minty chocolate sand. Either of those problems and you’ll feel like you’re only eating mint in the finished product instead of enjoying the cookie base itself.

4. As I mentioned earlier, I don’t mind a little color to my goodies (whether it’s green for St. Patrick’s day or pink for Valentine’s Day). However, it has to be just the right amount of green because otherwise it doesn’t seem natural and quite frankly grosses me out.

Wow, that is a lot to expect from a bar cookie but I definitely think I nailed it here!

Minty. Check. Sweet. Check. Pretty. Check. Outrageously delicious. Check. Okay, maybe that last point was not part of the four goals that I mentioned, but that’s an obvious goal for every creation.

They are super chewy and soft and I’m in love with them. Can one really be in love with a dessert? Yep.

What’s your favorite food to enjoy St. Patrick’s Day?

Rating:

Source: Tina’s Chic Corner

If you love mint, then you’ll also love these Peppermint Patty Stuffed Chocolate Chip Bars

Here are some of my other favorite chocolate chip cookie bars.

Coffee Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

Double Chocolate Chip Blondies

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Tina

Spicy Chorizo And Pasta

There are days that I think I might become a vegetarian. I’m not a fan of preparing meat because I don’t like to touch it raw and I have to be in the mood to eat it (as weird as the latter part might sound). However, there are times when I crave meat. Like a lot. You know, because it’s delicious. This time my craving led me to chorizo, a delightfully spicy sausage that is common in Spanish cuisine. The result was this outrageous pasta dish that will keep you coming back for seconds and thirds.

This pasta has a creamy pink sauce and is loaded with spicy goodness of chorizo and Pepper Jack cheese.

Spicy Chorizo And Pasta Recipe
(About 6 servings)

Ingredients:

1 pound chorizo sausage, halved lengthwise and sliced (See Note below)
1 onion, finely chopped (equivalent to about 1 cup)
4 garlic cloves, minced
3 cups low sodium chicken broth
1 (10 ounce) can diced tomatoes and green chilies (I used Ro-Tel)
1/2 cup heavy cream
12 ounces dry pasta (I used Campanelle pasta)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 cups shredded Pepper Jack cheese (divided per the directions)

Directions:

In a large pot over Medium heat, cook the sliced chorizo and finely chopped onion until the chorizo sausage is lightly browned (about 8 to 10 minutes).
Add the minced garlic and cook for about 1 additional minute.
Stir in the chicken broth, can of diced tomatoes and green chilies, heavy cream, dry pasta, salt, and pepper. Raise the heat and bring it to a boil.
Once it reaches boiling, reduce the heat to Medium-Low, cover the pot and let it simmer until the pasta is cooked (about 15 minutes). Stir it frequently during this time.
Stir in 1/2 cup of the shredded cheese.
Set your oven on the broil setting.
Pour the pasta mixture into a 9 x 13 baking dish.
Sprinkle the remainder of the shredded cheese on top.
Place the baking dish on a high rack in the oven and broil it until the cheese is melted and slightly brown (about 3 to 5 minutes).

* Note, fresh chorizo is soft so if you use like I did today, I found it easiest to do the following: Cut the chorizo sausage in half lengthwise. Cook the halves. Then slice them into chunks and return them to the pot. If you decide to remove the sausage casing, do so AFTER you have cooked the sausage. Otherwise you will essentially have spicy ground pork.

Store it in an air tight container in the refrigerator.

Are you looking for a quick and easy meal? Who isn’t? I made this in dish in about 30 minutes and it was super easy. It won’t win any health awards, but sometimes it’s worth indulging in a meal like this one from time to time.

All the ingredients are cooked in one pot, even the pasta! (Well, if you ignore the casserole dish for broiling the cheese on top.) I’m loving that because that means less dishes to wash. The sauce will thicken up quite a bit as it gets absorbed into the pasta. The end result won’t look like weird pasta soup like you see at this stage.

The chorizo, Pepper Jack cheese and chilies from the Ro-Tel make this dish awesomely spicy. (Though my husband still put Tabasco on it when he ate it.) Add pasta to the party and you’ve got one chic meal! Can a meal be chic? In my world, yes, yes it can.

Broil or not to broil? You can certainly save yourself the few minutes and a dirty casserole dish if you eat the pasta straight from the pot. However, I also love the magic of slightly browned cheese that you get from broiling it. You can’t go wrong either way.

Mmm cheesy-tacular.

Are you a vegetarian? I’m curious how many vegetarian readers I might have. Is that even a fair question after a post involving sausage? I suppose you could be a vegetarian looking at recipes for your partner or kids who aren’t. The question made sense in my head.

Rating: