I hate coconut!

Something to do with the stringy texture in my mouth. And both of this week's cookies included it. They were also both drop cookies, which we've done before, so overall, not my most favourite class. Coconut Macaroons include whipped egg whites, icing sugar, coconut, ground almonds & lemon zest. They are then scooped onto onto a tray and baked for about 20 minutes. Once cooled, they are dipped in chocolate.

Apricot Coconut cookies include more of the dreaded coconut, dried apricots, oats, and the usual suspects {butter, sugar, flour...}. They also include orange juice and zest, which gave them a fresh, healthy taste. Yes, even when I'm not excited by our recipes, I still want to sample them!

Cookie coffee cake

This Raspberry Cream Cheese Coffee Cake had a dense, almost cookie-like texture. The batter included the basics: flour, sugar, butter, sour cream, eggs, baking powder & soda. It was then piped into the pan {a bit messy! a tough one to work with} and the filling {cream cheese, sugar & eggs, raspberry jam, sliced almonds, cinnamon sugar} was spread in the center and baked for an hour at 350 degrees.

The ultimate coffee cake

Loved this! This Chocolate Chip Sour Cream Coffee Cake was the basic recipe for all coffee cakes; the chocolate chips can be substituted with anything.

As with the other coffee cakes I've made so far, super-easy to make and no secret ingredients {butter, eggs, sugar, sour cream milk...}. Cinnamon sugar was layered in, which I thought was unusual for a chocolate coffee cake. Baking time was typical too: almost an hour at 350 degrees.

No mint. No chocolate. No likey.

These Choco-Mint Pinwheels contain: butter, brown sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour, baking powder and milk. The dough is then cut in half; cocoa powder is mixed into one half and peppermint into the other. A piece of each colour of dough is rolled flat and one laid on top of the other, then rolled into a log, refrigerated and cut into pieces. Baking time is 10 minutes. Even though we used 2 tsp of peppermint extract instead of the suggested 1/2 teaspoon, all we got was a minty after-taste. Peppermint oil would definitely be better to use and I couldn't taste the chocolate at all! Not my favourite but they made for a nice photo.

Straight from the ice box

Is it just me or do these look like shrimp cakes? Orange Pecan {Ice Box} cookies contain: butter, white & brown sugar, eggs, orange zest, flour, coconut and pecans. What we learned this week was how to roll dough into a log, refrigerate it {which makes it easier to cut as the dough has a chance to set} and then cut it into pieces. This log was rolled in pecans before being baked for 10 minutes. They taste pretty good.