As Christmas is coming super fast I am starting to make a list of gifts for teachers/the crossing guard/and after school staff. I usually just make something. Last year I made home made chocolate covered pretzels (with sprinkles by my daughter!)
This year I am just making a ton of cookies and I varied my usual recipe so I wanted to test it out last night.
This recipe believe it or not is based off a recipe on my bag of flour!
Ingredients
1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
1 1/2 sticks of butter or margarine
1 tsp. vanilla
1 large egg
2 cups quick cooking oats (which I smashed in zip lock bag with a rolling pin)
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
6 TB. chocolate chips (chopped to make it seem like there is more!)
1/4 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup ground flax seed
In a big mixing bowl, beat the brown sugar and butter until smooth. Add the egg and beat again. Add the rest of the ingredients until its all combined. I put 11 cookies on each cookie sheet. These don’t spread a lot, so its ok if they are close together.
Bake for about 10 minutes or until they are lightly browned on the top.
Leave on the cookie sheet for a good 5 minutes before taking them off. They are super soft right out of the oven.
Once cooled I melted a little Chocolate Flavored Almond Bark (chocolate used for making candy). It’s right next the the chocolate chips in the baking aisle. Drizzle the chocolate over the top. The best part about the Almond Bark is that it dries super quick!
This is what the package looks like:
The best part about these cookies is that they are super moist but chewy. I kind of like that vs. a crunchy cookie.
I plan to get cute cookie tins at the dollar store. They even have really cute Holiday plates that I may use as well and cover with colored saran wrap.
AND, just because I was curious, (and because I had to try one….or two!) I figured out the calories.
It made 44 cookies and each cookie was 138 calories and 8 grams of fat…. so not too bad!
Do you make/bake gifts for the Holidays to give to teachers, helpers, babysitters, etc???
Other ideas with almond bark:
You can melt a package of almond bark in a microwave safe bowl and add a bag of almonds. Stir until combined, and put a tablespoon at a time on waxed paper to make chocolate covered almonds.
You can dip pretzel rods in the chocolate and cover in sprinkles.
Take a sheet of graham crackers, and separate into 4 pieces. Take 2 pieces and put peanut butter in between, then dip in the chocolate. I make these ever Holiday and they taste like home made kit kat bars!
You can also make peppermint bark using the white chocolate variety:
2 lbs. white almond bark
1 1/2 c. crushed peppermint candy
Melt white almond bark in a microwave safe bowl until melted (about 2 minutes, stirring after each 30 seconds in the microwave). Crush either peppermint candy canes or peppermint hard candy in blender until it is powder. Meanwhile, line a cookie sheet with tin foil. Mix hard crushed candy with melted white almond bark. Spread on lined cookie sheet. Let it dry and chop into pieces.
YUM!
I like to do chocolate covered pretzels then rolled then in the Heath Bar pieces you can buy – I get rave reviews for those π
I am a huge believer in baked goods as gifts!
I always bake presents for people. It feels a lot more “giving” to me, plus it’s cheaper to whip up a bunch of batches of something, rather than seek out a bunch of individual gifts. My mom’s a teacher and I know that they already get tons of knick knacks and useless stuff, so why not a nice plate of cookies they won’t have to worry about storing since it’ll be gone in a few days!
I was just looking at those cute tins at the Dollar Tree! They also had these cool cookie plate covers over in the grocery section of mine – they were plastic bags fit to drop a plate of cookies in and then tie the top, almost how you make for a big gift basket? There were all cute holiday designs, I thought that was a nice alternative.
take butterscotch bark, melt,
take two ritz (everything is better on a ritz), little peanut butter between to look like an orange oreo and dip in the chocolate…
salty and sweet and GOOD EATS!
and sickeningly fattening if you eat 12 in one sitting… I know
Love the flax seed in your cookies – they look yummy!
Yummy cookies, such a nice gift!
Ooooh, looks good. They also look like those big, chewy cookies with crisp edges. Perfect.
Mmm you’ve combined all of my favorite things in this cookie. I am a chewy person as well. Crunchy just doesn’t do it for me.