Where there is a will, there is a way

While in the US these 4 months, I was introduced to the frappuccino and fell head over heals. The last one I had was 12 hours before we got on the plane. Somehow I found myself in Target with Ken buying some last minute items to take back to Brazil. There was a Starbucks at the entrance, so while Ken was off hunting down what we needed, I had my last Java Chip Frappuccino...

This is a recipe (from my sister once again!) that will hold me over just nicely till I make my way back to the US again. In fact, I may never step foot in another Starbucks again!

I had been looking forward to making this ever since we got home a week ago. At the grocery store, the ingredients started to come together. Mixed it up when I got home and had it chilling in the fridge for that "mid-evening" relax time after all the pressing things of the day were done.

FRAPPUCCINO

Mix in a 2 quart pitcher:

1 quart (4 cups) Chocolate milk

1 can sweetened condensed milk

8 oz. (1 cup) very strong coffee (either regular or decaff)

Store in refrigerator until ready to use. When ready to make your drink, put ice cubes or crushed ice in blender and pour enough mix in to cover the ice. Blend and enjoy!

A shot of Ready Whip and a little chocolate syrup makes a nice finishing touch. I priced a can of it here at my local grocery store: $ 6.00 a can. In that case, I think I can do without the whipped cream. :)

Starbucks, eat your heart out!

Just for a Chocolate Chip Cookie

I bought the 1 lb bag of these little guys...the colors are a little more "girlie" than I had anticipated, but once baked into the cookies, no one notices any more.

Friday afternoon I went downtown to take care of some business. When I got there, I discovered that it was impossible to do what needed to be done. So now what?!?! Instead of heading back home, I went to my bakery supply store and bought a pound of granulated yeast. Then I remembered a place where I had seen teeny tiny chocolate chips a long time ago. Was it Christmas time?

To make a long story short I searched and searched, but they don't "exist" any more (meaning "there are out of stock"). Bummer. By this time there was no stopping that irresistable urge to make cookies, so instead of chocolate chips, I decided on something similar to mini M&M's. These little guys are much more colorful and MUCH more available than chocolate chips.

Back home I threw open the cookbook and found a recipe. After noticing that the recipe was unusually large, I cut it in half and started throwing everything in the mixing bowl.

That's when I noticed something was not quite right. This was a special recipe to make a "mix" that you store on the shelf until you are good and ready to bake the cookies. Just scoop out a few cups of the mix, add eggs and vanilla and away you go!

Now what?!?! With everything in the bowl, I was already committed. Even a "half" recipe was going to produce a very LARGE amount of dough. Oh, my. What did I get myself into?!?!?

10 dozen cookies later, I finally turned off the oven totally exhausted. The girls were sure they had died and gone to heaven and the house smelled amazingly wonderful for the rest of the evening. I froze most of them in the hopes that I won't gain 20 lbs (you know...out of sight, out of mind) and that there will still be a few left two days from now.

Maybe it wasn't so bad after all. After the trauma of all that baking, Ken had compassion on me and took us out for supper.