Little afternoon treats

Hi everyone!

You know those high school superlatives, such as Best Dressed, Most Likely to be Famous, Most Likely to be a Millionaire, Class Clown, etc.? I always got pegged as either Most Likely to Succeed (ha, now that’s a joke if I ever heard one) or Best Dressed (because clearly, my uniform of bright pink rain boots and black leggings was considered “stylish” then).

Well I officially nominate myself for Most Likely to Get Hurt.

I don’t mean get hurt emotionally; I’m an emotional rock! Nothing can penetrate this icy, non-porous heart of mine! (Nothing, except kittens, that is.) No, I’m much more likely to bruise and stub and scratch and wear-n-tear myself down.

I ran the Berkeley firetrail this morning, even though “ran” should be used loosely considering I walked the first little bit until I got to a monstrous freaking hill and then pleasantly jogged my way along, but what with the uneven terrain and muddy ground and my unaligned hips and my shin splints and also probably just bad form, I screwed up my ankle and knee.

And now I’m that loser limping along. Most Likely to Whine About Being Most Likely to Get Hurt.

By the time I dragged my butt back home, I was dying for something to soothe my very unemotional tumultuous emotions. Emotional eating? What emotional eating?

I present to you the ingredients list for possibly the best banana bread recipe in cookie form.

This recipe is Courtney’s from Sweet Tooth Sweet Life but I made a few teensy tweaks to it. I used only 1/8 cup of sweetener (such as Splenda) and 1/4 cup of brown sugar since I didn’t want it to be too sweet, and bananas usually add enough sweetness themselves. I also cut the amount of chocolate chips down to 1/2 cup of dark chocolate chips, and reduced the butter from 2 tbsp to 1 tbsp.

Despite reducing the butter amount, I still had a hard time really creaming it into the sugar and banana nicely. Look at all those floating chunks! Pretty scary.

Fun fact – so you know why a lot of recipes emphasize stirring slowly or for only 45 seconds or not over-mixing? It’s because if you over-mix, the liquid will start to develop the gluten in your flour, turning your cookies or brownies from soft and tender to more tough (think the consistency of bread).

Therefore, if you’re mixing and you still have to add in your chocolate chips or whatever, add them in when you still have a few flour streaks to try and keep your cookies soft!

Glorious, glorious.

These cookies didn’t spread as much probably because of the reduced butter, but I swear they taste just like banana bread – soft and gooey and tender and a little bit chewy and absolutely derrricious!

Put to the friend taste test:

Such solemn faces, but I think Hannah and Kenzie liked them! Well, they better have or else I’ll have to hunt them down and kill them. I KNOW WHERE YOU LIVE, LADIES.

And while I was busy snapping photos of them eating my cookies, I noticed something super awesome!

Our tomato plant that we had bought over the summer and subsequently COMPLETELY failed to take care of has somehow survived through all the non-watering, and cold and wind and rain, and shabby initial attempts at staking, and other forms of neglect, and produced little cute baby tomatoes!

There was even a new little green bugger! What a pleasant surprise!

Awwies, I feel like such a proud momma, despite having done nothing. Those babies grow up so fast and turn out so well… *happy sniffle*

Question for you all:

What high school superlatives were you guys most often nominated for?

and

Have you ever had something turn out okay despite doing everything to mess it up?

P.S. Cookie recipe found here!