Brown Butter Double Fudge Chocolate Chip Cookies

I know the name of this recipe is a mouthful. But seriously... Somewhere in the heavens cookie gods are crying tears of joy thanks to this woman, and all that she bakes, then inspires me to bake... and devour half the batch with my boyfriend in one day during a Lost marathon. Calories don't exist if you don't count them, right?

Now, they might not be the prettiest cookies that cookie gods have ever seen, but it doesn't have to be pretty to taste so completely delicious.

So yesterday I was craving chocolate like no one's business, but I also knew that if I made something, it would have to be something Noah would like too, since we were hanging out and slowly trying to finish Lost on Netflix (We still haven't gotten there. We have 15 episodes left until our life is over as we know it.) This is what we found. They've become Noah's new favorite cookies and quite possibly mine too, although I probably could have stopped at dough and eaten the entire batch myself, then seriously regretted it later. Well. Actually. No regrets. These were just that good.

**There are two options to make this dough according to the original blogger. You can make the dough below in two half batches, or if you have a kitchen scale you can separate it equally once made. Since I thought the half batches were too complicated, I just had Noah separate it as best he could in half. It worked.

What you'll need:

• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 1/4 cup cocoa powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 sticks butter
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg & 1 egg yolk at room temperature
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (I used the entire bag, which is just over 2 cups. I like chocolate).

To make:

• Preheat oven to 325 degrees and lightly grease two cookie sheets.
• Heat butter in a saucepan on medium-low heat, stirring constantly until brown bits appear on the bottom. This should take about five minutes. Remove from heat and let cool completely.
• Once cool, add to a large bowl with the white and brown sugars and whisk until smooth. Whisk in the egg and egg yolk, then the vanilla.
• Separate the very liquidy dough into two bowls evenly.
• In one bowl add 1 cup flour, 1/4 teaspoon baking soda, and a pinch of salt until the dough forms. It might be time to get your hands messy and use them to incorporate the dough. Once mixed, fold in half of the chocolate chips and set aside.
• In the other bowl add the remaining flour (3/4 cup) and baking soda (1/4 teaspoon) and another pinch of salt. Add in cocoa powder and mix until dough forms, then fold in remaining chocolate chips.
• Roll each dough into twelve balls about one inch thick. Take one of each kind of dough and put  on top of each other, then place on baking sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes.
• Devour and enjoy.

The "Lost" cookie plate. It was gone in a blink of an eye and I have no idea what happened.

Bonnie Butter Cupcakes with Buttercream Frosting

Let me tell you something: I hate all vanilla cupcakes I make. I don't know why, but I feel like when I make them they turn out to be too dry or taste too much like flour. Other people may say they're fine, but I wouldn't have it. Instead I spent months too scared to try any vanilla cake recipes, and just stuck to boxed cake. That sucked, because I do love white cake, but I feel like boxed cake is cheating. As a baker, I have no desire to cheat.

But then I found these...

Bonnie Butter cake is something I've been eating since I was little. My wonderful Grandma Pat (who I probably got the baking addiction from) used to make this cake for my birthday every year, and I always pretty much died because it was so good, and so rich. Unfortunately, I don't visit my Grandma very often since she lives way in the boonies, near Hinckley. Luckily the last time we went up there for a visit, I asked her about this recipe. Little did I know, that it was from an old Betty Crocker cookbook. I figured if I was going to get over my fear of making white cake, this would to be the recipe to do it. Boy, was I right.

If I actually had any talent at making two layer cakes, I would've attempted that, but since my cakes always end up looking like the Leaning Tower of Pisa, I stuck close to home with cupcakes.

What you'll need:

• 2/3 cup butter, softened
• 1  3/4 cups sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
• 2 3/4 cups all purpose flour
• 2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/4 cup milk

To make:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line cupcake pans with cupcake liners.
• Mix butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla. Beat for 5 minutes.
• On low mix in flour, baking powder and salt alternating with milk.
• Pour into liners and bake for 15-20 minutes.
• Let cool and frost

Since I always use the same buttercream frosting recipe, I might as well just post it again.

What you'll need:

• 1 cup butter (I recommend European style. It's creamier and so worth the extra cost)
• 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla
• Milk (only add until reach desired consistency. I rarely end up using any.)

To make:

• Cream butter, then slowly add in vanilla then powdered sugar. Add milk one teaspoon at a time until reached desired consistency.

Enjoy!