What's Up In CJ's Kitchen?

Welcome to my blog - CJ's-Kitchen.  I'll be sharing with you my triumphs, experiments, and yes, even my failures.

What's up in my kitchen?  Plenty!  I've been experimenting lately with substituting honey for sugar in cookie recipes.  I'm planning on selling my baked creations at the local farmer's market this summer. I hope to find there is a market for hand-baked cookies and dream of someday opening up my own shop!

Yesterday, I experimented with a new recipe I've been creating for a granola-inspired cookie.  This is my second attempt - for the first, I modified an oatmeal cookie recipe of my Grandmother's, substituting locally harvested honey for the granulated & brown sugars and adding chunks of coarsely chopped almonds.  Well, the honey flavor was nice but the cookies weren't quite sweet enough and the amount of flour I had to add to offset the added moisture from the honey created a mufin or cake-like texture, although they were a bit dry.  As my family & I analyzed them, I came up with the idea to increase the oatmeal used in the cookies to balance out the moisture content to the point where I would be able to stick with 1 1/2 cups of flour the recipe originally called for.  I also came up with the idea to use a nut-butter - not peanut butter, but almond butter. 

So yesterday, I made a second attempt, now with almond butter & lots more oats.  Still, the cookies were dry, not sweet enough and frankly, a bit bland. I was dissappointed to find the almond butter does not possess the same qualities as it's peanut-counterpart - when you put peanut-butter in a cookie (or anything else, for that matter) you get a very distince and recognizable flavor and quality.  So it's back to the drawing board - my husband suggested trying 1/2 peanut butter 1/2 almond butter and that might be worth trying. 

That's ok, not every kitchen experiment can be a success and I've had more than my share of successes, it's certainly satisfying to come up with your own recipes in the kitchen, to have your family express delight in your creations.

Suggestions anyone?  Please feel free to share your ideas!

Thanks for joining me and I hope you feel inspired to try something new in your kitchen!