Other Blogs I’m Following

Guys, there are so many amazing baking blogs out there! Today I’m starting a new series highlighting some of my favorite up-and-coming bloggers and recipes that I’ve tried. Most months I plan to try three recipes, but this month I’m including five because there are two that I tried late last year that I know you’ll love!

If you’ve been following me for a while then you know I love sugar cookies. So when Tasia from Two Sugar Bugs posted her recipe for sugar cookie bars I knew I had to try them! I substituted the flour for my favorite gluten free flour (here and here), but otherwise I followed the recipe exactly. The jimmies and almond extract are optional, but do yourself a favor and include both. I must warn you, though, that these are super soft and super addictive. You can’t eat just one! I had to stash them in the freezer to keep myself from eating too many.

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Do you like red velvet? I know I do! (Red velvet white chocolate whoopie pies, anyone?) I literally drooled when Chelsea from Mile High Mitts posted her recipe for red velvet pancakes. I made them right before Christmas, and I’m planning to make them again for breakfast on Valentine’s Day. They’re rich but not too sweet, and they feel indulgent but they’re actually on the healthy-side! My only mistake was using too much cream cheese in the syrup. The recipe called for 4 ounces, but I had 6 ounces that I wanted to use up. That made the syrup too thick. These are gluten free without making any adjustments to the recipe. But gluten-full friends, I promise you’ll love them, too!

My all-time favorite flavor combination is peanut butter and chocolate. (I can’t believe I haven’t shared a peanut butter chocolate recipe yet. I need to get on that!) So imagine my excitement when Sarah from Just Add Cinnamon posted a recipe for peanut butter stuffed chocolate cookies! But this is where I have a sad story to tell. Usually I can make any dessert recipe gluten free, but this time the dough didn’t cooperate. It was too crumbly for the amount of peanut butter stuffing and I had to cut that part in half. This means my cookies were understuffed. I wish I had used 2 teaspoons of milk instead of 1, and I should have added a little xantham gum. But the flavors were perfect, even if I didn’t have as much peanut butter as I wanted. Gluten-full friends, try the recipe as is. Gluten free friends, make some adjustments and let me know how you fared!

A lot of recipes feel familiar even if I’ve never made them before. That was not the case with these chocolate brownie cookies from Karyn at You Can Bake It Too. I knew I wanted to make them, but the measurements are in grams! Some of you might laugh at me, but my American brain was like, what? Thankfully I have a food scale so I managed to figure it out. I also made a few substitutions. I didn’t have self-rising flour so I added 1/4 teaspoon of baking powder. I also substituted the caster sugar for granulated sugar. And of course I made them gluten free. But these changes didn’t change the chocolatey perfection of this recipe! They’re so rich and oh so good! My husband and I polished them off pretty quickly.

Have you ever tried an unfamiliar flavor combination that becomes one of your new favorites? Just last night I baked oat hazelnut toffee chocolate cookies and completely fell in love! Felicia from SideSwipe Blade made them look so good that I just had to try them! I knew I loved oats, toffee and chocolate separately, but I wasn’t sure about the hazelnuts. While I’m not normally a “nuts in cookies” kind of girl, these changed my mind! I knew I was in for a treat when my kitchen smelled amazing after toasting the hazelnuts. I followed the recipe exactly (including chilling the dough for 1 hour) except for subbing my favorite gluten free flour. And if you’re debating whether to sprinkle them with sea salt, stop debating and add it!

Do you have any favorite recipes that you think I should try? Tell me about them in the comments or tag me @rosesandwhiskers on Instagram if you see one you think I’ll like!

Happy baking.