Fruit Pizza

A simple yet delicious (and addicting) treat, Fruit Pizza, has been a family favorite for about as long as I can remember. Whether because it's an absolute cinch to prepare or because it's so dangerously delicious, this variation of Fruit Pizza is definitely my favorite (and the only one I really care for, honestly).

Normally, this recipe is spread on round cookie / pizza baking sheet. However, I was taking these to a party and thought it would be better served as individual "pizzas". The base of the pizza is a standard sugar cookie, with a cream cheese "sauce", bananas, whipped cream, strawberries and topped with granola. So YUM and so SIMPLE.

I think one of the things that makes me love to bake so much is the chemistry that takes place when the right ingredients are combined. I recently learned (via America's Test Kitchen) the way to make perfectly level / even cookies. The trick is to use the same measurement of baking soda and baking powder. It's so simple, yet many recipes do not include both in the ingredient list. The sugar cookie recipe I used included the soda, and so I added the same amount of powder. Voila! The cookies came out super level with no affect to the taste.

Fruit Pizza
Yield: 1 pizza pan or 12 3" individual cookies

Ingredients:
1 Batch sugar cookies (homemade or store-bought)
4 oz. cream cheese
1 C. powdered sugar
2 bananas
Strawberries
Granola (optional)

Directions:
Bake cookies; cool completely. With an electric mixer, beat cream cheese and sugar until smooth. Spread on cookie(s). Slice bananas about 1/4" thick. Place on top of sugar. Cover bananas with whipped cream. Topped with sliced strawberries and granola.

Refrigerate until ready to serve.

Enjoy!

Happy St. Patrick's Day - Dog Cookies!

Happy Birthday, Sweet Paco! That's right - our little lucky charm turns two years old today. We are so blessed to have him in our lives!

Paco is ready to party with his St. Patty's Day hat!

For your viewing pleasure, here are both dogs donned in party hats. Note how thrilled the old lady is, while Paco seems to think it's fun. I guess it's always fun when it's your birthday! :-)

On to the cookies! This year for Paco's birthday, I decided to make shamrock shaped cookies for his "cake". (He also needed something to share with his friends in order to celebrate - duh.)

Cookies packaged for some doggie friends

While visiting Chicago with some good friends of ours, we took some time to do a little shopping in Lincoln Park. We happened upon the cutest little doggie boutique where I picked up a fun organic dog treat cookbook! They have several divisions within the cookbook (much like with any "normal" cookbook), one of which is a new treat for each month. For March, the authors included this spinach and Parmesan concoction that sent our pups' tails wagging.  

Since my shamrock cookie cutter is quite large, I used the bone shape that I have as well.

Make them for your pup or pups today! And you can thank me later.

Spinach and Parmesan Dog Cookies
1 C. Oat flour (I use regular rolled oats and chop them up in a food processor)
1 C. Brown rice flour
1.5 C. Packed fresh spinach
1/2 C. Grated Parmesan cheese
1 Egg
1/4 C. Water

Preheat over to 350 degrees. Puree the spinach leaves in a food processor until smooth. Combine all ingredients together and mix until dough forms.

Roll out on a lightly floured surfaced to 1/4" thickness. Use a shamrock, bone or other shape to cut out cookies. Place on an ungreased cookie sheet (you can put them quite close together as they don't spread much while baking).

Bake for 20 - 25 minutes. Transfer and let cool completely on a wire rack (my dogs really enjoyed them while they were still slightly warm - who doesn't enjoy a freshly baked, warm cookie?).

Store cookies in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Source: Organic Dog Biscuit Cookbook

Cookies for a Cause

Happy Valentine's Day! (I know I"m a few days late...) This past weekend, some great friends from our small group and I had the privilege to serve some of Indianapolis's less fortunate. As a group of 5 couples, we've committed to doing a service project together once every other month and with each rotation, a different couple gets to choose who to serve. For the month of February, our sweet Lauren wanted to help a newer organization, Circle City Relief. CCR is a ministry partner within our church that collects un-purchased pizzas from Little Caesars and distributes them to those who need food. Every Sunday for the past year, CCR has spread the love of Jesus Christ by passing out pizzas and clothing, serving hot soup, establishing relationships, and praying for those who show up to IPS School 60 to take home some food and hopefully some hope.

So many cookies!

While preparing for our service project, the ladies and I thought it would be a nice gesture to provide cookies for the people we would be serving. Given the timing, it only seemed appropriate that we tap into a Valentine's Day theme with these heart-shaped cookies. When we approached the CCR leader with our plan, she loved the idea. She let us know that they were expecting 200 or so people... GASP. What did we get ourselves into? Instead of freaking out, we turned the opportunity to get together for brunch and just have fun in the kitchen with the girls!

(Side note: I served this spinach and cheese strata, my sister's famous coffee cake, OJ and coffee. I didn't think to snap photos prior to our enjoyment of the food but both recipes were perfectly lovely for a simple brunch!) 

After piping an edge to the cookies, here we are flooding the royal icing.

For the cookies, we went with my favorite sugar cookie recipe and because I've been sort of a royal icing addict lately, we went with royal icing for the smooth texture and yummy flavor. I go into more detail on royal icing here.

Our collective favorite cookie.

In hindsight, we definitely should have gone with a simpler icing - buttercream, perhaps - due to our time constraints and the sheer number of cookies we needed to turn out. Fortunately, we were able to ice the cookies quite quickly... but the drying process was more lengthy than desired for this type of project. Normally, the drying process wouldn't necessarily be an issue, but we had agreed to package the cookies in bags with ribbon.

With a little added flair.

After the ladies left my house, I placed all the cookies on my island to get an official "count". Glad I did - we only had about 150 and needed 200! We had many cookies left, so I simply whipped up a batch of buttercream and created a simple design for the remaining 50 cookies. I also added a touch of the pink buttercream to the royal icing cookies for a little added flair.

Here is what 200 packaged cookies look like. :-)

Lauren and I passing out cookies.

Fortunately for our group and the people we were serving, we were blessed with a beautiful, sunny day! Several hundred pizzas and over 200 cookies were passed out in just under 1.5 hours.

For me, I often take fresh, homemade baked goods for granted because I have a kitchen with an oven and the means to purchase ingredients. Some of the people we served were actually shocked that we would make cookies from scratch just for them. Yet for me, I felt absolutely blessed to be able to bring a bit of joy to folks who don't normally get to experience the fresh-made goodness of a cookie. <3

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Just for fun, I thought I would also share some of the special Valentine's Day cookies I made for my Granny, who turned 83 on the 14th. I used the same cookies but decorated with leftover buttercream.