The Easiest Peanut Butter Cookies on Planet Earth

Seriously the easiest peanut butter cookie recipe on earth.
You can not screw these up.

What You'll Need:

• 1 cup peanut butter (I prefer the natural kind, with less sugar - but always smooth...chunky peanut butter is the worst!)
• 1/2 cup sugar (I used Ideal to cut down on the calories)
• 1 medium-sized, room temperate egg
• That is it. For real.

What You'll Do:

• Pre-heat your oven to 175F (or 350c)In a mixing bowl, add in your peanut butter
• Pour in your sugar
• In a separate, smaller bowl, crack your egg and lightly beat with a fork
• Combine your egg into your sugar peanut butter mixture
• Stir until very well combined
• On a non-greased baking tray, roll out equal sized dough balls, evenly spaced - about 9-12 per tray
• Flatten lightly (I use the bottom of a drinking glass)
• Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the cookies turn from looking shiny to dull
• Gobble them up

The STEWART SCORE
Appearance: 1.5
Taste: 2
Ease: 2

Melt in Your Mouth Shortbread

I love Christmas baking. And shortbread.
This shortbread cookie recipe is, hands-down, the best melt-in-your-mouth delicious shortbread cookie recipe you'll ever try.

If you don't trust me, trust Martha.

What You'll Need:

• Electric mixer or hand mixer (you really can't make these to taste as melt-in-your-mouth delicious without having this)
• Baking trays
• Parchment paper
• 1 cup of room temperature unsalted butter (it is very important to ensure the butter is room temperature)
• 1/4 cup of powdered sugar
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 1/2 cup flour
• 1/2 cup cornstarch
• 1/4 tsp table salt
• 1/2 cup powdered sugar (to toss them in, once baked)

What You'll Do:

• Using your electric mixer or hand mixer, beat your room temperate butter and slowly add in the powdered sugar
• Beat at a medium speed for about 3-5 minutes or until the butter starts to look fluffy and pale
• Add in your vanilla and mix until combined
• In a separate bowl combine your flour, cornstarch and salt
• Sift until well combined
• Slowly add the flour mixture into the whipped butter mixture
• Mix until well incorporated
• Cover with cling film and refrigerate the dough for at least one hour

 

• Heat your oven to 350C (or 175F)
• On a baking tray lined in parchment paper, roll out evenly sized dough balls
• Space the balls out evenly - about 12 per tray
• Here is the key! Bake until the cookie bottoms have just a whisper of brown. Do not over bake!
• Remove from the tray and let cool on a rack for about five minutes
• In a separate, smaller bowl, add in the 1/2 powdered sugar
• Take each cookie (be gentle with them) and place inside the powdered sugar, move the cookie around gently, ensuring top and bottom are covered with sugar
• Replace back to the wire rack to cool
• Sample as you go along as there is nothing better than a warm melt-in-your-mouth shortbread
• Serve and graciously accept the outpouring of compliments
• Have tissue on hand to wipe away people's tears of joy

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 2 (some people choose to put candied cherry pieces on top, but I think that distracts from this cookie's good looks)
Taste: 2
Ease:1.5 (it takes some practice to not overcook)

Oatmeal Coconut Banana Cookies

I had some extra ripe bananas to use up and wanted to combine the sweetness of a ripe banana with the wholesomeness of oatmeal and my favourite thing - coconut.
Out came these oatmeal coconut banana cookies!

Easy to make, super delicious to eat.

What You'll Need:

• Small pot or microwave (to melt your butter)
• Electric or hand mixer
• Two medium sized bowls
• Cookie trays
• 2 Tbps of melted butter
• 1/2 cup dark brown sugar
• 1/2 cup of light brown sugar
• 1 super ripe banana
• 1 medium sized egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp your favourite cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp table salt
• 1 1/2 cup quick oatmeal (not instant, or it will go mushy)
• 1 cup unsweetened coconut

What You'll Do:

• Pre-heat your oven to 350C (or 175F)
• Melt your butter (either on your stove top or microwave. If you are using a microwave, do this slowly, 5-10 seconds or so at a time so the butter doesn't explode all over the place)
• Transfer the melted butter to your mixing bowl
• Thoroughly mix in your sugars (this will also bring the heat of the butter down, which is good as the next step is adding your egg and you don't want your egg to cook if it hits hot butter)
• Crack your egg, outside the butter and sugar mixture, and beat lightly with a fork
• Add your egg into the mixture
• Add the vanilla
• Add your banana
• Beat thoroughly
• In your other bowl, add in your flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon and salt
• Add this scoop by scoop into your butter mixture, with a fork, combine the ingredients - do not mix together
• Once the flour mixture has been added and combined, add in your oatmeal and coconut
• Use your mixture to combine everything together until well combined
• On your un-greased baking tray, spoon small sized dough mounds, evenly spaced - about 12 per tray
• (I then channeled Martha and thought she would add something to the tops of the cookies, so I placed a single chocolate chip on top to make them cute-as-a-button)
• Bake for 10-12 minutes or until the bottom is lightly brown
• You do not want to over bake these or they will turn to saw dust
• Let cool on a wire rack (or don't let cool and live dangerously)
• Devour

You can also add walnuts, chocolate chips or raisins to this recipe...or all three! Use about 1/4 cup for a batch of whatever extra you think would be tasty.

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 1.5
Taste: 2
Ease: 2

Pulled Chicken Pita Recipe

This recipe is easy, tangy and fresh.
Pulled chicken breast packed into toasted garlic butter pitas loaded with fresh cucumbers and tomatoes.

The below recipe is in three parts (the pitas, the chopped salad then the pulled chicken)

I hope you like it as much as I do!

What You'll Need:

• 4 Pita breads (whole wheat is nice)
• 1 Tbsp butter
• 1tsp garlic powder
• Baking tray
• 1/4 length of fresh cucumber
• 1 dill pickle
• 1 tomato
• 1/8 cup of vinegar
• 1 Tbsp sugar (or sugar-substitute, I used IDEAL)
• Medium-sized bowl
• Cooked Pulled Chicken - you can see how to make that, here
• 1 cup of My Tangy BBQ Sauce (or your favourite tangy BBQ sauce)
• Large saucepan

What You'll Do: The Pitas

• Cut each pita in half
• Place the halved pitas on your baking tray
• Mix your room temperate butter and garlic powder together
• Spread the garlic butter mixture lightly on the top of each pita
• Right before your pulled chicken and Tangy BBQ Sauce are combined, pop into the oven for 5-8 minutes at 350

What You'll Do: The Chopped Salad
This kebab-shop inspired salad is super easy and something you can store for a few days if you don't use it all up inside your pitas

• Using the same dicing technique shown here in my 'How to Dice an Onion' post, dice your tomato, dill pickle and cucumber
• In a medium-sized bowl, add in your diced veggies, then toss in your vinegar and sugar (or sugar substitute)
• Stir until you can't feel the sugar granules
• Pop into the fridge

What You'll Do: The Pulled Chicken with my Tangy BBQ Sauce

• Inside your large sauce pan, take your pre-cooked, pre-pulled chicken and slowly stir in your pre-made Tangy BBQ Sauce
• On a medium-heat stir the chicken until completely saturated in sauce
• (Pop your pitas into your pre-heated oven)
• Let heat through until piping hot

What You'll Do: The Assembly

• Now that everything is ready, this is the fun part - stuffing your pitas full!
• Take your pitas out of the oven
• Take your diced veggie salad out of the fridge
• Remove your BBQ sauce soaked chicken from the heat 
• Open your pita and stuff its brains out with the above

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 2
Taste: 2
Ease: 2 (this is a really fast recipe to make unless you need to make the pulled chicken and BBQ sauce, then the time for this recipe increased about 45 minutes)

How to Make Pulled Chicken

I was so incredibly sick of chicken and desperately needed a new way of serving it - so, inspired by pulled pork, I looked up how to make pulled chicken and it couldn't be easier.

Chicken is back and in this form extremely versatile!

What You'll Need:

• Chicken breasts (I used four)
• A large, heavy-bottomed pot
• Enough water to cover
• Stable cutting board and two forks

What You'll Do:

• Bring your water to a rapid boil
• Add in your chicken breasts
• Reduce your heat to a steady medium temperature - you do not want the water to boil again
• Cook for 25-35 minutes (depending on the thickness of your cut)
• Pull one cut out of the water and cut open to check if it is cooked through - there should be no pink. Even though pink is a charming colour, it is not something you want your chicken to be
• Pull out your chicken cuts, piece by piece and let rest on your cutting board for about 5 minutes
• Using two forks, pull apart with the grain of the meat, creating small strands of chicken

Once you have your chicken pulled apart it is totally up to you what you do with it.
Be creative!
Tonight I combined mine with my Tangy BBQ Sauce to create a deliciously easy Pulled Chicken Pita dish that my husband called a 'Ten out of Ten'.
Tomorrow I plan on using the remainder to make chicken fajitas out of.

Some more ideas are:

• Use it in casseroles
• Add it to a creamy macaroni and cheese recipe
• Toss it in salads
• Use it on pizzas

Let me know what you try out!

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 1 (its pulled meat...how pretty can it get)
Taste: 2
Ease: 2

Tangy BBQ Sauce

I have never made BBQ sauce before, but looking at labels can be a scary thing and when I was out shopping for a sauce, it occured to me - instead of buying a pre-bottled sauce loaded with glucose of every shade possible - I can make my own.

So I did and so I will share you with the recipe my husband called "A ten out of ten". I love this tangy and sweet mustard based sauce and I hope you do, too!

What You'll Need:

• Small heavy-bottomed sauce pan
• 1/2 cup dijon mustard
• 1/3 cup dark brown sugar
• 1/3 cup light brown sugar
• 2/3 cup vinegar
• 1/3 cup water
• 1 Tbsp sambal oelek (or any kind of your favourite wet chili sauce)
• 1/3 cup cola (I used Diet Coke, as that is what we had in the house)
• 1 tsp ground white pepper
• 1/2 tsp ground chili
• 1 Tbsp honey
• 1 Tbsp low-sodium soy sauce

What You'll Do:

• Place your saucepan onto a low heat
• Add in your mustard, dark and brown sugar
• Stir until combined, so when the temperature of the mixture has become hot
• Add in your vinegar, water and sambal oelek - stir until thoroughly mixed
• Pour in your cola - do this slowly as you don't want this to foam over the top of the pot
• Ground in your pepper and add your dry chili
• Pour in your honey and stir 
• Let simmer for 30 minutes or until the mixture starts to thicken and look completely unified
• Add in your soy sauce and simmer for another 5-10 minutes
• Voila!

This sauce is super tasty and I used it on a Pulled Chicken Pita dish I made for dinner tonight.
I will post that recipe in a moment.

You can keep this recipe for a week if refrigerated.
I find this combination of sweet and tangy a very versatile combination that would work well with chicken or pork.

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 1
Taste: 2
Ease: 1.5

Winter Root Vegetable Chicken Stew with Dumplings

For Amsterdam it is cold. There was actual snow that actually stayed on the ground this week.
When it gets cold, I want to eat nothing but carbs and snuggle on the couch so tonight I used some of the beautiful, fresh winter root vegetables I picked up at the market yesterday and make something warm and carb-crave-fulfilling.

This winter root vegetable chicken stew with dumplings is something I have never tried before. The gods of Martha must have been watching over me, because I must say this dish was heaven and relatively easy. You can use whatever winter root vegetables you have available. I used a parsnip and tried a Dragon Carrot as it looked fun. Long, purple with a white centre which gave this stew a lovely purple hue.

What You'll Need
For the stew:

• 1 large, covered pot
• 1 medium-sized onion
• 2 Tbps butter
• 2 Tbps vegetable oil
• Freshly ground pepper to taste
• 1 clove of fresh garlic
• 2 cups boiling water
• 1 Tbps Herbs de Provence
• 1 tsp Asian 5 Spice
• 2 Tbps fresh or dried dill
• 1 Tbps your favourite curry powder
• 1 tsp cinnamon (weird right? Well, trust me!)
• 1 large parsnip, 1 large dragon carrot, 8 medium sized carrots. As long as you have about 4-5 cups of chopped root vegetables, you can use any kind available to you. Turnips, beets, rutabaga, etc. All would work well. Just make sure you are using more than one kind
• 1.5 cups of diced tomato
• 1 whole, roasted chicken
• 2 Tbps flour or cornstarch (if you are looking for gluten-free)

For the Dumplings:

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 Tbps baking powder
• 1 tsp salt
• 2 Tbps butter
• 1/2 cup milk

What You'll Do:

• Dice your onion
• Chop your root vegetables and carrots into bite sized pieces, not too small or they will turn mushy
• Chop your dill
• Add in the butter and oil into your pan to melt
• Add in your onion and twists of fresh back pepper

• Squeeze in your freshly pressed garlic
• Let cook down until nice and soft
• Toss in the chopped vegetables

• Boil 2 cups of water, add in your Asian 5 Spice and Herbs de Provence, stir
• Pour the water and spice mixture over top of the chopped root veggies
• Add your curry powder, dill and cinnamon

• Stir thoroughly
• Cover and let simmer for 10 minutes
• While simmering, start to pull the chicken off your pre-roasted chicken. I bought a pre-cooked one today as I didn't want to spend all day in the kitchen :)

 

• Add in the diced tomatoes, stir
• Cover and let simmer for 10 minutes
• Add in your pre-cooked, roast chicken pieces, stir
• Cover and let simmer
• While simmering, make your dumpling mixture
• In a separate bowl, add in your flour, salt and baking powder

• Using two butter knives, cut in your butter until the flour mixture is crumbly
• Add in your milk and stir until combined
• Lift the lid of the pot and drop your dumpling mix, in equal-sized portions onto the top, leaving space in-between each dumpling

• Cover and let steam away for ten minutes
• Lift the lid and see your cute little dumplings, all plump and tasty looking
• By this point, your stew is nearly done, if it is too watery, what I did was, using a slotted spoon remove the dumplings gently and rest them on a plate. Then remove the veggies and chicken into a bowl
• Now you are left with the juices to thicken up. Using flour (or cornstarch), sprinkle onto the juice and stir rapidly until desired thickness is reached
• Then add back in your veggie mixture, stir and gently place the dumplings on top
• Serve and enjoy...maybe with a nice glass of red.

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 2
Taste: 2
Ease: 1 (it is a little time consuming, but using a pre-cooked chicken saves you some time!)

Banana Bread with Chocolate Chips

I love to bake quick breads.
After perfecting and then sharing my Pumpkin Bread recipe with you, I wanted to make a perfectly sharable banana bread recipe.

I think this one is it!

The trick - oil instead of butter and more chocolate chips than you think initially reasonable.

What You'll Need:

• 3 very ripe medium-sized bananas
• 2 large, free-range eggs
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup buttermilk
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup Ideal no-calorie sweetener (or white sugar)
• 1 3/4 cups of all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 3/4 cups chocolate chips
• 1 loaf pan
• 2 mixing bowls

What You'll Do:

• Lightly, but completely oil your loaf pan
• Pre-heat your oven to 350C
• In one of your mixing bowls, crack your eggs and beat until frothy looking (no need for any electric device, I know you can do this with a good 'ol fork...and that is what Martha would do)
• Add in the bananas, give them a good squash with a fork to loosen them up and mix into the eggs

 

• Pour in your oil, vanilla and buttermilk, mix thoroughly with the eggs and bananas
• In your other mixing bowl, add in your flour, baking soda, sugar, cinnamon and salt. Stir until mixed through
• Add your dry mixture into your wet mixture
• Pour in your chocolate chips (you could also add in some walnuts...but I tend to think there is a direct correlation between the amount of nuts added to a recipe and the loss of fun whilst eating said recipe) 
• HERE IS THE TRICK! Do not over-mix. Be gentle. Leave a few little lumps here and there for your homies
• Pour into your pre-greased loaf pan

• Pop into your oven, in the middle
• Bake for anywhere from 50 to 1 hour 20 minutes depending on your oven. My oven, much like my body, runs hot :) So my loaf was cooked through in around 50 minutes. I could tell it was cooked through as, when I stuck in a toothpick into the centre of the loaf, it pulled out clean - no uncooked battery goo.

The STEWART SCORE:
Appearance: 2
Taste: 2
Ease: 1.5