Zesty Cinnamon Butter Cookies + Apple Cinnamon Graham Cracker Caramel Cookies + Cardamom Cookies

Zesty Cinnamon Butter Cookies

My mom has decided to go on this weirdo diet once again. With this, she likes to waste egg yolks, yes, all the heart-healthy fats she just throws down the garburator. She is throwing out so much nutrition but also so many potential desserts! I couldn’t let this happen when I saw her about to throw out the yolks, so I put them aside and went and sat in the living room on a mission to find a delicious cookie recipe that requires many yolks. I found the perfect recipe. Be forewarned though, this is definitely a sinful recipe, not healthy at alllll, but so so good. You know how people talk about pork tenderloin when it's incredibly moist, and they say things such as "OH MY GOODNESS, it's SO moist it melts in your mouth!"... yeah, this cookie recipe is the pork tenderloin. This is a great great recipe if you've just made macarons, angel food cake, or anything that requires lots of egg whites. Don't throw out your yolks make some cookies! I can’t find the link for the recipe in which I adapted this from, but here is my version.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 ½ cups butter
• 12 egg yolks
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 3 tsp lemon extract
• ½ tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 3 ½ cups all purpose flour
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp orange zest
  

Directions:

Cream sugars with shortening, add egg yolks and stir. Mix in baking powder, extract, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, orange zest and flour.

Roll in a ball and roll in sugar. Flatten with a glass.

Bake at 350 F for 7-12 minutes.

Apple Cinnamon Graham Cracker Caramel Cookies

Recipe adapted from here

I have seen on occasion bloggers baking with cereal, i.e. substituting flour or ground up cereal. I thought this was a great thing to try, because in my house nobody seems to eat cereal but me (even though, I don't REALLY eat cereal since I eat it dry, and if I'm craving milk I have it on the side... I feel as though I'm cheating... but I never liked the sogginess of the cereal afterward). After eating this box of cereal for almost two weeks I was getting really sick of having that, so I decided I would make some cookies with it. These cookies were definitely a pain in the butt. The caramel plus the butter, these puppies wanted to spread like butter, ahahahhaha... okay not funny. I had to take them out twice during the baking process to re-shape them. The smell that these gave off though, holy goodness, delishhhh. I didn't put any chunks of apple in it because there are certain baked goods I could do with having chunks of fruit, but apple in a cookie, ehh... not so much. So here is what I did, and as usual I didn't do a glaze because I figured with the caramel and the apple-cinnamon taste from the Cheerios the cookies were already sweet enough.

Ingredients:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter, room temperature
• ½ cup brown sugar
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 2 3/4 cup Apple-Cinnamon Cheerios, finely crushed in food processor
  
• 1 cup graham cracker crumbs
• 2 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
  
• 20 caramels

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl combine butter and sugars. Add in eggs and vanilla. In a separate bowl combine Cheerio flour, graham cracker crumbs, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Add dry ingredients to liquid ingredients and mix well. Cut each caramel in 6 smaller pieces and add to dough. Peel , core and chop apple into smaller pieces and add to dough. Place larger portions of dough into a greased muffin top pan (will make approximately 18), or form dough into small balls and place on parchment paper lined cookie sheet. Bake approximately 13 minutes, or until tops of cookies are light golden brown. Allow to cool completely before removing from pans.

Cardamom Cookies

Recipe taken from here

Deliiiicious! Oh my goodness. These cookies were heavenly. They tasted like a shortbread cookie with a hint of warm and eucalyptine and lemony undertones from the cardamom. This is a great cookie to get you in the mood for Christmas. A great great cookie, I really loved them.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 1/2 tsp ground cardamom
• 1/4 tsp fine grain sea salt
• 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375F (190C). Line a cookie sheet with unbleached parchment paper. Place 1/4 cup sugar in a shallow bowl for rolling the cookie dough.

In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and 1/2 cup sugar until light and fluffy, then beat in the egg yolk. With a spatula, stir in the cardamom, sea salt and flour.

Scoop the dough in a heaped teaspoon, roll into a ball, and then coat with sugar granules. Place dough a few inches apart on prepared baking sheets. Bake for 8-10 minutes or until cookies are fragrant and golden brown.

Enjoy :)