Kakimochi is also known as Japanese rice cracker. It’s a teriyaki crunchy cracker and yes, there are some Hawaii bakeries that put them in cookies. The cracker kind of acts as a replacement for nuts or cereal, anything crunchy. Don’t knock it til you try it!

When I saw HEART SHAPED kakimochi in Hawaii, well, I just couldn’t resist and I knew I had to make up my own version of this old skool snack…

ingredients:
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup flour
1 /2 teaspoons baking soda
1 cup crushed kakimochi (arare) + more to decorate if you wish
3/4 cup mini chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and prep baking sheets with silpats.

I have NEVER come across kakimochi in this shape except for in Hawaii. It is so cute I can hardly stand it.

You can use any shape, of course since hearts are pretty hard to find. It hurts to crush up these cute little kakimochi hearts, but it has to be done.

In a freezer bag, place the kakimochi and crush them to pieces using a rolling pin, your hands, your full aggression. Hello anger management. Set aside.

In a small bowl whisk together the flour and the baking soda. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter and the brown sugar. Add the egg and the vanilla.

Add in the flour/baking soda mixture until combined.

Personally, I love mini chocolate chips. They add a lot of flavor in very little bites.

By hand, fold in the crushed kakimochi and the mini choco chips into the batter.

Spoon by teaspoonfulls onto the prepped baking sheets. Make them rounded and press them down slightly. Since the heart were SO cute I also placed one on top of each batter ball before sending it into the oven. You don’t have to do this, but I thought it looked adorable and added even more crunch.

Bake for 8-10 minutes until brown. Let cool on a wire rack.

For people who may have only eaten kakimochi as a snack, this is a new and interesting take that is worth trying out!

A good friend of mine sent me the best gift – a cookbook, better than that a SWEETS cookbook! The Perfect Finish is a great book full of wonderful ideas for all kinds of desserts.

I bookmarked a lot of them, but what I went straight to first was a recipe for chocolate chunk nutella cookies. I changed it a bit to make it more ‘nutella-y’ and I just love how they turned out. Super easy and very flavorful – the best kind of cookie!

ingredients:
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1-1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup Nutella
1-1/2 cups chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and prep baking sheets with silpats.

In a large bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda and salt.

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream the butter, the sugar and the brown sugar. Add the eggs and the vanilla until combined.

Gradually add the flour until the mixture is combined.

Then mix in the chocolate chips and the Nutella – I don’t like to fully combine it, ’cause traces of Nutella is always is a good thing.

Drop by Tablespoons onto the prepped baking sheets and bake for 8-10 minutes. I like mine a little bit on the crispy side, so ten minutes works for me.

Let cool on wire racks. When the cookies come out they will go from rounded balls to lovely flat cookie discs.

These are pretty addictive so I suggest you give away as many as you can – before you eat your fill, of course.

It’s surprisingly easy to make Oreos at home. Yes, yes, why would you want to when you can get them for $1.99 at the market? Well…can you get SUPER KAWAII OREOS at the market?? I think not. That’s why I made Hello Kitty Oreos!! whee! (I know, why would anyone do this – I ask myself that all the time.)

I love Hello Kitty – I’ve made her as cupcakes, as pasta, as waffles, as MOFFLES, I’ve done it all. You can find homemade Oreo recipes all over the internet, here’s how I made mine:

ingredients (cookies):
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup Valrhona cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) butter
1 egg

ingredients (filling):
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
2 cups powdered sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Prep baking sheets with parchment or silpats.

In a bowl, whisk the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar. Add the egg until combined.

Slowly add the flour mixture, careful it will fly everywhere – until incorporated. You will get a nice dough that will pull away from the sides of the bowl. It’s a rather soft dough, so I like to chill it for 10-15 minutes.

Now, to make the kitty faces, I first cut them out and placed them on the sheet. They looked perfect right? Then I baked them.

Not so perfect. This dough is tempermental and obviously perfect for little round Oreos, but I was not making little round Oreos, I was making Super Kawaii Fun Time Hello Kitty Oreos. SO. Instead…

I just pressed the cookie cutter into the flat blobs quickly AFTER I pulled them out of the oven and voila! Perfect kitties.

So – back to the basics, I baked them in the oven for 9 minutes, then (after re-cutting) transferred them to a wire rack to cool.

Now on to the filling. Most homemade Oreo recipes call for shortening. NO. I despise shortening almost as much as cream cheese and you know how I feel about cream cheese. SO, instead I just use butter, through and through – and it came out perfectly fine.

In the bowl of an electric mixer on low, beat the butter, sugar and vanilla until crumbly and combined. Once you don’t have stray powder-y sugar anywhere, go for it. Crank that baby up to number 6 and until you get a nice fluffy filling reminiscent of….hey, an Oreo!

Put the filling in a piping bag and pipe onto the backs of the cookies. Now you can spread it with a knife, but I am super obsessive and wanted that same blobby puffy side look that regular Oreos have. The piping bag will give you that look. Pipe a dollop onto the back of a cookies, spread it a bit with an offset spatula, then press down on the filling with the top cookie.

There you have it. Your super over the top cute Oreo. So delicious. It wasn’t that hard, right? Ok fine. Stick with your boring old ROUND ones. You’re right it’d totally take less time…but it’d be HALF AS CUTE~!

This is a good base cupcake. I had leftover buttermilk which is what makes it just so soft and perfect. Despite the melted chocolate incorporated into the batter I promise the cupcake is NOT overly sweet. What DOES push it over the top is the chocolate frosting and the cookie topper…

O.G. said chocolate causes depression. No way. This cupcake couldn’t make me happier.

ingredients:
1/2 cup melted chocolate chips
1/2 cup butter (1 stick)
1-1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
2 cups all purpose flour
1 Tablespoon Valrhona cocoa powder
1 cup buttermilk
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 Tablespoon vinegar

Chocolate frosting
mini Espresso Chip Cookies (recipe, here)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep cupcake pans with liners.

In a medium bowl whisk together the salt, baking powder, flour and cocoa powder. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer beat the melted chocolate, butter and sugar. Add the eggs and the vanilla.

Alternate the flour mixture and the buttermilk until combined.

In a small bowl mix together the baking soda and the vinegar, pour into the batter and mix until thoroughly incorporated. This will give the cake a nice soft crumb.

Fill your liners halfway to 2/3 full and bake for 15-17 minutes depending on your oven. Let cool on a wire rack.

I topped these with a chocolate frosting…then of course, mini Espresso Chip Cookies! Chocolate+chocolate+more chocolate. You’re cool with that, right?

I did this whole recipe by hand in a bowl – no electric mixer. It’s that easy, honest! But making these mini was a BAD idea. It just meant I ate about 10 times as many. sigh.

ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup Valrhona cocoa powder
1 Tablespoon espresso powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
1/2 cup melted chocolate chips
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
1 1/4 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Prep a baking sheet with a silpat or parchment.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, espresso powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In another bowl combine the melted chocolate, butter, sugar and eggs. Add the flour mixture until combined, then stir in the chocolate chips.

Using a Size 100 disher or a Tablespoon, place small balls of dough on your prepped baking sheet.

Bake for 10-12 minutes depending on your oven – then let cool on a wire rack.

These are highly addictive and I don’t think it has anything to do with the espresso…mini is just SO GOOD!

I saw this recipe in the Martha Stewart Cupcake book and thought I’d change it up a bit. The real kicker here is I added cinnamon chips which made everything just sing. Talk about flava!! I also added a Wookiee, but if you don’t have one you can just make do.

ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1 cup (2 sticks) butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3 large eggs
1-1/2 teaspoons vanilla
1/3 cup whole milk
1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips
1/2 cup cinnamon chips

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Prep a cupcake pan with liners.

In a medium bowl whisk the flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

In the bowl of an electric mixer beat the butter, sugar, and brown sugar. Once combined, add the eggs one at a time, then the vanilla.

Alternate the flour mixture with the milk until combined. This will look like cookie batter!

Cinnamon Chips are hard to find, but so worth the hunt. They are made by Hershey’s and as far as I can tell in the Los Angeles area they are only sold at Alberton’s. So weird! If you can find them – get them, you won’t be disappointed. They add a whole new dimension to baking. Plus wookiees love them. Just look at him, he can’t wait.

Now fold in the chocolate chips and cinnamon chips.

Fill your liners about 3/4 of the way full.

Bake for 18-20 minutes until toothpick test says they’re done! Let cool on a wire rack.

These are pretty addicting, I’m not just saying that. I’ve had people eat one and then immediately ask for more. Not one more, like TWELVE MORE. This is why Chewbacca is keeping this one all for himself…

I love Valentine’s Day because I love pink and I love hearts – it’s also a perfect time for sweets. This year I made some old favorites with a twist:

I made my Neapolitan cookies but used TEENY cutters and cut out little hearts. They look so good in the pan but unfortunately they spread like crazy…

They are still cute but it makes me want to use a miniscule cutter next time to see how small I can really get these things.

I also made up some M & M cookies but used the ‘Valentine’s mix’ which means pink, red and white. Cute idea but the M & M’s don’t show up that well. Doesn’t matter, they were still delicious.

Then I made mixed boxes of red velvet cupcakes and chocolate cupcakes. I just love how the white and brown look together with the little hearts.

Who knows if people appreciate all this work, but I had fun making all of it. Now what holiday is up next…?

Neapolitan cookies recipe, here.
M&M cookies recipe, here.
Chocolate Mascarpone cupcakes recipe, here.

A while back when I asked, ‘What desserts would you love to see at a luncheon?‘ Well I got so many neat responses, however I should have specified that it was an office luncheon, because I’m not sure a chocolate fountain would work for an afternoon meeting in the conference room, though that’d be hilarious!

A lot of people suggested mini things. Mini cupcakes. Mini cookies. Things you can grab and go. Also, you guys REALLY like Key Lime Pie. So many of you suggested that, I’ll have to try that next time.

I ended up making mini versions of my Carrot Cake Cookies:

Which turned out so cute bite sized, now I think I’ll do it this way all the time! It’s the perfect cookie to cream cheese filling ratio. Also since they are so small…you can eat ten of them.

I also made mini Chocolate Cupcakes, though because we are on Stormwatch here in Los Angeles, the ganache didn’t really set, which really ticked me off. Still, they turned out cute!

I could make mini desserts all day there are so fun but man, so time consuming! Is it possible to get carpal tunnel from scooping cookie dough? I think I’ve got it.

Thanks for all the suggestions, hopefully the office enjoyed their treats before heading back to work!

Mini Carrot Cake Cookies recipe, here.
Mini Chocolate Mascarpone Cupcakes recipe, here.

The kids wanted to decorate gingerbread. So I made up some dough and got out my GIANT 10″ gingerboy cookie cutter, which makes a pretty nice sized cookie. Lots of surface area for decorating!

I made up some royal icing and let the kids have at it.

The Baby went wild with the candies and was more interested in eating them than actually decorating.

I made up some Batman faces to stick on top of them, the idea was to totally Batman-them out in black and yellow, but I saw how much fun the kids were having just going whole hog with the candies, so I got caught up in the fun. They turned out not so much Batman – more like creepy Candyland. Still they were delish, then again, cover anything head to toe in candy and you can’t go wrong.

WHEE! The Kid’s chocolate allergy has magically disappeared so I’m all excited and want him to go for it Augustus Gloop-style. No dice. The Kid is way too cautious. He wants to eat at tiny bit just to make sure he’s ok. He’s no glutton like me. So I made these up to test the waters (leaving out the espresso, of course.)

ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
1/4 cup Valrhona cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon espresso powder
pinch of salt
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

In a bowl, whisk together the cocoa powder, baking powder, espresso powder and salt. Set aside

In the bowl of an electric mixer, cream butter and sugar until fluffy. Carefully add the pre-whisked dry ingredients until combined.

Add the eggs one at a time. Then slowly and carefully add the flour – don’t overmix! Add the chocolate chips – you can do this by hand if you like.

Wrap the dough in plastic wrap and chill for 20 minutes or so.

When you’re ready to go for it, preheat oven to 375 degrees. Divide the dough into two rounds, taking each one and rolling it onto your prepped sheet in a long skinny log, flattening it out JUST a touch. Yes it looks nasty, don’t mind that. Place logs a few inches apart on a silpat or parchment lined cookie sheet.

Bake for 20 to 23 minutes, just until a toothpick comes out clean. Let it sit on the cookie sheet for just a bit, then let the logs cool on a wire rack.

Now’s when you cut it. Don’t be freaked out – if all goes well this should be easy…if not, don’t blame me.

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees. Using a good serated knife, cut the loaf on the diagonal – making about 1/2″ slices. Now….Place the slices on a lined cookie sheet, and bake only for about 8 minutes. Turn cookies over, and bake for 7 minutes. Yes this step is necessary, just do it. It’s worth it.

Let cool and they are ready to eat!