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Pros and Cons of the Cookie Diet

You may be amazed at the thought of hogging on cookies, like the commercial shows its models doing, to shed flab and if it actually did, what a wonderfully yummy way to shape up!

However, market reports about thyroid patients following the cookie diet created by Dr. Siegal suggest that these individuals with serious weight related disorders could lose weight by sticking to a simple biscuit binging method that is light to digest.

All of Hollywood seems to be fascinated by the cookie diet that claims that a significant amount of weight can be shed by going on it (30 pounds in 8 weeks) – enough to grant it a fantastic fan following like no other diet plan has to date enjoyed.

After all, most people given a chance to be kids at heart would love to swap shopping for standard dietary inclusions and cooking regular meals, in favor of a treat like cookies. Continue reading “Pros and Cons of the Cookie Diet”

by gudfoodie
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Never-Fail Shortbread Cookies

This recipe gives you crumbling, melt in your mouth shortbread cookies. It requires that you make a dough and refrigerate it at least one hour before baking, so allow for enough time to bake these cookies.

First, prepare the dough. Ingredients you will need:

1 cup unsalted butter (not margarine), softened to room temperature

½ cup powdered (confectioners) sugar

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour

½ cup cornstarch

Continue reading “Never-Fail Shortbread Cookies”

by gudfoodie
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The Foods You Eat Can Change Your Skin Colour

In case you haven’t heard, you are what you eat. Perhaps you won’t turn into a chocolate chip cookie,

but there are certain foods that can increase or decrease your melanin production.

Melanin activates the pigmentation of your skin, making in darker when more melanin is being produced by the body. So, depending on the look you are hoping to achieve, eating certain foods can increase the melanin, while avoiding these foods will stagnate it.

Light coloured foods will give you whiter skin. Foods such as eggs and milk will dilute the melanin and keep your skin lighter coloured. On the other hand, the same theory applies to dark coloured foods. Deep, dark foods like coffee, tea, and black sesame can make your skin appear darker.

Vegetables and fruits contain many minerals and nutrients such as zinc, iron and copper. Lemons and cucumbers are excellent examples of foods rich in these minerals which aid in the formation of melanin. Strawberries, on the other hand can reduce melanin, keeping your skin lighter. Continue reading “The Foods You Eat Can Change Your Skin Colour”

by gudfoodie
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Flour – The Foundation For High-Quality Baking

Baking isn’t a secret art that only a chosen few get to experience. Anyone can become a great baker with time and practice. Aside from having good equipment to work with, having top quality ingredients is key. In addition, understanding what role your ingredients play is also important.

If you are baking something, odds are good that it has some amount of flour in it. Flour is the foundation for whatever you are making. It gives your product structure. What you are making and the type of end result you are looking for determines what type of flour one uses. Certain flours will make a fluffier, light bread. Others will end up with a heavy, dense one.

As the name says, all-purpose flour is a standard for many different types of products. It comes in bleached and unbleached and works well in almost everything. It is also the least expensive. It can be purchased in 5 and 10 pound bags at the grocery store. Most basic recipes call for all-purpose flour, including those for scones, chocolate chips cookies and biscuits. Continue reading “Flour – The Foundation For High-Quality Baking”

by gudfoodie
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White Chocolate Alternative

Not only have I had success with using carob chips and powder to appease my husband’s allergy to chocolate, but I’ve also enjoyed substituting yogurt chips for recipes calling for white chocolate chips. By U.S. law white chocolate must contain at least twenty percent cocoa butter. So if you are allergic to chocolate, you can’t eat white chocolate, either.

Even if you aren’t allergic to chocolate why substitute yogurt chips for white chocolate? After all yogurt chips do have more calories than white chocolate chips. Yogurt chips also have less than half the saturated fat. For most people it is easier to burn sugar or calories from carbohydrates than to burn off stored fat calories.

Not to say that a cookie, which is the food most commonly containing chips, is healthy, since almost all of them have some combination of butter, sugar and flour. But you can lessen the harm this little comfort food creates by reading the ingredients in a recipe and making a few health conscious substitutions. Continue reading “White Chocolate Alternative”

by gudfoodie
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Drinking a Nice Hot Chocolate is a Great Way to Take Off the Chill

Most people in just about every corner of the world take pleasure in sitting back with a nice warm mug of hot chocolate at some time or other during the course of a year. While some enjoy the warm chocolate drink often, others only imbibe occasionally, perhaps as the weather turns cold or as the snow begins to fall. For many people, sipping some hot, steaming chocolate is the only way to take off the chill and get warmed up from the inside out.

One thing that many people enjoy is adding a nice peppermint candy cane to the beverage, making the aromatic cup of chocolate even more of a Christmas treat. And, one of the favorite and most popular roles for this good, drink is to warm up Santa on those long and cold Christmas Eve delivery runs. There’s nothing better than a rich cup of warm chocolate refreshment, paired with warm chocolate chip cookies or some chocolate cake to keep Santa going.

There are even some people who consider hot chocolate to be so good for them that it is almost medicinal because it gives them an instant lift in mood. Still others just like to enjoy a cup of warm and liquidly chocolate because they enjoy the taste and it brings to mind many wonderful memories from their childhood. Continue reading “Drinking a Nice Hot Chocolate is a Great Way to Take Off the Chill”

by gudfoodie
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Fun Facts About Chocolate

There are so many weird and wonderful fun facts about chocolate, it’s difficult to know which to include and which to omit because of space considerations.

First of all, the Mayans used cacao beans as currency as they believed that they were more valuable than gold dust. They controlled the production of beans so that their currency wouldn’t depreciate in value.

White chocolate isn’t strictly speaking chocolate. We have been labouring under a misapprehension for many years. Chocolate has to contain cocoa solids, but white chocolate doesn’t have any in it. Instead, cocoa butter is used in the production of white chocolate.

Europeans are the biggest fans of chocolate, accounting for the consumption of nearly half of the chocolate that is produced globally.

Where was the biggest chocolate bar produced? In the UK; it was made by Thornton’s for its centenary. It was a record breaker, weighing 5,792.50 kilograms. Continue reading “Fun Facts About Chocolate”

by gudfoodie
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Oatmeal Carrot Raisin Cookie Recipe

Cookies have been around for many centuries. There are many different versions from the early days of baking. They have evolved from what were then called flat “twice” baked biscuits, or savory biscuits. Many different cultures and civilizations have tried the art of cookie baking. Some were more of a hard flat bread, which eventually turned into more of a pastry type of bread or cookie. Then it became more of a light to fluffy biscuit, and then into the smaller bite size bar like a Madeline, and or a type of drop cookie that we are familiar with today. Some of their efforts were savory, and some turned out to be sweet creations. I credit the Germans and the French for getting us to the sweeter side of things that have developed into the sweet cookies of our day.

In the current day we have bar cookies, drop cookies, refrigerated cookies, rolled cookies, and a few more. I think that the most popular are the drop cookies. The drop cookie was made very popular from the Tollhouse Company, by the development of the chocolate chip cookie. The Quaker Company has also helped in this effort to create a rolled oats cookie. They are both a very popular treat with many people all over the country. Continue reading “Oatmeal Carrot Raisin Cookie Recipe”

by gudfoodie
Barbecue, BBQ & grilling, BBQ food, Breakfast, Drinks, Family, Fish, Fruit, Healthy, Healthy eating, Italian, Light meals, Main Course, Mains, Meat, Meat & fish, Nutrition, One-pan recipes, Quick & Easy, Quick fixes, Recipe Roundup, Salad, Sauces & condiments, Seasonal, Seasonal produce, Sharing, Side Dish, Snacks, Summer, Summer Drinks, Uncategorized, Vegetable sides, Vegetables, Vegetarian

Oatmeal and Mini Chip Crisps: The Easiest Cookies Ever

For years, I stored my stand electric mixer in the back of a kitchen cupboard. To retrieve the mixer, I had to kneel on the floor, reach into a dark corner, and drag the mixer forward without hitting or damaging anything. Retrieving the mixer was hard on my back, and made me reluctant to use it. So I took the mixer out of the cupboard and set it on the counter.

I had a white mixer cover on hand, and put it on the mixer to keep the bowls clean. Now I don’t even use a cover. The mixer is by the stove, handy and ready for work. For small jobs, I use a hand-held mixer. It’s in the original box at the front of a cupboard, again, where I can see it.

In many cultures, holiday time is baking time. Home cooks get together and bake coffee cakes, fruit cakes, breads, buns, and cookies. Minnesotans like me bake a variety of cookies and have cookie exchanges. Each guest brings several dozen cookies to swap. After coffee and conversation, everyone has a platter of cookies to take home. Continue reading “Oatmeal and Mini Chip Crisps: The Easiest Cookies Ever”

by gudfoodie
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Quick and Easy Cookie Recipes For Your Toddler

Let’s face it – no matter how much we want our kids to stay away from sweets, they will always crave for treats like cookies, cake and ice cream. As long as they’re eating nutritious ad balanced meals, there’s nothing wrong with giving them sugar for snacks from time to time.

You could even involve them in the baking process! Try these quick and easy cookie recipes:

Caramel and Peanut Butter Combo

What you need:

  • 36 pcs. bite-sized chocolate-coated caramel peanut nougat bars
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 cups flour
  • 1 cup creamy peanut butter
  • 1 cup butter, softened
  • 1 cup packed brown sugar
  • 1 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt

Continue reading “Quick and Easy Cookie Recipes For Your Toddler”

by gudfoodie