On the Table: Chocolate Mint Chocolate Chip Cookies

This past weekend, Mark and I went to a cookie exchange party hosted by some friends of ours here in town. While our hosts did not require us to bring cookies -- though we were threatened with serious evil eye if not actual bodily harm if we did not take cookies home with us from the party -- I wanted to make some holiday favorites that I discovered pretty recently thanks to my friend Heather. With the exception of the type of chips and the sugar specifications, this recipe, which makes about 3 dozen cookies, is courtesy of her.

Ingredients

2/3 cup butter
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tbsp water
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cocoa
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp baking soda
2 cups (12-oz. package) mint chips or mint chocolate chips

Directions
Preheat oven to 375F. In the meantime, combine butter (at room temperature), brown sugar, water, and vanilla in large bowl and beat on medium speed until they are well blended. Add the eggs and beat well. In a medium bowl, stir together flour, cocoa, salt, and baking soda. Gradually add the dry ingredients to the sugar mixture, beating on low speed until just blended. Stir or gently blend in the mint chocolate chips.

Drop by spoonfuls about 2 inches apart onto an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake 7 to 9 minutes or until the cookies appear set. The cookies should still appear soft and moist. Remove from oven and cool on the pan for another 2-3 minutes; remove from cookies from sheet and let them finish cooling on a wire rack. Wear cookie pants, increase mileage, give utensils covered in dough to less metabolically challenged love one, share at a cookie exchange party or all of the above to prevent massively expanding waistline.
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As you can see, there was no shortage of cookies at the party. (There were actually even more cookies that didn't make it to the table.) It was a great time, and we left with almost as many cookies as we brought with us. The dangerous thing is that my mother has requested that I make the chocolate mint chocolate chip cookies when I visit her over the break.... It's a good thing that I'm gearing up to start marathon training in just under a month....

What are your favorite Christmas cookies to make? Have you ever been to or hosted a cookie exchange party?

On the Table: Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes

Although I don't tend to read them on a daily basis, every now and then, I'll peruse food blogs for a while and book mark some recipes that I'd like to try out on a lazy Saturday or Sunday.  This recipe for Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes from Annie's Eats was just one such recipe that I'd had bookmarked for a few weeks.  I had a ton of blueberries in my fridge over the holiday weekend, and I decided to put my standing mixer to use.  Please forgive the quality of my food photos.  I don't take them with any consistency, so they still aren't very good.

I didn't have any cake flour on hand so I used 1.5 cups of all purpose flour instead.  This did cause the cupcakes to have a slightly more muffin-like texture.  They were still delicious, though.

My husband is fruit-challenged, and this saddens me to no end.  He will eat cantaloupe, apples and oranges and likes lemon cake and lemon bars, but he is not a fan of berries.  Blueberries are the one exception to this, and, while he doesn't seek them out, he will eat the occasional blueberry pancake or blueberry scone.  Knowing his low fruit ceiling, I dotted my cupcakes with some fresh berries and left his without any garnish.

They tasted gloriously summery and we devoured the batch of 16 in less than a week.  I meant to take some to my neighbor, but I didn't have the will-power.

What are some of your favorite summer-time desserts and treats? Do you have a loved one who is fruit-challenged? How do you cope with it?