It’s too good to be true. Surely something that simple can’t taste good.

 
I’ve got kids begging me to bake cookies. It’s been that sort of day and I can’t fathom the thought of dealing with kids and cookie dough: the stickiness; the licking dough off fingers, hands and bench; sigh… adding stickiness to the clean up that never ends.

 
Okay no bake cookies… even if you don’t taste good, your no-bake nature has won me over. Let’s get no-baking!

No Bake Cookies

Ingredients

 
250g Arnotts milk arrowroot biscuits

400g sweetened condensed milk

375g white chocolate cooking melts

250g dark chocolate bits

Method

 
Place the milk arrowroot biscuits in a ziplock bag; wrap the bag in a large tea towel and bash it with a rolling pin. The biscuits don’t need to be crushed till it looks like it’s been through a food processor; but my boys had so much fun bashing the bag, our biscuits were crushed till it looked like it had gone for a quick blitz through the food processor.

 
Place your crushed milk arrowroot biscuits into a large bowl.

 
Over low heat, melt the white chocolate cooking melts. Pour the sweetened condensed milk into the pot with the melted white chocolate and stir well to combine.

 
Pour the white chocolate and condensed milk  mixture into your bowl of crushed milk arrow root biscuits and stir.

 
Let the mixture cool a little then add in a handful (or two or three or four kiddy handfuls) of dark chocolate bits and stir.

 
Pour mixture into a baking dish lined with baking paper.

 
Sprinkle a handful (or two or three or four kiddy handfuls) of dark chocolate bits on top of the no-bake cookie dough. Ever so gently press the bits into the dough.

 
Chill in the fridge for about 15-20 minutes or until it’s semi-firm. Take it out while it’s semi-firm and cut it into smaller pieces.

 
Once cut, place the no bake cookie pieces back in the fridge to set… or if you can’t wait (like us), dig in!

 
No bake cookies: no machinery required, minimal mess and waiting time. Minimal fuss.

 
Something that simple can taste good.

N & M: 4 years, 3 months
E: 2 years, 2 months
September 2012

Look at these two other yummy no bake recipes:
DIY Breakfast Bars by Dance to the Radio
No Bake Cookies and Cream Bars by Anny’s Blog

The post No Bake Cookies by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

Edible Straw Painting for Toddlers by Kids Creative Chaos
Teach toddlers to blow through a straw. If they accidentally suck in some paint it’s okay because the paint’s edible. Brilliant.

Rainbow Cupcakes by One Perfect Day

Rainbow cupcakes; for those times when you can’t decide on a colour. (I wonder if this principle will work with wardrobe decisions too?)

 

Carrot Cookies by Famiglia & Seoul

Smiles like that are what it’s all about. Check out how Gina & Grady spent their day making carrot cookies and reading The Carrot Seed.

The post The Weekly Kids’ Co-op: Into The Kitchen We Go! by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

Ingredients

1/4 cup castor sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
200g peanut butter
1 egg
dash vanilla essence
1/4 cup plain flour
strawberry jam

Method

Preheat the oven to 190C.

Put all the ingredients except for the strawberry jam into a bowl and mix until smooth.

Roll the mixture into 1 inch balls and place them on a baking tray about 2 inches apart.

Using your finger, make a deep fingerprint impression on each cookie ball. Make sure the impression is quite deep as you’ll be filling these with jam when the cookies are done.

Bake for about 10 minutes and allow to cool.

Fill each fingerprint impression with strawberry jam.

Devour with joy.

N&M: 3 years, 8 months

This post was shared with

Play Academy
Sunday Showcase

The post Peanut Butter & Jam Cookies by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.

“Insanity – heard of it?”

I think to myself, “Insanity. Yes. Most mums know it very well. We try to avoid it. Is this a workout that we want to avoid?”

Turns out that Insanity is a type of fitness program on DVD. A quick google search reveals, “The secret to the Insanity workout is max interval training, where you do long bursts of maximum-intensity exercises with short periods of rest”. The promo video ends with “Are you ready?”. I answer, “No.”

Ever notice how the rhythm of the home is like a workout? There are periods of maximum intensity followed by periods of rest. There are days that are Insanity type days: long bursts of maximum intensity followed by short periods of rests. Those days are hard work.

I try to plan my days so it’s not long bursts of maximum intensity followed by only short periods of rest. I would like to keep my sanity, thank you. A key part to this is to have one planned activity to engage the kids in the morning. It could be anything, so long as I’m giving them my full attention for a period of at least 15 minutes. Making easy peasy cookies is one such activity to help keep my sanity.

EASY PEASY COOKIES

Ingredients
250g plain flour
125g sugar
125g butter
1 egg
1tsp baking powder
few drops of essence

Method:

1. Preheat your oven to 180C

2. Place all the ingredients in a bowl and mix.

3. Roll out the cookie dough and cut out your shapes. (We used dinosaur cookie cutters).

4. Place cookies on a baking tray that has been lined with baking paper and bake for 20-30mins (or until golden).

 N&M: 3 years, 7 months
E: 1 year, 6 months

This post was shared in the following linky parties:

It’s Playtime
Today at Play
For the Kids Friday

The post Easy Peasy Cookies by Pauline appeared first on Lessons Learnt Journal.