Recipe: Mint Brownie Bites

Here is the recipe for the yummy cookies that won the contest in our neighborhood cookie party. Thanks Anita!

I tried the recipe while in Texas over Christmas again and they were so yummy.

Not that you probably want any more Christmas cookies, but if you get a hankering for something chocolately and minty, I suggest giving these a try!

Brownie Bites

• 2/3 cup(s) all-purpose-flour
• 1/2 cup(s) unsweetened cocoa
• 1/2 teaspoon(s) baking powder
• 1 pinch(s) salt
• 3/4 cup(s) granulated sugar
• 3 tablespoon(s) butter or margarine, melted and cooled
• 2 tablespoon(s) honey
• 1 teaspoon(s) vanilla extract
• 1 large egg white

Topping

• 1 cup(s) confectioners' sugar
• 1 tablespoon(s) milk
• 1 tablespoon(s) butter or margarine, softened
• 1/2 teaspoon(s) peppermint extract
• 2 ounce(s) white chocolate, melted and cooled
• 2 ounce(s) round hard peppermint candies, broken into chunks

---

Directions

1. Prepare Brownie Bites: Preheat oven to 350°F. Grease large cookie sheet.
2. In large bowl, combine flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt. In medium bowl, whisk sugar, butter, honey, vanilla, and egg white until blended. Stir sugar mixture into flour mixture; then, with hand, press dough just until blended.
3. With greased hands, shape dough into 1-inch balls and place on prepared cookie sheet 2 inches apart; press to flatten slightly. Bake 7 to 8 minutes or until brownies have cracked slightly. Transfer to wire rack to cool.
4. Prepare Topping: In medium bowl, whisk confectioners' sugar and milk until smooth. Whisk in butter and extract, then whisk in melted chocolate until smooth. Swirl 1 teaspoon topping on each cookie. Top each frosted cookie with 1 candy piece. Store in tightly sealed container with waxed paper between layers at room temperature up to 3 days or in freezer up to 1 month.

Source: http://www.delish.com/recipefinder/mint-brownie-bites-recipe

December Rewind: Part 1

I am woefully behind on posting all of our Christmas festivities. I have so many pictures on my phone but no pics from our "real" camera. We had a few events/parties at home in San Diego before we flew out to Texas on the 21st for Christmas and New Years.

Here is our San Diego December rewind. I'll upload the Texas pics in a separate post.

Encinitas Christmas Parade
This year we went to the Christmas parade with Stone, Shelby and Knox (neighbors who also happen to be college friends), but just happened to bump into most of our street when we got there. We LOVE the parade and have only missed it once since moving to Cali. It makes Encinitas seem like such a small, cute, beach town and makes me so happy to live there.

2nd Annual Cottage Way Progressive Dinner
Once again, such a blast! Like last year, we moved between four different houses: cocktail hour, soup and salad, heavy appetizers, and finished with dessert. I think this is one of those things that is going to keep getting better and better every year. Love this group!

I helped Thuy with dessert this year. Truffles, butterscotch pudding(all Thuy), chocolate dipped raspberries, and cookies.

Girl's Bible Study Pajama Christmas Party
Sweet Sindie usually hosts all of us girls and our husbands for the annual Christmas party, but we changed it up this year. Since there are so many babies now, we left the husbands home with the kids and we had a girls only pajama party. My friend Kayla had a great idea for our gift exchange. Instead of a normal white elephant gift exchange, each person brought 3 of their favorite things ($10 or less each and wrapped). We each put our name in a hat 3 times and drew 3 names out of the same hat (just not your own). Then we each gave the gifts we brought to the 3 names we drew. It was so fun. I brought Essie nail polish and took home Trader Joe's Coconut body lotion, lip balm and really cool spatulas. Other good gift ideas: wine, gift card for Starbuck's inside of a red-cup with her instructions for her favorite drink written on the side for the barista, chocolate, etc....

Neighborhood Cookie Party
We hosted the annual neighborhood cookie party and kid's gift exhange this year. As always, it was so much fun. The kids actually sat pretty still while they all opened gifts and the cookies were yummy! We also had pizza and salad for dinner and a cookie decorating table for the big kids.

Next up...Texas Trip.