Today was a fun baking day.  One of the best things about working from home is that it makes holidays like Thanksgiving much easier.  I can pop things into the oven to bake while I work.

For breakfast, I started out with a bowl of granola.

Mid-morning was an apple snack:

For lunch, I broke out some Hebrew National hot dogs that I got at Trader Joe’s last weekend.  Those are my favorite hot dogs, sooo good.

In the afternoon it was…. baking time!  I started out with some oatmeal banana chocolate chip cookies.  Still trying to use up those brown bananas…

These were winners.

Oatmeal Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies

12 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temp
1 c. brown sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 scant teaspoon salt (optional) – use only if using unsalted butter or shortening
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 3/4 c. old-fashioned oatmeal
1 c. mashed banana (about 3 old bananas)
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup toasted chopped pecans

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Cream butter and sugar. Mix in egg. Add vanilla. Mix in flour, baking soda and salt. Then mix in the oatmeal. Fold in mashed banana then stir in chocolate chips and pecans.

Drop by tablespoons onto parchment lined pans and bake for 11-13 minutes or until cookies appear set. Let cool on wire rack.

Makes about 4 dozen

Yum, yum, yummers!  Into the second freezer they go.  The ones that actually made it into the oven (there seems to be a mysterious cookie-dough monster in my house) and then made it off the cooling rack.

Next I baked a mini-apple crisp.  I used a combination of fuji and honeycrisp apples – cut them up, sprinkled them with cinnamon to prepare.

I love that mini baking dish.  It is the perfect size for making mini-bakes.  I adapted this recipe:

Apple Crisp

4 medium tart cooking apples, sliced (4 cups)
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
1/2 cup quick-cooking or old-fashioned oats
1/3 cup butter or margarine, softened
3/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
3/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
Cream or Ice cream, if desired

Heat oven to 375ºF. Grease bottom and sides of 8-inch square pan with shortening. Spread apples in pan. In medium bowl, stir remaining ingredients except cream until well mixed; sprinkle over apples. Bake about 30 minutes or until topping is golden brown and apples are tender when pierced with a fork. Serve warm with cream.

I divided this recipe by 3, for my mini baking dish, and it was the perfect size.  My mid-afternoon snack was cottage cheese cheesecake pudding with apple crisp!

After my snack, I went to the gym.  I did 40 minutes on the elliptical… slow and steady.  And boooooring.  Afterwards, I ran to Target to get a few items for my final bake-fest of the day… and my favorite.

But first, I made a healthy dinner of cheesy cauliflower, edamame, and Quorn chick’n tenders:

Drumroll please…….

TURKEY COOKIES!!!

Are these not the cutest things you have ever seen?  I saw them on the Pillsbury website and couldn’t resist making them for Thanksgiving.

In case I didn’t mention before, S and I are going over to my friend Wanda’s house for Thanksgiving.  She has five-year-old twins.  There will be other people coming as well – a total of 14 people.  9 adults, 5 kids.  So I thought the kids would love these cookies.

They are really easy – I used ready-to-bake refrigerated dough so the only time-consuming bit was the decorating.

I just can’t get over how frickin cute they are.

I also can’t get over how much frosting, how many cookies, and how many candy corn pieces I ate while I was making them.  Oops.

So now I am off to bed.  On an exciting note… my spiral slicer arrived today!  I didn’t get a chance to try it, because of my baking bonanza, but I promise you that there will be a review coming very soon.

G’night, ya’ll.