Brown Butter Pecan Toffee Cookies-Cookie Week 2014!

Welcome to the day 3 of Cookie Week, hosted by Kim of Cravings of a Lunatic and Susan of The Girl In the Little Red Kitchen! We’ve teamed together with 10 other talented bloggers to bring you 5 fantastic days of cookie recipes to get you in to the holiday spirits. If you are feeling a mid-week slump, then there is no better way to beat it than a big dose of cookie love! Please make sure to check out and enter our fantastic giveaway and check out our #CookieWeek Pinterest board full of all the cookie recipes you’ll see here this week!
Our sponsors for this event have provided us with some great prizes and we’d like to extend a huge thank you for their generosity. Thanks to Imperial Sugar, Circulon, Peanut Butter & Co. and Page Street Publishing for being a part of Cookie Week!

 Let's see what's baking up in the oven today:

Maple Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies by The Girl In The Little Red Kitchen

S'mores Cookies by Cravings of a Lunatic

Banana Walnut Biscotti by Chocolate Moosey

Brown Butter Pecan Toffee Cookies by The Cooking Actress

Candy Topped Toffee Squares by That Skinny Chick Can Bake

Maple Walnut Shortbread Cookies by Hungry Couple

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies by Dinners, Dishes and Desserts

Savory Cheddar Coins by Crumb

White Chocolate Cranberry Ginger Cookies by Jen's Favorite Cookies

These are some of the better cookies I've made in awhile. In fact-I gave a couple of these to friends of mine and Michael's and they have two 5 year old daughters. I snuck them the cookies and made it clear that these were adult cookies and would be wasted on children. They just can't appreciate the nuances, the overt amount of taste SENSATION that you will undergo if you eat these cookies. Upon eating his secret cookie, David assured me that I was correct. Way too good to share with the kiddos :P.

That said...I love children. By all means give your kids these cookies-they'll love 'em. They'll love them even more in 20 years. :D

It's kind of hilarious...I think my particular cookie preferences are starting to skew Michael's and my view of the world. Recently I made some perfectly acceptable CCC's-but Michael remarked they almost tasted like a sugar cookie. They didn't. They were much more of a classic chocolate chip cookie, though, and I tend to make a lot of very brown sugar heavy cookies-so in comparison they tasted almost like a sugar cookie. Ah....perspective is a funny thing.

These cookies are browned butter perfection-it's in the dough and the pecans are toasted in the nutty buttery goodness. They are made with dark brown sugar-which adds that extra special mollases-y wonderful flavor. Toffee, my crunchy little friends, are the extra special final element. And salt. Of course. They're crisp yet chewy and sturdy but slightly tender on the insides and then you get a delightful crunch from the pecans and toffee. These are very serious cookies, my friends.

Cookie Week 2014 Announcement and #GIVEAWAY (CLOSED)

I LOVE cookies!! Did you know I have close to 70 cookie recipes on this blog right now (and that's not including brownies/blondies/bars)? They are my favorite. If/when I ever open a bakery-it would be a cookie bakery. I just love 'em. So, obviously....when I heard we were doing cookie week again I was SO in! And to keep up with all the cookie goodness, follow our Cookie Week 2014 Pinterest Board!

Welcome to the second annual Cookie Week, hosted by Kim of Cravings of a Lunatic and Susan of The Girl In the Little Red Kitchen! We've teamed together with 10 other talented bloggers to bring you 5 fantastic days of cookie recipes to get you into the holiday spirits. Now is the time to break out the flour, butter, sugar and eggs. Bring your friends and family together for cookie exchanges or a giant baking party, we have got you covered! Our sponsors for this event have provided us with some great prizes and we'd like to extend a huge thank you for their generosity. Thanks to Imperial Sugar, Circulon, Peanut Butter & Co. and Page Street Publishing for being a part of Cookie Week!   Let's take a look at what prizes are up for grabs - one lucky winner will take it all!

• 1 case (10, 4-lb bags) Imperial Granulated Sugar
• 3-Piece Bakerware Set from Circulon
• 6 assorted jars of Peanut Butter & Co. peanut butter
• One copy of the cookbook Eat More Dessert by Jenny Keller
• One copy of the cookbook Bake and Destroy by Natalie Slater
• One copy of the cookbook Decadent Gluten-Free Vegan Baking by Cara Reed
• One copy of the cookbook Rawsome Vegan Baking by Emily von Euw

Make sure to stop by and grab a warm cookie from one of today's Cookie Week participants!

• Skillet Cookie by Cravings of a Lunatic
• Pumpkin Cookie Cups with Biscoff Buttercream by The Girl In The Little Red Kitchen
• Chocolate-Cherry Chews by Crumb
• Chocolate Hazelnut Cookies by Cooking in Stilettos
• Cranberry, White Chocolate, Crystallized Ginger Cookies by That Skinny Chick Can Bake
• Dark and Crunchy Peanut Butter Cookies by Hungry Couple
• Dulce de Leche Filled Brownie Sandwich Cookies by Mind Over Batter
• Muffin Top Cookies by Food Lust People Love
• Peanut Butter Cookie Dough Sandwich Cookies by Chocolate Moosey
• Pumpkin Eggnog Cookies by Jen's Favorite Cookies

Other blogs participating later this week include:

• Dinners, Dishes, and Desserts
• The Cooking Actress

Something Saturdays (11/1/14)

Sunday I had such a wonderful time in Pittsburgh with Carla (Chocolate Moosey)! As you can tell, I survived the drive! It actually was pretty simple. Then Carla took me to a gorgeous French bakery, La Gourmandine. I had a perfectly flaky pain au chocolat as well as some sort of chocolate dessert that reminded me of a giant candy bar. Carla had a beautiful passionfruit macaron. Then we went to the Duquesne Incline which was so cool and had a beautiful view of the city! One of the highlights of my visit was going on a tour at The Cathedral of Learning (University of Pitt), a gorgeous tall building that looked like an old Catholic cathedral inside. There were different rooms that were dedicated to different cultures (based upon immigrants who settled in Pittsburgh)-some of my favorites were the Italian room, Irish room, Lithuanian room, Greek room, and...well....all of them. It was SO fascinating and they were so beautiful! By this point we were starving, so we headed over to Burgatory for the best milkshake I've ever had (Fluffer Nutter) and an amazing burger and homemade potato chips. It totally hit the spot! Carla and I finally just visited a bit at her apartment before I headed back. I had such a great time and I'm so happy Pittsburgh and Carla are only 2 hours away :)

I had a fun-but somewhat unproductive-week! Tuesday I got to go to the shops at First & Main in Hudson with Michael's stepmom. The shops were SO cute and they reminded me of my favorite little spots in NY. So it won my heart. Wednesday I headed back to my and Michael's old high school to spend some time with his mom (a teacher) and sister (a student) and his best friend (also a teacher). While I was there we also booked our ceremony musicians! The director of campus ministry went to the same grade school as I did and so is very familiar with the church where Michael and I are getting married. He has a group of people who do weddings with him and they're extremely popular and in demand and talented! So thrilled I have one more thing crossed off my to-do list!

Friday Michael had the day off (he has to work today though) so we ran some errands (got his passport processed and found a new haircut place for him) and got dinner (steak!). Then I worked a bar crawl in the cold and rain...blech. Today I'm going to a bridal shower for Michael's cousin (she's getting married in February) so it should be fun!