Meowcena Cave is a new concept, which means we need help advertising this virtual cat cafe. The Meowcenians have been talking up the food, but everyone knows that a picture is worth a thousand words. The ads and menus are in the works, and they could really use a few foodie photos to add some oomph.

Cook up a drink, pastry, or sandwich, or other cafe food* take a picture of it, and post the picture along with the recipe and instructions on how to make it! The drink, pastry, or sandwich you choose can be something “normal” or something completely bizarre (perhaps that only a cat would like)!

*anything you could reasonably find at a small cafe! Think along the lines of Starbucks or little local joint!

This activity runs from April 1st to April 15th 23:59 Server Time!

• Photograph Portion
  • Include a photograph of the finished product of the drink, pastry, sandwhich, or other cafe food you made for this activity (including intermediate steps is fine too)
  • The picture needs to contain your username written somewhere (on a sheet of paper next to the food, written into the food, etc.)
• Recipe Portion
  • Include the name of your creation
  • Include the ingredients and the amount of ingredients needed
  • Include instructions on how to make it—brief instructions are fine

Ingredients

• 1 tsp of matcha tea
• 1 tsp of honey or other sweetener (optional)
• 2 oz of almost boiling water
• 4 - 6 oz milk (milk alternatives work too)

Instructions

1. Sift 1 tsp of matcha tea through your sifter into your mug.
2. Add 2 oz of almost boiling water to the tea
3. Whisk the water/tea mixture in a “W” shape until the mixture is foamy on the top (see here)
4. (Optional) Add sweetener to your milk which is in a separate container
5. Warm the milk (I do it in the microwave but over the stove works too)
6. (Optional) Vigorously shake the milk until it is frothy—I put mine in a container with a lid and shake the heck out of it. Be careful the lid is on tight because you don’t want hot milk squirting everywhere!
7. Add the milk to the tea and stir it together.
8. Drink up!!

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The participation prizes for this activity are the Coffee To Go and Donut Dreams equipable. A completed entry will earn the player both prizes. A player can earn a maximum of one of each prize for this activity.

Ingredients

• Deluxe chicken and fish lamb tubelets (freeze-dried) - 1/2c
• Glacial spring water unsullied by the stink of humans - 1/2c
• 鰹節 (bonito flakes) - 2x sprinkles
• Gourmet banana and honey ice cream for dogs - 2 small scoops

Instructions

1. Measure out 1/2c of deluxe tubelets.
2. Slowly bring half of your ultra-fancy spring water to a bare simmer (remember, every molecule of steam is water not going into your consumméow).
3. Add 1/4c of hot water to the tubelets. Mush with a spoon until they’re all squishy and meaty and vaguely reconstituted.
4. Add the reserved 1/4c of cold water - you wouldn’t want to burn the customeowrs’ delicate palates!
5. Top with two scoops of frozen treat
6. Garnish with bonito flakes.

(hooray Myla said this was allowed!)

Ingredients

• 1 cup warm water
• 1 tsp black tea
• 4-6 cardamom pods
• 1 star anise
• 4-6 cloves
• 1 cinnamon stick
• ¹/₂ cup milk
• Sugar to taste

Instructions

1. Break open cardamom pods in a mortar and pestle (or beneath the flat of a large knife blade)
2. Add cardamom pods, water, tea, anise, cloves, and cinnamon to a pot over medium-high heat, cover and bring to the boil
3. Add milk and sugar, cover and return to the boil
4. Strain into your favourite cup
5. Top up with boiling water if necessary, and enjoy!
   
   _{Not actually my favourate cup, but it’s thematically appropriate}

Ingredients

• Your favorite coffee grounds (I use either Black Rifle “Just Black” coffee or Peet’s “House Blend”)
• Milk
• Whipped cream
• Sugar or sweetener
• Peppermint Mocha flavored creamer or peppermint syrup
• 1 packet of hot chocolate mix (plain or with marshmallows, no extra flavoring though!)
• Candy cane (optional)
• Chocolate syrup
• A cozy mug

Instructions

1. Brew your coffee to your desired strength
2. Fill your mug 3/4 of the way with the hot coffee
3. Add in milk until the mug is almost full (leaving room for the creamer/syrup)
4. Stir
5. Add in hot chocolate mix slowly, stirring as you do
6. Mix in the creamer/syrup as desired for flavoring (the syrup will be a bit more strong than the creamer, so please be careful when you add it!)
7. Stir in your sugar/sweetener to your desired sweetness (I only add in 1 sugar packet myself)
8. Top the drink with whipped cream and drizzle the chocolate syrup on top
9. Optional: you can crush up the candy cane and sprinkle it on the whipped cream and syrup or simply place it in the mug stylishly as a garnish and allow it to slowly melt into the mocha
10. Enjoy!

Ingredients

• 2 cups of your favorite coffee (I use whatever I got for sale that month, usually Folgers or something, I ain’t fancy)
• 1 cinnamon stick (AKA, tasty tree bark)
• 1/2 cup vanilla flavored creamer (I use Very Vanilla Silk. It tastes like melted vanilla ice cream and it’s delicious)
• Your sweetener of choice to taste (optional, but I use Sweet’N Low)

Instructions

1. Brew up some of your favorite coffee. How you choose to brew your coffee is up to you. I usually brew up a whole pot!
2. Pour 2 cups of your freshly brewed coffee into your favorite mug that your uncle accidentally chipped two years ago when he came home for the 4th of July. Chipped mugs have character!
3. Add your 1/2 cup of vanilla creamer (or Very Vanilla Silk) to your coffee and stir.
4. Add your sweetener to taste if you like things sweeter, stir again!
5. Place the cinnamon stick into the coffee and let it sit for 5-10 minutes, or you can just leave it as a cute garnish.
6. Stir, one last time.
7. Accidentally take a drink before snapping a picture for Mycena Cave (oops).
8. Enjoy!

Ingredients

• Your Favorite Coffee
• Your Favorite Milk (or Creamer or Milk Alternatives? It still counts, right?)
• 1-2 Cups of Scalding Hot Water

Instructions

1. Check to be sure your coffee pot (or Keurig, if that’s what you use) is empty. If not, empty out the old coffee and coffee grounds.
2. Refill the reservoir with fresh water. My particular pot fills up to 12cups, so fill to your heart’s desire. Mind the line if using a Keurig.
3. Place a fresh coffee filter in the basket.
4. Scoop in your coffee grounds. For my coffee, I use three level scoops.
5. Flip the switch on and wait.
6. Pour milk (or creamer) into your cup, as much or as little as you’d like, once the coffee has brewed.
7. Fill the rest of the cup with coffee.
8. Enjoy!

Ingredients

• 12 oz. cup of coffee
• Packet of hot chocolate mix, approx. .7 oz
• Stirring utensil
• Additional cream and/or ice cubes if desired

Instructions

1. Pour yourself a cup of coffee.
2. Crack open the packet of hot chocolate and dump it into your coffee.
3. Mix thoroughly to combine.
4. If you’d like, add ice cubes and/or cream in order to cool down and mellow out the taste.

tastes like grown-up

Ingredients
Plain vanilla or chocolate ice cream (cheap brand)
Soda of your preference*
**if you like extra cronch use a diet or sugar free soda!

Instructions
1. Wake up at 3am
2. Try to go back to sleep
3. Fail
4. Scrape as much ice cream into a mug as you can before your spoon bends or you give up
5. Pour some soda
6. Think about adding vodka then remember you don’t drink
7. Eat in bed

Flan
(I have another photo with my username if this one doesn’t work. Just tell me and I’ll swap it out.)

Ingredients:
3/4 cup sugar
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, softened
5 large eggs
1 can (14 ounces) sweetened condensed milk
1 can (12 ounces) evaporated milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions:
1. In a heavy saucepan, cook and stir sugar over medium-low heat until melted and golden, about 15 minutes. Quickly pour into an ungreased 2-qt. round baking or souffle dish, tilting to coat the bottom; let stand for 10 minutes.

2. In a bowl, beat the cream cheese until smooth. Beat in eggs, one at a time, until thoroughly combined. Add remaining ingredients; mix well. Pour over caramelized sugar.

3. Place the dish in a larger baking pan. Pour boiling water into larger pan to a depth of 1 in. Bake at 350° for 50-60 minutes or until center is just set (mixture will jiggle).

4.Remove dish from a larger pan to a wire rack; cool for 1 hour. Refrigerate overnight.

5. To unmold, run a knife around edges and invert onto a large rimmed serving platter. Cut into wedges or spoon onto dessert plates; spoon sauce over each serving.

Ingredients

For Olive Salad:

1 jar Spanish/Manzanilla olives
1 jar pitted kalamata olives
1 jar non-pareil capers
1 jar giardiniera pickled vegetables
5-6 pepperoncini peppers sliced thin
4 teaspoons garlic, minced
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup avocado or extra-virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon celery salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon basil
1 teaspoon oregano

———
For sammich:

1 large muffuletta-style roll (focaccia or ciabatta will work as well)
1/3 pound thinly sliced sweet soppressata
1/3 pound thinly sliced mortadella
1/3 pound thinly sliced capicola
1/3 pound thinly sliced provolone cheese
Olive Salad from above

Instructions

1) Drain and chop the olives and giardiniera veg. You can do this as coarse or fine as you like. Use caution because the olives will be slippery. (Pro tip, crush them with the flat side of the blade before chopping, or use a food processor) When finished combine them in a container with a lid.

2) Drain the capers and add them to the chopped olive mix, along with the pepperoncini, spices, vinegar, and oil.

3) Put the lid on container and shake well. Refrigerate overnight to allow flavors to develop.

4) Slice the roll and spread the olive salad generously on each half. Feel free to add a little of the extra juice from the mixture to soak into the roll.

5) Divide the meats and cheeses into two roughly equal portions. Layer them on each half of the roll.

6) Put the two halves together, pressing them gently to sammich them. Slice sammich in half and serve!

Ingredients

• 100g flour
• 2 eggs
• 300ml milk
• 1 teaspoon of salt

Instructions

1. Mix both the flour and eggs and salt together in a large bowl. When satisfactorily mixed, you start adding in the milk, more or less a quarter at a time, slowly. Mixing well before adding more. Once all the milk has been added to the flour and eggs, there should be bubbles visible on top of the smooth and light batter.

    

2. Heat a tablespoon of oil in your frying pan, on a moderate to high heat. It’s debatable. (I, personally, use the hotter end of the spectrum. Using 6 on the hob!). Swish the oil in your pan about, making sure the oil coats the entirety of the bottom, and grab some random cup to pour out the excess oil. Leaving some in the pan.

    

3. Now take your batter - which it is best to either put it all in to some jug of some sort, or pour bits of it into a cup - and put a thin layer of it into the frying pan. Tilt your pan in circles, making sure the batter coats the bottom, and until the batter stops moving. It should take approx 30 seconds (perhaps less, if you put it on as high a heat as I do!) for the pancake to have turned a golden brown on that side. Make sure that the pancake is no longer sticking to the bottom (I use a knife to carefully separate it from the pan - which I also use to check how it’s looking, to make sure I don’t burn it - as I have still not mastered the art of knowing when it can stop sticking itself. And I’m impatient.). Now, you can either use a spatula to flip it, or flip it using the pan itself. And just wait for the other side to cook a golden brown, too.

    

4. Now is the time to add toppings. Lemon and sugar are a favourite, and the best time to add it is when the pancake is warm, so it can soak in. Just sprinkle some sugar on, as much as you’d like, and then squirt lemon over it. Either a real lemon or some squeezable bottle lemon will do. Once the toppings have been added, you can fold the pancake up like a scroll.

5. Eat them all in one go and wish you’d savoured them more, knowing that next time you’ll eat them just as quickly, and the cycle will repeat itself.

   Side-note: These ingredients to make quite a few pancakes by themselves, but if you ever felt the need for more, just double up on all the ingredients!

Later picture with my name on it, because I didn’t read the guidelines like a dum-dum

This part turned out really nice and honestly I think it’s safe to stop after this stage and eat it as is. o-ob

Ingredients:

• 10 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups of sugar
• 2/3 cups of chocolate powder (I used Nesquik’s)
• 1 1/3 cups of cake flour

Instructions:
Separate egg whites from yolks and beat the poor whites into a thick froth. Slowly seep the sugar in as you continue beating, and, once done, add the yolks one by one. Mix the flour and chocolate powder and gently sift the mixture in.

Line a cake tin (around 960cm² or similar in size) with baking parchment and spread the cake mixture on it. Bake for 40 minutes at 170°C/338°F.

The result here wasn’t great - because of too much milk it stayed wet for a long time and since I didn’t wait long enough it ended up drowning the cake. Later, because of all the coconut oil I put in, it turned oily and brick hard. :D;
This recipe has been adjusted and the results will hopefully be less disappointing, but I encourage experimenting! Substituting the milk/sugar/butter combo with some condensed milk might be a good alternative.

Ingredients:

• 500ml of milk
• 1 cup of sugar
• A cube of unsalted butter (some of it can be substituted with coconut oil)
• 500g of desiccated coconut
• Vanilla extract

Instructions:
Cook the milk together with sugar and a trickle of vanilla extract. Once hot, add the desiccated coconut and cook for another 15 or so minutes. Mix the butter in and wait for it to cool down.

Cut the cooled cake in half, spread the coconut mix on top of one of the halves and cover with the other half. You can experiment with the layering to make things more interesting, for example a layer of jelly should look and taste nice 8)

For the top, decorate it however you like! I used melted white chocolate, shreds of dark chocolate and some stray cake crumbs because why not. 8)

Things can get chilly on the Oregon Coast over the winter, so we like to warm it up and add a thrill to our drinks.

Ingredients

• 1 Peppermint Teabag, alternately you could use loose peppermint leaf in a teaball
• 1 teaspoon rounded of Instant Coffee
• 1 teaspoon heaping of cocoa
• 6- 8 ounces of boiling water
• alternate choices, sweetner of choice, toppings such as whipped cream and peppermint candy sprinkles

Instructions

1. Place in bottom of generous coffee mug the teaspoons of Coffee and Cocoa.  Add any additional preferred sweetner
2. Add boiling water, stir vigorously until coffee and cocoa is completely dissolved
3. Place Peppermint teabag into coffee cocoa mixture.  Let steep for at least a minute or two.  Dunking helps speed up the process.  Remove teabag after a couple of minutes and throw away.
4. Add additional garnishes such as whipped cream or sprinkles, peppermint pieces make a nice addition
5. Enjoy!

OregonCoast

I just want to remind everyone that this is a Cafe, not a five star restaurant! Please make sure that your entries fall into the categories specified in the instructions — we’ve expanded them to not only be limited to coffee, pastries, and sandwiches, but include anything you could reasonably find at a small cafe. If you can’t buy it at Starbucks or that trendy little hole-in-the-wall coffee shop downtown, we don’t have the ingredients to make it here!

If you have any questions about whether or not your recipe falls under our umbrella, you can ask one of our regional meownagers, Myla or Crow and they’ll let you know!Senior Head Pawtissier

If the cats are anything like me, there’s something lying around their cafe to fancy up some good ol’ brownies. Like coffee, adding a few simple steps can elevate something simple into something cafe-worthy.

Ingredients

• Favorite brownie mix (and whatever it calls for - often eggs, milk, oil, ect)

• 4 oz chocolate candy from Christmas and Halloween - hopefully from this year
        With guesstimation I found this was about 3/4 Cup hersheys kisses

• A few of those hard mints that always seem to be lying around (4 used in pictured brownies)

• 1/4 Cup heavy cream
        Substitution can be made for 1/4 C whole milk and 2 tbs butter, as used for the recipe.
        If 2% or other milk, add more butter.

• Dash of mint extract

Instructions

1. Place the hard mints in a plastic bag and use a rolling pin to crush into tiny shards
2. Make brownies according to package, but adding the crushed mints to the mix before pouring into the pan.
3. Cook brownies for time recommended on box.
4. As the brownies are cool, begin making the ganache. Chop the chocolate into small chunks, so that it melts easier. Place in a heat-resistant metal, glass, or ceramic bowl and set to the side.
5. Begin heating heavy cream (or milk and butter) and a dash of mint extract in a saucepan, stirring constantly. Do not let it boil or it will burn!
6. When there are a few bubbles around the edge and a shimmer of steam rises up, take off heat. Pour over chocolate pieces. Let sit five mins.
7. Stir the chocolate until smooth. If it still has hard lumps of unmelted chocolate, either the chocolate pieces were too big or the liquid was not hot enough. Use a double boiler to finish melting chocolate. If you do not have a double boiler, see below on how to DIY one.
8. Pour over brownies. Spread evenly with a spoon or spatula. Let cool.
9. Cut and serve!

Double Boiler DIY
If you don’t have a zillion cooking gadgets lying around, you may not have a double boiler. I sure don’t. But! It’s function is to heat up something slowly with steam to avoid burning or curdling, and you’ve probably got the required parts and don’t know it.

1. Find a kitchen quality metal or glass bowl that fits well on top of a saucepan. It needs to allow 2-3 inches so the boiling water in the saucepan does not come into contact with the bowl on top. The top bowl should also sit snugly on top to keep the majority of steam in the pan; this is how it gently heats the chocolate so as not to burn it.
2. Be very careful, because any escaping steam is going to be HOT. Also, the bowl will be HOT. Please have hot pads, hand towels, ect. on hand and be safe.
3. Get an inch or two of water boiling in the pan. When it’s nice and bubbly, put the second bowl with the chocolate, milk, and butter mixture on top. Turn the heat down to low and stir constantly until the chocolate completely melts.
4. Removing the top bowl can be tricky as it releases the pent up steam. I recommend carefully angling one edge up away from you for a few seconds to allow the steam to vent before completely removing the bowl. Set this very hot bowl down on a hand towel or heat resistant surface to avoid damaging your countertops.

This is less a recipe and more a cry for help, to be honest…

Ingredients

• Speculoos Cookie Butter
• Nutella
• 2 slices of peasant bread/Vienna bread
• Chocolate milk

Instructions

1. Spread the Speculoos in a very thin layer on both slices of bread because it’s stronger than you think it is.
2. Slather some Nutella on top of the Speculoos on both slices because you’re a heathen who doesn’t care about mixing spreads since it’s the end of the Nutella jar anyway.
3. Make the slices a sandwich. Come on, you know how to do this.
4. Take a bite, realize it’s not that great. It’s just bread and some flavored spreads.
5. Pour a thematically appropriate mug of chocolate milk, because apparently you’re out of hot chocolate.
6. Dunk sandwich in chocolate milk?
7. No, that didn’t make it better. This is just bread and flavored spreads, and now it’s soggy.
8. Force yourself to finish the soggy sandwich because again, there’s not much in the house and you need something in your stomach.
9. Chug the chocolate milk to get rid of the weird texture in your mouth.

Ingredients

• 1/3 cups oats (can do more than this, just make sure to double the milk!)
• 2/3 cups milk (milk alternative or water will also work)
• 1 tsp cacao powder
• 2 tsp pure maple syrup
• dark chocolate chips
• berries or fruit of choice

Instructions

1. Mix oats, cacao powder, milk, and maple syrup over medium heat on stove
2. Optional: add 4-5 chocolate chips for a richer color in the oatmeal
3. Once oatmeal is warm, add in fruit. Personally I use frozen mixed berries but fresh works just as well! (If preferred, you can also save the fruit and add it to the top instead of cooking it.)
4. Continue to cook over medium heat, stirring occasionally to prevent burning, until desired consistency.
5. Transfer to bowl and sprinkle with chocolate chips! They’ll melt and add a lovely sweetness to the dish.

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk
• 1 packet of cat-friendly instant cocoa substitute (or actual cocoa if you’re a weird non-cat)

Instructions

1. Pour cup of milk into desired beverage containment unit.
2. Heat beverage containment unit in the nearest microwave for a minute and thirty seconds.
3. Carefully remove beverage containment unit from microwave.
4. Dispense packet of cat-friendly instant cocoa substitute into the milk-filled beverage containment unit.
5. Stir until well mixed.
6. Serve while still hot.

Ingredients

• ~1 cup boiling water
• ~2 tablespoons loose leaf chai (or just a teabag)
• 1 tablespoon honey (optional - can be substituted for any sweetener)
• milk (or milk alternative - I used vanilla almond milk!) to taste

Instructions

1. Put the kettle on to boil!
2. Prepare your tea steeping vessel by putting your leaves in it - I used my gf’s french press because the thing we have actually intended for steeping tea leaves always gets leafs all over the place >:I If you’re using a teabag, just put the bag into your mug.
3. Once the water is boiling, pour it over your prepared tea! Allow to steep for 4-6 minutes.
4. After the tea has steeped, remove the leaves (compost them or use them to fertilize plants, if you can!), and add in your sweeter and milk of choice.
5. Stir and enjoy!

Ingredients

• Designated vanilla cake mix
• Designated vanilla icing mix
• 50g unsalted butter
• 1 egg
• Sprinkles (optional)
• 75ml (5 tbsp) water

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 170°C (fan assisted 150°C)
2. Tip cake mix, cracked egg and 75ml of water together into a bowl
3. Whisk until smooth
4. Tip mix into container of choice, (cupcake cases)
5. Bake for 16-18 minutes
6. Whilst they cool, start making icing - tip icing mix and 50g unsalted butter together
7. Mix them until smooth, press the mix into the butter as you go
8. Once smooth tip sprinkles into mix if desired and stir them in - this stops them from falling everywhere once you bite into it
9. Apply icing to cooled cakes, and you’re done!

Ingredients

• Water
• Black tea
• Condensed milk (make sure the ingredients are only milk and sugar!)
• Sugar (optional)

Instructions

1. Prepare the kettle - fill your teacup or mug a little more than the amount of tea you want to end up with at the end and then pour into the teapot. Afterwards, place one bag of black tea with the string cut off (I use English breakfast tea) or one teaspoon of loose leaf tea of your choice. Add more or less depending on how strong you like it. (If you’re using loose tea, make sure you have a strainer handy for the end!)
2. Bring the tea up to a boil and then turn off the heat (or put it on the lowest setting depending on how your stove retains heat). Move the kettle so that it’s only on half of the burner and set a timer for 5 minutes.
3. While the tea is steeping, add some water to your empty teacup or mug, just enough to cover the bottom, and microwave it for about a minute. Leave it until the tea is done.
4. After 5 minutes, pour out the water you used to heat your cup and then pour your tea into the cup, using a strainer if you used loose leaf tea. If you left the stove on earlier, make sure to turn it off!
5. Add in a teaspoonful of condensed milk - to make it easier, I usually spin it around to coat both sides instead of trying to scoop it. Stir the spoon into the hot tea to combine!
6. Optionally, you can add a little sugar depending on how sweet your condensed milk is and how sweet you like your tea!
7. Enjoy! :D

‘Stop Being Sick’ Tea
Ingredients:
Your favorite black tea, brewed strong
1 Tablespoon Honey, local and organic if you can get it
1 Tablespoon Lemon juice or concentrate
1 Tablespoon Raspberry Jam
1 Tablespoon Brandy (optional)

Instructions:
1. Give due consideration to making a voodoo doll of whoever gave you these germs, then discard this plan as it takes too much effort.
2. Boil water for tea
3. Select your favorite tea mug, as large as you can handle, and pour in your tea
4. Into the tea, combine the honey, lemon juice and raspberry jam. Alternatively, put the jam into a tea strainer if you don’t want to deal with the seeds
5. Pour in the brandy if you’re adding it
6. Drink while still hot
7. Curl under 3 blankets and, ideally, a cat

Ingredients/Equipment
- Kettle/hot water

- Large bowl or jug

- (Ideally) a bottle to store in

- (Optionally) sugar/honey/ice cubes, depending on tastes.

- Some sort of herbal or flavoured tea (one teabag will probably be enough to make a pint or so, but you’ll need more as the quantity of drink increases. Also: make sure it’s a decent tea.)

Instructions
- Boil kettle and put teabag/s in a large bowl or jug

- Pour freshly boiled (or slightly cooled, if dealing with a milder tea) water into bowl/jug

- Leave to steep (you’ll probably be looking at a good ten minutes in most cases, but you may need to experiment a little to get the right strength for you / the particular tea)

- Remove the teabag/s, stir, and (optionally) add sugar or honey to taste. Bear in mind that the end results probably won’t taste quite like the normal tea, so you might want to skip this the first time (you can usually add them later, if needs be)!

- Leave to cool for half an hour or so, then decant into a bottle (if possible) and refrigerate

- Serve once completely chilled – either as-is or with some ice.

Ingredients

• 1 cup peanut butter (creamy or chunky works fine!)
• 1/8 cup honey
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1 egg
• A splash of vanilla extract (optional!)
• A pinch of baking soda (also optional!)
• A pinch of salt (also also optional!)

Toppings
I like a little bit of toppings on my cookies so I sprinkle a chocolate chips or a little sea salt on top.  These are by no means necessary.

Instructions

1. Preheat your oven to 350 F/175 C.
2. Mix your ingredients together until they’re creamy and smooth (unless you’re using chunky peanut butter. You will have very tired arms if you try to mix it into total smoothness).
3. Once your ingredients are well and mixed, grab a spoon and drop dollops of peanut butter cookie dough onto your baking sheet (I line everything with tin foil for ease). To get that peanut butter cookie marking on top, gently press a fork into the top, first one way and then another so that the markings make a cross hatch. If your cookies are too sticky, that’s okay!
4. If you want to put some toppings on, sprinkle them on top now.

5. Pop your uncooked cookies into the oven! The norm for these guys is about 10 minutes but check them often. As soon as they start to brown at the edges, they’re done! These cookies are supposed to stay soft so don’t be alarmed if they look it.

   Wait until they cool and then chow down!

Edit to add: I realized a little too late that I didn’t put my name tag in the baked cookie photo. I will add a new one with a new batch (we’re not going to complain about more cookies here, haha) in a day or so!

Ingredients

• 3/4 cup of milk
• 1/4 cup of whipping cream
• 1 cup of ice cubes
• 1/2 cup of mint chocolate chip ice cream
• 6 Thin Mints (or other minty chocolate cookies of your choice)

Instructions

1. Break up the cookies a bit until the cookie chunks are about the size of the tip of your finger.
2. Pour all of the ingredients (including cookies) in the blender.
3. Pulse blend until smooth.
4. Pour into a glass and drink!

Ingredients

• Fruit; options can include but not limited to strawberries, bananas, kiwis, raspberries, etc
• 1/2 cup plain yogurt; if you lack plain, flavored works as well! I used coconut for mine
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup of milk; amount varies on how ‘liquidy’ you like your smoothies!
• Honey to taste for sweetness
• Ice cubes (optional, my blender doesn’t always agree to crush them properly so you don’t need them. Sometimes pre-crunching them with a baggie and a rolling pin helps!)

Instructions

1. Chop up fruit into smaller pieces and add to blender
2. Add yogurt and milk, and ice if applicable
3. Blend
4. Apologize to cat for scaring them with the noisy blender
5. Add in honey if needed for sweetness and reblend
6. Apologize a second time to cat
7. Serve in appropriate cat glass!

Optional Alternative
Swap out yogurt for ICE CREAM. 8)

Ingredients

• Oats
• Whole Milk/Milk Alternative/Water
• Maple Syrup
• Peanut Butter Chips
• Fruit (Optional)

Instructions

1. Fill bowl half way with oats.
2. Add milk. Stir in milk to make sure oats have enough to soak up while cooking. Add more if you would like!
3. Heat in the microwave for 2 minutes.
4. Stir oats, drizzle maple syrup on top, toss in peanut butter chips while still hot to melt them, and add fruit.
5. Enjoy!

Perfectly Smooth Cold Brew Mocha

Ingredients!

One (1) old 24 oz pickle jar, cleaned
Instant Hot Cocoa Packet
2 oz coffee, coarse- or medium-ground
3 cups cold water
Milk to taste
your name on an old envelope

Step One

Use your wife’s yarn scale to measure out 2.05 oz of coffee, and then decide that you don’t feel like being exact enough to remove 0.05 oz.

Step Two

Dump that good stuff right into your empty pickle jar. Try not to spill too much on the counter. Put the scale back where you found it so your wife doesn’t know you stole it.

Step Three

Pour all three cups of cold water into the jar. Doesn’t that look appetizing?

Step Four

Put the lid on and shake that stuff up really good. Get kinda funky with it if you want. Much more appetizing now, right?

Step Five

Wait eighteen (18) to twenty four (24) hours. The longer you wait, the stronger the brew will be.

Strain your coffee mix through a coffee filter to get all the grounds out. You should have about two and a half cups of coffee. Throw the coffee grounds out, or put them in your compost for a really robust nitrogen boost!

Mix 1/2 a cup of cold brew, 1/2 a hot chocolate packet, 1/2 cup water and milk to taste. Heat in the microwave until it’s warm and delicious. Yes that’s a different recycled jar than the first one. Feel free to use a coffee mug instead. <3