Putting on a layer of fat for the cold Maine winter

So its fall, and I am craving the scent of cinnamon in my house, and what better way to accomplish this than cookies?  I haven't had any luck finding canned pumpkin this year, so I have had to be brave and make all of my pumpkin dishes from actual pumpkins.  I'll tell you how, and you can go out and buy a can of pumpkin and make the recipe.  I won't tell.

This recipe has lots of healthier, whole ingredients that can easily be substituted for the "normal" variant, it will work either way, but the cookies taste so freaking good that I am including my healthier stuff so you can try it and become addicted like I have. 

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 c butter, soft
3/4 c brown sugar
3/4 c sugar in the raw (turbinado sugar)
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 c whole wheat bread or pastry flour
1 c oatmeal
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 t cinnamon
1 c cooked, mashed pumpkin (or canned, if you can get your hands on it)
1 1/2 c chocolate chips (dark, milk, semi sweet, your call.)

Pumpkin processing;
Take a 4ish lb sugar pumpkin and chop it into 4 pieces.  Scoop out the seeds and goop, and either boil it until its mashable with a fork, or bake it in a shallow pan, face down and covered with tinfoil at 375 for 1.5 hours.  When the pumpkin is no longer hot enough to melt your skin, peel off the pumpkin skin, and mash it with a fork.  Let it cool, and proceed with the rest of the recipe.
Canned Pumpkin;
Open can. Remove 1 c pumpkin. Laugh because you have found the 1 remaining can of pumpkin in the known universe.

In a big bowl, cream the butter and sugars together, add the egg, and vanilla and mix.  Add the other ingredients sans the pumpkins and chocolate, and mix.  Finally add the pumpkin, and mix well.  Fold in the chocolate chips, and CHILL THE FREAKING BATTER.  I cannot stress this enough.  If the batter is warm, the cookies will be crap. 

Preheat the oven to 350, and on a greased baking sheet drop golf ball sized dollops of batter onto the sheet.  Bake for 11-13 minutes.  Enjoy, these buggers are addictive.

Its HOT

Ok, so in the northeast right now we are having a heat wave of epic proportions.  Its officially September and yesterday it was 97F.  That's REALLY hot for my neck of the woods, and being that 3/4 of the year, we need to run the furnace, most, if not all of the houses around here have no central air.  So we are all dying in the heat.  School is also starting up, and that brings me to today's recipe.  Tomorrow is a very special day at my house.  My eldest child, who for the sake of anonymity, we'll call Cinderella, is starting kindergarten.  That makes today her last day at home with Momma, and since its roughly the temperature of the sun, with the humidity of monsoon season, I made her one of her favorite treats...Cinderella's Favorite Lemonade.

Simple?  Yes, but in this heat, delightful.

Cinderella's Favorite Lemonade

1 c water
2 c sugar (bad, I know, but its a treat)
1 c blueberries
1 1/2 c lemon juice
ice
6ish cups cold water
mint leaves for a garnish

In a saucepan, heat 1 cup of water, mixed with the 2 cups of sugar, and 1/2 cup of the blueberries.  Heat this until the sugar is dissolved and the blueberries have turned the water bright pink.  Pour this into your pitcher with the 6 cups of cold water, the lemon juice, and then add the ice, the rest of the blueberries, and a few mint sprigs, and chill.  If you don't get the color pink you want (this is Cinderella's lemonade, after all) add a splash of cranberry juice to the final product. If you are serving this to a princess, I suggest a fancy cup.