Do Not Make These I Beg of You

Recently I asked some of my friends what brand name childhood treat I should try to make for them, and the vote came down to everyone's favorite sandwich cookie, Oreo. 

Do not try to make Oreos.

There is a reason that the Oreo cookie company is so successful. 

They have made their iconic recipe INCREDIBLY difficult to replicate. I have no idea what kind of black magic they're using over at the Oreo factory to so easily make millions of these little chocolate devils every day, but I can assure you it is nearly impossible to make these at home. It caused me a great deal of hair pulling, sweat, and tears, but in the end I (sort of maybe) prevailed, and I am proud to say that I have made homemade Oreos before.

I seriously do not recommend making these. It's going to save you a boat load of stress to just go to the supermarket and buy a pack of Oreos. Why don't you go do that now, you can have something to munch on as you laugh at my many near-failure experiences during the creation of these cookies.

Well.

INGREDIENTS;

For the cookies

1 cup melted butter

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 cup melted chocolate chips

1 egg

1 1/2 cup flour

3/4 cup cocoa powder

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking soda

For the part that everyone eats first (filling)

1/2 cup of softened butter

1 2/3 cup powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 tbsp milk

pinch of salt

FOR THE COOKIES

In a bowl, mix the butter and sugar together. Mix in the melted chocolate and the vanilla, then add the egg.

In another bowl, whisk together the flour, cocoa powder, salt, and baking soda.

Simple enough, mix the flour mixture into the wet mixture until a dough forms. You'll probably have to use your hands, like I did, which is why I don't have any pictures of the dough before this next step (it can get pretty messy).

Once the dry ingredients and the wet ingredients are completely mixed, cover the bowl with plastic wrap and stick it in the fridge overnight.

This step here is me trying to make it easier for you at home. The original instructions told me to roll the dough into logs, then to wrap the logs in plastic wrap and refrigerate them for 2 hours. Then to unroll the logs and cut them like a loaf of bread to make the sandwich part of the cookie.

TOO BAD THE COOKIES WERE LIKE SAND BY THE TIME THEY WERE DONE REFRIGERATING AND JUST CRUMBLED WHEN I TRIED TO CUT THEM.

I became very frustrated with these dumb cookies. I spent, not exaggerating, half an hour repeatedly trying to cut these stupid little logs into cookies and it just was not happening. Eventually I got fed up and was just about to quit, when I got the idea to take a glass cup and simply press down on a ball of dough to flatten it.

What do you know, that seemed to have done the trick. Also, I didn't have to feel like a failure as I crumbled yet another log of cookie dough in my hands. I suggest this method.

So once your dough has been refrigerated overnight, flour your counter top and start forming it into little balls, then use a cup to flatten it. If the dough seems too hard, don't worry, it softens up really quickly just sitting on the counter top. In fact, you might want to keep some of it refrigerated while you're forming the rest into cookies.

Preheat your oven to 325 and cover a baking sheet with wax paper. Place your flattened cookies on it the baking sheet and bake them for 20 minutes.

 After baking;

While the cookies are cooling down, prepare everyone's favorite part of an Oreo, the filling.

Here are the ingredients again so that you don't have to scroll all the way back up to the top;

Filling

1/2 cup of softened butter

1 2/3 cup powdered sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 tbsp milk

pinch of salt

Mix the butter and powdered sugar together. Add the vanilla, milk, and salt, and mix until it's all smooth and creamy.

Once the cookies have cooled, spoon some of the filling onto a cookie and simply place another cookie on top and squish.

Yes, I turned my filling hot pink with the help of food coloring to make these a little less painful to look at.

Unfortunately, this is the only picture I got because my little brothers heard the word "Oreo" and immediately inhaled every cookie in site. 

So I suppose they were yummy. I still say go out and buy your Oreos, do not make them at home.

Chicken Enchiladas

About a month ago I was looking for a tasty Mexican dish to make for Cinco de Mayo when I came across a recipe for chicken enchiladas on Pinterest. This was on the 5th of May and since then I have made these enchiladas SIX TIMES.

There have been days when the family and I were just out running errands and my dad has spoken up and said, "Do we have everything you would need to make enchiladas at the house?" and if I didn't, we would go out of our way to the grocery store to get whatever I needed to make them.

They never last more than 24 hours. They're gone. An entire dish of enchiladas vanishes before your eyes like magic.

I almost don't want to give this recipe to you. Let me warn you that it is dangerously easy to go into a food coma from eating these. It's like a virus. We've caught the chicken enchilada fever and the only cure is more chicken enchiladas.

But I also feel as if your life is not complete until you have had these enchiladas, so I will share them with you.

INGREDIENTS

4 cups of cooked chicken, shredded chicken breast 

1 cup sour cream

1 cup shredded cheese
1 tablespoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon oregano
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup of either canned tomatoes or salsa
an avocado or 2 (optional)
1 teaspoon garlic powder
8 8 inch soft tortilla shells (for a 9x13 baking dish)
3/4 cups of MORE shredded cheese

This may seem like a lot of ingredients, but I assure you it's not. I don't like doing recipes that require me to buy 30 different things from the store and hike the Andes for goat fur and gold coins from a leprechaun.

The first thing you're going to do is cook your chicken. I get those big bags of frozen chicken in the freezer aisle and grill them on our Forman grill, then completely mutilate them with forks once they're cooked through. It doesn't really matter HOW you cook them, you could boil them or bake them or whatever you like best, as long as by the end they're cooked through and shredded.

Bro tip; don't use a blender to try to shred the chicken. Just trust me.

While your chicken is cooking, get out a medium sized bowl. In the bowl mix your sour cream and 1 cup of shredded cheese together. Add your chili powder, 1/2 teaspoon oregano, pepper, and salt to the sour cream/cheese mixture and mix until all of those spices are incorporated.

Once the chicken is cooked, you'll need to shred it. When I shred the chicken, I either put a portion of it in a bowl and use two forks to rip it apart, or a take a knife and cut the chicken into little pieces. Whichever way you 'shred' it, it's going to take a while, so you'll have to be a little patient with it.

After shredding all your chicken, grab a very large skillet and dump all of the chicken inside. Dump your sour cream mixture into the skillet as well, and mix the two together.

Put the skillet on the stove and heat the mixture until the cheese starts to melt. Once the cheese has melted, pour in the salsa OR the canned tomatoes (whichever you decided to use) and mix well.

At this point you can add your avocados (if you want). My family is avocado crazy and we had some ones that needed t be used up, so I threw them in there.

Preheat your oven to 350.

Next, grab some tortillas and a 9 x 13 baking dish.

Start filling the tortilla shells with the enchilada mix and rolling them up, placing them side by side in the baking dish.

Every single time I've made this I've wound up with a ton more enchilada insides than I was able to fit into the tortillas, so I put a little Mackenzie twist on it and;

Spread it all out

Sprinkle 3/4 cup of cheese over the whole ensemble and pop it in the oven for 20 minutes.

20 minutes later;

You've got yourself  a dish of enchiladas worthy of the queen of England's dinner party.

Have fun eating them :)