Browned butter chocolate chip cookies

 Ingredients:

one cup of butter- starting weight 236 gr after browning 189 gr

2 cups of flour (I am considering adding more flour)

2 TBS cornstarch

1 t baking soda

1/4 t baking powder

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 cup light brown sugar

2 t vanilla extract

2 large eggs

2 cups of chocolate- can by chips or chopped bars of dark, semi sweet, or milk chocolate

Procedure:cook two sticks of butter on medium heat for about 5-8 minutes, watching closely for the butter to foam and the milk solids to start to brown. Remove from heat and pour into dish to refrigerate until solid.
Browning the butter adds flavor to the cookies, and reduces the amount of liquid in the recipe. If you need to add more liquid, add a tablespoon or two of milk.
Cream butter with sugars, add eggs one at a time and add vanilla.

In a separate bowl, mix flour, cornstarch, backing soda, baking powder. Add dry ingredients to wet and mix briefly to combine. Add chocolate of your choice. Scoop by the ice cream scoop of your choice and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. 

Bake at 350 degrees on an ungreased cookie sheet. No need for parchment. 15 minutes for smaller cookies, 18 minutes for larger cookies.

Cucumber Coconut Lemon Ginger Smoothie

 Did your garden produce too many cucumbers? Is this summer so hot you need a cool, refreshing drink? Or, like me, did you miss dinner to go to Yoga class and now you rather drink your dinner? Maybe all of the above? Yup!

Peel or don't peel one large cucumber. Squeeze one half of a lemon into your blender. Add chopped cucumber and one inch of piece of peeled ginger root. Blend.  Too strong.

Add 6 ice cubes and blend again. Better, but I'd like it sweeter and I know that there is about one tablespoon of cream of coconut left from some cocktails, so I added that and .... perfect! Just what I wanted. 

If I didn't have the coconut I was going to add a handful of green grapes or frozen pineapple.