brownies stuffed with smores

Have I made this before?
I don't know.
I'm too lazy to look back at my old brownie posts and see.
Honestly I'm not that into brownies; I can't just like any old kind.
I need to have some texture in there or if there can't be texture then it has to be made with the high quality cocoa. You know that deep, rich 60-70% cocoa chocolate?  Love that stuff.
So when I make brownies I go all out and dress them up.
Remember when I made the peanut butter cookie crusted brownies?
My taste buds do.  Man those were good!
OR how about the peanut butter & fluff brownies with salty cookie crust?
Yeah I remember those!
Those are worth gold in my house; aka they get hubby to do all those things that sit on the "honey-do" list.


Easy to make.
Just take your favorite brownie mix, pour half the batter into well greased pan, add a layer of mini
marshmallows (if you want the marshmallows still visible after baking then use larger marshmallows), add a layer of crushed grahams 1/2 - 1 cup, then top with remaining brownie batter, and bake.



No graham crackers?
Use shortbread, use Oreo's...you can use any type of crunchy cookie really.

I realize you cannot see the marshmallows in the brownies.  That's because I used the mini ones and they dissolved a bit, BUT there is a nice chewiness to the middle.
So if you feel the need to see the marshmallows, I suggest using large marshmallows, although they might stick out on the top--which is also a good thing.

brownies stuffed with smores
print recipe

take your favorite brownie recipe
pour half the batter into greased pan
layer on mini marshmallows or large ones (large will still be present after baking, mini will dissolve)
layer on crushed graham crackers 1/2 - 1 cup (add a pinch of salt to the crushed crackers)
gently push (just a little) the mixture down a bit
pour remaining brownie batter over top
smooth out with wet spatula or wet hands
bake according to original brownie baking directions

don't have crushed grahams? use crushed shortbread cookies.

Harmless Harvest 100% Raw Coconut Water Giveaway

Today I'm thrilled to have a giveaway with Harmless Harvest Coconut Water.
One of my favorite ways to naturally hydrate is with Harmless Harvest 100% Coconut Water.
It is what coconut water should taste like; not watered down, not filled with crap or loaded up with extra sugar and in most cases extra water!
This is all natural, in it's purest raw form, and 100% safe and 100% sustainable!

I am one of those people that is just so tired of all those energy-sugar-laden sports drinks or ‘heavily’ watered down “so-called” coconut water drinks.  These drinks do nothing for me on a hot summer day, on a medium-heavy workout at the gym; that if anything they make me feel unhealthier, drained, or worse ready for a nap after a workout.  I do seek out those coconut water drinks, but am always so disappointed by how much water they contain, and not enough electrolytes, minerals, etc.

You can imagine my surprise when I found Harmless Harvest pure 100% coconut water.  I’ll admit I was a little setback by how small the bottle was thinking another company selling a watered-down product in a small bottle. 

But in all honesty, after one drink I noticed a huge difference.  I am one of those people that tends to get low blood sugar and dehydration during the summer and have to keep an eye on my potassium levels.

Watching those survivor shows on TV I would learn just how good for you pure coconut water is, but never truly understanding the mineral/electrolyte compound that helps to make you feel (truly feel hydrated).  Harmless Harvest coconut water has all five electrolytes naturally: sodium, magnesium, phosphorus, potassium and calcium.

What energy drink, sport drink, etc… out there has all of these in a naturally occurring environment?  Exactly.  None.

After your next intense workout out, gardening day, hot summer day—or any day where you sweat a lot, and not to forget those days when you are dehydrated, try a bottle or two of Harmless Harvest and see just how better you feel.

And lastly, I can guarantee you that if you’ve never had pure coconut water you will be shocked at just how good it is.  There are a lot of “so called” coconut waters out there that have fillers, flavorings, and added sugar to them so that you can never really taste just how good coconut water is. 

So what does it really taste like then?

Pure coconut water has a nice nutty undertone (in foodie terms: an all natural almond joy taste) with gently sweet water like taste.

My favorite part of drinking harmless harvest coconut water is there is NO after taste and no crash and burn either.  If anything, this coconut water is exactly what your body needs—daily, workout or not. 

The owners of Harmless Harvest: Justin Guilbert & Douglas Riboud were kind enough to take some time and answer a few questions for me. 

There is also a giveaway at the end of the interview! Read through to find out!

Thank you Justin and Doug for doing this and taking time out to help educate us a little better about your company.  Tell me a little bio about your company first.

We founded Harmless Harvest in 2010 to develop beverages that provide the raw nutritional integrity of sustainably harvested ingredients. By combining innovative scientific techniques with local traditional knowledge, we launched the world’s first raw and organic coconut water ethically sourced from small agroforestry systems. Without spending any money on marketing and relying on word-of-mouth, popularity skyrocketed and it’s now available in retail locations nationwide.

Was this your first business venture?

We had zero experience in the beverage industry before starting Harmless Harvest, both coming from traditional corporate careers. Perhaps a little naively, we believed products should taste like the original, maintaining the aroma, flavor and nutritional integrity, and focus on social & environmental progress. So we decided to make them.

And what made you want to do this? A raw, organic, all natural coconut water drink?

By rejecting the disconnect between brand promise and reality, we wanted to make a product that created the brand. Instead of people purchasing the name on the bottle, we want people to choose our coconut water because of the quality inside. Harmless Harvest exists due to the reputation of 100% Raw Coconut Water, not the other way around. It was important to prove that quality can trump marketing, and people want a great product as much as we do.

Your labeling is perfect.  

You really zoned in on the key words of the importance of pure raw coconut water: never heated, 100% harmless, raw. 

Was this your intention to do it this way as a means of educating the public?

I ask this because so many other new drink products are geared towards “energy this” or “energy that”. 

By Harmless Harvest, we’re saying that choices have an impact, but it can be a positive impact. You don’t need to be harmful to the source when you produce something.

The name of our product is also the only ingredient: 100%Raw Coconut Water. That’s it. We wanted it to taste like a freshly cracked coconut and, not surprisingly, achieve that by adding absolutely nothing and not heating it. We wanted people to understand that just from the label, no gimmicks.

Tell us a little bit about how you get this raw coconut water from Thailand to the USA?  Is it kept cold, how is it transported safely and in a safe manner?

After being cracked on location, our coconut water is maintained in a deep frozen state until high pressure processing. Trust us, it sounds a lot easier than it is!

How hard was it to start this business given that your coconut water comes from Thailand?  

Is that right only Thailand or are you sourcing from other areas?

We spent years searching across the world for coconuts of the highest quality, grown in traditional rural communities. There were many false starts and mistakes before we found the right opportunity in Thailand. Now we have strong ties to the communities we work with there and are hoping to expand to new agroforestry locations that grow our specific variety of coconuts.

In the beginning venture towards bringing this coconut water to completion was there anything that threw you off, put the plans off to the side temporarily.  I know problems happen with any new business venture, but did they have any major setbacks that they plowed through? 

Obtaining the level of quality that we wanted forced us to create the entire system from scratch. We were utilizing technology that had never been used with coconut water. This was in addition to setting up a system for harvesting, bottling and transporting perishable goods where no system existed. Finally, everyone was already familiar with coconut water lining their pantry shelves, so educating retailers and consumers on the perishability of a raw product and the variation that nature gives us (as seen in our pink bottles) was imperative. Innovation requires effort, not just ideas. There was, and still is, a lot of hard work involved in getting those coconuts from the tree to your fridge.

I see that sustainability is a very important part of your company’s mission. 

Can you tell us why this is important to you? 

Sustainability is not just important, it is essential to Harmless Harvest. 

Why do we assume that production needs to be destructive? 

Why can’t it be neutral or even positive? The question should be really asked of other company’s: how they can stay in business without sustainability?

And with this sustainability any farming, plants/trees can die, be injured, or damaged. 

What process do your farms use to sustain their crops over time?  In other words, how do they plan for future crops—do they let land lie fallow, plant new trees each year, etc…?

We work with centuries-old operations in Thailand. These are agroforestry systems that have other crops such as mangos, bananas, mangosteen, mingled with the coconut palms. The farmers work with what they have and implement traditional techniques. It’s a long-established natural method of growing and harvesting.

There is a video on your website that explains quite simply how your coconut water is minimally processed.  

It’s called the HPP process, or high pressure processing using high pressure instead of heat to stop potentially harmful bacteria getting into the coconut water.

You say this is the safest but most expensive process.  Why is it so costly?

HPP extends the refrigerated shelf life of our coconut water while maintaining the delicate organoleptic compounds found in a freshly cracked coconut. It requires specialized machinery, facilities and the staff to perform the process, but also a dedicated management.

I drink this coconut water a lot, I’ve come across a couple of bottles that are pink coconut water?  

We don’t mix or homogenize our coconut water so, just like in whole coconuts, there can be variation among bottles. One of these variations is the level of antioxidants. While all of our coconut water is perfectly clear when it’s bottled, those that contain the highest levels of antioxidants can spontaneously turn pink with time. Additives could hide the harmless color variation, but we love that the delicious pink bottles show that we add nothing to our coconut water. We were afraid people would run from the pink bottles, but by telling them the truth, we now know many people who seek them out.

Can coconut water go bad?

Like all freshly squeezed juices, coconut water will naturally go bad shortly after the coconut is opened. With the use of HPP, Harmless Harvest coconut water achieves a longer refrigerated shelf life. It is similar to milk in that there is a risk of spoilage if it is not kept refrigerated or drunk before the best by date.

Once you extract the fluids from the coconut, what do you do with the remaining husk and meat?

Currently, most is resold locally. We are also working on several options, ranging from new products to energy sources for our facilities in Thailand.

Do you have any recipes using your coconut water? 

I know I use mine in smoothies in lieu of milk or water, for that extra boost of nutrition.

We have seen lots of recipes with our coconut water ranging from simple additions of chia seeds, mint or even jalapenos in the bottle to smoothies and sauce for mussels. We still love it straight.

Are there any other Harmless Harvest products that we can look forward to?

Oh I hope we can see coconut bars?  Almond Joy like clones that are all natural and tastier? How about chocolate-coconut cups?  OK, you get the idea here. 

But seriously do you plan on expanding your product line to foods or more drinks?

We are so excited to introduce our next project: 100% Raw Tea. 

You will be able to find Unsweetened, Honey, andPeppermint varieties in stores as of this summer. We freeze the tea leaves right after picking, pulverize with spring water, filter and use HPP to extend the shelf life and extract maximum flavor of the 100% Raw & Organic ingredients. 

On the coconut front, we have many innovative products coming soon. Stay tuned!

To find out more about Harmless Harvest, please visit their website HarmlessHarvest.com.

Find them on Facebook or follow them on Twitter.

To find out where to buy Harmless Harvest please click here: stores. 

Most Whole Food stores do carry Harmless Harvest. 

Thank you so much for this interview; very informative.

For the giveaway, they were kind enough to donate three (3) free coupons for their coconut water + a free t-shirt to two winners.

To enter leave ONE comment telling us if you've tried Harmless Harvest before and what other products you'd like to see made with all natural coconut water and/or coconut.

PLEASE have a valid email address in your signature line.

ALL ANONYMOUS COMMENTS will be deleted; you must have a full name and email in your signature line. 

We'll do the drawing next friday 4/12/2013. Good Luck!

salty chocolate oat cookies (recipe clone from kayak cookies)

Surely everyone knows by now my obsession with Levain Bakery in NYC and my obsession with Kayak Cookies aka Salty Oats Cookies here on cape cod.
I've done all the recipe re-creations I can with Levain.
And now I'm onto Salty Oats.
Some of you may have heard of Salty Oats?
They are predominately sold in the NE.
A semi-healthy cookie that is almost a meal too.
A hearty cookie that packs a flavorful taste with a nice dose of salt.
Like Levain, no one knows the recipe for Salty Oats cookie.


Some have speculated that they use a rice flour to get that perfect chewy like texture.
So with my first batch, I used rice flour.
Never baked with it before, but I like it.
What does the rice flour do to the cookie?
Well it makes is half gluten free, it brings a richness to the cookie and that's about it.
I think I might know more when I make the oatmeal raisin version; with chocolate it's hard to tell as the cocoa powder is rich and dominates the cookie flavor-wise.
At Salty Oats they have these flavors: oatmeal-raisin, chocolate oats, chunky chocolate-pecan--all salted--all good!
With these cookies I created I had set out to create first oatmeal raisin, then halfway through mixing I realized I had no raisins!  So last minute, I made them into chocolate BUT wanted to try them with nuts added. Her recipe has no nuts.
So now, I have salty chocolate-walnut.
The verdict?
I think I almost nailed it.
I know I didn't add enough oats, and I should have made them a bit bigger.
But texture wise I nailed it spot on.
If you know of the Salty Oats and are a fan, do try and make these, they taste just like the chocolate oats one.
And it's an easy recipe to play with, switching out different ingredients.




These cookies really don't spread at all. So if you make them into dough balls, you will need to "gently" push down on them halfway through baking.  Just a gentle push because they do crack!


Truly a good cookie.  Hearty, tender inside with a nice gentle crispy outside.
I added a hint of cinnamon too.
At Salty Oats she claims to use Belgian chocolate; I will have to look for Belgian cocoa powder.
Best part? The salt on top, don't worry it's not overly salty at all, and the other best part?
This cookie is not too sweet--I hate overly sweet cookies.

salty chocolate oats (kayak cookie recipe clone )
print recipe

1 1/2 cups bread flour
1/2 cup white rice flour
1/2 cup + 1 TB dark double dutch cocoa powder
2 sticks unsalted butter, room temp (16 TB)
1 cup light brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 ts baking powder
1 ts baking soda
1 ts sea salt
1/2 ts cinnamon, optional
2 large eggs
1 ts pure vanilla extract
2 cups of rolled oats (not quick cooking!)
extra course sea salt for sprinkling the tops

In a medium bowl, whisk all the dry ingredients.
In a larger bowl, cream the butter and both sugars; add in the eggs, vanilla extract and mix.
Add dry ingredients to the wet and mix till just combined--don't overmix.
Next, by hand, add in the rolled oats.
Cover dough well with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least three hours or overnight.
When ready to bake, preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Line up two baking sheets with parchment paper or whatever method you use for baking cookies.
Divide dough into 12-13 large chunks; roll into balls and place on cookie sheet about an inch apart.
Sprinkle tops with sea salt before baking.
Bake for about 14-17 minutes. Halfway through baking, you might need to give the dough balls  a gentle push down to flatten very slightly--be careful not to push too hard as they will crack.  Also rotate pans halfway through baking too.
You'll know they are done when the bottoms are almost crisp/set up and the tops have a gentle crisp to them. It's really easy to overbake them, so definitely check at the 15-minute mark.
Makes 12-13 cookies.

friday links

Happy Friday!
Happy Good Friday!
And Happy Easter to you as well.

Shall we get to my latest obsessions?
Alrighty then.

spicy mayo. yeah have you tried it?
it's so good I have to get it by the cup full.
I might be prone to drinking it straight up too.

Don't even get me started on this.  Lake Champlain Chocolate. Heavenly chocolates.
My favorite is the peanut butter, but this caramel is a close second.
And Lake Champlain you need to add a touch of salt to this. Seriously.

Cape Cod finally has a Panera Bread and I finally got to try the Cobb salad with extra avocado.
Tasty indeed.

Bob Marley iced coffee is good.  A bit sweet, but then again I don't like sugar in my espresso or coffee, but this was good.
Not too many preservatives or chemicals in there--which is good.

it's ice cream season!

And guess what?  The snow storms on cape cod have stopped!!
We also got a couple days of sun.

east dennis, ma

race point, provincetown, ma

harwichport, ma

race point lighthouse beach, provincetown, ma

harwichport, ma (one of the deep sea fishing ports)

so nice to be outside, on the docks and it's not bitterly cold.

can you imagine living here? harwichport, ma (wychmere beach club)

around the web:
10-minute yoga workout to jumpstart your spring from yoganonymous
matzo pizza! from seriouseats.com
fried sun-dried beef w/ chili dipping sauce from shesimmers.com
vitamin D & muscle efficiency from paleo lifestyle magazine
store fresh grated ginger in freezer from thekitchn.com
DIY easy rosemary focaccia from thekitchn.com
buffalo chicken deviled eggs from closet cooking
DIY cabinet door storage for measuring cups from thekitchn.com
8 yoga poses to help cervical spine & neck issues from mindbodygreen.com
make your own honey bunny grahams from half baked harvest
DIY homemade frozen pizzas from thekitchn.com
cakespy's favorite buttercream frosting from cakespy.com
vegetable manchurian from ang sarap
custard cream cookies! from bits of sunshine
healthy fudgy brownie bits from averiecooks
6 ways to clean smelly plastic containers w/out chemicals from thekitchn.com
cadbury creme scotch eggs from cakespy.com
homemade chocolate hazelnut baci from butter baking
zesty chickpea & cumin dip from strayed table
cookies & cream ice cream cupcakes from taste & tell
carrot daikon kimchi from autumn makes & does
10 habits that will help you become slimmer from mindbodygreen.com
spaghetti squash pad thai from shared appetite
12 great tips for the perfect steak from will cook for friends
focaccia rolls from fabtastic eats
mustard & walnut cheese crackers from mad about maida
breakfast sushi rolls from apron strings blog
DIY homemade cadbury creme eggs from the hungry mouse
saint agur blue cheese sables from seriouseats.com
meyer lemon mascarpone cake from seriouseats.com
4 ways to boost your metabolism from blisstree.com
healthy: pb power fudge from heidi powell
how long does it take to fall out of shape? from outsidemagazine.com
homemade mango lassi from use real butter
(youtube video of a girl who is having a funny aftermath from wisdom teeth removal)
10 companies making fast food healthy from dailyburn.com
the power of being honest with yourself from marksdailyapple.com
do you all believe this?
do you use apple cider vinegar for health reasons?
healing powers of apple cider vinegar


Have a wonderful weekend!