cookies and cream cookies (plus blizzard 2013)

I'm back!
And I can say I survived the blizzard of 2013!
As most of you know, cape cod got hit pretty bad with the blizzard, or was it called storm nemo?
My area got hit hard.
Thankfully we survived it ok with minimal tree damage and house damage, but we lost power for three days.
For three days in 30 degree temperatures during the day and teen temperatures during the night.
You can only imagine how hard that was, mentally and physically.
I can honestly say it was one of the hardest things I've ever done in my life.
By day two our inside home temperature was 43 degrees!
Hubby and I would lay in bed at night with 7-8 blankets, fully clothed, listening to the house creak and moan with the declining temps.
We could see our breath inside our home.
We didn't have a fireplace, but we did boil water over the gas stove every three hours.
Granted this is not safe and I don't recommend it to anyone, but we have high ceilings and only did this a few times to raise the temperature up a bit.
On day two and a half with no heat, we looked everywhere for a hotel room--they were snatched up fairly quickly and the waiting list was about three pages long.
The only communication we had was the radio and our iphones with which I got updates via the NStar website that said we had another three days to go until power was completely restored.
You can imagine the freak out factor I had with this news.
I wasn't so worried about us making it in the cold, my biggest fear was our pipes.
It was only a matter of time before the pipes would freeze.  We did wrap a few pipes that were closest to the outside walls with clothes and towels, and blocked up the doors and windows with sofa cushions.
During the day we'd go to a local grocery store that was partially open, running on generators and eat whatever they had and use the restrooms to wash up.  It was hard to come home to the house at night knowing it would be dark and cold.
There were two homes on our street that had whole-house generators, driving by these homes every night seeing them inside watching TV, using the computer, or cooking away in the kitchen was surreal--strange to say the least.  It leaves you desperate in a way; longing for any kind of normalcy---again.
On our third day of no power we decided I would go the next day and stay with friends.
My husband was not leaving the house--under any circumstances.  I didn't like this, and had zero say in the matter, but he did have a lot of army training so he was quite familiar with handling extreme conditions and weather.
You know how there are certain moment-like life events that happen to you that you never ever forget?
The time the power came on was in my top five.
We were just coming home for the night, driving down our road, seeing some lights on in houses that we were confused on whether or not those were the ones with the generators--we weren't sure because it all looked different.
Then we drove onto our street, and noticed the entire street was lit up like a christmas tree!  When you're used to seeing black and then you see everything illuminated it's quite a change.
I remember screaming the whole way down our street to our house, saying 'oh my god, oh my god....!"
And then we got to our house and it was all black!
I didn't know hubby had turned all the lights off so that when the power did come back on we won't blow a fuse--he forgot this too!
So we both weren't sure if the power was on.  Then I remembered that above the garage door is a motion detector light that glows red laser light when there is movement in the driveway which in turn turns on the outside lights.  And POOF, the little red laser light started moving as I drove closer to the garage door and the lights on the garage door clicked on!!
I screamed "yes, the power is on!"
I screamed again, opened my truck door and started to get out, forgot to put the truck in park, caught myself and put it in park, got out and ran towards to the gas meter to hear for the sound of hissing to validate my curiosity again of whether the power was truly on.  It was-- It was hissing away!
We both ran inside and were almost crying with happiness.
Hubby remembered the vent to the heater was blocked with a 4-5 foot snow drift, he ran around to shovel it out, while I ran around the house in shear happiness, turning on this or that light, and checking the all the heat panels.  Finding my cat sitting on one of the floorboard heat panels--how he managed that balance act I'm still not sure, but porr thing he was cold too.
That night taking a hot shower-- well there are no words really for that; how do you describe that?
I mean it had been three days without hot water; your body just does a collective 'sigh' when the hot water hits your back for the first time.
We did lose power again the next day for six hours--what's six hours though when you've been through three days?  Nothing.
As of today, thursday, my town still has about less than 100 homes still without power.
These are the places that are farther out from the main grid; homes that lost a lot of power lines and have older power lines/systems.
But thankfully today, thursday was the day that everyone in my town would be restored according to NStar. Happy Valentines Day indeed.
I haven't been cooking or baking for a while, cleanup is first, but I did find a recipe from the archives that I hadn't posted yet.
Happy Valentine's Day!
I know I'm happy--very happy and VERY grateful.


The taste of cookies and cream literally in a cookie.  Seriously these are good.
Any type of Oreo will work and flavor-wise you can mix and match too.

Eating the dough is just as tasty too, plus there are no eggs so it's fairly safe.

cookies & cream cookies

print recipe

2 cups + 2 TB flour

1/2 ts baking soda

1/2 ts (oversized) salt

12 Tbsp (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted & cooled

8 oz. cream cheese softened

1 cup light brown sugar, NOT packed

1/2 cup sugar

1 ts vanilla extract

2 cups crushed Oreo’s (not fine crush but not big chunk either)

Cook notes: I made my cookies larger than normal, about golfball size.

So make them whatever size you like.  If you make them smaller you should reduce baking times.

Whisk all dry ingredients together; set aside.

With stand mixer, or by hand mix butter and cream cheese together until smooth.

Add in both sugars and beat until thoroughly combined.

Beat in vanilla extract until combined.

Add dry ingredients & beat at low speed just until combined.

By hand, add in the crushed Oreo’s.

Cover dough securely with plastic wrap and chill two hours or overnight. 

When ready to bake cookies preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Drop dough onto parchment lined baking sheets and bake for 12-14 minutes or until edges are set and bottoms are light brown. Do NOT overbake!

Cool cookies on sheets until able to lift without breaking and place on wire rack to cool.

Should make about 30-32 cookies.