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Hawaiian Macadamia Butter Cookies

August 29, 2012 · by Ari · 6 Comments

Sometimes you make a cookie that you just don’t want to share with anyone.

Well, if you’re Heather, that is every cookie. I’m sorry Heather, but I will never stop teasing you no matter how good you get at sharing. My friend Heather used to have a sharing problem. She’s worked on it, and recently shared some amazing food with me in Seattle. I was so proud of her. My mom also has a sharing problem. If you ask for a bite of her ice cream, she goes all food aggression and practically growls at you like Clementine. Basically, that was me with these cookies.

Every once in a while, a recipe just turns out so perfect that you can’t wait to make it for every event for the rest of your life, and make double because half of it will never even make it out the front door.

I was really inspired by all of the food in Hawaii. I came home with a full out list. Some people relax on vacation. I wrote lists. And you know what, awesome things came out of it. I like lists.

So let’s discuss these magical cookies, shall we? They have every single food I loved in Hawaii: macadamia nuts, coconut and banana. Also, they have white chocolate, because how could you have those foods and NOT include white chocolate?! That sounds like a terrible idea. When I was little, I used to eat mass amounts of solid white chocolate. It was my favorite. I also don’t ever remember being a single digit size in elementary school. I’m sure there’s no correlation….

Not only are these babies stuffed with all good things that exist in the world, they are the perfect texture. It’s like they were made with real butter! Okay, so I will never stop believing that fat substitutes are awesome for baking, and that baked goods made with applesauce are still seriously delicious. However, they do not taste like butter. These do. I think it’s something about the oil/fat content of the macadamia butter. It works perfectly, and I love it so much more than a peanut butter cookie.

Soft, gooey and perfectly balanced. These are a guaranteed crowd pleaser.

Make these cookies. Make them today. And tomorrow. And next week. Trust me.

Hawaiian Macadamia Butter Cookies

yield approx 1.5 dozen

1 1/4 cups white whole wheat flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
dash salt
1 medium extra ripe banana, mashed
1 cup Roasted Macadamia Butter
3/4 cup turbinado sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1/4 cup egg substitute
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup white chocolate chips
1/3 cup unsweetened coconut (I found unsweetened low fat, but regular unsweetened is fine too)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a large cookie sheet with parchment paper and set aside. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.
In a large bowl, beat the banana, macadamia butter and sugars. Beat until smooth. Add the egg substitute and vanilla and mix well. Add the flour mixture and beat thoroughly. Fold in white chocolate chips and coconut.
Using a small cookie scoop, drop dough onto lined cookie sheet. Use an extra piece of sprayed parchment paper to slightly flatten each dough ball.
Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until just golden. Do not overbake. Let cookies stand on sheet for 2-3 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.

Maui Part 2 (Hike Maui)

August 16, 2012 · by Ari · 2 Comments

Want to know what my very favorite part of my honeymoon was???

LOOK AT ME!!!!! I SWAM TO THE WATERFALL IN FREEZING COLD OPEN WATER!!!! I’M BRAVE!!!!

The all day hike. DUH. Shocking, right? 😉 Well, the hiking part wasn’t all day. We did 2 hikes that totaled about 5 miles, so that was actually a pretty short amount the day, but the whole activity including the drive to Hana was all day. 6am-7:30pm of awesomeness.

If you’ve ever been to Maui, you’ve probably heard people talk about “The Road to Hana”. You don’t actually go to Hana, you do The Road to Hana. The road that includes 600 “hair pin turns” and 54 1 lane bridges. That’s why lots of people pay someone to drive them around. That didn’t interest me. I have a husband that gets zero driver anxiety. If I need to get somewhere, I bat my eyelashes and look cute (works every time). However, when I discovered we could do The Road to Hana, and participate in the most challenging hike the Hike Maui brochure offered, I was sold.

Most people spend their time in Maui on the west side of the Island. That’s where places like Lahaina are, and where people do all the touristy things. However, the east side of the island is like a completely different world! The west side looks kind of deserty. When you enter the east side, it’s like being transported into the most gorgeous tropical rainforest! Our guide Randy was incredibly knowledgeable, and in just the drive, I learned so much!

Painted Eucalyptus AKA “Tourist Tree” because they turn red and peel. Haha. Great joke, Maui.

WAVES!! I love the ocean. I’ve always found it to be the most calming, peaceful place.

For our first stop, we put on WATER SHOES!!! What??? We were told to get ready to hike through some mud! I wasn’t quite sure what I had gotten myself into, but I put on my shoes, and sucked it up. Actually, getting muddy was FUN. I used to be all “Wahhh I don’t like to get dirty” and annoying, but I’m branching out, people! The muddy hike was short and steep. It took us to a beautiful waterfall (see the top pic). Everyone started getting in the water and swimming across to it, but I was scared. It was cold. I couldn’t touch the bottom. I’ve never swam across open water (yes, in 27 years–I’m a wimp). Finally, I got the heck out of my own way, and swam to the waterfall, and it was AWESOME!!! I definitely would have regretted it if I’d skipped out.

Our next stop was the famous black sand beach! Soooo cool!

Finally we arrived on the east side of Haleakala, and began our longer hike.

These are the trees they used in Lost to hide from the smoke monster.

This is my I Made It To The Top I’m A Warrior face. I make it often. I like it because there’s no double chin. Randy got me with only 1 chin in every picture. I like that guy.

If you ever find yourself in Maui, I HIGHLY suggest hitting up Hike Maui, requesting Randy, and doing the all day thing. If I were to go back, I would even pay to do it a second time!

Maui Part 1

August 14, 2012 · by Ari · 5 Comments

I didn’t say much about my honeymoon. I’ve mostly been waiting for pictures, but truth be told, there’s not a whole lot to say. It was AWESOME. I loved almost every second. Instead, I just wanted to show you some of the highlights 🙂

We spent the extra $20 a day and got a stupid touristy red convertible. Totally worth it.

Napili Bay

I have an ice cream problem.

My favorite. On our sunset dinner cruise.

DOLPHINS!!!! Near Lanai, on our snorkeling trip.

On top of the clouds @ Haleakala

More to come, as well as lots of Hawaii inspired recipes. I took notes….on my honeymoon. Don’t judge me.

NYC Marathon Training Week 7

August 7, 2012 · by Ari · 1 Comment

AKA

Marathon Training: Vacation Edition

3/4 runs + 1 hike. Not too shabby for my honeymoon, right? I’m actually pretty proud of myself for getting it done. I didn’t follow my plan completely even on the 3 runs I completed (speed work, what speed work?), but I got my long run in, and that’s what I was the most concerned about. Let me tell you, it was NOT easy. First of all, I went from living with my running buddies, having a schedule, and being responsible to a group for getting up and running each day I said I would to running solo with just myself (and a weekly email to Coach Susan) to answer to. Also, running is way more fun with friends, in 65 degree temps, and in slightly hilly-flat terrain. You know what is less fun? Running alone in 70% humidity, feeling like every direction you go, you are climbing a mountain. What’s up with that, Maui? Huh??

Anyway, I definitely got discouraged my first 2 runs, but by the end, it got better. It always does. I know it will be the same thing coming back to Phoenix, and running in the 95 degree temperatures. It’s not going to be easy, and this week I might hate life a little, and feel discouraged, but it can only get better and easier from there. Here’s a look at how week 7 went down.

Tuesday–12 mile long run, 10:40 avg pace. I don’t remember the last time I wanted to give up on a run so badly. 3 miles in, I was sure I couldn’t finish. There seemed to be hills in every single direction. My body was literally dripping in sweat from every single pore; in fact, my running skirt looked like I had peed my pants because it was soaking wet. You’re welcome for that detail. I had to take a lot of “stretch” breaks. What? You don’t pause your garmin to “stretch” at the top of every hill you do? Oh. In all seriousness, that’s a bad habit I developed when I first started running, because I wanted to keep up to some imaginary “expected pace” of people who blogged about running. I was slow (well, still am), and I didn’t want to be, so I “stretched” a lot to catch my breath. I’ve been really good about breaking that habit ever since I started training for the Seattle half that never happened, but I was not good about it on this run. By the time I got back to our condo, I felt discouraged, frustrated, and totally lame. Then I plugged my garmin into my computer to see that I had climbed 1021 feet of elevation. Then I sat there and continued to drip sweat just sitting. I gave myself a little pep talk, and a mental break, and realized that, all things considered, I did pretty okay.

Friday–5 mile hike. I will write more about this when I get posts up about the trip itself, but I hiked in mud, rolled in mud, swam to a waterfall, and hiked through rainforest, and a bamboo forest to a 400 ft waterfall! It.Was.Awesome. My favorite part of the trip, hands down. I counted it as my 5 mile hilly run. Let’s just pretend it’s the same thing 😉

Saturday–3 mile run, 10:26 avg pace. There’s a reason there were 4 days between my first and second run. I may have given myself a mental break, but I was flat out discouraged by running in Napili Bay. This run, unfortunately, was no different. I felt ridiculously sluggish, tired, and just overall unhappy with it, but I did it because it needed to be done.

Sunday–3.1 mile run, 9:35 avg pace. So….there definitely was no track anywhere near me, and also no flat road for miles (is there ANY flat road on that island?!), so for “speed work”, I decided to run faster than the day before. Brilliant, right? And you know what? I DID! Not that the bar was set super high, but I ran significantly faster, and felt so much better! I don’t know if it’s that I ran the opposite (but equally hilly) direction, and maybe the inclines were less steep, or if it’s just that my body was finally getting used to it, but the run was awesome, and I almost kept going, but after 2 lame runs, I decided to just end it feeling good.

Now, I’m back to the 115 degree temps. This will be…interesting. I got back to Phoenix yesterday morning, and I haven’t run yet, but tomorrow is track day. I’m not gonna lie, I’m nervous to see how much the heat slows me down, and that I won’t be able to keep up with my teammates who’ve been running in these temps all summer, but I know all I can do is do my best to adjust, and wait for the summer to be over.

Hawaiian Macadamia Butter Cookies

Maui Part 2 (Hike Maui)

Maui Part 1

NYC Marathon Training Week 7

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