Cottage baking & down-to-earth recipes

Newest Recipes

Microwave Peanut Brittle
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Microwave Peanut Brittle

I have been making Peanut Brittle for decades. I have perfected the recipe for people who don’t want a slab of peanut brittle but a melt in our mouth experience. Once my peanut brittle is out and on the pan cooling, I wait about 5 minutes and then start pulling the peanut brittle out so it is thin and easier to eat.

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Fantasy Fudge
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Fantasy Fudge

Fantasy Fudge, this recipe was developed by Kraft and put on the label of their Marshmallow Cream jar.  It is a really easy, and really fantastic fudge recipe.  It goes together quickly.

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Chocolate Crinkle Cookies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Chocolate Crinkle Cookies

Ah, Chocolate Crinkles cookies, how I love you so. These cookies are really good, and kind of a different cookie.  Most of the chocolate cookies are not like these.  These are kind of like little cakes, only more dense.

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Nonna’s Sugar Cookies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Nonna’s Sugar Cookies

This recipe was given to me by a friend at the bank I used to work with.  She was Italian and this cookie was one that her Italian grandmother made every Christmas. It is very different from the North American sugar cookies that are fat and covered with yummy buttercream. Not that I don’t love those cookies too.  But this one is so different and just so good.

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Microwave Pecan Brittle
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Microwave Pecan Brittle

I have been making Pecan Brittle for about 10 years.  When I first started I made it on the stove top. This stuff had to be cooked on the stove top at such a high temperature that I burned up about a dozen expensive candy thermometers.

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Thin & Crispy Chocolate Chunk Cookies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Thin & Crispy Chocolate Chunk Cookies

Ready to get chunky? These cookies are sooooo goooood. I got this off of a Facebook Real years ago and they looked so easy and so good that I tried them.  I am so happy I did.  They are excellent cookies . 

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Butter Mints, Two Ways!
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Butter Mints, Two Ways!

I have loved butter mints since I first had them at a wedding in the 1970’s. I don’t buy boxes of them because I cannot stop eating them. This year, however, I tried my hand at making them, and this recipe is so close, even better than the ones in the box at the grocery stores.

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Best Soft Peanut Butter Cookies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Best Soft Peanut Butter Cookies

This is a very good recipe, actually my favorite peanut butter cookie recipe. I lived in Framingham, Massachusetts in the 1980s, and got this from a caterer there.  I have used it ever since. 

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Cocoa Fudge Brownies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Cocoa Fudge Brownies

I am always looking for new recipes.  That is because I bake for a Bible study every Wednesday for about 35 people, and on Saturday for a mission service for about 65 people.  In an effort to not always be making the same things, I search out new recipes.  

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Dutch Butter Cookies
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Dutch Butter Cookies

What can I say, I love butter and I love simple.   The only challenging part of these cookies is rolling the logs in the demerara sugar.  Worth it though. These are a kind of an elegant little cookie.  

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Easy Homemade Cheese Sauce
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Easy Homemade Cheese Sauce

Cheese Sauce is not just for kids.  My husband loves cheese in all of its forms and so I developed this recipe for him to use on vegetables, chicken, whatever strikes his fancy. 

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Best Soft Snickerdoodles
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Best Soft Snickerdoodles

Ah, Snickerdoodles.  I love these cookies.  They are a star cookie in my opinion.  I have no idea where the recipe came from but I know my Mom used to make these for us often for an after school surprise.  I know it's not healthy, but it was the 70's, the era of TV dinners.  

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Homemade Cranberry Sauce
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Homemade Cranberry Sauce

This recipe came from my daughters years ago. They made it for one Thanksgiving and it was just so good and so much better than the gelled canned stuff.  My daughters are both grown now and are both good bakers and cooks. 

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French Breakfast Puffs (aka Cinnamon Muffins)
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

French Breakfast Puffs (aka Cinnamon Muffins)

This is a muffin that is close to my heart.  When we were young, my dad would stay home while my Mom took all of us to church.  We would come home to the most amazing breakfast that he made.  These muffins were one of the things he made regularly. 

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Cookie Sheet Cake
Tracy Lingenfelser Tracy Lingenfelser

Cookie Sheet Cake

Cookie Sheet Cake, A/K/A Texas Sheet Cake, is what I call the 30 minute cake.  It is so easy to make, is delicious, and just a really amazing little cake.

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