Fair Cookies

My youngest decided to enter some cookies into the chocolate chip cookie contest at the county fair this year. He chose one of his favorite cookies, a chocolate chip-pumpkin cookie that also has golden raisins. He was very excited and counted down the days until baking day arrived. After looking over the recipe, he gathered all his ingredients (including some pumpkin from our back garden).




Mixed the recipe together.






Time for quality control!




He was thrilled to get a blue ribbon for his cookies!



There were three judges, two kids and one adult. The adult told him that his were her favorite! Both the boys also entered some vegetables in the "smallest vegetable" category (red currant tomatoes and fingerling potatoes), and we are waiting to see how the judging comes out on those. This is the first year the boys have entered anything in the fair and they have had a lot of fun deciding what to enter and taking their stuff in. I'm sure they will enter even more next year!

Here is the recipe for anyone who would like to try it:

Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Cookies

1 C packed brown sugar
1 C pumpkin
1/2 C oil
1 tsp. vanilla
2 C flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
3/4 C golden raisins
1 C chocolate chips (if you use non-dairy or vegan chocolate chips, this is a vegan recipe)

In a large mixing bowl, beat together sugar, pumpkin, oil, and vanilla. Sift together dry ingredients and add to pumpkin mixture and stir until smooth. Blend in raisins and chocolate chips. Drop by tablespoons on a greased or non-stick baking sheet. Bake at 350° for 12-15 minutes.

Berry Picking

We went blackberry picking a couple weeks ago and got about a gallon, but it was obviously a little early in the season. The ripe berries were a bit hard to find and we got a fair amount that weren't completely ripe , but we did alright. We decided to go back this weekend figuring that the season should be in full swing. It definitely was! There were lots of berries even though we could tell that there had been people there picking the day before most likely. If I had a good, high pair of waterproof boots, we would have gotten much more. The farm boots I have would have been too short for the level of the creek. As it was, we probably got about two gallons (minus what the boys ate while picking). We sure had a lot of fun!

The boys (all three of them), with their berry buckets.




Demonstrating how they tested the quality of the berries.




Hmmm, maybe this is why their buckets weren't very full...




When we got home, we made some blackberry lemonade using the delicious berries from today and some of the lemon juice from the big bag full of lemons that I juiced and saved earlier this summer.





Now I just have to figure out what I want to do with them. I may make some blackberry syrup and/or jelly. The syrup sounds extremely good to me right now. Yum!