Almond Pudding Cookies with Brown Sugar Frosting

It's funny how you don't realize how much you miss someone until you finally see them again.

Remember my best baking bud, Sarah? She came to visit the other weekend before she headed up to Pittsburgh for her big-girl law internship. Sarah is an amazingly strong and compassionate woman, and having her as a friend is priceless. We may be in different places, in our lives and in the US, but we still get each other.

We spent the weekend exploring a local "beach", eating at some of my favorite local spots, cooking and baking, sipping on wine, and catching up on life. Before I jump to the cookies we baked, can I please tell you about my *new* official Williamsburg breakfast place?! I already knew that Food for Thought offered an awesome dinner menu, complete with vegetarian/vegan options, sweet potato fries, and pumpkin cornbread (AH!). Then, wham, they started serving breakfast a month or two ago...so Sarah and I went for Sunday breakfast. The menu meets all my breakfast requirements; also, not only do they have blueberry pancakes, but they have granola pancakes (which I combined into one awesome pancake!). And they serve fresh beignets as you wait for your order. Sarah got the "crepe"-ucopia, which was layers upon layers of crepes, Chantilly cream, and seasonal fruit. Food for Thought is awesome. And YOU need to go if you are ever in Williamsburg, VA!

Now, onto the evilest cookies ever...i.e. with a single bite, they took a hold of my every thought and action. To parallel my opening line: It's funny how you don't realize how much you miss a flavor until you finally have again. Almond extract = my crack. Add brown sugar into the mix, and I am a serious goner. DANGER DANGER!!!


These cookies were so soft, chewy, warm and sugary; overwhelming in the best possibly way. Believe me, they smell and taste as good as they look (if not better). I ate five of them in one sitting. Yeah, they're small but oh, the sugar! I had a huge tummy ache and didn't regret it one bit.

These cookies have pudding mix in them, which I've never tried before. I'm assuming this added to the chewiness and denseness of them; addition of pudding mix: APPROVED. My only suggestion is to make the cookies bigger. I believe that cookies should equal to at least be three bites (or else I'll just toss them into my mouth like Skittles, which is exactly what happened).

If you are ready to experience all I have been raving about, hop on over to Crazy for Crust for the recipe--the only modification we made was leaving out the sliced almonds from the cookie dough.

Oh, and welcome to June!