It's

Cozy Food Friday!

That means it's time to share a recipe from 

another great cozy mystery!

Today I'm featuring a recipe from the cozy mystery 

CHERRY CHEESECAKE MURDER by Joanne Fluke. 

Book 8 in the delightful new 

Hannah Swensen Mystery series.

I always get hungry and develop a major sweet tooth when reading this series. Fluke's lead character, Hannah, owns a bakery called The Cookie Jar. There are always delectable treats featured in each book. 

Today I'm featuring a cookie recipe that I think is perfect to make from this time of year, right into the holiday season. 

(Oh heck, all year round!)

PEANUT BUTTER AND JAM COOKIES 

(PBJs)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Rack in middle position

1 cup melted butter (2 sticks, 1/2 pound)

2 cups brown sugar (firmly packed)

1/2 cup white (granulated) sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup peanut butter

2 beaten eggs (just whip them with a fork)

1/2 cup chopped salted peanuts (measure AFTER chopping)

3 cups flour (no need to sift)

approximately 1/2 cup fruit jam (your choice of fruit)

   Microwave the butter in a microwave safe mixing bowl for approximately 90 seconds on HIGH to melt it. Mix in brown sugar, white sugar, vanilla, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Stir until they're thoroughly blended. 

   Measure out the peanut butter. (Hannah sprays the inside of her measuring cup with Pam so it won't stick.) Add it to the bowl and mix it in. Pour in the beaten eggs and stir it all up. Add chopped salted peanuts and mix until they're incorporated. 

   Add flour in one-cup increments, mixing it in until all the ingredients are thoroughly blended. 

   

Form the dough into walnut-sized balls with your hands and arrange them on a greased cookie sheet, 12 to a standard sheet. (If the dough is too sticky to form into balls, chill it for an hour or so, and then try again.)

   Make an indentation in the center of the dough ball with your thumb. Spoon in a bit of jam, making sure it doesn't run over the sides of the cookie.

   Bake at 350 degrees F. for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the tops are just beginning to turn golden. Cool on a cookie sheet for 2 minutes, then remove to a wire rack to finish cooling. 

Yield: approximately 7 dozen cookies, depending on cookie size. 

   Hannah's Note: If you happen to run out of fruit jam and you have cookies left to fill, put a few chocolate chips in the indentation. You'll have to call those cookies PBCs, but they're wonderful! 

Please note that all food photos are from Google Images. Your version may vary in appearance

Anyone besides me hungry?

I'm going to take a wild guess and say that a few of you are going to be making these sometime soon. ;-)

You can purchase CHERRY CHEESECAKE MURDER by Joanne Fluke at your local bookstore or order it online

Barnes & Noble

Amazon

Book Depository

NOTE: I am not in an affiliate program with any online company.

I do not receive payment in anyway for my suggestions to you or 

if you make your purchases from a company I mention. 

Keep reading and check out my installments of 

Book Beginnings on Fridays

and

The Friday 56

Book Beginnings on Fridays is a meme hosted by Rose City Reader

Share the first sentence (or so) of the book you are reading

Keeping my Cozy Food Friday theme going with... 

CHERRY CHEESECAKE MURDER by Joanne Fluke

Book 8 in the Hannah Swensen Mystery series

My Book Beginnings for this week...

Prologue

Lake Eden, Minnesota---Wednesday, the Second Week in March

"Cut!"

Dean Lawrence had directed at plenty of locations, but Lake Eden was the worst. These yokels raised boredom to a whole new level. The chubby broad who ran the bakery made a great cheese cake, and that was the only good thing he could say about Podunk Central.

Nothing was working today. They were never going to get this scene. The local lethargy must be catching, and it was time to kick some butt. 

"What's with you Burke? You're supposed to make people weep for you! Get up. I'll show you what I want here." Dean pushed Burke out of camera range and got ready to play the scene himself. 

The Friday 56 is a meme hosted by Freda's Voice

Rules: *Grab a book, any book. *Turn to page 56 or 56% in your eReader (If you have to improvise, that's okay.) *Find any sentence, (or few, just don't spoil it) that grab you. *Post it.

Continuing with the CHERRY CHEESECAKE MURDER theme

My Friday 56...

(My 56 is from page 55 since page 56 is a recipe)

"That's him! I'm glad you said it, girl. I don't even want his name to pass my lips. And now I got to get going, 'cause if I set even one of my eyes on him, I'm going to kick his you-know-what to kingdom come!"

CHERRY CHEESECAKE MURDER by Joanne Fluke

There's no such thing as privacy in Lake Eden, but Hannah never thought things would go this far. Everyone has been telling her what to do ever since she got not one but two marriage proposals. Movie mania soon shoves Hannah's marriage dilemma into the background and even gives her cat a shot at stardom. The Cookie Jar serves as snack central with Main Street rented out for the week. She stirs lots of fresh gossip, whipping up treats for cast and crew, including demanding director Dean Lawrence's favourite - cherry cheesecake. Everything's on schedule until Dean demonstrates a suicide scene with a prop gun that turns out to be all too real. As filming continues, Hannah sifts through the clues, hoping against hope that the person responsible for Dean's death is half-baked enough to have made a mistake. When it happens, Hannah intends be there - ready to rewrite a killer's lethal script with the kind of quirky ending that can only happen in Lake Eden...

Includes fourteen original dessert recipes for you to try!

Joanne Fluke

Learn more about Joanne Fluke on her website

www.joannefluke.com

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