Cookie Bars Cookie bars are a fun treat that everyone loves! They are cookies made from anything you want! My favorite is a S’mores Crumble Bar. Making this item was very fun yet a little challenging. It consisted of Chocolate, graham crackers, and Marshmallows as it main ingredients. When combined, these three complement each other deliciously. You may know the taste from the common campfire snack, S’mores. The S’more Cookie Crumble bar I made tasted just like a S’more, but in cookie formation. Making the cookie bar was really fun. Other kids in my class made all different types of cookie bars. Some made “Slutty brownies” which is a cookie with an Oreo layer and brownies on top. Others made peanut butter chocolate chip cookie dough bar. As you can see, there are many different options when choosing what type of cookie bar to make. If you want to get creative, this is great for bringing to a social gathering or party. They don’t take too long to bake and they sure are tasty! When making yours, get creative! Makenzie C.

Have you ever noticed that Newtown has about three shops just for ice-cream? They aren’t spread that far apart either, they all are in close proximity to the center of town. Although there are three shops selling the same product, we as residence have found a way to differentiate the three. The very first shop we had was the one across from our Saint Rose Church, which I believe is just called The Ice-cream Shop, but I could be wrong. This classic was the place to go in its thriving years, as it has all types of ice-cream, including sundaes, soda floats, and one of my favorites, snow cones. The shop can be said to resemble an ice-cream truck except located on a busy road and attached to the ground. If you’re not in the mood for real filling ice-cream, this is the place to go for its light truck like essence. The next shop that opened up, for my luck, down the street from me is the Creamery. The Creamery has been wowing its customers since the day it opened. Located on a dairy farm run by a Newtown family, these folks only use the fresh milk from their cows to make home-made ice-cream. Here you can find all types of creative names for flavors such as 302 chocolate moo (chocolate fudge) and the grasshopper (mint). It’s been known that people from surrounding towns come to the Creamery for their ice-cream, as it’s the “best in the state”. Although the creamery is only open in the late spring through summer, they offer customers to buy gallons of ice-cream to hold them over through the winter. The Creamery is THE place for real hearty home-made ice-cream. The final place that opened just this past year is actually a chain shop. The frozen yogurt shop, Peachwave can be found across from our Walgreens. This place although a chain, is light and bright in decoration and gives you a health food feel when you walk in the door. Looking at the flavors you will find that most of them are either sugar free or fat free or even both! Also the large area for pick and choose toppings always is switching it up for fan favorites. Half of the toppings bar is fresh fruit and by fresh, they mean it! The other half has the classic toppings along with some new ones like chocolate rocks or graham cracker crumbs. If you’re a health freak or just looking for a light treat on a hot day, Peachwave is the shop for you. So, seeing the different styles of ice-cream we have in our town you can decide which one fits you. Which shop would you choose? The ice-cream truck essence, the home-made farm ice-cream, or the light and healthy treat? Morgan C

On Tuesday I went to Danbury High School on a field trip for one of my classes. We were taking a tour of the school and my partner brought me to the culinary area of the school. Something that I found really interesting about there culinary program, is they have a cafe in the school. The cafe is run by the culinary teachers and the students work there. They alternate from cooking the food, being a waiter/waitress, and busing. Teachers in the school will schedule for there class to go for lunch, it is privilege for them to go to the cafe. What I found interesting about the cafe was that it is basically a mini restaurant, students have to pay for the meals and then tip the waiters/waitresses. I thought it was really cool how other students that aren't apart of culinary can enjoy  According to my partner, the food is really good too. Amy M

Recently, my family and I went out to dinner at the new restaurant, 160 Main. My dad is friends with the owner, who also used to own Mona Lisa, the restaurant that occupied the same building before it changed from an Italian place to a remodeled American grille. We wanted to try a few different things on the menu, so my dad ordered the chicken pot pie, my mom got the meatloaf, and I ordered the slow braised beef. We shared little bits of all the food, and my personal favorite was the braised beef. It was still on the bone and was on top of a pile of potatoes and vegetables and was covered in a red wine demi sauce. It reminded me of a meal my mom and I sometimes make. It’s a pot roast that just sits in h the crock pot for about 6 or 8 hours with all the other ingredients cooking with it. When it comes out, it’s very tender and stringy, and just falls apart. Also, the other ingredients that cook in the crock pot with it form a nice gravy to put over potatoes and vegetables with the pot roast. Overall, I really liked the new restaurant, 160 Main. The food reminded me of home which is always a good thing when trying a new restaurant. I would recommend that everyone try it sometime.

Jake L.

Connor Yesterday after class, I went home and used the cookie recipe to make cookies for my family. I made them with dried cherries instead of chocolate chips though, because we didn’t have any chocolate chips. They turned out very well but I did have a few problems. Since I made them as drop cookies and not uniform sizes, two of them weren’t done when the others were. My mom now decided that I need to make cookies for when we have family over for Easter. She wants me to make peanut butter cookies and snikerdoodles because they are my grandmother’s favorite cookies. So then yesterday, I was looking for recipes a found a few good ones on the food network’s recipe. Also, my grandmother recently bought a bread maker so now she has been sending us all these recipes she’s wanted to try. She has already made three loaves of Italian bread and sent them to my aunt. For Easter she is making wheat bread and cinnamon raison. She thinks that she is going to use the cinnamon raison loaf for a strange bread pudding she found online. She always brings bread pudding to holidays because she says it is a family tradition but no one ever eats it even her. The recipe she found involves all these weird savory spices like; coriander, savory, sage and paprika but she insists it is a dessert.

I have always had a love for ice cream. Whether summer or winter, night or day, I am always in the mood for this icy treat. Some of my favorite flavors are vanilla and cake batter. One of the reasons why I love this treat so much is because of all of the flavors. Now a day, you can find anything in ice cream from waffle cones to cake to even bacon. Not only the flavors themselves but also toppings. I would have to say that I like a lot of different toppings but my favorite is anything with chocolate. Chocolate chips, Oreos, brownies, peanut butter cups, I like them all!

                As much as ice cream from the grocery store is good, there is nothing better than going to the ice cream shop. The one thing that sets the store apart from any regular gallon in your freezer is the soft serve. I love soft serve vanilla! I like the soft texture of it. The ice cream shop across from St. Rose has great things called avalanches that are pretty much soft served ice cream mixed with any kind of topping you like. Places like Peach Wave are great too (however I don’t quite like the taste of frozen yogurt as much).  My absolute favorite place in the entire world to go to no matter what season it is is Cold Stone Creamery.  They have the best cake batter ice cream I have ever tasted. It doesn’t get better than some cake batter ice cream with brownies and Oreos.

                As much as I love cake batter ice cream, I cannot drive down to Danbury every day and get it. Making homemade ice cream always seemed impossible to me. I never had an ice cream maker so I always turned away recipes that required one, however a couple of weeks ago, I bought an ice cream maker. After looking up a couple of different recipes I found one that seemed good. One of the things I didn’t like about this cake batter ice cream recipe was that you had to heat it up and then completely cool it. This took a very long time and I am pretty impatient. I found a different recipe the next time that didn’t require heating it. After tasting both, I would have to say that they tasted exactly the same and it was much easier to make the second one. Here is the recipe for the second one:

Ingredients:

1 cup whole milk, well chilled

3/4 cup granulated sugar

2 cups heavy cream, well chilled

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2/3 cup cake mix

Directions:

1.       Place freezer bowl of ice cream maker into the freezer. It is better to keep it in there 24/7 that way it is always ready.

2.       In a medium bowl, whisk the milk and granulated sugar until the sugar is dissolved.

3.       Stir in the heavy cream and vanilla to taste.

4.       Stir in cake mix, making sure there are no lumps.

5.       Pour mixture into the freezer bowl and let mix until it has thickened (about 25-30 minutes).

6.       Remove ice cream from freezer bowl and place into a separate container.

7.       Place freezer bowl and the ice cream into the freezer to further harden.

-Christina Moore

This week my friend Gill and I decided we really wanted to bake a home made pizza. We went to the store together and bought all the ingredients we wanted to put on the pizza like tomato, mozzarella cheese, garlic, broccoli, onion, and other vegetables. We didn't know how to bake our own dough so we bough whole wheat dough at the store. We got home, rolled it out, put all of our toppings on it and baked it. It was one of the most delicious pizza's I've ever had, probably because everything was so fresh! Now that we have learned in class how to make pizza dough we will try it next time using that recipe for dough. Cant wait! -Natalie P.