Pup treats to share...

Just a few days ago, we baked up a few treats to take over to the new neighbors. Since meeting them, we've found that quite a few of them have pups running around their house too! I carved out some time today to make a few of these Apple Peanut Butter Biscuits for Max and Spike to take over and share so their pups can partake in the fun!

We made sure that the biscuits passed the quality control group (Spike and Max were waiting at the oven for me to pull them out, but were not happy that they had it wait... they didn't understand that they still had to cool down!) and they quickly snarfed up their pieces once they had cooled enough.

With just a touch of honey to lure them in, the biscuits are made with creamy peanut butter, unsweetened applesauce, water, oil and of course a combination of all-purpose and whole wheat flours. The dough is a snap to throw together and rolled out well - you may need a little more or a little less flour depending on the consistency of the dough. You want it to be somewhat soft to roll out easily, but it should not be sticky at all. I use a variety of smallish cookie and bone cutters to divvy out the biscuits, but you could just use the top of a small glass if you don't have any. Since it makes quite a few and we only give the pups one or two a day, I like to keep the excess in the freezer just to make sure they don't go stale.

Okay... so these pups totally know how to work the camera - see how the are pretending to be patiently waiting? Um yea, with a bucketful of treats in front of them, this pose did not last long!

We had a pasta toss for dinner that made use of one of my favorite savory ingredients - prosciutto! In just about 20 minutes, I had plates of this Cavatappi with Prosciutto and Parmesan dished up and ready for us to enjoy tonight. A couple minutes before the curly pasta is finished cooking, a garlic clove is lightly sautéed in olive oil. When you drain the pasta, a few tablespoons of the starchy cooking water is added to the garlic followed by the al dente pasta. To season, fresh parsley, salt and pepper are tossed in, along with a couple tablespoons of extravirgin olive oil to loosen things up. To add some complex flavors to this clean dish, thinly sliced salty prosciutto is added to the mixture with a few thin shavings of nutty Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese to complete this meal. Very manageable and a little more elegant than your every day pasta toss, this recipe will definitely have a spot near the top of the recipe stack to be made again soon.

Recipes
Apple Peanut Butter Biscuits
Cavatappi with Prosciutto and Parmesan