Pomegranate White Chocolate Macademia Nut Cookies

Ingredients
1/2 cup unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/2 cup turbinado
1/2 cup rice syrup
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cup all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup chopped macadamia nuts
1 cup white chocolate chips
1 cup pomegranate arils (to see how a monkey can get those seeds out of the pomegranate look HERE)

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat and set aside.

2. In a bowl, combine together flour, baking powder, baking soda, turbinado, and salt. Set aside.

3. In small bowl, combine 1 egg and vanilla. Set aside.

4. In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and rice syrup together until smooth. Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix until well combined. Slowly add flour mixture to the wet ingredients. Mix until just incorporated.

5. Using a rubber spatula/scraper, stir in the nuts and white chocolate. Fold in pomegranates gently being careful not to pop them. *

6. Use your clean fingers to pull out tbsp-sized dollops (for small cookies) of dough and gently roll into a little ball and place on your parchment, obviously using more dough if you prefer big fat cookies. **

7. Bake cookies for 8-10 minutes for small cookies, or 10-12 minutes if you are making larger cookies, until the cookies are light golden brown. Remove from oven and let cool on parchment for 2 minutes, transfer to a wire rack to finish cooling (if you have one).

Spiced Coffee with Cinnamon
Recipe courtesy of Giada De Laurentiis

We saw Giada make this on the Ellen Show the other day. Being monkeys, we like to copy things so we will be trying this for the holiday season.

Ingredients:
1 cup sugar
¼ teaspoon ground allspice
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon ground ginger
2 cups double strength brewed coffee Vegan whipped cream

Directions:
In a small saucepan, combine the sugar and ½ cup water. Bring to a boil over medium heat and reduce heat to low. Add the allspice, cinnamon, and ginger and simmer for 5 minutes, or until the sugar is dissolved.

Take the pan off the heat. Add 2 tablespoons of the spiced syrup to each cup of coffee and stir to combine. Optional: Top each cup with a dollop of vegan whipped cream.(Yeah, optional, as if a monkey would EVER make it without whipped cream!)

Dust with additional cinnamon and serve. OOOOOOOooooooops, you got a little whipped cream on your nose there!

Serves: 4 monkeys