Leprechaun Treats

OK, I have to admit that the title for this post is more exciting than the treats I actually made. Cut me some slack, most of my household belongings are in boxes, we've been dealing with a flood, and I've been averaging six hours of sleep a night if I'm lucky. But this is supposed to be a post about baking, not me whining about how tired I am! :)

I just went with the philosophy that anything green and with mint equals St. Patrick's Day and converted two basic recipes to serve as my special treats for coworkers.

First was just chocolate chip cookies - I love how festive the batter looked with a little green food coloring:

Add a little peppermint flavoring and they become mint chocolate chip cookies. Also, I didn't realize I was out of regular semi-sweet chocolate chips, so I ended up using a bag of mini chips:

I think this contributed to the overall effect of making them look like scoops of mint chocolate chip ice cream....yum, ice cream!

I was pleased to see that the green color came through, even after the cookies were baked. And the simple touch of color delighted everyone who saw them (especially since my love of the color green is well known). And, I'm not going to lie, I was dorky enough to bring them in a green tupperware container that I had bought and used for Christmas treats. Yay for green!

To have enough treats for Andrew to bring into work, I also did a batch of brownies and added a bag of dark chocolate and mint chocolate chips that I had also bought around Christmas (I think it was Tollhouse special edition package) - so voila, a shot of minty flavor without making the whole thing taste like mint, plus hints of pale green peeking through:

After all, a holiday wouldn't be as fun without themed treats!