Chai Tea Spice Cookies

We're pregnant!  And we are so very uncontainable with excitement.   I have a tiny human being growing inside of me.  CRAZY!!  That little plus sign popped up very quickly and we freaked out.  Did not even know what to do.  It was awesome.  It took a long while for it to actually kick in that we made a baby.  I still don't think it completely has set in, and I expect that really won't until I actually hear the heartbeat or see the little guy.  Since it is too early to know the gender, and we don't like calling the baby "it", we call it by what size it is that current week.  Names we have called the baby so far have been...Poppy (poppyseed), Sesame, Lentil, Chickpea, and Kidney bean.  It's kinda fun.  I am currently 8 weeks and 3 days.  We are due to have our little kidney bean on August 16th, 2011, which is 2 days before Hubby's birthday.  We tried to think of creative ways to tell our families.  Since we found out our great news just a few weeks before Christmas, we decided to do Christmas themed surprises for our families.

This is the box we sent my parents and grandparents up in Michigan. They are Christmas ornaments that have little baby toys inside and say "grandparents and great grandparents" on them.

And the month baby is due on the back.

For Hubby's parents, I made cookies with a "bun in the oven" picture on them.  I thought they were cute : )  We also had them all open up little baby booties with their presents.  It was fun.  And lastly, here is a picture of the current baby belly maybe baby bump?  (can't decide if it's legit or if I'm just bloated!)

8 weeks is a little early to be showing...I think.  So it may just be bloated-ness.  It's kind of a constant feeling nowadays.  But all is cool!  There is a baby in there somewhere, and it is now the size of a kidney bean, can bend its arms at the elbow, and will turn away if it feels a hit from the outside. : )  (much more is developed than that, I just got really excited about those!)

So those cookies.  What kind of food blogger would I be if I didn't sneak a recipe into a blog post that has almost nothing to do with food?  But it does,  because I love food.  And any part of my life that I am really excited about, there is almost always food involved.

These little bun in the oven cookies are actually more like tea biscuits.  They are chai-spiced and sugary, but not at all too sweet.  They are crunch little things that go great with coffee or tea.  I made chai sugar cookies along time ago, but couldn't remember the exact recipe, so I just decided to wing it and ended up with these.  It was good thing.

Chai Spiced Tea Biscuits


3/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/4 cup flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt
1 chai tea bag


Beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy.  Beat in egg and vanilla.  Mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and chai tea bag contents.  Stir into butter mixture with a large spoon, adding the dry ingredients in 3 or 4 batches.  Divide the dough in half, flatten a little bit with a rolling pin, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 375.  After chilling, roll out the dough to about 1/2 inch thickness.  Use you favorite cookie cutter to cut out shapes.  Bake on greased or nonstick baking sheets for about 10 minutes, until the edges and bottoms are golden.