Imagine this: See’s Candies and chocolate chip cookies — all in one.

If that doesn’t get your lips smacking, I don’t know what will.

Now, you can enjoy the truly blissful taste of the two together with See’s Candies new semi-sweet chocolate chips. There’s even a cookie recipe included on the back of the package to make baking a batch super easy.

The chips are larger than your usual ones — about 1/2-inch in diameter. What that means is when the cookies come out of the oven, you get so much more ooey-gooey chocolate in every bite.

The recipe makes perfect chocolate chip cookies, too — crispy on the edges, chewy in the center and with a load of chocolate chips throughout.

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Is it just me? Or does every Costco shopper end up buying those huge tubs of cashews because they’re just way too tempting?

Even among my own family members, I can count quite a few who have a weakness for those lovely, whole crescent-shaped nuts crammed generously into those big plastic containers. Indeed, when I visit, I can’t help but notice the tub sitting on a coffee table or kitchen table, ready to be opened at the slightest hunger pang.

I’m definitely guilty of that. But I also wanted to do more with my hoard of cashews than just shovel them into my mouth.

Leave it to Martha Stewart to come to the rescue.

Her “Butterscotch-Cashew Blondies” are tender with a touch of crunch and a wonderful caramel-toffee-vanilla flavor.

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Fourth of July might be the ideal time to celebrate the last of the season’s fresh cherries with a bang.

Those sweet, crunchy orbs come and go all too soon, don’t they?

But Payson Fruit Growers has a way to let you enjoy them all year-round.

Founded in 1964, the farmer-owned business processes tart cherries that are grown on local farms in the Payson, Utah area. Recently, I had a chance to sample some of their products.

Some of the tart Montmorency cherries are turned into Tart Cherry Juice Concentrate ($18 for 1 quart). The thicky, syrupy concentrate is fabulous for adding to smoothies or to pan sauces for duck, pork or chicken.

I stirred two tablespoons into 8-ounces of carbonated water, then garnished with fresh cherries and a rosemary sprig to make a refreshing summer soda. It’s super fruity and not overwhelmingly sour. But if you like it sweeter, you can add a tablespoon or two of simple syrup.

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It’s a good thing that opposites attract.

We often joke that my husband is the Nasdaq to my “flatline.” His personality tends to be more volatile than mine, which is fairly even-keeled.

And when it comes to cookies, he favors a soft, cakey texture to my fondness for crisp and chewy.

So, when Harvard-educated pastry chef Joanne Chang of Boston’s Flour Bakery & Cafe came out with a recipe last year for chocolate chip cookies that promised to be chewy with the addition of bread flour in the dough, I was intrigued whether it would somehow satisfy both my husband’s likes, as well as my own.

The recipe, “Chocolate Chunk Cookies” is from Chang’s cookbook, “Flour: Spectacular Recipes from Boston’s Flour Bakery & Cafe” (Chronicle Books), of which I received a review copy. The cookbook includes more than 100 recipes from her bakery, where 1,500 customers come to get their sweet tooth fix every day.

The dough calls for both milk chocolate and semisweet chocolate. I used a sample of Taza Semi-Sweet Baking Squares that I had recently received. Unlike other chocolates, Taza’s products are processed minimally and made from stone-ground beans. The result is chocolate with a much rougher texture, but deep flavor. The baking squares are earthy, with a noticeable acidity and slight bitterness. An 8-ounce container is $10.50.

The dough is a mix of all-purpose and bread flour, along with both granulated and light brown sugars, and plenty of butter. Chang recommends letting the dough firm up in the refrigerator for at least a day before baking the cookies to let the ingredients meld, which is what I did.

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There are times when I’m decidedly old-school.

I prefer a paper wall calendar — the big kind with pics of the Eiffel Tower or Berkeley Breathed characters  on it — to keep track of my appointments rather than my smart phone.

I like to hold a real book in my hands, not a Kindle.

I like to plop myself on the couch on Sunday mornings with the many sections of the New York Times stacked by my side, not an iPad with various newspaper apps loaded onto it.

And there are times when I just want a simple buttery cookie with nothing more than good ol’ dried fruit in it.

Old-school, but oh-so wonderful.

That’s just what “Pebbly Beach Fruit Squares” are. The recipe is from “Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy: Melt-In-Your-Mouth-Cookies” (Artisan), of which I received a review copy last year, by Berkeley’s doyenne of baking, Alice Medrich.

With turbinado sprinkled on top, these are kind of like a sugar cookie sandwich with a filling of your favorite dried fruit, such as prunes, apricots, cherries, dates, cranberries or even dried ginger. Medrich recommends a combo of ginger and cranberries for the winter holidays. I used some especially plump, dried black currants, which I toted back from Quebec last year.

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