Nuts? You're Nuts!

Last week's adventures in nutty baking were so much fun, I decided to explore nuts further.  This time I was in a guest kitchen; one with an amazing Red Kitchenaid stand mixer (and my mom).

We made Almond Cloud Cookies! No almonds needed. (Seriously.)  The most important ingredient is almond paste. Apparently you can make this yourself, but I doubt it's worthwhile. Also, the brand of almond paste one uses seems to affect the outcome. We used Love 'n' Bake. See how on the can, the apostrophe in " 'n " is a heart? Isn't that cute?

The (Brooklyn-based) company is also kind enough to let us know that "Love 'n Bake" and "Love 'n Bake 'Schmear'" and the logo with the cute little heart apostrophe are their trademarks. Schmear? Really? In most parts of the world New York, I believe "schmear" was once used to refer to cream cheese (on a bagel), but apparently it has come to mean anything spreadable. Okay, so I guess almond (or chocolate) "schmear" isn't so... um, verkakte.

Back to the cookies. We're also using Almond Extract (made from bitter almond oil, water, and alcohol) and Almond Flavor (which is bitter almond oil). I'm not sure why we need both, but I'll reserve judgment until I see the final product.

Two Butter Pecan Shortbreads for the Price of One

Before I start: I have to acknowledge that I know today is Purim, and I know I should be making Hamantaschen. But the thought of rolling and cutting out all that dough for a cookie I don't even like was a little overwhelming on this lazy Sunday. I would also like to note that today is my grandpa's 94th birthday. Happy birthday, Pop-Pop!

So, I've made Butter Pecan Shortbread, two ways. Shortbread is super easy to make, not too sweet, and generally delicious. Plus, it comes from Scotland. I've been to Scotland (and eaten their haggis), and am of the opinion that pretty much everything from Scotland is fantastic (particularly their weddings, their castles, and their kilts).

Wedding, Castle & Kilt -- all in one photo! Trust me.

You can even make shortbread chocolate! Or dip it in chocolate! This makes it almost the perfect food! I didn't use chocolate today, because I was actually, strangely in the mood for something un-chocolatey. I may or may not have overindulged in Cadbury Mini Eggs this weekend.

Anyway. Today is all about shortbread and pecans. I love it when I get to make something with chopped nuts, because I get to use my Big Choppy Knife. Perhaps I enjoy the choppy knife a little too much; when I pulled it out, my husband took one look and warned me, "Be careful."

Ginger: For Health & Happiness

They say that ginger can soothe aching muscles, brighten dull skin, ease an upset stomach, prevent heart disease, and even cure depression.

I just think it looks like an alien visitor from a faraway planet. It's ugly. But -- it's ugly in a so-ugly-it's-almost-cute kind of way.

When I started gathering my ingredients for Chewy Chocolate Gingerbread Cookies, I paused to contemplate why I had never before cooked or baked anything using fresh ginger.  I mean, I'm a pretty good cook and a frequent viewer of food-related television; I'm not afraid to use spices and try different techniques when I cook, so I wondered, "Why have I never come face-to-face with a ginger root?"
And the questions kept coming.

Something's Wrong, Here...

It's ironic, then, that for my first real post I've made brownies, baked on a Wednesday. C'est la vie!

I knew I was running low on flour, and was too lazy to go get more (Don't judge me! Those 5lb bags are heavy). But I'd found this brownie recipe that only called for 1/2 cup of flour -- which is great for two reasons:
1. I had enough flour in my house to make the recipe, and
2. A brownie recipe with only 1/2 cup of flour is bound to be deliciously rich and fudgy.

Alas, when I started gathering my ingredients on Sunday afternoon, I realized I had no sugar. None.
So I had to postpone my delicious brownies until later in the week. (And don't think for a moment that my coworkers weren't fully expecting some sort of delicious, sugary snack on Monday morning. They asked; I answered; they pouted. It was tragic. They even offered to buy me a pound of sugar before I went home that day. . . )

But I think my dear office-mates would agree that these peppermint patty brownies were well worth the wait. Yep, that's "peppermint patty," as in -- there's a layer of York peppermint patties in the middle. Because really, who can argue with chocolate and mint?

I'm a big (huge!) fan of any recipe that begins by instructing me to completely cover the pan with foil, because this way I might actually keep my shiny new pans... shiny and new.  Hooray!

Semisweet chocolate! A great start.

 Chocolate + Butter = Best Friends (in a heatproof bowl)

Bring water to simmer --

NOT a boil.  

It's a good idea to pay attention when you're melting chocolate and butter. It's not a good time to stop and take photographs of melting chocolate, because it has a tendency to burn when you do this...

Perfect!

Add sugar, and then eggs.

This is actually a good time to stop and take photographs. I like to let the chocolate-butter-sugar combo cool for minute before I add my eggs, so they don't scramble. 

And add a little bit of cocoa powder to make sure it's really chocolatey...

 

Start with a layer of batter, then add peppermint patties, and cover with remaining batter.

Something strange happened, and a few of my patties bubbled to the top while the brownies were baking.  But even though they weren't beautiful, they were certainly delicious!

Ghosts of Cookies Past - Part II

Immediately following the Great Christmas Cookie Experiment of 2010, I found myself with a lot of time on my hands, and a serious desire to bake. Cookies were most practical, because they travel well and are readily available as individual portions for my husband's coworkers -- who were usually the (willing or unwilling) beneficiaries of my baking binges. I generally love anything sweet, but baking all these new treats was kind of addictive. I found myself baking at least one treat almost every weekend, when I had long stretches of unplanned time (which are necessary because I'm slow I like to take my sweet time and enjoy the process).

You know what happens when you bake cookies for a few Sundays in a row, and bring said cookies to work a few Mondays in a row?  People start to expect them -- to need them!  And I would hate to disappoint two whole offices full of salivating lawyers. So, I began to bake cookies. On Sundays.
(And to photograph the results).

Snickerdoodles

Rum Balls

Valentine Hearts

Lime Meltaways

Dark Chocolate-Cherry Cookies

Ghosts of Cookies Past

This is how it all started.

I'd never made a Christmas cookie - or really even contemplated it - until this past December, when I decided my life wouldn't be complete until I had decorated some festive holiday treats. Not being of the Christmas-celebrating persuasion, I opted for snowmen and snowflakes over ornaments and trees. With my mom along for moral support, I took a little field trip to the NY Cake store on 22nd Street and found an excellent collection of cookie cutters. After choosing 5 or 6 shapes I couldn't live without, and stopping for some sanding sugar and pretty, pretty silver dragees (pretty!), I went home and began researching.

To whom does a novice cookie-baker-slash-decorator turn when she wants a good, standard rolled sugar cookie (and royal icing) recipe? To Martha Stewart, of course! And Martha did not disappoint. The dough was simple to make, and the cookies were tasty - and more important - a great canvas for my art.

If you look at royal icing recipes and guidelines, most of them tell you things like "mix until icing is the consistency of glue" or "add sugar until icing is proper consistency." These directions are utterly unhelpful (what kind of glue? what does proper mean?!), and I discovered that the ideal royal icing is generally the result of good, old-fashioned trial and error.  In other words, I can't tell you how to make perfect royal icing, but I know it when I see it!

So... it turns out that decorated sugar cookies are a huge undertaking. You have to make the dough, chill it to firm, roll it out, cut the cookies, bake them, and let them cool completely. Then decorating takes another full day. But, it's worth it when they turn out to be so cute.

My cookies made me so happy that I almost couldn't bear to part from them (much less let people eat them)! Luckily, I had just gotten a new camera, and was looking for excuses to practice using it. And practice I did.