Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 12!!

For the piece de resistance of the twelve days of cookies project, I attempted a recipe for chocolate cookies that was famously made every year by my grandma Neena. She would make them in great quantites and send them to everyone. Let's just say I had very big shoes to fill --these cookies are known, so the pressure was on. I was doubting the cookies were turning out at every step. I kept thinking in my head, "OK, its a do-over. I knew I would have at least one..." But I forged ahead. The doubters and nay-sayers in my family were telling me the cookies were too light in color -- Neenas were much darker and more chocolately. But don't judge a cookie before its frosted! The frosting made the cookies much richer, and suddenly I had achieved the ultimate -- historical cookie accuracy. The greatest compliment I got was "Hey Kendra, these taste just like Neena's!"

Thanks for reading, everyone. Its been a fun and fattening December! Stay tuned for more meaningless forays into cooking and baking minutia. xxoo Merry Cristmas! Kendra

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 11

I saw these "salty oat" oatmeal cookies featured on this episode of Food Network's Recipe for Success, and I vowed to try to replicate them at home. The are oatmeal cookies that are sprinkled with kosher or sea salt after being dropping by tablespoons onto the cookie sheet. I was intrigued by the idea of having a salty finish to my sweet cookies -- that combination of salty and sweet is really appealing to me.

These cookies were a huge success. They are very munchable and the salt at the end makes the taste more interesting to the palate. I also like them because they have oatmeal in them, which means one side of my brain can successfully convince the other side of my brain that they are in some way good for me. In fact, I am having a "healthy snack" even as I type this! :)

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 10

I saw this biscotti being made by Giada on the Food Network (I've seen so many of her shows I feel that we are on a first name basis). I have been wanting to make biscotti for a long time, and this was the perfect holiday recipe, because it has dried cranberries and pistachios in it, not only for wonderful flavor but for Christmas colors.

This is almost my favorite cookie so far -- and no chocolate!?! Actually, the great thing about biscotti is that it easily lends itself to being dipped in chocolate. Unfortunately for me, I somehow have not mastered the skill of melting chocolate to the right consistency for dipping, so this biscotti had to go without. Wait, you say -- don't you just nuke the chocolate or melt over a double boiler and dip away? It seems like the answer would be yes, yet somehow I have failed. I tried to make a white chocolate dip for this biscotti, but it came out globby and chunky rather than smooth and shiny. Maybe there is a melting secret, but until I figure it out, these biscotti are doing just fine on their own.

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 9

Today I decided to make the wonderful toffee that I had overindulged on at the latest cooking club meeting, using this recipe that had been handed down in my friend Maggie's family. The ingredients and instructions are quite simple. But to me, making toffee felt more like a chemistry experiment than baking cookies. Per Maggie's recipe, I was supposed to stir the butter and sugar until the goo (which is an apt description by the way) is the color of brown sugar -- um, light or dark brown sugar I wasn't sure, nevertheless, I put the (light) brown sugar by the pot to compare colors. Here is the changing of the colors:

Right after I take the second picture, my dad hears me sprinting up the stairs, and hearing the alarm in my footsteps wants to know if there was a crisis. "Yes -- Separation!!" I yelled! At the same time the color became the perfect brown sugar caramel color, so that I was ready to pour and spead the goo -- I had separation!! I ran to the computer to re-read what Maggie had written about her own issues with separation.

Ultimately, I think what went wrong is that butter and sugar behave differently here in South Carolina because I am so much closer to the equator. Its the only logical explanation I can think of.

Minutes later, the goo had re-formed, and was ready to be poured. Only now it was a much darker color than light brown sugar. My toffee turned out not as fabulous as Maggie's -- its darker, harder, and with a different consistency -- but it still tastes good! I guess with butter, sugar, and chocolate it is hard (for even me) to ruin something entirely. :)

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 8

The first cookies I made when I got to my parents house were chocolate walnut tassies, the recipe which came from Woman's Day magazine. As I was making this two-part cookie, I had a bad feeling that they were not going to come out. As I was molding the pastry, I started to think of different excuses to explain why they were so bad....the best I could come up with was that 'flour and sugar behave differently because I am so much closer to the equator.' Fortunately, it turned out I didn't need to use that oh-so-believeable reason, because actually the tassies were quite tasty.

Because I am home, there was an urgency to get the pictures taken immediately out of the oven. You see, my dad is lurking about, ready to pounce. In fact, several of the cookies did not make it to stage three, where a top layer of chocolate is poured over the cookie. Instead, dad got out the Hersey's chocolate syrup, and poured that over the cookie. Demolishment commenced. Due to my quick trigger finger, however, I was able to squeak out a few photos of the cookies first. It is good to have your cookies loved!

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 7

At some point during this project, I just had to make gingerbread men, the cookies of the season. These cookies, if I do say so myself, look maaaavalous. They taste pretty good too. Not too sweet, with a nice touch of ginger. Did you know that gingerbread men are made with ginger, that root vegetable that is used a lot in asian cooking? HA! I guess most people are like, umm yes, I did! But I never really stopped to think about where the ginger word and flavor came from. It was weird to scrape bits of ginger root into the dough -- but it works!

I made gingerbread men and snowflakes and decorated them with icing and silver dragees, then put the dragees away in my baking cabinet. Next time I opened the cabinet, all these little silver dragees came raining down on my head and scattered EVERYWHERE. Acckk! I guess the plastic container had opened up in the cabinet....

And hey, the next time I make these I am going to make gingerbread women, because how come gingerbread men get all the glory?!? :)

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 6

I was drawn to these cookies because of their name -- Snowflakes. They sounded like they would be festive little bites, plus the recipe from epicurious.com called for a bit of chocolate in the middle, which a makes anything taste better. Once I started making the cookies though, I realized this cookie had a terrible little secret. NO butter. That right, folks. A complete ixsnay on the utterbay.

Although I was disappointed that I wasn't going to get my butter fix for the night, I decided to soldier on. To redeem itself, this cookie was ridiculously easy to make. I believe the coconut gives it some fat, so that it cannot be billed as a fat free cookie. I don't want to go check that out though. I will just continue to believe I am eating a butter-free cookie that tastes good. And Pebbles the cat seems to agree!

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 5

Today, in preparation for our holiday cookie exchange for the cooking club, I made decorated holiday cookies, with the recipe from my cooking bible, Cook's Illustrated The New Best Recipe cookbook. These cookies are so simple to make -- only 5 ingredients, and you only use a single bowl, so cleanup is a cinch. Well, until the rolling out, cutting, and decorating that is. Then things get a little trickier and a little messier.

I took the first picture before the cookies were fully decorated in case I goofed them up later. The trees came out ok, but the ornaments looked a little shabbier. I may have been trying to complicate things, but I was using two different types of icing --a royal icing and a glace. The royal icing is for outling and piping and I love the glace for filling in the cookie -- it hardens into a beautiful shiney coating. And I like the taste better. But with only three colors (red, green, and white), that meant I was actually pulling from 6 different bowls of icing.

So do you want to know what the 5 ingredients are? Here's a hint: the cookie uses no eggs, and no baking powder. Yes, butter and sugar! But what else??

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 4

For today's cookies, I went straight past double chocolate and directly to triple chocolate. Triple Chocolate Espresso Bean Cookies from the great food blog 101cookbooks.com to be exact. These cookies are an adult cookies, and not for the faint of heart! The funniest thing about making these cookies is that I went to two grocery stores and neither one carried chocolate covered espresso beans (a food crime, for sure). I thought to myself, Kendra you are cookie wiz by now -- you have both chocolate and espresso beans at home, so why don't you make your own "from scratch" and really go martha stewart on this recipe?!

The results are here:

They don't look quite like what you would see at Trader Joes. I ended up deciding to toss the whole lot because they wouldn't separate and were not very appetizing. Instead, I increased the amount of chocolate chips called for, and I added plain espresso beans to the recipe. They came out pretty good, and they give you a nice chocolatey espresso kick in the pants!

...So does anyone know the secret to making attractive chocolate covered espresso beans?!

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 3

Today I made Swedish Christmas cookies. I am part Swedish, I am told, so this was delving into my culinary ancestry. However, the recipe came from the very american Food Network, although I'm sure you can find it all over. These cookies taste pretty good. Very foreign, though. Definitely euro cookies. The special foreign ingredient is cardamom. I had to go to the grocery store for cardamom, because I didn't have it in my spice repertory yet. I'm way into cardamom now, and I want to make more dishes with it. It can be used in both sweet and savory foods. Cardamom is like, soooo the new nutmeg! :)

Also, I had fun forming and shaping the (not so) perfect log. I also liked rolling the log in the sugar because it was nice and messy. The tinkling sound of little bits of red sugar hitting the floor filled the apartment, and I am sure I will find them for weeks to come. Very festive!

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 2

After the pignoli cookies, I was hankering for something with chocolate. So I picked something with a LOT of chocolate! Basically the cookie serves as a bed of rich chocoate dusted in powdered sugar in which to delicately cushion a chocolate Hershey's kiss. These were soooo delicious. Especially warm out of the oven -- not hot, but when the Hershey's kiss has just started to firm up again. You see, you bake the cookie, and then when they come out of the oven, you press a kiss into each one one. It gets all shiney and melty and I have a feeling you shouldn't jostle them at this point. But right after that is the perfect time to eat. And if you didn't quite time it to perfection of the first one, why, try try again! That was MY motto!

If I were to make these again, I would be sure to make the cookies pretty small in size. The cookie to candy ratio should be even smaller that you think. Also, the recipe (from Womans Day magazine) called for the cookies to be rolled in powdered sugar before baking. I would bake the cookies first, then dust them with a sieve of powdered sugar, then add the kiss. I bet they would come out even prettier. The recipe called for caramel-filled chocolate kisses. That sounds delicious, but I used peanut butter filled kisses, because that it what I had around as a gift from my mother-in-law. That bit of peanut butter with the chocolate was, as we all know, two great tastes that taste great together.

Twelve Days of Cookies, Day 1

I decided to start with a pignoli cookie -- that's a pine nut cookie for us Americanos!! My former boss made a mean pine nut cookie, but I couldn't find the recipe so I was forced to troll online. My recipe came from a site called www.odense.com. I guess they are the makers of a certain type of almond paste. Well, this cookie sure uses a good deal of almond paste! In fact, my main complaint about the cookie is that the taste and the texture (sans the pine nuts) seemed almost like eating almond paste straight from the tube. Not that I would ever DO that. Im just saying hypothetically that is. It used a minimum of flour -- truly a minimum, it was 1.5 tablespoons in my recipe (that I halved). Good for the gluten sensitve I guess. Its good to make them very small, because they are dense and sweet. The pine nut is a great foil to the dense sweetness. Luckily, one of Gregg's biker friends came over later that evening and only a few cookies survived the onslaught. So at least they were appreciated!