Tag Archives: cookies

Give Me Some Sugar

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I’m not really sure why I decided to make iced sugar cookies, but a couple weeks ago it suddenly occurred to me that I “HAD” to make iced sugar cookies.

I did some research and then settled on a recipe and icing instructions from Bake at 350. Do you know her? Her website is pretty awesome and her cookies are just stunning. So pretty!!!

I made these cookies several times and there are two notes that are important. 1.) Use COLD butter, and 2.) These cookies are better with White Lily flour. They tend to be harder when you use all-purpose. Which is fine, but I like the more delicate crumb that this flour provides.

Anyway ~ I’m going to direct you to Bake at 350 for the recipe and instruction on royal frosting… mostly because they are so detailed and well written. Here. That way I can just show you all the pictures of my snowflakes!!!

Yesterday

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I wrote this nearly a month ago, but I never got around to posting the recipe, so I’ve attached the recipe and pictures.

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Yesterday I ran 18 miles. I ran 16 blissfully uninterrupted miles, but as the sun sank rapidly I lost sight of the pavement and tripped. This time (unlike last time) I only scraped up my palms. The bruises and gashes on my legs finally healed, but now my palms are the unfortunate victim of running.  Today, I went on a 4 mile hike… and you know what? I feel amazing.

Most people don’t understand why I run… and I find it hard to put into words. But mostly, I love it because I have to dig deep and find the courage and strength to do it. You know, at mile 10 when the sun is setting and you’re the only person still running, you have to fight back the quitter in you. You have to put your feet on the ground and move. And, the only thing that keeps you going is YOU. Running is a testament to the strength and the good inner fiber you have. It shows you the power you have over everything else. It’s not about control or anything else – it is about your insides. Your guts. Do you have it or not? Because even when your feet hurt, you want to cry, your underwear is giving you blisters, your music died, and the only thing you can hear is your rasping breath against everything else – you can prevail. That’s what running is about for me. It’s a test of faith in the strength that I have inside me.

Anyway, yesterday when I was standing in CVS with blood dripping down my arm and panting while I picked out band-aids and antiseptic I laughed a little. Mostly because I honestly contemplated running 2 more miles with the blood trickling down my arms before going to the drug store to patch myself up. Because, the goal was 20 and I had only finished 18 when I reached the 24hr CVS.

And since I’ve really only been regaling you all with stories and commentary on myself (I mean really, what a narcissist!) These are chocolate cookies. They aren’t very good the day after, and you absolutely have to underbake them for them to be as yummy as you want them to be. In fact, they’re a bit fussy, but I love them. To combat the dry cookie crumb you get the day after, you should scoop balls of them and freeze them and bake as you want to eat them. I only make 6 cookies at a time because they’re just not good unless they are fresh out of the oven.

Chocolate Cookies (Modified from the back of the Ghiradelli bag!)

  • 2 1/4 cups of flour
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp of salt
  • 1 cup of butter, softened
  • 3/4 cup of granulated sugar
  • 3/4 cup of brown sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 2 cups of chocolate chips, measured and then melted
  1. In a heavy bottomed pan gently melt the chocolate chips. I use an All-Clad skillet, heated on high for a few minutes before throwing in the chips and letting it sit off the heat until the chips have melted down and I can stir them easily. Or just be a normal person and use a double boiler. Let the chocolate cool.
  2. In a bowl, beat the butter and both sugars until light and creamy
  3. Add the eggs, beating well after each addition
  4. All at once, add flour, salt, and baking soda and stir until well incorporated
  5. In a thin stream, incorporate the cooled chocolate and dough.
  6. Drop tablespoons of cookie dough two inches apart on cookie sheets and bake at 375 for about 10 minutes
  7. Note: These cookies are best just a bit uncooked, so once the dough poufs, remove them from the oven for perfectly baked cookies. Once the cookies cool, they deflate a little and form a perfectly chewy interior.

 

Bibbity Bobbity Boo!

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Tada! I’m back. I promise. I’m not sure what I’ve been doing that would excuse my 10 day hiatus, but I do have a delicious quick recipe for you.

I was making lemon tart a while back, and as I removed the crust from the oven to pour the lemony curd into the shell I dropped it. The little pieces of crust scattered everywhere! But I snagged a little piece from the pan and thoughtfully chewed on it while I swept up the other crumbs. I’m a sucker for pie crust. I was notorious for picking the crust off the pumpkin pie during Thanksgiving as a kid, so I guess not much has changed. I swapped out some white flour for whole wheat, sprinkled sea salt over the tops, and mixed turbindo sugar in for a delightful little crunch. The flavor is mild and the sweet/salt melting on your tongue is just my favorite. The cookies can be difficult to roll out, so I roll them out on plastic wrap and pop the little cookies up and onto my baking sheet.

Whole Wheat Shortbread, for pie crust lovers like Kaprise!

  • 1/2 cup of all purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup of whole wheat  flour
  • 1/3 cup of sugar (I used a mixture of granulated and turbindo sugar)
  • 8 tablespoons of unsalted butter
  • 1/2 teaspoon of flaky salt
  1. In a heatproof bowl, melt the butter until completely melted. Allow the butter to cool to room temperature
  2. Mix the flour, sugar, and salt into the melted butter. Knead for a minute or two until the ingredients come together.
  3. At this point, you may chill the dough for 30 minutes to allow the dough to firm up a little. This makes it easier to roll out and cut.
  4. But, I’m not patient enough to wait for the dough to firm, so I spread parchment paper or plastic wrap on my counter and use my little 1/2 inch fluted circle cookie cutter and punch out my cookies. Then I just lift the paper/wrap and pop the cookies onto a baking sheet
  5. Bake cookies at 325 degrees Fahrenheit for 10 to 15 minutes or until golden brown

Almond Kolaczki

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I find myself in the kitchen, puttering around and measuring out cups of flour for a lot of different reasons… but I find myself leveling sugar and cracking eggs most when I’m hurt. Most people don’t realize the number of cookies and pies that I ease on to my counter is directly correlated to my happiness. It’s my way of healing myself… I put things together and make things whole and beautiful when I feel everything but. This summer has been a tough one, filled with lots of traveling and baking. Lots of baking. I have made hundreds of cookies, stewed pounds of fruit into jams and jellies, and whipped hundreds of eggs. So when a friend mentioned his grandmother used to make these cream cheese cookies that were light, flaky and dusted with snow white sugar I just had to try them.

I did a little research, and turns out the cookie he is talking about is “kolaczki.” The exact origins of the cookie is not known, but many countries claim it as their own and have their own variations. I only had a block of cream cheese and three boxes of butter in my refrigerator, so naturally I picked the easiest recipe that I had the ingredients for.

Instead of doing the traditional fruit filling, I rolled the dough into layers to enhance the flakiness and omitted the sugar and opted for almond paste. I took a tube of almost paste, dusted it with sugar and rolled it out thin. I sandwiched the thin almond paste between two layers of the kolaczki dough and cut scalloped circles dusted with raw sugar crystals. The result? A light cookie with a sweet almond layer, almost like a lighter and smaller almond croissant.

Kolaczki (Kaprise kitchen style)

  • 8 oz of cream cheese (I used Lucerne neufchatel cheese)
  • 12 oz of butter (3 sticks)
  • 3 cups of sifted all purpose flour
  • 7 oz of almond paste
  1. Let the cream cheese and butter soften at room temperature for 30 minutes to 1 hour.
  2. Beat the cream cheese and butter together until smooth and creamy
  3. Add 1/4 cup increments of flour, blending well. The dough will be very soft.
  4. Turn out on a lightly floured surface and shape into a square. Wrap tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 6 hours.
  5. After the dough has rested, roll out the almond paste and set aside.
  6. Roll out the dough into 1/4 inch thickness. Place the almond paste between two layers and roll once to adhere the layers.
  7. Cut cookies out of the dough. Re-roll as necessary.
  8. Bake at 350 F for 15-20 minutes.

🙂 Enjoy!

Procrastination

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It is the end of the semester, and I should be frantically reading and studying for my exams. I have 4 of them. One of them is a 4 hour written exam… 4 hours. Thank you Professor B for keeping it old school and making it a written exam.

Instead of doing anything law school related, I took one look at the bright blue sky, jumped into my running gear and bopped my way through an easy 3 mile run. I had every intention of showering and walking to the library when I got back, instead I opened my refrigerator and saw the chocolate and cream cheese I had stashed. Two hours later? I was easing a pan filled with gooey whole wheat chocolate chip cookies out of the oven and easing a pan of cheesecake swirled brownies in. And the minute the brownies were out of the oven, I pretended not to be a bad law student, loaded my bag up. Then I hurried a plate of brownies and cookies to my concierge before guiltily walking to the library.

I obviously am sitting at the law school library and still procrastinating. I might have spent an hour popping the keys of my keyboard to clean the keys, and another 30 minutes posting these recipes…. but no matter. Theses brownies and cookies were well worth it. These cheesecake-marbled brownies were found on the veritable smitten kitchen website. I halved the brownie recipe and kept the cheesecake the same because I like a higher ratio of cheesecake to brownie in mine, however I am sure the chocolate lovers out there will prefer the original recipe. I also left the chocolate chips off the top, and swirled the brownies significantly less (because I was trying to get a heart shape in the pan…. which did not work very well).

Gooey Almond Chocolate Chip Cookies (interpreted from everywhere! everyone has chocolate chip cookie recipes that they swear by, and this is my take on chocolate chip cookies. You’ll notice that this recipe is large. You can easily halve the recipe, but I think that is unnecessary. I bake 12 cookies at a time, and make neat little 1 tablespoon balls of cookie dough and freeze them in 12 cookie containers. When you want cookies, you can just pull a container out and plop them on a sheet before baking. Just add one or two minutes to the overall baking time.)

  • 2 cups of all purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour*
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons of baking soda
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons of baking powder
  • 1  teaspoon of Kosher salt (the flaky kind)
  • 1 1/4 cups of  unsalted butter, softened (2 1/2 sticks of butter)
  • 3/4 cup of brown sugar
  • 1/2 cup of turbinado sugar (sugar in the raw)
  • 1 cup of sugar**
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 1/2 teaspoons of vanilla extract
  • 10 oz of 60% chocolate chips***
  • 3.5 oz of almond paste, cut into small cubes and tossed in a tablespoon of flour****

* I use Bob’s Red Mill Whole Wheat Flour for this round and the cookies were a pinch tougher than a normal cookie. I have had extremely good results with King Arthur White Whole Wheat Flour.

**I used Organic Cane Sugar, but feel free to use regular white granulated sugar

*** I used Ghirardelli 60% Cacao Bittersweet Baking Chips in the dark brown bag. I like the largeness of the chips, but feel free to use anything else you like. I use almost the entire bag, save for a handful of chips that I eat while I’m baking.

**** I used Odense Almond Paste. (This is NOT marzipan). It comes in a 7 oz tube, I cut it in half and throw one side in the freezer to firm up before I cut it. I cut with an extremely thin and sharp knife and put the little cubes in a bowl with a little flour to prevent the little cubes from getting stuck together. Also, though I only use 1/2 of the tube, I think the cookies would benefit from the use of the entire tube. Some of the cookies were lacking the tangy almond paste, which I found disappointing.

  1. Cube almond paste (see ingredient notes)
  2. In a large bowl, whisk the butter, brown sugar, turbindo sugar, and white sugar together until creamy
  3. Add the eggs, one at a time, whisking well after each egg.
  4. Stir in vanilla.
  5. Add 1 cup of all purpose flour and baking soda and baking powder and salt still until evenly incorporated
  6. Add the remaining 1 cup of all purpose flour, 1 1/2 cups of whole wheat flour, and stir until smooth
  7. Add the chocolate chips and almond paste cubes and stir until just incorporated
  8. Turn the oven to 350 F
  9. Spread parchment paper on a cookie sheet and drop 1 tablespoon rounds of cookie dough on the sheet about 2 inches apart. Flatten a little with the palm of your hand.
  10. Bake at 350 F for 15 minutes until just brown (check your oven to make sure that your cookies don’t need less or more time. My baking sheet is an industrial aluminum pan and so it tends to bake a little faster)

General Notes

  • I used turbinado sugar for the crunch it gives the cookies. Sometimes, to enhance the crunch in the cookies, I’ll increase the volume of this sugar and lower the brown sugar. I also add a drop or two of water in the white sugar to make up for the lack of brown sugar. The water helps achieve a deep molasses flavor in the cookies during baking, just be sure not to go overboard with this step.
  • These cookies bake at a lower temperature for longer, be patient, they are well worth the wait
  • Like most cookies, if you store this dough covered in your refrigerator, the flavors of the vanilla and sugar are enhanced and the cookies taste even better. The gluten in the flour relaxes and you get these amazingly tender and chewy cookies. I’m sure there are better explanations than mine out there, but I imagine it’s some sort of chemical reaction that creates a better cookie after the dough has rested in the refrigerator for a while. In any event, I tend to be on the impatient side, so I always make a pan of cookies before the dough gets anywhere near the refrigerator.
  • If you do store your dough in the refrigerator, make sure it is tightly wrapped and stored away from any smelly foods (like garlic/onions and leftover dinner). I have a sensitive nose, so the minute my cookies smell like dinner, I chuck them. Also, do not leave your dough in the refrigerator for more than a week. I’ve been told they can be left for 2 weeks… but something about eggs in flour for 2 weeks skeeves me out.
  • Do not melt your butter. Something about melted butter absorbs more flour and your dough turns into this weird texture. Do not melt! I’ve been told that softening the butter in 10 second intervals in a microwave is helpful. I didn’t grow up with a microwave, so I tried this and ended up with really hot butter coating the inside of my microwave. I usually take the butter out of the refrigerator, go for a run and take a shower before I start making the cookies. The butter is still firm but creamy at that point. The moment you see transparent yellow, throw it in the refrigerator until it firms up again.
  • Even if you are using parchment paper, make sure your pans are squeaky clean. If you have any residual oil or food on them from another meal, the oven will bake that smell and taste right into your cookies as they bake. Scrub those pans!
  • For non-stick pan users, you might consider lowering the temperature 10-25 degrees. Something about that dark coating makes cookies bake differently.