Archive for the 'cookies & squares' Category
I’ve been lured into a recipe once again because of its intriguing name. This one jumped out at me from a book – the Gourmet Cookie Book: Single Best Recipe from Each Year: 1941-2009, which I ordered last year and which arrived the week after Christmas, and so I never did look at it, and then grabbed it on the way out the door to flip through on my lap last weekend during a leisurely drive to Banff. My mission: to choose a few cookies to make for our upcoming bake sale and cookie exchanges. Yes! I’m going to have one – sorry to leave you hanging. I have deets.
I narrowed it down to a few, from this particular book at least. I made some Nutella brownies that are different, texture-wise, from every brownie I think I’ve ever made. In a good way. I added toasted, roughly chopped hazelnuts and dried cherries – the real kind, not the maraschino kind.
And although I brought both to the same place, thinking that the brownies would be the hands-down winner, everyone went a little nutso for these crisp, buttery ginger cookies, made with good powdered ginger that gave them a sort of pepperiness you wouldn’t get from fresh.
It’s Scottish; a thin, cooked-till-golden layer of shortbread (made with ginger), topped with a layer of melted butter, icing sugar and Lyle’s (or Rogers’) Golden Syrup (made with ginger), but is so much more than shortbread topped with icing. Über simple, totally inexpensive, makes lots. They kind of break into shards, but it’s kind of endearing, so you don’t really have to worry about them breaking. They’re totally unassuming – not fancy at all – but totally yummy. Everyone made a point of commenting about these. Especially the guys. They’re not greatgrandmotherly at all.
I’ll make a batch this weekend, for our cookie exchange! And most likely something else, too. So here’s the plan: want to come? comment here (or if you did last time, that works too) and I’ll email you. Don’t sweat the numbers – the most casual way to do a cookie exchange without assigning X-dozen cookies to each attendee is to just say: bring what you like, and take home as many as you brought. That way the math always works.
The Cookie Party of All Cookie Parties is next weekend, Saturday December 10, at 2pm. There will be wine! There will be nog! There will be cookies! There may even be a tree! Hope you can come!
Skibo Castle Ginger Crunch
from Gourmet, December 1999
Shortbread base:
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
3 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. ground ginger
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup cold butter, cut into pieces
Topping:
1/3 cup butter
1 Tbsp. Lyle’s or Roger’s Golden Syrup (British cane sugar syrup)
1 cup icing sugar
1/2 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. vanilla
Preheat oven to 350°F and butter a 9×13″ metal baking pan.
In a medium bowl, stir together the flour, sugar, baking powder, ginger and salt and blend in the butter, working it in with your fingertips until the mixture resembles coarse meal. Press evenly into the bottom of the pan (it will be thin) and bake until golden and crisp, 20 to 25 minutes.
Just before the shortbread is done, melt the butter in a small saucepan and whisk in the golden syrup, icing sugar, ginger and vanilla. Bring to a boil and simmer for 30 seconds.
Remove shortbread from oven and pour topping over, tilting pan and using a spatula to cover it evenly. Cool in the pan, then cut into small rectangles or break into shards.
Makes about 64 pieces.
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December 02 2011 | cookies & squares | 41 Comments »
Oh eff. This is what I said, out loud even, having just come home from the gym where I tend to work up an appetite voracious enough to make steamed cabbage taste divine, and clicked on Gwendolyn’s blog and these babies popped up and practically licked me in the face. Or it may have been me licking the computer – I can’t remember. I mean – look at them. Love at first sight? I believe.
The baker in me was intrigued by the use of cornstarch in this particular dough. Not much – only 2 tsp. to 2 cups of flour. Would it really make a difference? Or is it gimmicky? Designed to lure in people like me who are hungry and haven’t eaten a freshly baked chocolate chunk cookie in far too long?
So I made them – for research purposes only. Besides, I’ll be seeing Anna Olson – Gwendolyn’s cookie muse – at Christmas in November at the Jasper Park Lodge in a month – I could use this as a conversation piece. You know, something to chit chat about.
There’s a half pound of chopped chocolate in these. (That sounds way better than 8 oz or 2 cups, don’t you think?) Go semisweet or as dark as you like. I do like chopped chocolate in a cookie rather than chips – you get that spread of teeny bits to enormous chunks, which works in these. They really are All That, and interestingly enough the cornstarch – perhaps paired with the low sugar-flour ratio – produces a cookie very different from those I generally fall back on. They have that thick denseness reminiscent of the ones I used to get at Cookies by George when we took the bus downtown after school. They aren’t cakey, but they aren’t as chewy as most. But yet they are chewy. At any rate, they’re totally fab. Even Ben looked up from the table and said, all contemplative and serious (particularly for an 8 year old), “wow, these are really good chocolate chip cookies.”
I sprinkled a few with a bit of crunchy salt for salted dark chocolate cookies. I know, the whole salted caramel/chocolate combo is so last year. Who cares? It’s also so delicious.
These are totally ridiculously easy to make. You don’t need to age the dough, or chill it, or do anything but nibble at it as you stir, then scoop (I really do love my levered scoop – ask Santa for one) and bake. Never before has superherosim been so easy.
Half a Pound of Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies
With thanks to Gwendolyn and Anna.
3/4 cup butter, at room temp
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
2 tsp vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp. cornstarch
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
8 oz. dark or semi-sweet chocolate, chopped into chunks
Preheat oven to 350F.
In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugars until pale and almost fluffy. Beat in the egg and vanilla.
Add the flour, cornstarch, baking soda and salt and stir or beat on low until almost combined; add the chocolate chunks and stir just until blended.
Drop dough by the spoonful onto a parchment-lined (or buttered) sheet and bake for 10-14 minutes (depending on their size) until golden around the edges but still soft in the middle. Transfer to a wire rack to cool. Makes about 1 1/2 dozen large cookies.
September 23 2011 | cookies & squares | 36 Comments »
I’ve had these on my mind for awhile. The perfect marriage of tart & tart, lemon and rhubarb were made for each other. All you need to do here is chop fresh rhubarb (fairly finely, or at least not in enormous chunks – go for the size you might cut celery to add to a salad) and scatter it over a baked shortbread base before pouring the lemon filling on top. Those thin red stalks of tender rhubarb are perfect here.
My standard shortbread base has half the butter of a traditional one – generally it’s 1/2 cup butter to 1 cup flour, and I use 1/4 cup butter to a scant cup of flour. (It’s easy and almost instantaneous in a food processor.) The result is a crumbly mixture that doesn’t appear to be moist enough to work, but pat it into the pan and it totally does.
It will crack a bit as it bakes – that’s OK. You won’t notice one bit once the filling is poured overtop. And that trimming of just 1/4 cup of butter equals about 44 grams of fat and 400 calories. So why not? You’ll never notice the difference.
I cut these while they were still a little warm – everyone was outside waiting for dessert. The secret to cutting gooey, sticky-filled bars like this cleanly? Freeze them first. Then flip them out of their 8″x8″ pan onto a cutting board and cut into neat squares or bars. Set them on a serving tray and they’ll thaw in about 20 minutes. Everyone will ask you how you cut your bars so cleanly.
Rhubarb Lemon Bars
Base:
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup sugar
1 scant cup all-purpose or whole wheat flour
pinch salt
Topping:
1 cup sugar
2 Tbsp. all-purpose flour
1/4 tsp. baking powder
pinch salt
2 large eggs
grated zest of 1 lemon
juice of 1 lemon (about 3 Tbsp.)
1 1/2 cups fairly finely chopped fresh or frozen rhubarb
icing sugar for sprinkling
Preheat oven to 350°F.
In a medium bowl, stir together the butter and sugar until creamy. Add flour and salt and stir until well combined and crumbly.
Press into the bottom of an 8” x 8” pan that has been sprayed with nonstick spray. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until just barely golden around the edges.
In the same bowl (no need to wash it), combine the sugar, flour, baking powder and salt. Add eggs, lemon zest and lemon juice and stir until well blended and smooth.
Sprinkle the rhubarb evenly over the base, and pour the lemon filling over top. Bake for 30 minutes, or until golden and set. Cool completely in the pan on a wire rack before cutting or freezing. Cut into squares or bars, and sprinkle with icing sugar before serving.
Makes 12 bars or 16 squares.
I’ve decided to share a few links to rhubarby things that have been inspiring me lately. If you’re looking for inspiration for your ginormous rhubarb plant, or that healthy, ruby-red one down the alley your neighbours seem to be neglecting, Gwendolyn has some pretty tasty looking rhubarb pudding cakes, Tara has a lovely rhubarb story, and Simple Bites served up a rhubarb upside-down cake.
And Lottie + Doof have an absolutely heart-stopping rhubarb raspberry crostata that has just shot to the top of my must-make list.
July 03 2011 | cookies & squares | 19 Comments »
I forgot to mention the chocolate chip cookie dough truffles. (Yes, I did contribute to the potluck!)
On Friday night my 13 year old niece, Emily, came over to hang. To sit on the kitchen counter and talk about soccer tryouts (the provincial team! so proud) and boys, mostly. She wanted to bake. Often we make buns, but it was getting late, so chocolate chip cookies were decided on. For the dough, mostly. As we mixed and gabbed she decided to melt some chocolate chips and dip small pretzels into it, like those chocolate dipped pretzels you buy at the store. We sprinkled coarse salt on some, which wasn’t really necessary since the pretzels were covered with crunchy salt to begin with.
We were eating the dough, commenting on its vast superiority to baked cookies themselves, and then decided to chill rolled balls and DIP THEM IN CHOCOLATE. The result, of course, is a crisp chocolate shell with soft cookie dough inside. Hello, my love.
Also? You don’t have to heat up the kitchen. Which I’m happy to report is starting to be an issue.
We managed to save some for the potluck. They went quickly.
You could of course use any cookie dough for these. We used chocolate chip cookie dough – more or less the one on the back of the Chipits bag.
Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Truffles
You don’t need to add baking soda, since these won’t be going into the oven – if you’re going to bake them, add 1 tsp. baking soda to the flour.
3/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp. vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
pinch salt
3 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, divided
In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugars for a minute or two, until fluffy; add the eggs and vanilla and beat again. Add the flour and salt and beat until almost combined; add half the chocolate chips and beat on low speed or stir just until blended.
Shape the dough into large marble-sized balls and place them on an ungreased baking sheet, then refrigerate or freeze until firm.
Melt the rest of the chocolate chips in a bowl in the microwave, or a small pot over low heat on the stovetop (careful it doesn’t burn!) – dip the balls of dough, using a fork if you want to coat them completely. Set them on a sheet of parchment or foil and let sit (or refrigerate) until firm.
Makes lots.
May 31 2011 | cookies & squares and dessert | 25 Comments »
Food is all those substances which, submitted to the action of the stomach, can be assimilated or changed into life by digestion, and can thus repair the losses which the human body suffers through the act of living.
-The Phsysiology of Taste, Brillat-Savarin
So yeah, let’s have that potluck.
It turns out I’m quite the procrastinator, even when it comes to things I’m really excited about. Probably more so about things I’m totally nervous about. Shocking, I know.
My plan for months – especially since that potluck in Tofino – was to have one here and invite all of you. As my mom used to say – immediately, if not sooner. (Generally this phrase was used in reference to our getting some chore done that should have been done eons ago.)
I didn’t want to interrupt anyone’s long weekend, plus I had this silent auction dinner. Next Saturday night, it turns out, I’ve committed to judging a salsa contest. I’m not sure I could duck out of the potluck for a couple hours without anyone noticing. Also: Mike might kill me.
The weekend after – which according to my calendar is the first week of JUNE – I’ll be in Texas. Yes. I’m going on a business trip, for a conference. How grown-up am I?
The weekend after that we’re all going to be in California. (Guess what? We’re taking the boys to Disneyland. Still doesn’t seem quite real, but the tickets are booked!) The weekend after that I’m cooking for Will Shatner. (Yes, that Will Shatner.) And then it’s the last weekend of June. The end of school, beginning of summer. EEK. And I don’t want to wait that long.
Also, the apple tree in our backyard is beginning to bloom. I love it when it’s in bloom – the branches loaded with pink flowers distracts from the thawing dog poo. And so it looks like next Saturday must be the day, but perhaps maybe in the afternoon, so I can go judge salsas at 8? I know it won’t work for all of you, but I’m hoping some of you will come, even though it’ll be too light out for patio lights.
Wait, before I get into logistics, I want to tell you about these eccles cakes.
They’re not really cakes per se – they’re crisp, sugary squares or rounds puff pastry filled with currants and brown sugar – better, I think, than any Danish. I made them recently because I needed comfort food, I really did, and they remind me of my mom. I’m not sure why these stand out above other things she’d bring home from the grocery store when I was a kid – they weren’t even all that, arriving in hard plastic clamshells from the bakery with the texture of refrigerated store-bought puff pastry that coated the inside of your mouth. Maybe it’s just because she loved them too. I’ve since decided that if I’m going to eat things like pastries, they’re going to be the very best I can find – and these are near mind-blowing when made at home and eaten warm from the baking sheet.
I’m not suggesting you set about making puff pastry from scratch, although I don’t discourage it – but these particular eccles cakes were made with half a package of store-bought puff pastry, and took about five minutes to put together. And look at them! Like crispy-chewy butter tart sandwiches, these are. I’ll make some next weekend, just to prove it to you.
The great thing about puff pastry is its foolproofness – no matter what you do to it, it will bake up golden and crispy and if it’s imperfectly cut, rustic-looking. Some eccles cakes are round, and others are square, some are made with candied citron and cinnamon along with the currants – feel free to add either or both, but I’m a bit of an eccles cake purist, myself.
Eccles Cakes
1/2 package frozen puff pastry, thawed
1/2 cup currants
1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar
2 Tbsp. butter, softened
pinch cinnamon (optional)
1 egg, lightly beaten
coarse sugar, for sprinkling (optional)
On a lightly floured surface, roll the puff pastry out to a large rectangle or square big enough that the pastry is about 1/4-inch thick.
Preheat the oven to 375F. Mix together the currants, brown sugar and butter and spread over one half of the pastry. Or mix the butter and sugar, spread it over the pastry and sprinkle with currants. It doesn’t much matter.
Fold the pastry over to cover the filling and roll gently with the rolling pin almost until the currants poke through the surface. Cut into squares or rectangles (any size you like) with a sharp knife and transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Brush with egg, cut a few slits in the top of each with a sharp knife (be careful not to go all the way through) and sprinkle with coarse sugar.
Bake for about 20 minutes, until golden. Try to share.
So – the potluck. If you seriously want to come, I’ll get into details after the jump…
continue reading »
May 23 2011 | cookies & squares and dessert | 44 Comments »
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