Cookies for All

Janet here: Yes, it's true, we're kicking off this holiday week with a posting about cookies. Regular readers realize that we believe strongly that a day without cookies is a questionable day indeed. I always feel better after baking cookies, and I feel pretty darn good after eating one warm from the oven. It's the proverbial win-win.

You can feel particularly good about making and eating these cookies. They're oatmeal after all. It's fiber for God's sake! Yes, there are milk chocolate chips too, but fiber!

Anyway, I put in chocolate chips and pecans this time, but one of the things I like about these cookies if you really can add anything you want. Hope you enjoy them.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Pecan Cookies

Ingredients
2 sticks of butter, softened
1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugard
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 cups old-fashioned oats
1 cup chocolate chips
1 cup pecan pieces

Method
Heat oven to 350 degrees. Beat together butter and sugars until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla and beat well. Add combined flour, baking soda and salt. Mix well. Stir in chips and pecans or whatever else you're adding.

Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls onto cookie sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown.

Cool one minute on cookie sheet; then remove to wire rack.

Feeling lazy? Put the whole shebang into a 13X9-inch baking pan and bake 30-35 minutes to make bars instead.


Rachel here: Oh, cookies. This weekend I made glazed molasses-spice cookies (from "The Best Recipe" by Cook's Illustrated...of course), mostly because I'd never made them before. I sort of figured I'd have to send John off to work with a bunch of them because I didn't think we'd be all that into them. Don't get me wrong--I thought we'd like them--just not in that eat-a-dozen-each kind of way. I was seriously, seriously wrong. The flavor and texture to these cookies was perfect.

You know when you really love someone and you unwittingly make them really happy? It is one of the great little surprises in life, I think, and such a good feeling. Anyway, while I have definitely enjoyed my fair share of these cookies, John unexpectedly went gaga for them. I think even he was surprised by how much he liked these cookies. It was a simple and happy little development in our weekend and I made a little note in my cookbook for some future rainy day when my man could use a little pick-me-up or when I just want to make something to show him I'm thinking about him and I love him.


Glazed Molasses-Spice Cookies
makes 15-20 large cookies

Ingredients
2 1/4 c. all-purpose flour
2 tspn. baking soda
1/2 tspn. salt
1 1/2 tspn. cinnamon
1 tspn. ginger
3/4 tspn. cloves
1/4 tspn. allspice
12 T. unsalted butter, softened
1/2 c. dark brown sugar, packed
1/2 c. granulated sugar, plus 1/3 c. for rolling cookies
1 large egg
1 tspn. vanilla extract
1/3 c. unsulphured molasses
1 1/4 c. confectioners' sugar
2 T. milk


Method
Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt and spices and set aside. Cream together the butter, brown sugar and white granulated sugar until fluffy. Add egg, vanilla and molasses, beating until combined. Add dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Place remaining 1/3 c. of granulated sugar in a shallow bowl. Roll dough into balls, using approximately 2 T. of dough per ball. Roll each ball in the bowl of sugar before placing on baking sheet. Bake, rotating halfway through, until the centers are soft and puffy and the edges are just beginning to set. These cookies will not look as done as you're probably used to and you don't want them to; this is key for establishing their super soft texture. If your cookies get hard as they cool or by the next day, then next time try cooking them less.
Cool cookies. Once completely cooled, sift confectioners sugar and stir in milk until smooth. Using a spoon, drizzle the glaze over your cookies (I suggest doing this over a piece of wax paper for easy clean up). Let set and enjoy.

Fruit Bread Frenzy

Janet here: I remember very little of my father's grandmother, Nana, who died when I was in elementary school except this: she made outstanding date bread that I loved to eat smothered in cream cheese. Her recipe died with her and I've been on the lookout ever since for that exact date bread. This one is one I've come up with that is pretty darn close. Do you have a favorite date bread recipe? Share it up! In the meantime, find some cream cheese after you make this version.

Date Nut Bread

Ingredients
8 ounces chopped dates
1 1/2 cups boiling water
2 3/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons butter
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 cups chopped nuts--I used pecans and walnuts this time

Method
Combine all the dry ingredients together. Then add the egg, sugar, butter, vanilla and dates. Stir. Add nuts.
Pour into baking pan. Bake at 350 for one hour.

Delicious with cream cheese....

Rachel here: Banana bread, I think, is what I make best. It's certainly the only thing of any complexity that I have made over and over again without a single mishap and, if I do say so myself, the recipe I use is just perfection (it's from "The Best Recipe" by Cook's Illustrated and after I made it for the first time I wrote "perfect" next to the recipe, so...). I am so pleased with this banana bread, in fact, that I have overnighted it across the country to two of my nearest and dearest friends, Jessica (my bff since high school) and G (my brother who is closest to me in age). I'm pretty sure that Jessica and G will agree: this banana bread has straight-up healing powers, be it a broken heart or a head wound (I just realized that this could serve as incentive for people I know to feign ailments in the name of getting their own fresh-from-the-oven loaf from California...uh-oh). Anyway, I love making it and I've loved sending it to people I love when they're down for the count (I should confess that I love my ma's date bread, too...a certain somebody I co-habitate with doesn't "do" dates, though, so I haven't made it in years). Oh, and I love making it for myself, as well, including the challenge of trying not to consume the entire loaf before the sun has set. While it's no aphrodisiac, clearly for me banana bread is a food of love...do you have one?



Ingredients
2 c. all-purpose flour
3/4 c. sugar
3/4 tspn. baking soda
1/2 tspn. salt
1 1/4 c. toasted walnuts, chopped coarse (I use closer to 1 1/2 c. because I love nuts)
3 very ripe, speckled bananas, mashed well (approximately 1 1/2 c.)
1/4 c. plain yogurt
2 large eggs, beaten lightly
6 T. butter, melted and cooled
1 tspn. vanilla extract

Method
With rack on lower-middle position, preheat your oven to 350 degrees. If you're using a non-stick loaf pan, grease and flour the bottom and side. If you're using a regular loaf pan, grease and flour only the bottom. Combine dry ingredients (flour through walnuts) in a large bowl, whisk, and set aside. In a medium bowl, combine the wet ingredients (bananas through vanilla) using a wooden spoon or spatula. Fold the wet ingredients into the dries using a rubber spatula until just combined. Batter should be thick and very lumpy. Pour batter into loaf pan and place pan in oven. Cook until a toothpick comes out of the center clean, approximately 55 minutes. Cool in pan for 5 minutes before removing to finish cooling on a wire rack. Enjoy!

Happy Birthday, John!

Rachel here: This past weekend my beloved partner in crime (and our beloved illustrator) heralded the end of another year and the start of his next. He and I have a deliciously wonderful birthday tradition of baking each other specially requested birthday cakes. In the past, John has made me a cake in the shape of a Life car (like, from the board game...my favorite childhood board game because we didn't own it), tiered chocolate cake, flourless chocolate cake (ok, clearly a theme is emerging around what I usually ask for for my birthday)...the list goes on. Anyway, I, in turn, have dutifully made John a vanilla cake with vanilla frosting every year because, though he's anything BUT vanilla as a person, this is what he asks for. And so, this year I tried to up the ante a little bit, figuring I've been getting off pretty easy with this whole vanilla-vanilla thing year in and year out, and I endeavored to make his cake look like something...

a double chocolate stuffed golden oreo cookie (his latest obsession).

It didn't work.

First, I didn't have an exacto knife (as I was so sure we did) and so the stencil I tried to make had to be completely revamped at the last minute. Then, though absolutely freaking fantastic, the frosting that I made wasn't thick enough to function visually as whatever the "stuff" in oreos is and kept oozing down the sides of the cake.

And yet, the cake is totally totally good. The cake part itself is a little dense, but it's not too sweet which is nice for a cake and allowed for the chocolate, powdered sugar and whipped cream to shine through. Though I was a little disappointed not to have achieved my initial goal from the outset of my cake-baking endeavor, I was quite pleased with the end result (and I think the birthday man was, too). And, of course, I was delighted to celebrate another year in the life of my fantastic partner and best friend. To many more years, John, and many more cakes.

Rich and Tender Yellow Cake
from "The Best Recipe" by Cook's llustrated

Ingredients
4 large eggs, room temperature
1/2 c. whole milk, room temperature
2 tspn. vanilla extract
2 1/4 c. sifted cake flour
1 1/2 c. sugar
2 tspn. baking powder
3/4 tspn. salt
1/2 lb. (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened and cut into 16 pieces

Method
Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and prepare two 9x1 1/2 inch cake pans with vegetable shortening. Line the bottoms of each pan with parchment paper and grease as well. Dust cake pans with flour, tapping out excess. In a small bowl, beat together the eggs, milk and vanilla. Measure out 1 c. of this liquid mixture and set aside. In your mixer, combine the dry ingredients, blending well. With the mixer running at its lowest speed, add the butter in one piece at a time, mixing until the flour and butter look sandy. Add the 1 c. of egg mixture and mix at the lowest speed until it's incorporated. Increase your mixer's speed to medium-high and beat everything until light and fluffy. Add the remaining egg mixture in a slow and steady stream. Scrape down the sides of your bowl and beat batter on medium-high until it looks slightly curdled. Divide batter evenly between your cake pans and smooth with a rubber spatula. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean, roughly 25 minutes. Remove and cool in pans for 10 minutes on a wire rack before removing and letting cool completely before icing.

Chocolate Cream Frosting
from "The Best Recipe" by Cook's llustrated

Ingredients
1 1/2 c. heavy cream
16 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped fine
1/3 c. corn syrup
1 tspn. vanilla extract

Method
Bring cream to a boil. Pour over chocolate and add corn syrup. Let rest for 3 minutes. Whisk gently until smooth. Add vanilla. Refrigerate, stirring periodically, until desired consistency is reached. Try really hard not to eat (this stuff is seriously good).

Once everything was cooled, I assembled my two cakes with a layer of frosting between them. I cut out letters and hearts and whatnot and placed them on the top and sifted powdered sugar over to create the design. When I served the cake, I drizzled more of the frosting over it and added a dollop of whipped cream. I took a few pictures of the cake in this state, but they all came out blurry and, well, it was time to eat. It sure was pretty, though. Anyway, what do you like on your birthday?



Janet here: Regular readers know that I don't "do" cakes. (And by "do," I mean bake. Certainly I've been known to eat them.) Instead, we all get the homemade ice cream cake of our desire (click here for recipe). That said, I have nothing but admiration for Rachel and John's birthday cake baking plan and think it is quite a lovely family tradition all of their own creation. I can't wait to see the cakes they make their little bun in the oven.

Be My Valen-scone?

Janet Here: Okay, so Rachel wins the I-Can-Make-My-Scones-in-a-Cute-Shape, Take-That Contest. But I'm telling you that this recipe for Currant Scones from the New Blueberry Hill Cookbook is the tastiest. And since we're 3,000 miles apart, she's just going to have to take my word for it. (Oh and I only had to make them once.)

Anyway, I've always enjoyed scones. Somehow they feel less caloric to me than muffins, and fewer calories, sadly, has been something I've been consumed with for most of my life. That said, I don't think I actually discovered them until I went to England in my 20s. I grew up in an era when chocolate chip cookies, cakes and pies were pretty much all the dessert options. Scones would have fallen under that odd ethnic category left to things like ravioli and Indian food — yeah that's right, I didn't have that until my 20s, too. My kids have no idea how lucky they've been. Anyway these are terrific! My husband ate one right off the baking pan.

Currant Scones

Ingredients
2 cups unbleached white flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup sweet butter
1/4 cup currants
grated rind from one orange (of if you're lazy like me, orange peel from a spice jar)
1 egg
2/3 cup half-and-half
1 egg yolk plus 1 tablespoon water, mixed
cinnamon-sugar

Method
Heat the oven to 425 degrees
Mix the flour, baking powder, sugar and salt together in a large mixing bowl. Using a pastry blender or fork (that would be me) cut in the butter until the mixture resembles coarse meal (or you get bored and tired of doing it, which is what happened to me since I was using a fork). Stir in the currants and orange rind

In another bowl beat the egg lightly with a ford. Slowly beat in the half-and-half. Add this mixture to the dry ingredients and combine thoroughly.

Pat the dough into a flat circle about 6-8 inches in diameter (I put down a little flour to prevent stickiness). Cut into six pie-shaped wedges. Place wedges on an ungreased baking pan, sides not touching. Brush the tops with the egg yolk and water mixture, and sprinkle with the cinnamon-sugar.

Bake for 10-15 minutes until brown on top. Mine took 15.

What's your favorite scone recipe?



Rachel here: To answer my mother's question regarding favorite scone recipes (I'm pretty sure she's not asking me, but that hasn't stopped me from butting into her conversations yet, so...), the one that she used is my favorite of all time. Yes, that's right: the woman used my favorite scone recipe. I suppose it's fair, seeing as how the cookbook is hers and I never bothered to transfer the recipe to California. Still, though, this felt like a losing battle from the get go. And, as it turns out, it wasn't just a feeling. I bought myself a new cookbook the other afternoon when I found myself with a few hours to kill (a rare moment, for sure). Not only is this cookbook new, it is from a category in which I have never indulged before: baking. Now, of course, this isn't to say that I've never owned a cookbook with baking recipes in it. Far from it. Instead, what I mean, is that I've always bought my cookbooks for their breadth instead of their focus. Buying a cookbook that's just on baked goods always seemed sort of frivolous (this is so revealing about my personality, right? ugh) and, in turn, the actual purchasing of one felt nothing short of decadent. Not only is the cookbook super focused, it's super focused on food that has little to no nutritional value. I walked to my car with a bounce in my step and, instead of starting for home, I sat there and thumbed through each page, fantasizing about which insanely delicious looking/sounding treat I would make first.

Now, you may have noticed that I have withheld the name of this cookbook. This is because I tried one of the scone recipes from it twice and each resulted in its own special total failure. Were I making pretty much anything other than scones I would be completely willing to assume responsibility for these culinary disasters. The problem, though, is that if there is one thing in the world that I can bake it's scones. Ask my mother (I suspect it's why she used my favorite recipe). Ask John. Ask anybody, really. I can make scones. And so, to protect the innocent, I am keeping the name of this cookbook a secret in hopes that the next recipe I try from it will work out and then I will sing its praises. For the time being, though, I have to believe that the scone recipe is inept and/or riddled with typos...I simply refuse to believe that this recipe somehow stumped my scone-making prowess (Honestly? I was so maddened by my first failure that I got out of bed last night to try again...like, I couldn't sleep after making bad scones...another personality revelation, I'm sure).

And so, this morning, I turned to my old faithful, The Best Recipe by Cook's Illustrated. I've mentioned this tome before (and it really is a tome...it could keep your house grounded in a tornado it's so thick) and, though the scones I made were petite (my own decision), they are yummy...and, as my mother so begrudgingly noted (though I'm not sure why since I think she's got her own heart-shaped scone in her picture), certainly festive. A little jam, a cup of tea and a book and I couldn't be happier (although, I will reiterate, if you're making scones, use my mom's recipe from above because, truly, it's superior).

Citrus Honey-Nut Scones
Ingredients
2 c. all-purpose flour
1 tspn. cream of tartar
1/2 tspn. baking soda
1/2 tspn. salt
1/4 c. chopped walnuts
2 T. lemon zest
4 T. butter, chilled and cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/2 c. whole milk, plus extra for milk wash
1/4 c. orange juice
2 T. honey
Demara sugar


Method
Preheat oven to 450 degrees with rack in middle position. Whisk flour, cream of tartar, baking soda, salt. walnuts and lemon zest together. If you have a food processor, pulse everything except the lemon zest until combined and then add the zest, pulsing just to incorporate. Cut the butter into this mixture, using whichever method you prefer if working by hand (I have always been partial to the two-knives approach) or the steel blade of your food processor. You want the mixture to resemble coarse cornmeal with a few slightly larger clumps.
If you are working by hand, form this mixture into a well and add the milk, orange juice and honey to the middle. Quickly blend the ingredients into a soft, slightly wet dough. If you're going the food processor route, add the liquid through the feed tube, pulsing until the dough forms a rough ball.
Place your dough on a well-floured surface and roll it to 1/2 inch thick. Using a greased and floured cookie cutter, cute out your scones and place them on your baking sheet. The number of scones this recipe yields depends on what size cookie cutter you use. Swipe tops with a milk wash and sprinkle with demara sugar. Bake 10-12 minutes, rotating halfway.