You make my heart flutter!

    When I decided to make these cut-out cookies, I was planning on making valentine's day EKG cookies... I was going to use 2 different patterns- atrial flutter (you make my heart flutter) and PVCs or 2nd degree heart block (you make my heart skip a beat). If you frost the cookies with royal icing, you can make a smooth surface that you can write directly on with food-safe markers. However, I don't have any of these markers and I didn't have time to search for them this week. I'll post a picture if I end up finding some before the end of the week! I have to say, though, the ones I decorated with just icing are probably prettier than the EKG patterns would have been.
    I found this cutout recipe on epicurious.com (it's from Bon Appetit magazine), and I have to say, it was delicious. I'm usually not a cut-out fan but they are so buttery and dense, they almost taste like shortbread cookies (I never said they were healthy!) and the orange and cardamom add a subtle spice. The recipe recommended decorating them with raw sugar before baking, but I chose to ice them with royal icing instead. They don't really need anything added to them, so icing isn't that important, but it does make them look prettier. I also baked them for about 5 minutes less than the recipe called for- I like my cookies more lightly baked (not brown).

Orange-Cardamom Cutouts

-1 1/2 c unsalted butter, softened
-1 cup plus 2 tablespoons sugar
-1 medium egg
-1 3/4 tsps finely grated orange peel
-1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
-2 1/2 c flour
-1 1/4 tsps ground cardamom
-1/2 tsp salt
-parchment paper

Royal Icing

-2 Tb meringue powder
-1/4 c water
-2 c sifted powdered sugar (use less if you don't have a sifter)
-1/2 tsp vanilla

For the cookies:
-Cream butter by hand or with a mixer until fluffy, add sugar and continue to mix until it is encorporated.
-Add egg, vanilla and orange zest and continue to beat until it is well mixed.
-Mix the cardamom, flour and salt together. Add the flour to the butter mixture about 1/2 c at a time and stop mixing as soon as all of the flour mixture is incorporated.

Finished cookie dough

-Divide the dough in half, shape each half into a round disk and wrap it in plastic wrap. The dough needs to be chilled for at least 1 hour before rolling out, but you can leave it in the fridge overnight (as I did) and then set it out about 15 minutes before you want to use it.

 -Preheat the oven to 350 before you start rolling out the cookie dough.
-Roll the first disk of dough out to about 1/8 of an inch on a lightly floured surface. If it is very difficult to roll out, give it another minute or two to warm up.
-Flour your cookie cutters so they don't stick to the dough, and cut out the cookies. Place them on a cookie sheet covered with parchment paper. If your oven isn't preheated yet when you finish your first sheet, just put the whole thing in the fridge until it's ready.
-Bake the cookies for about 10-12 minutes, depending on the size of the cookies you're making. Let the cookies cool slightly on the cookie sheet before transferring to the cooling rack.
-When you're done with the first disk of dough, you can reshape the extra into a disk and pop it in the freezer for about 10 minutes before rolling it out again. Repeat with the second disk.
-Allow cookies to cool completely before icing.

For the icing:
-Mix the meringue powder and water and whisk by hand or with a mixer until it forms soft peaks (as egg whites do- to check this, lift the whisk or mixer attachment out of the bowl and see if the mixture stands up on it's own in a "peak").
-Mix in the powdered sugar until it is well mixed and the icing has the right consistency (should be a little more watery than typical buttercream icing).
-Add in vanilla, and food coloring (if you want multiple colors, divide it into small bowls and and color each individually).
-put the icing into ziploc bags and cut a small hole in the corner to pipe.
-To ice the cookies, outline the cookie first, then fill in the center and spread lightly with a butterknife or spatula. Then, shake the cookie lightly from side to side to evenly distribute it. If this work easily, the icing is probably too stiff and you need to add a little more water.
-To create patterns, you can draw lines or dots with contrasting colors and drag a toothpick or spatula through the layers to create a marbling effect.

Death by Chocolate Cake

     I planned to make this cake for my friend Maggie's birthday- she loves chocolate, and it doesn't get much better than this flourless cake for a chocolate lover. It is dense, rich and incidentally, one of the simplest desserts I have ever made. I served it with raspberry sorbet to balance out the devilishly rich chocolate flavor. I think it is best served at room temperature or warm, but can be stored for a couple days in the fridge. This  was adapted from a recipe in Rozanne Gold's "Cooking 1-2-3" (found on epicurious.com). It calls for semisweet chocolate (and no sugar) and didn't include the cinnamon, which I think was a nice addition. The chocolate flavor is very strong, so you don't notice it right off the bat, but it adds a subtle note to the scent and taste of the cake. Needless to say, I brought the cake to Maggie's apartment before the party and it didn't make it long enough to see her birthday :-).

Flourless chocolate cake 
-8 oz unsweetened chocolate, chopped
-1 cup sugar
-10 Tbs us butter
-1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
-6 medium eggs (or 5  large or extra large eggs)
-1/4 tsp salt

-Start by melting the butter and chocolate in a double boiler over medium heat on the stove. If you don't have a double boiler (like me!), fill a large saucepan with water and place a smaller saucepan inside (you'll melt the chocolate and butter in the smaller saucepan). The idea is that the stove will heat up the water and then heat up the chocolate more slowly and evenly, preventing it from burning. Stirring the chocolate mixture frequently will also allow the chocolate to melt properly (you don't have to stir continuously, but definitely keep a close eye on it).

The chocolate, sugar and butter melting in my make-shift double boiler

- Once the chocolate and butter has started to melt, add the sugar, and continue to stir.
- Remove the mixture from heat when completely melted and add the cinnamon.
-Whisk the eggs with the salt until it triples in size (about 8 minutes with an electric mixer).
-Fold in the chocolate mixture until it is completely incorporated. At this stage, if the chocolate it too hot, it will cook the egg before they have mixed... but if you removed it from heat when you started the eggs, you should be fine.
-Prepare a 8 1/2 inch cake pan by lining the bottom with parchment paper (cut to fit the bottom) and spraying the pan with cooking spray. They recommended a springform pan, which would certainly make it easier to remove the cake, but I didn't have one and it turned out just fine.
-Pour the batter into the cake pan and smooth to cover the bottom evenly
-Bake at 375 F for ~20 minutes- the center should still be slightly moist, and I think it would have had a slightly better texture if it had been baked less (about 18 min instead of 20).
-Allow the cake to cool about 30 minutes in the pan before removing.

When Life Gives You Lemons.....Make Limoncello!

  The very first kind of alcohol I tried was Limoncello- an Italian lemon liquor. I was on a trip to Italy with my mom... and I was 13. When we visited Sorrento, we had dinner at a little hole in the wall restaurant that served Limoncello between courses. They seemed surprised that I hesitated to try it. It's exactly the type of alcohol a 13-year old would like, it's smooth, sweet, fruity and it tastes more like candy than alcohol. I haven't had it for years, but I found a recipe last week when I was going through some of my mom's old magazines and I thought I'd give it a try. It's surprisingly easy, and would make a pretty gift or base for a New Year's eve cocktail! Some recipes recommend leaving the lemon peel in the vodka for up to 3 weeks, but I also found a couple recipes that only took a couple of days. Basically, the fewer lemons you use, the longer the lemon peel needs to soak in the vodka. It is best when stored in the freezer up to 3 months, and should be served very cold.

     My sister, Melissa, and I decided to make it this year as gifts. We used 80 proof vodka and the Limoncello we made froze when we stored it in the freezer (it gets diluted with a sugar syrup). However, it was delicious and thawed within a few minutes of removing it from the freezer- it never froze solid. Some recipes call for Everclear, which would solve this problem, but I don't think it was be as tasty. A higher proof vodka may be a good intermediate.

Limoncello
22 lemons (preferably organic)
1- 175 ml Smirnoff 80 proof vodka
6 cups sugar
6 cups water

-peel off the zest with a potato peeler, knife or zester. Make sure that you get a very superficial layer, as the white pith below the zest is bitter.
-add the peels to the vodka and allow to sit at room temperature for 2 days- 1 week (we waited 3 days), stirring occasionally.

The lemon peels and vodka

-after the peels been allowed to mix with the vodka for several days, make a simple syrup with the sugar and water. Start by heating the water to a boil in a medium saucepan. Add the sugar until it is all dissolved.
-Remove the sugar syrup from the heat and add to the vodka and lemon solution. Allow to sit in the fridge for a day, then strain out the peels.
-funnel the finished limoncello into glass bottles and store in the freezer. Drink once well chilled.

My parents had these pretty bottles lying around, but you can find similar ones at World Market.

It's Beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

    Christmas is only a few days away, and our family is in full holiday preparation mode, which means baking several batches of cookies a day. We have already made peanut butter blossoms, lime- macadamia nut shortbread, caramels, chocolates with caramel and nuts (peanuts, cashews and pecans), and these cut-out cookies. Needless to say, it's a fun time of year, but good luck fitting into your pants after it's over. I'm posting this recipe because I think it's overall, the most popular type of cookie at the holidays (if there are others you want to see, let me know and I'll try to post it in the next couple of days). And, it's also a lot of fun to decorate them with family and friends. Most people don't have piping kits at home to decorate with, but we just use a ziploc bag with a small hole in it to pipe the icing.

The arm broke off this poor cookie while we were transferring it, but Cory found a way to make it look like we'd done it on purpose. I suggested dressing him in a hospital gown...

     This cut-out recipe is from my grandma, and we've been making them for Christmas for years. Using powdered sugar instead of conventional granulated sugar makes these cookies very soft and delicate. We usually get together to decorate the cookies together. My mom, my sister and I try to make them look pretty, while my dad's technique is to put lopsided smiley faces on most of the cookies. The last couple years, Cory has also joined us for cookie decorating and has made some entertaining additions, including a gingerbread man with a broken arm and a Christmas pirate (see below).

 Cut-Out Cookies

-1 cup butter at room temperature
-1 1/2 cup sifted powdered sugar
-1 egg
-1 tsp vanilla
-2 1/2 cup flour
-1 tsp soda
-1 tsp cream of tartar
-1/4 tsp salt

Buttercream icing
-1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
-1 lb powdered sugar
-3 Tb of milk
-1 tsp vanilla or almond flavoring

for cookies:
-Cream butter in a mixer and sift in sugar until fluffy.
-Add egg and vanilla, and beat well.
-Sift in flour, soda, cream of tartar and salt.
-Chill the dough for at least 1 hour.
-Roll out the dough on a floured surface (to 1/8 of an inch). Cut out the cookies and place on a cookie sheet prepared with parchment paper. Parchment paper isn't required, especially if you have non-stick cookie sheets, but it makes it easier to remove the cookies from the sheet without breaking them.
-Bake at 400 F for 6 min.
-Place the baked cookies on a cooling sheet. They will be very delicate, so you may want to allow them to cool a little before removing them from the tray.
-Allow cookies to cool completely before icing.

How to hold a piping bag

for icing:
-cream butter, sugar and milk together, Add vanilla and add a small amount of food coloring to color the icing. Pipe icing onto cookies by placing icing into ziploc bags and cutting out a small piece of the corner of the bag. You can also use piping bags, but this method requires no equipment.
-Get creative and have some fun! 

My dad did quite a few on this tray- can you figure out which ones? :-)

A Family Tradition

    As long as I can remember, my family has made cookies and homemade caramels the Friday after Thanksgiving. This cookie recipe has been passed down in the family for several generations (my grandma, who is now in her 80's, used to make them with her mother as a child). It is based on the traditional German cookie, Lebkuchen, but it has evolved over the years to become it's own entity. We make them as Christmas cutout cookies, but they can also be made in other shapes or rounds. They are similar to gingerbread cookies or molasses cookies. You can decorate them with icing, but they are pretty and delicious without any decoration at all! Every year, there's a discussion about what shapes to make- my uncles prefer the "wise men," but one looks like a conehead and another looks like Bart Simpson.

     These cookies are best when they are rolled out thicker than typical cut-out cookie, making them too thin will make them crisper and more cracker-like. We use hickory nuts in the cookies, but these can be hard to find and expensive because they aren't grown commercially. Pecans would work well, too, but the flavor will be a little different. This makes a large batch, so you may want to start with 1/2 or 1/4 batch to see if you like them first.

"Lap" Cookies

-4 c molasses
-2 c sour cream
-2 Tb soda
-1/2 tsp cinnamon
-1 lb brown sugar
-1/2 c shortening, softened
-1/2 tsp cloves
-4 cups hickory nuts or pecans
-flour

-Mix molasses, sour cream, shortening, brown sugar, soda, cinnamon, cloves until well blended.
-Add in nuts.
-start adding flour, stirring in as much as you can.

Cookie dough before kneading in the last bit of flour.

-scoop out the dough in workable batches (about 2-3 large scoops). Knead in just enough flour that the dough can be rolled out and becomes easier to work with. Adding too much flour will make the cookies tough.
-Roll out the dough so that it is a little less than 1/4 of an inch thick. It will be thicker than traditional cut-out cookies.
-Cut out rounds or any shape you like. It's best to put shapes of about the same size on each cookie sheet, so that they bake evenly.
-Bake at 375 F for about 10 minutes. Make sure you take them out of the oven before they start to brown- bake them just enough to set. Transfer them from the cookie sheet to the cooling rack before they cool completely to prevent them from sticking.
-Make sure you try some right out of the oven and stay tuned for other holiday recipes :-).

Sinful Lemon Crumb Muffins

    These muffins were one of my favorite treats as a kid, and they still rank at the top of my list! The recipe comes from the Pine Tree Barn Restaurant in Wooster, OH, the town I was born in. In addition to a restaurant, they sell furniture and have a large candy counter (my favorite part). They also have a large Christmas tree farm, and it's where we got our tree every year we lived there. These muffins are really more like cupcakes, but they didn't "count" as dessert, so I was allowed to eat them as part of my meal, which made them even better :-). I couldn't think of any way to improve on this recipe, although I think they'd be good with fresh raspberries or strawberries in them. Also, just to warn you, this recipe makes a ton of muffins. Unless you're baking for a big crowd, it's best to halve the recipe.

Pine Tree Barn Lemon Crumb "Muffins"

For cake:

-3 c sugar                                

-1 1/2 c sour cream

-4 1/2 c flour                           

-2 Tbs +2 tsp lemon juice

-1/2 tsp salt                             

-zest of 4 lemons

-1/2 tsp baking soda                 

-6 eggs

-1 1/2 c cold butter

For crumb topping:

-1 1/2 c cake flour                   

-1 stick melted butter

-1 1/2 c sugar

For glaze:

- 3/4 c sugar                            

-1/3 c lemon juice

-Prepare crumb topping by sifting together sugar and cake flour, add enough melted butter to make crumbs.

-For cake, sift together flour, salt and sugar. Add butter and blend with a fork or food processor until is resembles coarse crumbs.

-In another bowl, beat eggs, add sour cream, zest and lemon juice. Add to flour mixture and blend.

-Fill muffin tins 3/4 full, cover with topping.

-Bake at 350 F for 20 min. Remove and allow to cool.

-Prepare glaze by mixing lemon juice and sugar. Poke 6-8 holes in the top of each muffin, spoon glaze over the top.

-Makes 2-3 dozen muffins.

If you're in the area and would like to try these muffins, visit the Pine Tree Barn Granary Restaurant

Happy Challah-days!

      About a month ago, my friend Debbie convinced me to take a Jewish cooking class, called "Culinary Shabbat." She assured me that it wouldn't be a big deal that I wasn't Jewish, and that it would be a lot of fun to take the class together. I was a little unsure when I showed up at the Chabad House to find that the class was being taught by the orthodox rabbi's wife... I was even more unsure when the girl next to me started talking about the first time she went to Israel. That said, it was a lot of fun to learn about Jewish culture, tradition and food, even though I felt a little bit like I had to keep my Christian heritage a secret. I think the girls in the class must have thought my parents were the worst Jews in the world- they gave me a Roman name, didn't teach me any of the traditions and I'd never even had gefilte- fish before (not that I was missing out on that one)! One of the best recipes from the whole month was the challah (a soft, eggy bread).

The recipe below makes 2 huge loaves! They were about 12"x6".

    It is traditional for challah to be consumed during Shabbat dinners and holidays, but it is delicious during any time of year. A tradition that was new to me was the dividing of the challah, which is usually done by women. It involves removing a small piece of the challah dough prior to braiding it, saying a blessing and burning or throwing the small piece of dough away. The passage describing the ritual cam be found in Numbers 15:17-21. While I did this in the class, I can't bring myself to throw away any of the dough when I make it at home :). 

Challah

bread dough:

2 c warm water

2 packages (or 2 Tbs) dry yeast

1 Tbs salt

1 egg, beaten
1/2 c sugar

1/2 c olive or vegetable oil

7 c flour

egg wash:

1 egg yolk

1/4 tsp vanilla

pinch of sugar (optional)

- To make bread dough, add the yeast and a sprinkle of sugar to the warm water, and allow the yeast to activate for about 5 minutes. It will appear slightly foamy. If you don't see this, throw out the yeast and start over. Be careful not to have the water too hot, as this will kill the yeast. 

-Add the sugar, salt and 1/2 of the flour (3 1/2 cups). Mix well.
-Add the egg and oil and mix thoroughly.

-Then slowly knead in extra flour a half cup at a time. The dough will become smooth and elastic, resembling the consistency of a stress ball. Stop adding flour at this point, even if you haven't added all 7 cups. Too much flour will make the dough (and bread) tough.
-Coat the dough with a thin layer of oil, cover with a towel and place in a warm place to allow the dough to raise.
-Allow dough to rise for 2-3 hours until it has doubled in size:

-Divide the dough in half. Then divide each 1/2 in 4 pieces and create 3 ropes of dough. Place them parallel to one another and braid them as shown below. Start in the middle, passing the rope of dough over the first, under the second and over the third. Repeat, going left to right. When there is no dough left, fold the end underneath the loaf. Repeat with the other side.

-Mix the egg glaze, and spread generously over the top of the bread. Sprinkle with cinnamon and sugar or sesame seeds, if desired. 

 -Bake at 375 F for approximately 30 minutes until the top is golden brown.

Hope you enjoy! My plan is to make some challah with olive oil and rosemary for post-Thanksgiving turkey sandwiches :-).