Happy Valentine's Day: A Galentine's Party with My Neighbors

I had a great time preparing for and writing about the 12 Days of Valentine's Day this year. I hope you enjoyed it too. It culminated with a Galentine's Party at my house with a bunch of my neighbors.

 My sugar cookies were delicious, though they certainly looked homemade.

I made my popular raspberry punch with heart shaped ice cubes, made with cranberry juice for a deep red color. One friend told me she loved it so much that she drank 4 cups! Now that is a successful punch recipe.

We laughed; we ate sweets; we caught up with one another. It was a great party the night before Valentine's Day. I hope you are having a great week too.

#12daysofvalentinesday #valentinesday #valentine

12 Days of Valentines Day: Day 5: Sugar Cookies

It isn't Valentine's Day without my paternal grandmother Nama's sugar cookies baked into hearts. She made these gorgeous cookies for us every year and I remember that she liked to include a few hearts frosted in chocolate frosting (add cocoa powder to frosting when mixing) and she loved the color purple, so many of her heart were shades of lavender and purple. This batch was all shades of pink. I am helping to host a Valentine's Galentines Party next week and I am baking these for the girls. Yum! Happy Day 5

Nama's Old Fashioned Rolled Sugar Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder

Cream butter in mixing bowl. Beat in sugar, egg, milk & vanilla. Add flour, salt & baking powder. Mix well. Divide dough in half and wrap each disc of dough in waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator at least one hour. Use plenty of flour on board, rolling pin & cookie cutters to prevent sticking. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Bake at 375* on a parchment paper lined or un-greased cookie sheet for 5-8 minutes.

Nama's Frosting

Mix 2 Tablespoons of hot water to 1 cup powdered sugar. Mix with whisk until no lumps. Tint with a drop or two of liquid food coloring. Spread with knife. Frosting should not run off the cookie. add more powdered sugar if you make it too thin. Frosting will dry and look beautiful. Do not stack cookies or they will dent each other.

Note: Using hot water makes the frosting shiny. Add drops of hot water as needed to perfect consistency.

#12daysofvalentinesday #valentinesday #cookies #beautyofeverydaylife #finddelight #grandmothersrecipe #cookiemonster #prettyinpink

Russian Pastry Tip: Frosting Flower

I confess that over the holidays I swiped some homemade buttercream off of a cake that I'd made and used it to frost a cookie I was about to eat. Gluttony? Sugar coma? It was a reckless move and one that may have changed my baking forever. 

Plus column: I now know that my grandmother's sugar cookies taste great with buttercream frosting.
Negative column: How am I ever going to go back to her original hot water frosting?

Part of the cute look of this cookie is because I used 2 different colors of frosting and a Russian Pastry Tube Tip. You can buy them at Fancy Flours, my favorite online baking supply store.

I dyed 1/3 of the frosting bright pink and smoothed it around the edges of the disposable pastry bag. I loaded the rest of the white frosting into the center of the bag. When I piped out the frosting, it created this fantastic and distinctly shaded design. I just love it. It reminds me of a lily pad and I think it would look darling in green with lilac, yes?

Nama's Old Fashioned Rolled Sugar Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder


Cream butter in mixing bowl. Beat in sugar, egg, milk & vanilla. Add flour, salt & baking powder. Mix well. Divide dough in half and wrap each disc of dough in waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator at least one hour. Use plenty of flour on board, rolling pin & cookie cutters to prevent sticking. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Bake at 375* on an ungreased cookie sheet for 5-8 minutes.

My New Favorite Buttercream

1/2 cup unsalted butter
3-4 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup 2 % milk
1 teaspoon vanilla

Cream softened butter. Slowly add milk. Add vanilla. Slowly add powdered sugar 1 cup at a time until blended and delicious.

Gingerbread Men: Big and Small

 

Yesterday I began my holiday baking. An army of gingerbread men have been baked and decorated and are all ready for my new book club's holiday cookie exchange tonight. 

My secret recipe is actually an adaptation of the Betty Crocker Gingerbread Cake Mix that was published by the company years ago. To the box mix, add 1/4 cup hot water, 2 Tablespoons melted butter and 2 Tablespoons of all purpose flour. Mix together and roll out on a floured surface. Bake at 375 degrees for 6-9 minutes on a parchment lined cookie sheet.

I wanted to show you my "life imitating art, imitating life" photo above. This year I found a dollhouse-size baking gingerbread scene (in the mini section) at Michael's Craft and I have it nestled as a gift for Day 7 in my tin advent calendar.  When I started rolling out the dough for this first batch of gingerbread men, I realized how great it would look next to the teeny-tiny version. Voila!

Do you bake gingerbread men?

Mother's Day Worthy Cookies and Marie Antoinette

Too pretty to eat!

That was the consensus when I made this beautiful set of Marie Antoinette cookies with edible wafer paper from my favorite online source, Fancy Flours.

The funny thing about making something that is "too pretty to eat" is that the audience is just as happy with the cookies as if they had eaten them! The oohs and ahhs last just as long and everyone circles back to admire them all over again. Edible Art, indeed. It's just in this case, no one wanted to take me up on the edible part. I did, of course, and they were delicious! 

You can buy these edible wafer paper ladies at Fancy Flours.com

You'll remember my post about designing custom cookie cutters for this project. It was well worth the effort, wouldn't you say? Plus, now I have a "woman in a ball gown" cookie cutter in stock for future high profile depictions. 

Of all the stories that surround Marie Antoinette, my favorite was that she insisted that flocks of sheep were dyed to match her dresses. When word arrived in the field that she was wearing a blue gown that day, the shepherd would release the blue sheep into the field to graze. Can this possibly be true? What a sight that would be. 

My edible wafer paper selection included images of French pastries (you can see a few above) and I also made some cookies with wafer paper from the Mother's Day Vintage Stamps collection. All in all, I just love them. 

I baked and decorated these in Florida and my parents spent just as much time strategizing how I could transport these cookies home with me safely, as they did packing up their actual belongings. The cookies made it home in bubble wrap and a cardboard box and I am still trying to think of a way to display them for future enjoyment. 

The cookies are made from my grandmother's sugar cookie recipe and iced with her simple powdered sugar and hot water frosting. I wanted to see if the edible wafer paper images would transfer as beautifully on her frosting as it does on royal white icing.  It worked really well (you adhere the image with corn syrup and allow it to set) and I am happy that I can use this form of artwork on an easy frosting.

If you love baking, you should really experiment with edible wafer paper. I always say that I am driven by color and sugar - these cookies are a perfect 10.

Wafer Paper bedecked Cookies: One Giant Leap for Mankind

This is Day One in my experiment with edible wafer paper.  Have you heard of such a thing? It is individual images printed on potato starch sheets with food-coloring like dye.  FancyFlours.com has a wonderful selection of edible wafer papers (click their link in their website's sidebar to choose: there are seed packet images, butterflies, bunnies and more. Your head will spin with delight!) that you can buy and use to adorn your baked goods.  It is simple to cut out the images and adhere them to royal white icing-frosted cookies with light corn syrup.  When I am back in town, I will experiment even more.

This is my first attempt and I have a few improvements to make in my process, but boy-oh-boy am I happy with my first try! These images look like wallpaper!  I was so pleased with them, I wrapped 4 of the cookies in bubble wrap and flew them to Florida with me to show my parents.  They couldn't believe how professional they looked. "Too pretty to eat!" was the consensus.  I can't wait to make more and show you my progress. 

Beehive Blondies, Butterscotch Cookies

I have wanted to make some natural honey-like cookies that would look beautiful as bee skeps.  I considered gingerbread, but that tastes too much like December.  It finally dawned on my that I could use my Heavenly Bites cookie recipe to make some Beehive Blondies.

Heavenly Bites Butterscotch Cookies

1 stick unsalted butter, melted
1 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 t. vanilla
1/2 t. baking powder
1/8 t. baking soda
pinch of salt
1 cup flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter (or use vegetable spray) and flour a rimmed cookie sheet. In a mixing bowl, beat melted butter and brown sugar together. Mix in egg and vanilla extract. Add flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt and mix. Pour the batter onto a cookie sheet and smooth it out.  It should cover about 2/3 of the pan. You are basically making very thin brownies.  

Bake at 350 degrees for approx 15-18 minutes, depending on your oven.  Cookie base should have some "give" when pressed.  If you allow it to bake until crisp, you won't be able to cut out shapes.

Cool until just warm, cut out beehive and bee shapes to enjoy with a friend. Yum!

Kitchen Test Tubes

I found the perfect "rack" for my cookie-sprinkle-filled test tubes!  Remember when I was on the hunt for a way to display them?  I was shopping at Michaels craft store and noticed that they sell medium-size clear acrylic boxes (near the unfinished wood and tin containers).  I bought 2 boxes and took the lids off.  The bottom half of the box makes the perfect container for my sprinkles. 

The test tubes are safe and secure, all while showcasing the beautiful colors and textures of the sprinkles.  I can leave this on the kitchen counter and get inspired to bake.

Cookies: The Power of Cute

Look how cute he is!  And he doesn't even have a chocolate chip eye or hooves yet!  This gingerbread moose is a perfect example of the power of cute. 

Much like a sound byte is a memorable moment in a speech or presentation, a  simple but cute cookie can leave a lasting impression at a party.

Think I'm joking?  I know this from experience.  One night I took a plate of snowflake cookies to a book club meeting.  I made a simple powdered sugar frosting and frosted the snowflakes in different shades of blue - starting with white and every few cookies, I'd add a drop of blue food coloring to make the frosting a shade darker.  Plain sugar cookie dough, Plain frosting, blue food coloring.  Simple, but beautiful. 

This was at least 8 years ago and I every so often someone in the group reminds us of those beautiful cookies, the most recent mention was last month!  It makes me feel good to know that something I baked gave them a moment of delight.

The power of cute is keeping it simple.  Gingerbread is brown.  Moose are brown.  That is all you need to know to make an impact. If I recall, I found the moose cookie cutter in a set sold at IKEA. 

Christmas Cookie Dough

Today I make 4 batches of my grandmother's (Nama's) sugar cookie dough.  Two batches with go in a freezer bag (wrapped in wax paper first) and into the freezer until I have more time to bake. And two batches will become holiday shapes like trees, stars,bells and sweaters. After baking and cooling, I will freeze them too.  The day I am ready to decorate them, it will take just an hour or so on the counter and they will be room temperature and ready to frost.

I do a lot of baking this time of year (and know a lot of cookie eaters!) so this is the best way for me to get ahead.  All of my Thanksgiving side dishes will be made on Wednesday.  Today, we bake!


Nama's Old-Fashioned Rolled Sugar Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder

Cream butter in mixing bowl. Beat in sugar, egg, milk & vanilla. Add flour, salt & baking powder. Mix well. Divide dough in half and wrap in waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator at least one hour. Use plenty of flour on board, rolling pin & cookie cutters to prevent sticking. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and cut out shapes with cookie cutters. Bake at 375* on an ungreased cookie sheet for 5-8 minutes.

Nama's Cookie Frosting
Mix 2 Tablespoons of hot water to 1 cup powdered sugar. Mix with knife. Tint with a drop or two of liquid food coloring. Note: Using hot water makes the frosting shiny. Add hot water as needed to perfect consistency.

Cookies for 2012 London Olympics

Yet another reason to love the Olympics - theme cookies!  And I am happy to report that they taste as good as they look...I just ate the pink pig (the bakery is located in Cincinnati, which has long been associated with pigs) and I'm about to inhale the British flag.  That's the beauty of cookies; I have to eat them while they are fresh.

Dan and I just spent a glorious weekend with friends at their home in Louisville and when we first arrived, this adorable tray of cookies was in our room to welcome us. So thoughtful!  

With all of the exciting Olympic coverage lately, I wouldn't have been able to resist these beauties either.  Hats off to The BonBonerie for their enthusiastic collection of sweet treats honoring the Summer Olympics, which brings a little delight to the world every 4 years.  

Stroopwafel Savior

It is too good to be true.  I have been gifted a box of boxes of Stroopwafels!  That's right, a box of boxes and I am over the moon.

Last Summer I was introduced to this magical caramel waffle cookie when my husband's friend, Greg came to visit and bought us a tin as he passed through Amsterdam.  You can re-read my post about his visit here.

In my enthusiastic, sugar-loving way, I proclaimed in my blog that from now on, anyone passing through Amsterdam has to get me some Stroopwafels.  You have knocked me over with a feather when I received a box in the mail from Greg and found that it contained enough Gouda's Guile Stroopwafels to last me all year! 

I was eating one as I started to write this post and it has disappeared in a flash.  Yum yum yum.  You can see a cookie above warming over a cup of tea.  The heat from the tea makes the cinnamon caramel chewy and fabulous.

Bless you, Greg, for your extraordinary gesture of fun and kindness.  You certainly understand "delight."

Cookie Spoons

I have a new friend who loves tea, tea sandwiches and tea parties and we've been getting to know each other over tea-for-two.  We each make some favorite recipes and while away the afternoon talking and eating sandwiches, scones and sweets.

I have really enjoyed our time together and love the fact that it gives me an occasion to try out some new things.  For example, I have had a really neat "cookie spoon mold" for over a year now and I've never used it!  It is a white bake-able plastic that you fill with cookie dough and bake.  Each tray makes 4 spoons at a time.  Aren't they cute?!  I used the shortbread-like recipe that came with the mold to ensure that the spoons were sturdy enough to place on a saucer and not break.  Perfection!  And they are delicious too.

Want to make your own cookie spoons?  My suggestion is to buy two molds, so that you can have 8 cookie spoons baking in the oven at once.  And at around $2 a mold, a set can fit in most budgets.  Have fun!      

Homemade Cookies

No, my kitchen isn't quite this antique (though I'd love to have an enamel-top baking table...), but I thought I would use this photograph to represent the ritual of baking cookies from scratch.

A friend broker her arm over the weekend (darn that ice!) and I am doing some baking in hopes that oatmeal chocolate chips cookies are, in fact, medicinal. 
Have you ever made the recipe from the inside lid of the Quaker tub?  I always skip the cinnamon and use chocolate chips in place of raisins and they always turn out delish!  

Honolulu: Honolulu Cookie Company

Yes, I am doing a lot of "research" for you and tasting everything that looks delicious and unusual for you. Enter stage left: The Honolulu Cookie Company.

Imagine tropical shortbread in the shape of a pineapple, possibly dipped in chocolate. Wow. I cruised the sample bar and can say that "Pineapple Macadamia" and "Lilikoi Mango (it's pink!) were my favorites. My friend has a "frequent shopper" card here so I know that I will get to come back!

If you order online (www.HonoluluCookie.com) I would get the "No Ka Oi (meaning the very best) Pineapple Wrap Box" - it holds one of each of the 15 flavors!

Dutch Stroopwafels

Stroopwafels, where have you been all my life?  From this day forward, any friend flying through Amsterdam, must get me a tin of these divine cookies! 

Remember when our friend was flying in from Kazakhstan?  He picked up a tin of his favorite cookies for us on his layover in Amsterdam.  Stroopwafels are butter waffle cookie filled with cinnamon-scented caramel.  He taught us that stroopwafels are placed on a cup of hot tea or coffee.  The warmth of the beverage melts the caramel filling and creates a delightful chewiness.  We all stood around in the kitchen and I broke pieces off of this cookie and gave everyone a sample.  The consensus was: Yum!

But as the weekend wore on, no one else seemed to be craving the cookie like I was.  I ate one that night with coffee.  I ate another at breakfast.  Then on Monday while blogging.  I was following my own philosophy of enjoying gifts and not "saving them."  By eating one cookie a day, I made the contents of the pretty tin can (representing wind mills painted in the style of Holland's Delftware) last a whole week. 

Looking back, I think I actually showed a lot of self-control by making them last at all.  These are fresh, chewy, caramel cookies and you must try them if you get the chance.  I am trying to refrain from ordering a huge box of them, I found the exact cookie here - my tin is the first one shown.

Lilly Pulitzer Cookie Cutters

For a limited time only, "cute" reigns in the kitchen!  Lilly Pulitzer designed a limited edition set of cookie cutters that I just had to have.

The shape of the palm tree, monkey and elephant cookies are pulled right from Lilly's famous fabric designs and I think they are a scream.  The cookie cutters are made of hot pink plastic and feature a plunger-like panel that pushes down and imprints the dough after the shape is cut.  I think the detail this creates in the palm tree (bark/leaves) and money (face/chest) are perfect. The next time I bake, I will dye the cookie dough pink and let the detail speak for itself - no frosting needed!

Come on Buffy, it's time to bake!

My Grandmother's Old Fashioned Rolled Sugar Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons 2% milk
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon table salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
Cream butter in mixing bowl. Beat in sugar, egg, milk & vanilla. Add flour, salt & baking powder. Mix well. Divide dough in half and wrap in waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator at least one hour. Use plenty of flour on board, rolling pin & cookie cutters to prevent sticking. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and cut out shapes with cookie cutters dusted with flour.  Bake at 375 degrees on an ungreased cookie sheet (or use parchment paper) for 5-8 minutes.

Lemon Tea Cookies

I love tea cookies and I have been experimenting with recipes so that I will be able to have a variety of simple & delicious cookies (baked and ready-to-eat) in the freezer for whenever I want to serve tea.  This incarnation is a straight-forward lemon cookie.  I prefer them without frosting (although an icing made of powdered sugar and lemon juice would be delish!) and think they are my new favorite for a Spring Tea. 

Lemon Tea Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup white sugar
1 egg
2 Tablespoons, plus 1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 Tablespoons fresh lemon zest
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder

Cream butter in mixing bowl. Beat in sugar.  Beat in egg.  Mix in lemon juice and zest.  Add flour, salt & baking powder. Mix well. Divide dough in half and wrap in waxed paper. Chill in refrigerator at least one hour. Use plenty of flour on board, rolling pin & cookie cutter to prevent sticking. Roll out dough 1/4 inch thick and cut out circles with a biscuit/cookie cutter.  Bake at 375 degrees on an ungreased/Silpat covered cookie sheet for 5-8 minutes.

12 Days of Valentine's Day: Cookies

Now I am not a doctor, so you can't take me too seriously, but I think that if you add a few star ingredients to a great cookie, you can think of it as "good for you."

This delicious Oatmeal cookie contains ingredients that are known to be good for your HEART (heart/love/Valentine's Day...get it?):

Dark Chocolate (flavonoids)
Dried Cherries (antioxidants)
and Oats (increase whole grains/fiber intake)
...and if you want to change the butter to margarine and tweak the sugar source, go for it.

12 Days of Valentine's Day Oatmeal Cookies

14 T butter or margarine
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 Teaspoon vanilla
1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
3 cups uncooked old fashioned oats
1/2 cup chocolate chunks (or chips)
1/2 cup dried cherries

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
Mix butter and sugars together.  Add eggs and vanilla. Combine flour and baking soda and slowly incorporate into batter.  Add oats and mix.  Add chocolate and dried cherries and mix.  Place large teaspoonfuls of dough on an ungreased cookie sheet (or place on a Silpat = easy clean up and no sticking) and bake for 8-10 minutes until golden brown. 

Enjoy!  These are great cookies that are delicious any time of day, especially in the morning with coffee (I am eating one right now!).  Happy Day 2! 

Day 2: Make a batch of cookies and add in some "heart smart" ingredients.

Frosting and Fellowship

Years ago, my friend Angie and I decided to plan regular craft nights for our friends.  We'd set the date, gather some snack foods and invite our friends to join us for "Glue & Gab," a dedicated time to work on projects in the company of other like-minded people.  Fun, right?  Well, for whatever reason, Angie and I were the only regular attendees and ultimately it became just me going to her house or her coming here.  We faithfully still refer to our crafting as "Glue & Gab" and I was so happy when she called to invite me to her next brainchild, "Frosting and Fellowship."  Ha!

So this week I headed over to her house to experiment with Royal White icing. In all my years of baking, somehow I had never tried it!  I knew all kinds of tips and techniques from my years of watching Martha, but I had never put my knowledge in to practice.  So with all the time in the world, we gave it a try. 

A friend had shown Angie a technique for decorating cookies with Royal White icing that involves piping an edge around the perimeter of each cookie and then "painting" in the open area with thinned icing and a paint brush (as opposed to flooding with a pastry bag).  It worked like a charm and our cookies are gorgeous!  What I like about this icing is the smooth finish and "stackability" - the icing hardens and it won't get dented or ruined on a cookie tray or in transit to a party.  

Long live "Frosting & Fellowship!"