Cookies » simmiecakes

Lake Tahoe

I just came back from a week at Lake Tahoe. The weather was beautiful, the water was clear, and the company delightful.

It was a perfect vacation of reading, hiking, water skiing, relaxing, and eating. While I was there I took my first foray into high altitude baking and whipped up a batch of ginger snaps and a double batch of chocolate chip cookies. I didn’t change the chocolate chip recipe at all, but I did reduce the baking soda in the ginger snaps to 3 tsp.

At one point there were 18 of us in the cabin and we managed to devour upwards of 300 cookies in a day and a half. I feel like I should be concerned about this mass consumption, but instead I’m impressed. Who says cookies can’t be eaten for breakfast? (Well, me, but that’s a different story.)

We had a couple of visits from the friendly neighborhood bears who must have known we were having too much fun and eating too many cookies. Sadly I slept through the excitement so I didn’t get to see them. I did wake up at 5 AM the first night I was there to the sounds of what surely was a large woodland creature rifling through my suitcase. However, by the time I managed to get this guy to protect me from the vicious beast, he had escaped while returning all of my stuff to its appropriate place. Turns out those Lake Tahoe animals are quite polite.

Alas, vacation cannot last forever. We’ve returned back to our regularly scheduled lives which means late night baking is back. Tuesday night, me and some blueberries spent some quality time together. It was magical. A post is soon to follow.

Just real quick…

I’m heading out shortly for a week-long trip to Vienna and Munich. It’s mostly for work, but I plan on having some fun along the way too. There will be incessant updates of every minute detail of my day, so be on the lookout for that. But, before I go, I just have to leave you with one thing.

Liquid Nitrogen Ice Cream.

My First Project 040

Please excuse the terrible photo. I’m working on it.

Let’s just say, that liquid nitrogen ice cream is…awesome. It’s smoother and creamier than regular ice cream and while making it, it’s practically required to stir while doing your best evil laugh. MWAHAHAHAH!

DSCN1196

Then eat it with some of the best chocolate chip cookies ever…and well, life is complete.

Alright, gotta run! Catch ya on the flip side!

Hamantaschen

hamantaschen

Today is Purim. Heard of it? It’s awesome. Purim is a holiday full of festivities, costumes, gifts, and general good cheer. The Purim story has scandal, manipulation, one really evil fella, a righteous dude, a cool queen, and plenty of intrigue.

That evil dude is named Haman and we hate him so much, when reading the Purim story we scream and stomp and bang to drown his name out. We also make cookies in reference of him. Hamantaschen are triangular cookies traditionally filled with poppy seeds or prune filling, but these days we also include our variety of jams, jellies, and other sweet fillings.

fillings

I whipped up a batch of these the other day in about an hour. But I forgot about the proper folding method for this specific recipe which led to some less than attractive cookies. So I raided some pictures from last year’s batch of cookies to show the proper way to make a pretty, and triangular, cookie.

Hamantaschen

adapted from Smitten Kitchen

8 Tbsp unsalted butter, softened
3 oz cream cheese at room temperature 3 Tbsp sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp orange zest
1 1/3 cups plus 4 tsp flour
1/4 tsp salt
jams, poppy seed filling, etc

orange_zest

Cream the butter and cream cheese together until smooth. Then add the sugar and beat for another minute. Add the egg, vanilla, orange zest, and salt and mix until well combined. Then add the flour until incorporated. The dough will still be a bit sticky.

Form the dough into a large disc, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate until firm. Since I was short on time, I stuck my dough in the freezer for about 20 minutes.

circles

After the dough has firmed up, roll it out on a well floured surface to about 1/4″ thick. Cut out circles. As you can see, I used an IKEA cup, which I think is about 2″ in diameter.

circles_with_fillings

Spoon about a teaspoon of filling into to the center of the circles. Poppy seed filling is my favorite, but I also used raspberry preserves, and blackberry preserves. Apricot preserves are another popular filling.

unbaked_cookies

To make them triangular shaped, fold up the dough on three sides and squish the dough together. As you can see in the picture above, I simply pinched the corners. This led to a big batch of cookie rounds with hot jam oozing out. My hamantaschen did not stay together. I realized I did not have this problem last year, so going back to my older pictures, I discovered my previous, and successful, folding method.

proper_folding_method

As you can see, I folded each third up and layered it down over the other sides at each corner. This horizontal squishing method seemed to work a lot better than my pinching method of this year. Live and learn I suppose (although, apparently live, learn, and remember is what I needed to do).

Bake them for 18-20 minutes in a 350º oven. Makes about 20-22 cookies. Yum!

Chocolate Chip Cookies

cookie_pile

I’ve always been at battle with chocolate chip cookies. Many a-recipe tried, many a-disappointment felt. They were always too cakey or too crispy or too dry. As a frequent baker, I have always felt a twinge of shame knowing the best chocolate chip cookies I make come from a package. Yes, that’s right. A MIX. Because sometimes mixes are dang good.

BUT. Yes, BUT. I’ve found my recipe. Actually, Melissa found my recipe a long time ago and I finally decided to get around to making it myself. So maybe it’s actually Melissa’s recipe. Let’s be fair, it’s the New York Times’ recipe. They know news and they know cookies. Who wouldda thunk?

These cookies are perfect. They are crispy on the outside, chewy on the inside. During this blizzard of ours, I want to wrap myself up in them. The ooey-gooey chocolate with a touch of salt (so elegant…even my salt-hating roommate likes it. I know, someone can hate salt??) brings these cookies to perfection.

dough_ball

They take a while to make. Perfection is found after a 24 hour waiting period, but it’s SO worth it. You can make them right away too, but the extra time makes a big difference.

Chocolate Chip Cookies

adapted from The New York Times

8.5 oz (2 cups minus 2 Tbsp) cake flour
8.5 oz (1 2/3 cups) bread flour
1 1/4 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp coarse salt
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter
10 oz (1 1/4 cups) light brown sugar
8 oz (1 cup plus 2 Tbsp) granulated sugar
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups chocolate chips
sea salt

I have a kitchen scale I use to weigh all of my ingredients. It’s definitely the more accurate way to go, but if you don’t have a scale, the volume measurements should work just fine.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter, brown sugar, and white sugar until fluffy. Then add each egg one at a time, making sure it is well mixed before adding the next. Then add in the vanilla.

batter

Sift the bread flour, cake flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda into a bowl. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the sugar and butter (and eggs and vanilla) mixture until just combined.

chocolate_chips

Mix in the chocolate chips by hand so they don’t break.

cookie_dough

Holy cow, this cookie dough is so good I kind of want to lick my monitor (is that weird? I don’t care, I’m sort of drooling right now thinking of this).

fridge

Now comes the hard part. Cover the dough with plastic wrap (so that it’s pressed down, touching the dough) and stick it in the refrigerator for at least 24 hours. I promise, it’s totally worth it.

tray

Preheat the oven to 350º.

After the dough has thoroughly chilled, scoop out golf ball sized balls out dough and place on a parchment paper lined cookie sheet with about an inch between each ball. Sprinkle lightly with coarsely ground sea salt.

Bake for 18 to 20 minutes until golden brown. Remove from the oven and let cool on a wire rack.

Makes about 3 dozen cookies. I think I’ve already eaten at least 7.

Baby Shower Cookies

It’s been a very green and pink couple of weeks for me. First I made an adorably-whimsical birthday cake and followed that up with these little baby shower onesie cookies. I’m finally learning to plan ahead a bit so I can afford the time it takes to add many of the little details. I’d like you to please note the buttons. Yes, those are individual sugar crystals that I added with tweezers in place of the stitching. Those were added as the clock was rounding 12:30 AM (apparently my time management skills aren’t that great) and that’s when I stood there, in the middle of my kitchen, tweezers in hand, and thought to myself, “I think you have a problem. This is ridiculous” To which I responded by leaning over, tweezers in hand, and continued adding 8 sugar crystals to each cookie. I think they make them pop a bit more. Totally worth it.

The design of the cookies was based off of the invitations for the baby shower. It was definitely a bit of a challenge translating paper art to cookie art. You’ve got to tiny-ify everything. Challenging, but fun.

invitation

Oatmeal Cranberry White Chocolate Chip Cookies

oatmeal_cranberry_chocolate_chip

I’ve known my friend Melissa since our freshman year of college. She’s a pretty fantastic person. Here are a few things about her:

Melissa and I met because we were apparently the only two girls in our writing seminar who did sports. Turns out we did the same sport. Gymnastics.

The first time I did gymnastics with Melissa she was wearing an Ithaca is Gorges t-shirt and black shorts. Is it creepy that I remember this?

When we were in college I used to say that Melissa reminded me of Rory from the Gilmore Girls. My thoughts were confirmed when a girl in her class (who I had never met) said the same thing.

Melissa is really really smart. She was so smart that during graduation she got to walk at the front of the procession holding a stick with a ribbon. Then she gave a speech. They don’t just let anyone give a speech at graduation you know.

Melissa was a teacher for two years on the South Side of Chicago. She was one of the more…progressive teachers at her school. She also has very effective “teacher voice”.

Melissa is now in law school. She still teaches children in the mornings. And does a lot of homework. Sometimes I don’t see Melissa for long stretches of time because she is so studious.

Oh, and one last thing about Melissa. She really likes to bake oatmeal cookies. Oatmeal raisin, oatmeal chocolate chip, oatmeal pumpkin…and they are all really good.

So, when I saw this recipe, I immediate thought of Melissa. I think when she digs herself out from under her massive textbooks, I will share some of these with her.

cranberry_chocolate_chip

Oatmeal Cranberry White Chocolate Chip Cookies

adapted from Oceanspray.com

2/3 cup butter
2/3 cup brown sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups of old-fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups of flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp of salt
6 oz of dried cranberries
2/3 cup of white chocolate chips

This recipe is easy-peasy. I think it took me less than twenty minutes from start until I had warm cookies on my counter.

Preheat the oven to 375º.

Mix softened butter and brown sugar in a bowl with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add the eggs one at at a time making sure each egg is fully incorporated before adding the next one.

In a separate bowl, combine the oats, flour, baking soda, and salt. Slowly add this dry mixture to the wet one, mixing well so that it is all combined.

batter

Stir in the cranberries and white chocolate chips.

Drop rounded teaspoonfuls onto an ungreased cookie sheet and bake for 10-12 minutes until golden brown. Let cool on a wire rack.

Makes about 3 dozen.

cookie_stack

I’ve been busy…

Baking, baking, baking! I went crazy this past week. Ninety-five sugar cookies, 8 dozen cupcakes, and one adorable candy corn cake later, I’m still not done. I’m on a baking roll. But I’m not baking rolls.

cupcakes

We had a harvest festival at work this past weekend. They have moon bounces, face painting, food, and pumpkins for the little kids. Employees can come and set up tables to sell crafts, food, and baked goods. I’ve been going for a couple of years now and bringing lots of brightly colored cookies and cupcakes for the kids.

leaves_and_webs

pumpkins

I do my part by stuffing the kids full of sugar and then giving them back to their parents. The kids are adorable though. This year I saw a little boy in a full head-to-toe monkey costume complete with a banana peel on his head. He was about 10 months old and had no idea what was going on, but you couldn’t help but smile when looking at him.

leaves

I spent many a late evening last week baking cupcakes, icing cookies, and decorating cake.

making_cupcakes

And yes, I do often bake with my computer in front of me. I have a minor fear I’m going to spill and entire bowl of royal icing on it sometime, but so far I’ve managed to keep it pretty clean.

red_velvet_cupcakes

I made chocolate cupcakes with chocolate icing, vanilla cupcakes with vanilla icing, chocolate cupcakes with vanilla icing and vanilla cupcakes with chocolate icing. And then I was very confused. So I made red velvet cupcakes.

icing_cake

Betsy got a hold of my camera and took a bunch of pictures of the cake making process. It was pretty cool because usually it’s me taking pictures of it after the fact or holding my camera in one hand, trying to take a picture of whatever the other hand is doing. Again, risk of dropping camera in batter: high.

cake_scraps

But cake scraps?! Perfect for future desserts. Do I hear trifle?

rolling_fondant

I decided to make a giant piece of candy corn cake for the harvest festival. I figured it was a pretty simple design but would still be cute. I started out by making a triangular shaped cake, icing it with some chocolate icing, and smoothing on some yellow fondant.

smoothing_fondant

Next, I kneaded and rolled out some orange fondant for the center stripe of the candy corn.

kneading_fondant

orange_fondant

Finally, I finished it off by smoothing on the white fondant.

white_fondant

But a giant piece of candy corn isn’t all that exciting, so I decided to add a few little figures to up the cute factor. A little ghost and a witch’s hat did the trick.

ghost

hat

And the finished product!

finished_cake

table

I think I might have finally come down off my sugar high by now…

Lemon Shortbread Cookies

top_stack

The weather is getting cooler, the days are getting shorter, it’s fall! I can hardly believe it’s here. Some how this summer flew by, and it’s been a great one, but I’m excited for autumn. I’m from New England and really, autumn is our season. We have apple picking (in sweaters), hay rides, pumpkin picking, and foliage. We also have apple pie, apple crisp, donuts, and cider. I CAN’T WAIT.

lemon

But as the warm weather winds down, it’s still pretty nice to sit outside, read a book, and enjoy these delightful cookies, maybe with a cup of tea.

lemon_zest

Plus, there are only 4 ingredients, how easy!

Lemon Shortbread Cookies

adapted from The Cookie and Biscuit Bible

1/2 cup unsalted butter
4 Tbsp sugar
1 1/2 cups flour
finely grated rind of two lemons

butter

Read the rest of this entry »

Lime Zest Cookies

I am a rebel. I mean, I’m sure you all knew that already, but seriously, I am a culinary wild child. It’s ridiculous. How they even let me into the kitchen, I don’t know. And how I make it out…another one of life’s greatest mysteries.

You want to know what I did to earn this outrageous label? I used LIMES. That’s right, LIMES. This recipe is actually titled Lemon Zest Cookies, but I went out a limb, toed the line, stood at the edge, and FOUND SUCCESS.

lime_zest

Limes were also 10 for 99 cents, as opposed to lemons which were 3 for 99 cents.

But seriously, these cookies are a perfect summer treat. The limes give them a subtle twist without being overpowering, and the cookies are light and delicious. I think I ate 12 this morning.

Lime Zest Cookies

adapted from The Golden Book of Cookies

3 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp finely grated lime zest
1 tsp freshly squeezed lime juice
2 Tbsp milk

In a large bowl, beat the butter, granulated sugar, and brown sugar until creamy. Add the eggs one at a time, making sure each egg is fully mixed in before adding the next. Stir in the vanilla, lime zest, and lime juice.

limes

In a medium bowl, measure out the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

Gradually add the dry mixture to the wet mixture until full incorporated.

Add a the milk slowly, until a soft dough forms. The dough should not be too sticky.

Turn the cookie dough onto a floured surface and knead until it is smooth.

dough_log

Divide the dough in half and roll each half into a log about 12 inches long. Wrap each log in plastic wrap and refrigerate for about 45 minutes, until firm.

Preheat the oven to 400º.

slices

Slice the dough logs into 1/4 inch thick slices and place about 1 inch apart on greased cookie sheets. Bake for 8-10 minutes until the cookies are lightly brown.

cookie_stack

Tiki Party Cookies

Tiki_cookies

This post is about my dentist. Yeah, I know the title says “Tiki Party Cookies”, but really, it’s about my dentist.

I have a love/hate relationship with my dentist.

I dread going to the dentist. On the way there, I get that nervous, butterflies in your stomach feeling, along with a small side of dread. I’m not afraid it’s going to hurt (although the gritty toothpaste always weirds me out), or dislike the sound of the drill. But, I always feel a bit like a failure when I go to the dentist. I’m that kid that always listens to what the teacher says, always does her homework, and never gets in trouble. Except at the dentist. I never floss enough, which leads to cavities. And cavities you can’t undo. It’s a permanent mistake. A forever reminder of when I broke the rules.

colors

But I love my dentist. The guy is great. He’s super nice and always remembers me. His wife and his daughter work at his practice, and the hygienists and staff are awesome. If I look past the inevitable flossing lecture, it’s usually a very pleasant experience.

tiki_masks

Which is why when I was asked to make some tiki-themed cookies last time I was at the dentist, I wholeheartedly agreed. So, palm trees and tiki masks it is. I honestly had no idea what a tiki mask really looked like, so I based my design on a picture of a tiki mask balloon I found online. I think they came out pretty cute. What do you think?

palm_tree

Now I’m dreaming of tropical destinations, the sound of the waves crashing on the shore, and watching beautiful sunsets with a strawberry daquiri in my hand. I’m ready for my tropical vacation.

Oh, and I’ll be sure to pack some floss.