The aura of a baker

Yesterday I met my friend, Mary, for a walk. It was a beautiful, sun-filled day in Rochester, NY (a normally cloudy place). When I opened the door of Mary's car I sensed a wonderful aroma - sweet, spicy, fruity. I looked around and saw that the car was empty of any food. When I mentioned the aroma to Mary she said that she had been baking apple pies that morning. I too have been having a similar experience. I tend to bake in the morning and I have been noticing that when I wash my hair it is sweet smelling and the clothes that I had on are also permeated with sugar and spice.

Well, last night I decided to make Chocolate Chunk Biscotti. My previous  forays into biscotti making were very pleasant. This time it was not pleasant at all Nick says that the dough will be sticky. This is a gross understatement. The dough was a mess. A big chuncky chocolate mess. I wrestled two logs onto a cookie sheet and shot them into the oven. They turned out fine, a bit larger than I had hoped but fine none the less.
I also made meringues. As most people know meringues are made of egg whites and sugar. These meringues also have walnuts and raisin bits in them. They are called Walnut Boulders. And since I had egg whites in the refrigerator and it was, as I mentioned, a gloriously dry day in Rochester and meringues don't behave well when it is raining I gave them a whirl.

Lemon Pistachio Biscotti, Sour Cream Cinnamon Drops, Chocolate Shortbread, Hermits

My adventure this week has taken me to try another biscotti - Lemon Pistachio. I was assisted by the lovely Ellen who shelled the pistachios for me. These biscotti are lighter in texture than either the Classic Tuscan or the Quaresimali (hazelnut Lenten biscotti). I sliced them fairly thin before the second toasting and they came out really great - a lot of lemon flavor from the zest of 2 lemons.
I also made a cutout cookie - Chocolate Shortbread. Unlike the classic shortbread this cookie is rolled and cut. However, like shortbread the ingredients consist of flour, sugar and butter (with chocolate added). These are not easy cookies. I did not experience a whole lot of joy making these. The dough is really fussy, sticky and generally hard to handle. I resorted to rolling it out between plastic wrap and I had to constantly chill the dough. The cookie did get a good review.
Then I moved onto my favorite type of cookie, the drop cookie. Fun to make and fun to bake. I made Sour Cream Cinnamon drops (left side of plate) and Hermits. Both cookies taste great. The Sour Cream Cinnamon drops have a great texture and a wonderful cinnamon flavor. The Hermits have a bit of coffee in them as a flavor. They also have brown sugar, nuts and raisins.

Week 6 - 28 cookies done

I've been busy this week though the photo only shows two cookies (Fancy Jumbles & Banana Walnut Squares) but I made a couple more. I made another type of biscotti. It is called Quaresimali which translates as Lentens - so appropriate for this time of year. It is made with hazelnuts, flour, egg whites and a touch of oil. This dough didn't stay together for me - somewhat frustrating so my friend, Rick, suggested I add a bit of water which I did and it made all the difference. I formed the logs, baked them, cooled them, cut them and  and baked them again. They taste great. I love hazelnuts anyway so what's not to like.
I also made the Chocolate Sables dough which is a refrigerator cookie so it is in my refrigerator waiting to be slicing and baked. (I will do that this afternoon.) If these are anything like the French Vanilla Sables we have another real hit on our hands. The dough is made with cocoa and is very dark.
The drop cookies of the week are the Fancy Jumbles. They have currents and walnuts and have a not-too-sweet taste. Definitely an adult cookies. Again, drop cookies are so much fun to mix up and drop them onto the cookie sheets, see them bake and spread a bit and then take them out of the oven.
The bar cookies are the Banana Walnut Squares. The process is akin to making brownies but the results are slightly less thick though these are really nice and moist.

Tuesday's cookie offering

I brought this tray of cookies to my group today. It consisted of (clockwise from the left) Classic Tuscan Biscotti, Chewy Oatmeal Raisin, Ricotta Drops and Vanilla Sables.
I made the Biscotti yesterday. It was a first for me. I have never attempted Biscotti before. The process was easy and the results were great. This recipe does not have any oil/butter in it. The Biscotti are firm and loaded with almonds. The chewy oatmeal raisin were left over from Saturday and were still tasty. I made the Ricotta drops Monday as well. I really like drop cookies. They are easy to put together and I love "dropping" them onto the cookie sheets (with parchment paper). These cookies have both lemon and orange zest. They are light and moist and do need the powdered sugar to finish them off nicely. The last cookie on the plate is the Vanilla Sable. This is one of the refrigerator cookies that I assembled last week. All I had to do today was preheat the oven, cut the cookies - any number I wanted - from the roll and bake. So easy. And these cookies are fantastic. Light, flavorful, crumbly. I like all of them but have to say that the vanilla sables are my favorite from today's offering.
Tomorrow I think I'll try another Biscotti - maybe ones with pistachios. Oh, and I went to the market for more flour and butter. There won't be old flour and butter in my house during this project.

My mission/project restated for new blog

Why cookies? Because they are small, easily given to others and are a lot of fun to make. I will be making 210 recipes in 42 weeks. In other words, I will be finished with the book just before Thanksgiving. I figured out that I have to bake 5 recipes a week. A majority of the cookies are sweet but there are a few savory "cookies" in the book and I am looking forward to creating them as well.

Backtracking - cookie project background

nancymarthacookies.blogspot.com

Sunday Night dinner party

We invited our son, Hari, his girlfriend, Katie and our friends, Rick, Lilah, and Dylan over for some dinner last night and I thought - cookies for dessert! I quickly leafed through Nick's Cookies Unlimited and came across Chewy Oatmeal Raisin cookies, scanned the recipe, found that I had all of the ingredients on hand and made the cookies. They smelled great in the oven and turned out nice and firm. The recipe made quite a few. They include nuts and chocolate chips as well as oatmeal and raisins. I didn't make them too large. Ram and I tested them before supper and agreed - these are good, nice and chewy, good raisin and nut flavor and the chocolate chips are just a nice added taste delight. I put them out after supper and got other good reviews. 

On to Ricotta Drops and chocolate rocks tomorrow.