I have several blog posts in my head right now, just waiting to be written. My Saturday, for sure, is going to be written at some point. But not right now. Instead I will bore you with more mundane details about baking overseas. And maybe some other random things that are floating around my head today.
I was able to spend the afternoon baking because today is the king's birthday, which means it is a big holiday and we all get the day off. For some reason I decided I would spend this delightful sunny afternoon attempting to make Christmas cookies. Now, some time ago I blogged about my first try at chocolate chip cookies. Disaster. The second batch come out much better after some recipe tweaking- not perfect, but better. So I'm not really sure what made me think that these two new Christmas cookie recipes were going to be as easy as they sounded.
For starters, I was a bit limited by ingredients, utensils, and motivation. Ingredients because I couldn't find powdered sugar or chopped nuts. Utensils because I don't have a food processor to chop up whole nuts or even a great knife to try to mince them without mincing my fingers. Motivation because I wasn't willing to haul to the import grocery store at a different mall that would have surely had both of the above.
So I went with the peanut butter cookies with the Hershey's kiss in the middle and the thumbprint cookies with jam in them. I started with the peanut butter cookies but the dough wasn't forming quite right. I am guessing it was either the brown sugar (every country has their own definition of brown sugar) or the butter. But in either case, the dough was more like like drop cookie dough than roll cookie dough. So I couldn't roll them, just drop them. So you know, I bake them up and put the kisses in them and they look okay. And then I tasted some dough off the spoon and it tasted funny. So I ate a cookie and sure enough it tasted funny. I can't quite put my finger on it.
The thumbprint cookies went together surprisingly easily, even if it took ages to get the butter and sugar "light and fluffy" with nothing but a wooden spoon. The dough was the right consistency- yeah :) I couldn't roll them in nuts as called for (see above) so I thought I'd roll them in sugar, because you know, what cookie isn't better rolled in sugar? They look great and taste pretty good, but are a bit dry. Not sure why. And they would definitely taste better with a little nutty flavor on top. Ah well.
My plan with making Christmas cookies, with making any cookies really, is to give them away. My sweet tooth is just too big and powerful to tolerate them being in my house more than overnight. So the question is, what to do with the peanut butter cookies which are not quite as they should be but still look okay. Give 'em away anyway? Even the first few that seems just a tad under baked? Try to find someone just honest enough to tell me if they really are bad?
I sure do miss baking with my friends in Michigan. For one, they have completely stocked kitchens. No substitutions necessary. Although I believe one of them is out a cookie press after last year's cookie extravaganza. That's my fault. Would love to have some Mrs. Trella's cookies, or even Pfefferneuse, but if I can't manage a simple peanut butter cookie there is no way I am trying either of those. Guess I'll just have to eat a double portion on Christmas Day. Darn.
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