C is for Cookie!

Oh these have a been a long time coming. I first made them for a cookie swap with some Twitter friends. Such yummy fun! I had planned on posting the recipe but somehow never got around to it until now. I had wanted to mess with the recipe a bit so I suppose that’s my excuse.

Well, after one of the people in that swap, Kate (AKA: Knitsophrenic), had asked for the recipe and said she loved them (which TOTALLY made my day) I figured maybe I’d leave well enough alone. So now I have no more excuses.

I like the texture cornmeal adds to cookies and I’ve said it before, I love the floral flavor of cardamom. So why not combine them? I recommend you use a fine cornmeal rather than course or the dough may have a gritty texture.

The thing with this dough is you need to let it rest before rolling and cutting. A couple of hours would suffice but I’ve left it overnight and even frozen the dough and they come out beautifully. If you do freeze the dough, you’ll want to put it in the fridge to thaw 24 hours before you plan to bake them off.

I also decided to fancy them up a bit by dipping half of the cookies into a nice chocolate ganache. What do ya think Kate?

You can cut them into any shape you like, I used a 2 1/2 inch fluted cookie cutter but use what you have. A glass dipped in flour would work just as well if you don’t have cookie cutters.

I hope you enjoy them!

Orange Cardamom Cornmeal Cookies
Adapted from “The Cookiepedia” by Stacy Adiamando

Ingredients
3/4 cup (3 1/2 oz) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (2 1/4 oz) white whole wheat flour
1/2 cup (2 1/4 oz) fine cornmeal
3/4 teaspoon cardamom, plus additional for sprinkling
1 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons orange zest
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) room temperature butter
1/2 cup (3 3/4 oz) sugar in the raw
2 egg yolks
3/4 teaspoon orange juice (from the orange you zested)

Dough Instructions
1. Combine flours, cornmeal, cardamom, baking powder, salt and zest, set aside.
2. Cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 5 minutes.
3. Add the egg yolks and mix well.
4. Mix in the orange juice.
5. With the mixer on low speed, add the dry ingredients in three installments to the butter mixture.
6. Form the dough into a disk, wrap tightly in plastic and let rest in the refrigerate for two hours or overnight.

Baking Instructions
1. Take the dough out of the refrigerator and let stand at room temperature until it is pliable. Meanwhile, preheat the over to 350 degrees.
2. Line two cookie sheets with Silpats or parchment paper.
3. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough to about 1/4” thick.
4. Cut out the cookies using a 2-1/2 inch cookie cutter of your choice (I used a fluted cutter) and place about an inch apart on the prepared cookie sheets.
5. If desired, sprinkle the tops of the cookies with a tiny bit more cardamom.
6. Bake until the edges just turn golden, about 10-12 minutes.
7. Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

Chocolate Ganache
1. Place a sheet of parchment onto one or two sheet pans, depending on how many cookies you are going to dip. Set aside.
2. Heat 1 cup heavy cream in a pot over a low flame until you start to see bubbles around the edges, don’t let it boil.
3. Remove from heat and add 8 ounces of chopped bittersweet chocolate and whisk until all of the chocolate has melted.
4. Carefully dip half of each cooled cookie into the chocolate and place onto the prepared sheet pan. (I put them onto a rack which left ridges on the back…oops!)
Allow the cookies to set before serving.

Notes:
You can use 1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour if you do not have whole wheat.
The cookies I decided to dip in the ganache did not have the cardamom sprinkle, but don’t let that stop you, go ahead and sprinkle away.

Read Full Post »

Grandma Bea’s Filled Cookies: #cookielove bloghop

I have fond memories of these special cookies from my childhood, made by Grandma Bea.

When I was a little girl my parents were friends with this couple who also had two kids, each one year older than my sister and I. We had all become good friends and their grandparents had become surrogate grandparents to us: Grandma Bea and Grandpa Sam.

Bea and Sam had once owned a luncheonette. She was a wonderful baker and used to make these delicious cookies stuffed with all sorts of jams, nuts and chocolate pieces. I remember how excited I was coming home from school to find a box of her cookies sitting on the table or when my mom would send us over to her apartment to pick them up. Mmm, I can remember just how good they smelled, just baked. She would package them up in a shirt box, you know, the kind you get from a department store.

Of course Grandma Bea wasn’t just the cookie lady, she was an occasional baby sitter when we were young and an avid knitter who kept my sister and I in cozy, warm hand knit sweaters, hats and scarves for many years; she was family. I remember my mom taking us over to her apartment periodically for “fittings”. I suspect she designed her own patterns as well. Hmm, if only I knew then what I know now, I’d have learned to knit from her many years ago. Sigh.

This cookie recipe was one I believe she created herself. I’ll admit to making a few small tweaks, replacing the melted margarine with cubed, room temperature butter. I also worked out a few “approximate” measurements and formalized the instructions. This was one of those recipes that was done by feel. Many years later she had told my mom the recipe who wrote it down and I got it from her.

December is #cookielove month!

Please join the #cookielove fun by linking up any cookie recipe from the month of December 2011. Don’t forget to link back to this post, so your readers know to stop by the #cookielove event! The twitter hashtag is #cookielove. My fellow co-hosts for this bloghop are:

Badger Girl Learns to Cook, Baking and Cooking: A Tale of Two Loves, BigFatBaker, Bloc de Recetas, Bon a Croquer, CafeTerraBlog, Cake Duchess Creative Cooking Corner, Easily Good Eats, Georgie Cakes, Hobby and More, Mike’s Baking, Mis Pensamientos, No One Likes Crumbley Cookies, Oh Cake, Queen’s Notebook, Savoring Every Bite, Simply Reem, Soni’s Food for Thought, Teaspoon of Spice, That Skinny Chick Can Bake, The Art of Cooking Real Food, The Spicy RD, The Wimpy Vegetarian, Vegetarian Tastebuds, Vegan Yack Attack.

Powered by Linky Tools

Click here to enter your link and view this Linky Tools list.

Here is Grandma Bea’s recipe for her lovingly made cookies.

Ingredients
3 cups flour (14 ounces)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 stick of butter, cubed at room temperature
3/4 cup granulated sugar (5 1/2 ounces)
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup milk
Fillings of your choice

Instructions
1. Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl, set aside.
2. Cream the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer until light and fluffy.
3. Add the eggs one at a time until combined, then add the vanilla.
4. Turn the mixer down to low and add about 1/3 of the flour mixture until mostly incorporated then Add a bit of the milk.
5. Repeat twice more, ending with the milk.
6. The dough will become stiff. When it starts to form a ball, stop the machine and turn out onto a floured surface and bring the dough together, gently.
7. Split the dough in half and form each piece into a disk and wrap in plastic. Place in the refrigerator for 45 minutes to an hour or overnight. Allow the dough to soften on the counter before proceeding.
8. On a lightly floured surface, roll out the dough until it is about 1/8″ thick.
9. Using a 3″ round cookie cutter, or a glass as Bea did, cut out a series of circles. Set the scraps aside.
10. Place a small amount of your filling in the center of the dough. Fold one side just past center and the opposite side over that, press gently to seal. You can also form into crescent shapes if you wish.
11. Bake on a parchment paper or silicone mat lined cookie sheet in the oven at 325 degrees for 20 minutes or until lightly golden.

Allow cookies to rest on the sheet for 5 minutes then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Yum!

Notes

• The dough freezes well. I usually bake off half and freeze the rest of the dough for a later craving.
• You can re-roll the scrap once, after that I usually just bake the bits sprinkled with a little cinnamon-sugar.

Filling Options

• Jam with or without crushed nuts and/or raisins
• Cinnamon-sugar and raisins
• chocolate ieces
• Sliced apples or pears
• Spiced pumpkin puree
• Hazelnut spread
• Peanut butter and chocolate

Read Full Post »