Dream Lemon Raspberry sandwich cookies

The other night I woke up from a very vivid dream. I usually can only remember bits and pieces of dreams, but this was super clear and detailed. I dreamed that I ate the best lemon raspberry cookie in the world. It was a sandwich cookie, two lemon cookies with raspberry jam in between. The cookie itself was rustic and imperfect, but it was the most delicious thing ever. In my dream, I shared it with my parents, who didn't think it was anything special. But I knew they were wrong.

So I awoke with a mission: to make the cookie of my dreams! All I really needed was lemons and raspberries, since I had all the staples to make cookies. I scoured the internet for a recipe that resembled my dream cookie, but couldn't really find anything. It wasn't a cut out cookie, it was more of a drop cookie. I finally found a recipe I could adapt, from David Leibovitz's book Ready for Dessert. His is an orange poppy seed cookie with raspberry jam filling.

So I swapped the orange zest for lemon and omitted the poppy seeds. This cookie dough is super buttery. The original recipe says to roll it out, but it was too soft for that, so I just scooped it into balls and rolled them evenly. Then I pressed them flat onto cookie sheets, making mostly uniform disks.

While baking, it was hard to tell when the cookies were done, because they were so soft. I removed one and tested it to tell for sure.

After cooling, I sandwiched raspberry jam that I bought between two cookies. Not too much jam, so it wouldn't squish out. The first bite had a lot riding on it! They were delicious. Super lemony and soft, with a hint of raspberry. I could have used more jam to up the flavor.

I'm not sure they were the cookies of my dreams, but they were super tasty and delicious. I made 10 sandwiches, and my husband had eaten 5 by the end of the day. I call that a success. I think I'll continue trying to make the perfect lemon raspberry cookie, but this was a great start.

The Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookies

I am constantly on a quest to make the best chocolate chip cookies. It's my husband's favorite treat and there's so many different ways to make it. Crispy, Chewy, Cakey, with nuts.... the possibilities are endless!

So when I found a recipe online for brown butter chocolate chip cookies I decided to give it a go. Half the butter is browned, meaning melted in a pot and let boil until it turns a rich caramel color. After a little cooling, it's ready to use in the recipe.

These turned out great! Chews and crisp along the edges and nutty from the brown butter. It really lends a great depth of flavor to the cookies. They're not too sweet, the perfect texture, a big hit!

But, since I never leave good enough alone, I decided to jazz them up a bit. So I dipped them in melted chocolate, then sprinkled them with fleur de sel and......Bacon! Chopped up cooked bacon. Yup.

I only had enough chocolate to dip about half the cookies, but they were so rich and decadent that you really can't eat too many. Wow. These were sooooooo good! Successful experiment for sure.

Peaches!

So, a few weekends ago, there was a local peach festival. So of course I went, gobbled up some peaches and fair food, and brought a bag of peaches home too. These are Colorado Palisade peaches, in season right now, and people say they're better than Georgia peaches. Well, growing up in the South, I had to try them and see.
I decided to make 2 peach desserts with my 6 large peaches. Both are Martha's recipes, with some tweaks by me. I made peach cupcakes and peach cookies.

First, the cupcakes. Martha's recipe calls for nectarines, but peaches are a good substitute. I peeled and chopped up all the peaches at once, so I could just make the various recipes easily. They smelled so good!

After mixing up the batter, I layered the batter with the peaches so when you bit into the cupcake the peaches are in the middle. I've made peach cupcakes before, but I mixed the peaches into the batter, and they all sank to the bottom. This is a better technique.

They baked up perfectly, very fragrant, with a few bits of peaches peeking out. The recipe suggested topping them with whipped cream, but I left them plain.

I also made peach cookies, which also turned out great. Little sweet bites of peach in each one. It was a peach bonanza!

I love using seasonal products when I bake, or coming up with a recipe just to use whatever's fresh. These were indeed excellent peaches, although I can't say how they compare to others. We'll have to do a side-by-side taste test to determine that.

New Year, New possibilities

So, I have been seriously slacking. I blame it on 2 jobs plus school. However, now it's down to only 1 job and school, so I have no more excuses. My plan for the New Year:
*Find a kitchen
*Prep to sell at farmer's markets in the spring
*Marketing!
In other words, steps required to catapult me to success. When school is finished in one year, I plan to be ready to go pro. Along the way, there will be lots of baking. I will resume the Tania/Martha challenge, and fine tune my own recipes as well.
Until I get going again in a few days, here's some pics of my holiday baking: cupcake cookies!

Martha's Cupcake Challenge #13- Chocolate Chunk Cookie Cupcakes

So, I finally got back to my Martha Challenge! This one actually turned out by accident. I was planning to make chocolate chip cookies for my husband, since they are his fave. But instead, I figured I'd make Martha's chocolate chunk cookie cupcakes. These are a cross between a cookie and a cupcake, with tons of chocolate chunks. I used both chocolate chips and chopped chocolate, both semisweet of course.
Again, I ran into some altitude problems. The chocolate bits sunk to the bottom of the cupcakes. I believe this is a density problem, and I know how to solve it next time. You must first dredge the chunks of whatever in a little bit of flour, which will (hopefully) suspend them in the batter while it bakes. Also, they got very dark very fast. The recipe called for a high temp, and the recommendations I read for high altitude baking say to increase the temp, so that's probably why they browned too much. It didn't affect the taste, though! I chowed down on quite a few of these myself.
Here is the inside, with the chips at the bottom. Live and learn, I guess! These were a huge crowd pleaser, and I kinda wish I had one right now :) Also, my sister made these a few weeks ago for some friends and had great results too. I can't wait to try the Peanut Butter Cookie Cupcakes!
But next week, stay tuned for some Beatles themed cupcakes, in honor of the new Rock Band and box sets (which I have both pre-ordered)

Martha Challenge #12- cookies and cream cup-cheesecakes

Cupcake Challenge #12: Oreo Cup-Cheesecakes!


It's been a while sine I've been able to bake, since we moved to Colorado! I finally got (most) of my kitchen stuff unpacked, so I was able to bake today! Today was National Cheesecake Day, and I've never made a cheesecake before, so I decided to tackle the challenge. I decided to make individual cheesecakes, in keeping with the cupcake theme, and Martha of course had the recipe for me.

These are cookies and cream mini cheesecakes, with an entire Oreo as the crust on the bottom.
These did not require a bain marie, which made it easier for me. I had no issues with altitude, since these had no leavening agent in them. They sunk a bit in the middle, which I'm guessing is due to overfilling. I wasn't sure how to tell if they were done. The recipe said to bake for 22 minutes, or until set. I checked them frequently, and they seemed ok at 22 minutes, but I probably could have let them bake a few more minutes. Then they had to cool in the fridge for 4 hours or more. My tast-tester said they were delicious, but maybe not firm enough in consistency. That's also perhaps why they sank. All in all, a good first attempt at cheesecake, and one more recipe down!