Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

Hi there! It's Fall! Were you all aware of this? Because it sure did sneak up on me. I guess I should have had some warning considering all the pumpkin recipes that are floating around the internet. It seems like pumpkin is everywhere out there in the blogosphere! From breads, muffins and cakes, to flans, puddings and pies, to stews and curries, it's out there in all forms possible.
For my first pumpkin recipe of the season I wanted to make something I never had before. Something that was still full of pumpkin flavor but was more unique than the usual pumpkin quick breads and muffins. And if it could marry together that perfect combination of pumpkin and cream cheese, well then I would be a happy woman. So that's how these totally amazing pumpkin whoopie pies came to be.

Almond Rochers

 Greetings and good morning!  I hope you enjoyed the season premiere of The Bachelorette as much as I did, and that you treated yourself to a tasty Monday night dinner.

Today I want to talk about meringues.  Or rather, I want to talk about these meringues, which I have lovingly named "Dr. Seuss cookies".  They come from the lovely Tartine cookbook, which I have on loan from the local library.  That's a great tip that I got from BFF Jill!  Test drive a cookbook before you buy it, it'll save bookshelf space and money if you don't like the book, or don't find yourself cooking from it in the four weeks that you have it.  Yesterday I catered a meeting for John's research group, and I couldn't help but feel a bit listless at the thought of baking another chocolate cake, oatmeal cookie, or heaven forbid, a cupcake.  Don't worry, we're not abandoning the baking staples here at B+C, but I think that with baking, as in most things, you have to shake it up every once in a while to keep yourself interested.

Enter these morsels.  With a beautifully short ingredient list and an appearance that look straight out of Whoville, these cookies charmed me into making them.  The technique is surprisingly simple, and the result is a cookie that's lighter than air, melts in your mouth, and is packed with flavor reminiscent of a toasted marshmallow.  Are you convinced yet?  Wait until you see how easy it is...

Crispy Salted Oatmeal White Chocolate Cookies

One of my favorite reasons to bake is when I’m baking something for someone else. There’s nothing like the feeling of sharing with others a delicious treat that you’ve made with your own two hands. I like to think about the person who will be receiving it, and how it will hopefully bring them joy. Which is what I was hoping these cookies would bring when I made them for my friend Caitlin. She had mentioned to me that she was a white chocolate nut, and so I hemmed and hawed over various white chocolate recipes, finally deciding on these cookies. I was hoping that there would be enough white chocolate flavor in them, because I did not want to disappoint.

Let me tell you a little bit about Caitlin real quick, because she was my very first best friend. We were neighbors growing up, which was a pretty big deal because our houses were out in the country with no one else nearby. Caitlin and I were born two months apart, and I like to think about how we became best friends from the time we were infants. I guess we didn't have much choice in the matter considering our location.

Caitlin and I
Considering our outfits, I'm assuming sometime during the late 80's or early 90's

But I was so lucky to have someone to share such an amazing childhood with. Whether it was exploring in the creek together, creating our own special languages, playing hide-and-go seek in the tall grass of the field next to our house, or goofing around at a slumber party, Caitlin and I were always having a good time. It may sound silly, but I look back on those years as being a truly magical time; and I feel blessed that I got to spend it with a really good buddy.

Jammy Thumbprint Cookies

My boyfriend John comes from a huge family, with eight children to be exact.  Along with sisters, aunts, uncles, nieces and nephews, he has six brothers.  Yes, you heard correctly.  Six.  Brothers.  I spent this past weekend at the home of his brother Dan and Dan's wife Nicole.  Dan and Nicole are one of my favorite couples on earth, and we always have a blast with them, in large part because Dan's such a ball-buster.  Case in point:  a few weeks before Christmas, Nicole, sister Jill and I had a cookie-baking day.  We made chocolate cookies, peppermint bark, chocolate-dipped pretzels, biscochitos, and peanut butter thumbprints while John and Dan spent the day drinking beer at a San Diego Chargers' game.  When the boys were dropped off after the game they were a tad... dehydrated.  We thought we'd impress them with our prolific cookie bounty, but Dan took one look around the kitchen and asked, "where are the fruit-filled cookies?".  Sigh.  I guess you can't win 'em all. 

So Dan's birthday is around the corner, and since he's always a great host to us (I'll share his margarita recipe this summer), I thought I'd finally get around to those fruit-filled thumbprint cookies he requested so many months ago.  This is a Martha Stewart recipe, and the ingredient list is blissfully short.

Homemade Oreos

There's something about that first bite of an Oreo cookie that takes me reeling straight back to my childhood. I can remember the way I liked to stack them in tall piles, piles that were way too large for such a small child to be consuming, and then eating them one by one, each a little differently. Some I would eat whole, others I would twist apart, scraping out the center to eat first, and savoring the cookies which were my favorite part. But my absolute favorite way to eat Oreos was dunking them whole, in a nice big glass of cold milk.
To this day that's still the way I enjoy to eat them. Although I don't allow myself to eat them very often nowadays, because left to my own devices, I do believe I could polish off an entire package. Honestly, it's a problem. And that's why after I baked these bad boys I promptly gave them away, because I knew it wouldn't be long before I started stacking them in piles and eating away the whole batch one by one.

Ok, ok, so maybe I enjoyed one or two before giving them away.

Butter + Cream + Joy the Baker

Before consuming Easter chocolate by the fistful and rocking and rolling through another LA earthquake, we spent a gorgeous day in the kitchen with our moms, BFF Jill, and the one and only Joy the Baker. Odds are that you already know Joy and her beautiful blog. If you don’t, mosey on over to her site and take a look.

Joy is gracious. And calm. And talented. And pretty. She was nice about it when I overdid it on the corn syrup in her vanilla glaze, and when our chocolate glaze set too early. In our downtime, Joy shared tips on food photography and this crazy awesome little world of blogging that we’ve just recently joined. She was a great teacher in every sense of the word, and to put it bluntly, her recipes kick ass. You should make them too.

If you want to see her in action, check out the On the Lamb cooking demo this Saturday at noon at Surfas in Culver City.

Lotsa pictures after the jump!

Best-Ever Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

You wouldn’t think that having a recipe for the best-ever oatmeal raisin cookie would be a problem, but for me it is. First though, let me describe these ideal cookies. They are the perfect consistency (in my opinion), thin and chewy, soft in the middle but crispy on the outside. The flavor is buttery and rich, faintly spiced with cinnamon, and speckled with the perfect amount of plump, sweet raisins. I call them the best-ever, which seems to imply that I tested out other recipes before deciding this one was best. But if I’m being truthful, it was the first oatmeal raisin cookie recipe I ever tried, and I just knew there could be no better cookie out there.
So what is the problem, you may ask? You see, my father, my brother, and my boyfriend all adore these cookies and if I make them I must make sure to give some to all three of them. If I don’t, I get a lot of, “Where are my cookies?” and “You gave some to him, but not to me?” And so, I’ve learned over the years that when I bake up some oatmeal raisin cookies, I better have enough to share with everyone.

But the real problem isn’t that I have three grown men harassing me about oatmeal raisin cookies, it’s that each one of them want them prepared a different way. It started with my brother, who likes his oatmeal raisin cookies without raisins. Oh and he also likes them iced. I think it has something to do with these cookies of his youth. Once my boyfriend found out there was icing involved, then he wanted in on it, only he likes the raisins. And finally, my father. Who bless his heart, just likes good old-fashioned oatmeal raisin cookies, no icing or raisin removal needed.

Shortbread

I feel a little bit bad for the shortbread cookie. I would like to say that I had a craving for shortbread and had been planning on making it for days, but that could not be farther from the truth. The truth was that I felt like baking but was too lazy to go to the store to re-stock some essential baking ingredients such as milk and eggs. What I did have was butter, and the handful of other ingredients this recipe needed. And so, out of an unwillingness to go to the store, came this shortbread.

But this cookie deserves more credit than that. For something with so few ingredients these are exceptionally delicious. The consistency is crumbly yet fine, and they are buttery with a savory edged sweetness. They can be prepared in less than an hour and last up to two weeks in an airtight container. So the lowly little shortbread has a lot more to offer than it was the only thing I could make with the ingredients I had laying around.

The recipe comes from the Tartine cookbook, which is a renowned San Francisco bakery and cafe.
I've never been to the bakery, but based on the mouth-watering recipes in this book, I would be remiss not to pay it a visit someday. What I like and sometimes dislike about this cookbook is the attention to detail. Each recipe is meticulously covered step by step down to the smallest detail. This means that a lot of the desserts in the book can be a little high maintenance, but the results are well worth the effort. This shortbread recipe is most definitely not high maintenance however and may be the simplest in the book. This simplicity is yet another reason this cookie deserves more credit than it receives.

For this particular shortbread recipe, Tartine recommends using butter that is extremely soft. It describes the butter needing to be the consistency of mayonnaise which is pretty darn soft. I achieved this by microwaving it in ten second intervals until it was at that point. Place your butter in either the bowl of a stand mixer or a medium mixing bowl.
Add the salt and then mix until the salt is completely dissolved.

Sift the flour and cornstarch into a bowl or on to a piece of parchment paper.
Gradually add the sugar to the butter and mix until just combined.

Add the flour and cornstarch and mix until the dough just comes together. Mine was still a little crumbly still and it turned out fine. Place the dough into a buttered pan.

Pat the dough out as even as possible and bake in the oven for around 30 minutes. You want the edges and the bottom to be just golden brown.

Once the shortbread is done cooking, take it out and let it cool on a wire rack for about 10-15 minutes. You want it to still be warm, but not too hot to handle. Sprinkle the surface with sugar and tilt the pan to coat, shaking out the excess. This will give the shortbread a sparkling top layer and add some sweetness.
While the shortbread is still warm, cut it into slices using a sharp knife. If it gets too cold it will be more difficult to cut. Once cut, let it continue to cool completely in the pan.
Once the shortbread is cooled, carefully lift out the pieces. The first piece will possibly break and be difficult to get out but it should be easy after that. It's even easier using a small offset spatula.
Enjoy your delicious shortbread and make sure to share it with some friends so it can get the credit it deserves.
Shortbread
Adapted from Tartine

1 cup + 2 tbsp (9 oz) unsalted butter, very soft
½ tsp salt
1 ¾ cups + 2 tbsp (9 oz) all-purpose flour
½ cup + 2 tbsp (2 2/3 oz) cornstarch
1/3 cup (2 ½ oz) granulated sugar
¼ cup (2 oz) superfine or granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 325 degree Fahrenheit. Butter a 6 x 10 inch glass baking dish*

Place the butter in a mixing bowl. The butter must be very soft – the consistency of mayonnaise or whipped cream. Add the salt to the butter and mix well so that it dissolves completely before you add the rest of the ingredients. (I used a stand mixer with the paddle attachment) Sift the flour and cornstarch together. Add the granulated sugar to the butter and mix just until combined. Add the flour mixture and mix just until a smooth dough forms.

Pat the dough evenly into the prepared baking dish. The dough should be no more than 2/3 inch deep. Bake until the top and bottom are lightly browned, about 30 minutes (mine took about 35 minutes). The middle of the shortbread should remain light. Let cool on a wire rack for about 10-15 minutes.

Sprinkle the shortbread with the superfine or granulated sugar. Tilt the dish so that the sugar fully and evenly coats the surface and then tip out the excess sugar. With a very thin, sharp knife, cut the shortbread into rectangular fingers. If the cookies have become cold they will not slice well, so they must still be warm to the touch at this point. Chill thoroughly before removing from the baking dish.

The first cookie is difficult to remove, but the rest should come out easily with the aid of a small, thin offset spatula. The cookies will keep in an airtight container in a cool place for 2 weeks.

*I'm not sure I've ever seen a 6 x 10 inch baking dish before. I thought that was pretty random. Until I pulled down the glass baking dish that I own, measured it, and found out that it's 8 x 12 inches. Which may be even more random than 6 x 10... Anyways, I used that, and it worked fine. I'm pretty sure the more traditional 9 x 13 inches would work fine as well.

Chocolate Decadence Cookies

While I have to admit that I haven't been as festive as I could be this season (our Christmas decorations consist of red dish towels with reindeer on them), I wasn't going to let the season pass without a good day of holiday baking. For this day, I enlisted the help of John's sister Jill...


And his sister-in-law Nicole...
These two make me warm and fuzzy and happy inside. If the boyfriend leaves me, I'm keeping them.

There's nothing better than spending a day in the kitchen with girlfriends... Except when your day in the kitchen is preceded by a night like this... (Caveat- there were also two boys helping with red wine consumption)

That continues here...

And ends in the evacuation of this splendid seafood platter that we enjoyed earlier...
But all's well that ends well, and this story ends with Sunset Magazine's chocolate decadence cookies. These cookies are delicious little morsels, and I'm happy to report that I managed to make them successfully, even with a hangover that would have killed a small animal.