Apple Peanut Butter Sandwich Cookies

These cookies are the perfect accompaniment to a cup of hot tea or make a great afternoon snack if you bring your lunch to work.  They are soft and cakey with the subtlest hint of spice from the cinnamon and nutmeg.  The tartness of the Granny Smith Apple provides a nice balance to the rich frosting.  Their simple appearance is deceiving – you’ll be really pleased how good they taste when you bite into them.  It’s the happiest I’ve been with a recipe in months.

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Cranberry Walnut Rugelach

I didn’t grow up eating rugelach, I’d actually never heard of it until I moved to New York, but I’ve been making it regularly since finding this recipe during the Food Network’s “12 Days of Cookies” a few holiday seasons ago.  I really enjoy the process of making rugelach, it’s more time consuming and difficult than a typical cookie, but well worth the effort.

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Russian Tea Cakes – Mini Post #3

These are my Mom’s favorite cookie and I recently shipped her a batch for her birthday.  These cookies go by several names – you might know them as Mexican Wedding Cookies or Walnut Snowballs – but they are all the same basic recipe.  I’ve made these with many different varieties of nuts depending on what I happen to have in my freezer and they’ve always tasted delicious.

Packed and ready to go

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Lemon Ricotta Cookies

I saw this recipe on an episode of Everyday Italian years ago.  I was intrigued because I love lemon desserts and cheese, but didn’t get around to making it until last week when I had a container of ricotta in my fridge that needed to be used up.  These cookies aren’t the best looking thing I’ve ever made and I originally hadn’t planned on putting them up on the blog because I think they appear a bit sickly, but the positive reaction from my coworkers made me realize the recipe is a real gem.

These cookies have the texture of a little cake.  They are only subtly sweet and would be perfect with a cup of tea.  They would be a nice addition to a holiday cookie platter, since the tang of the lemon would provide a nice balance to many of the richer holiday treats. Read the rest of this entry »

Maple Meringues

A few weeks ago this recipe was posted on the King Arthur Flour Baker’s Blog.  I bookmarked it and baked the meringues within a week.  That never happens.  Most recipes I bookmark simply languish in my files and a very small percentage might get baked 6 months later.  So why did I make these so quickly?  First because they’re maple.  Growing up my family made maple syrup so I’m a real sucker for anything maple flavored.

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Black and White Cookies

This weekend my boyfriend and I hosted a New York City trivia contest at our apartment.  He wrote all the questions and I made Big Apple themed desserts.  The first dessert that came to mind was black and white cookies.  Pat loves these cookies, and they just look so New York.  Until I moved to the city I’d never seen them, but here they are in every deli, bodega, and grocery store.  While easy to find, store-bought black and whites are frequently terrible (stale and dense).  This delicious recipe from America’s Test Kitchen couldn’t be better.  I first made them last year and the result was a delicious tender cookie with a perfect, shiny, not-too-sweet frosting.

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Hazelnut Crescent Cookies

Every Easter and Christmas our old landlord used to bring us up an assortment of delicious homemade old school bakery cookies. Some of them were dry and not particular good but we appreciated the thought tremendously. These cookies remind me of those powdered greek butter cookies, Kourabiethes, but prepared with ground toasted hazelnuts instead of almond. I still had a large bag of toasted hazelnuts unused from my butternut squash lasagna a few weeks ago and after a late night at work last week I was looking for a stress reliever,  and thought baking of course. I came across this Bon Appetit recipe and was thrilled to see I already had all the ingredients already in my pantry.

Because I have a food processor, making the dough was really a cinch. I prepared it the night before and woke up early to form them into tiny horn shaped crescents. This recipe makes about 40 cookies but make sure you don’t bake two racks at a time. The first time I made these I tried to save time and use the top and bottom rack but sadly ended up burning the bottom batch. After the enthusiasm I received when I brought these into work last week, I knew Monday would mean another batch was needed, preferably 40 cookies this time. So I took my time and baked separately. These will definitely be one of my go-to gift cookies in the future, not too difficult and they impress like no other. A very classy cookie delicious with a tea and a good book. Just make sure you’re not wearing black when you eat them. They cookies  ‘snow’ all over you, like it’s doing outside now!

Refridgerate the Dough at Least 2 hours

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Vegan Cowboy Cookies

I’m not vegan, but I occasionally like to make vegan desserts for friends who are.  In general people are very excited and thankful when you bake for them, but when you bake something for a vegan friend the thanks is tenfold.  People with dietary restrictions are so often left out of food sharing that they seem especially appreciative when they are included.

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Thumbprint Cookies

My friend Anna gets a shipment of these cookies from her Mom in Ohio every Christmas.  I first tried the cookies back in college and each year she saves me a few because I love them so much.   I finally got around to making my own this year and am so happy that I did.  They were a huge hit with my family on Christmas Eve.   They are very buttery and nutty, but the cookie itself is only slightly sweet.  Almost all of the sweetness comes from the jam.  I used strawberry and mint, but you can customize it based on your flavor preferences and what color would be seasonal appropriate. Read the rest of this entry »

Homemade Oreos

Almost a year ago I was reading cooking blogs and spotted these homemade oreos.  I casually mentioned to Pat that I should make him these cookies sometime since he’s such a huge fan of regular Oreos.  He agreed that it was a great idea and has been pestering me to make them ever since.  We celebrated Christmas on December 21st and when he got home from school that day I had a huge tray of the cookies waiting for him.

It was silly of me to wait so long to make these cookies.  They’re actually quite simple and they were a huge hit.  I made a double batch so I could give some as gifts.  The consensus was that they’re, “Even better than regular Oreos.”  Considering I don’t like regular Oreos I didn’t think this was such a compliment, but then I realized that coming from Oreo-lovers this is high praise indeed.

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