Twice-Baked Lemon Ginger Shortbread

This is a story about ginger. Knobs and knobs and knobs of ginger. Enough ginger to turn my vegetable crisper into a small gnarled forest. Enough ginger to crowd out the salad greens and other respectable vegetables.

You see, about a month ago, I thought it would be a good idea to brew my own ginger beer. It turned out great. In fact, I was so pleased with the process and the result, that on my first go I bought a pound of ginger at the supermarket. As it turns out, a pound of ginger is significant. I'm tired of ginger beer (who could have guessed?) and yet the fridge is still brimming with ginger. 

This sweet snap shortbread with lemon and ginger in both the base and glaze is a product of my increasingly creative efforts to go through the remaining store. 

Twice-Baked Lemon Ginger Shortbread

For the shortbread

12 tbsp unsalted butter

1 one-inch knob of ginger

zest of 1/2 lemon 

5 tbsp sugar

1/16 tsp ground cloves

1/8 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp salt

1.5 and 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

For the glaze

Juice of 1 Lemon (or more, to taste)

1 one-inch knob of ginger

1 cup confectioner's sugar

Melt butter and then, while waiting for it to cool, grate the first one-inch knob of ginger. Add the zest of 1/2 lemon, and press/strain the mixture through a cheesecloth (or coffee filter. But if you're going to use a coffee filter, take care, they can break easily when wet). 

Mix the liquid and melted butter, and then add in 5 tablespoons of sugar. Stir in the spices, and then mix in the flour. The dough should come together and be slightly fluffy. 

Press the dough into quart-sized sandwich bags, making it a uniform 1/4 inch thick. Refrigerate or freeze for at least 2 hours


For the Glaze
Grate an additional 1-inch knob of ginger, and juice the lemon that you zested. Filter the two together and press through a coffee filter or cheesecloth. Stir to combine with the 1 cup confectioner's sugar.


Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F, and cut the plastic away from the shortbread sheets. Lay them in a parchment-lined baking sheet, and bake for 18-20 minutes. Remove the hot shortbread from the oven, slice it (a pizza cutter works well for this) and return it to the oven for another 18-20 minutes, until the edges of the shortbread cookies start to brown.


Wait until the shortbread is completely cool before applying the glaze by dipping, drizzle or spreading.

Three Ingredient Peanut Butter Cookies, Plus Chocolate

I observed passover for the first time this year. That means no flour (among other things). In previous years I've made the light and often fat-free meringues or the incredibly unhealthy and delicious toffee matzah crunch.

This year I decided to go somewhere in the middle, though I have to admit it's a mistake to think of these cookies as anything but rich. They have a little bit of protein, because of the peanut butter, but that's as much of a healthy glow as I can lend these four ingredient sugar bombs.

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies (gluten free)

1 cup peanut butter

1 cup sugar*

1 large egg

1/2 cup chocolate chips

(*you can reduce this to 3/4 cup, if you want)

Mix all ingredients and drop by the tablespoon onto a greased or lined baking sheet. Bake at 375 degrees F for 6-9 minutes. The bottoms will start to brown. Be sure not to overbake, or it'll become crumbly. Don't worry too much. It'd still be delicious crumbs.

When I was putting together the dough, I really didn't expect these to bake into something that had the texture and sturdiness of a cookie. Somehow, they do.

Victory Over 'tashen

Last year, I knew it was purim when my roommate pulled out the crafting supplies and made glittery paper-plate party masks. He then mentioned something about a plan to drink until the line between good and evil blurs, and went off to purim festivities with his girlfriend.

And of course, I made busted hamantashen.

This year, I knew it was purim when my old catholic brother-in-law announced it on facebook.

So I took another swing at the poppy-filled cookies. These 'taschen were made with the citrus that I had on hand.

The poppy seed filling is optional. If you're hankering for something other than the nutty crunch of poppy, feel free to sub in your favorite homemade, or store-bought, jam or jelly. You could swap in chocolate spread. You could even use peanut butter and mini-marshmallows and make a strange fluffernutter.

Poppy Seed, Blood Orange Hamantashen
(adapted, gently, from Smitten Kitchen)

Poppy Seed Filling:

1/2 cup milk

1/4 cup sugar

Zest of 1/2 blood orange

1/2 cup poppy seeds

Juice of 1/2 blood orange

1/2 tablespoon orange liqueur

1/2 tbsp butter

1/4 tbsp vanilla extract, or seeds of 1 vanilla bean

Dough:

Zest of 1 lime

1/2 cup powdered sugar

1 and 1/8 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 stick (4 oz) salted butter, at room temperature

1 large egg yolk

Egg Wash:

1 large egg, beaten

Make the Filling:

Heat the milk, sugar, zest, and poppy seeds in a medium-small saucepan. Cook at a simmer for about twenty minutes. The seeds should begin to plump up slightly. You won't be able to actually see the seeds expand, but you should notice less liquid sloshing around.

Add in the juice, liqueur, butter and vanilla (extract or bean scrapings). Continue heating gently for another ten minutes. Allow the mixture to cool slowly, and then refrigerate it to cool further. The slow cool allows the poppy seeds to suck up as much of the liquid as is possible.

Make the Dough:

In a medium bowl, combine the zest, sugar, flour and salt. Dump in the butter and egg yolk, and use a pastry blender to process the dough until it comes together to form a crumbly mass.

Process a bit more until it hangs together, and then press the dough into a flat shape, and wrap tightly in plastic wrap.

Refrigerate the dough for at least an hour.

Form the Cookies:

Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Gently flour your dough-working surface (table or counter) and roll the dough out to about a quarter-inch thickness. If the dough starts to crack as you're rolling, don't worry. Just go slowly, allowing it to warm up as you work.

Use a biscuit/cookie cutter or small glass to cut out 2.5 inch rounds, remushing and then re-rolling the scraps of dough to make as many rounds as possible.

Move your dough rounds to your parchment-lined baking sheets.

Put a heaping 1/2 teaspoon of poppy seed filling in the center of each round, and then fold, don't pinch, three sides of the dough over the filling to form the traditional tricorner shape.

Beat your egg wash egg, and then use a pastry brush to apply the wash to the formed cookies. The egg wash is bound to redistribute some of the poppy seeds across the face of the cookie. Don't worry about it. It's... an extra decorative touch.

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F, and refrigerate the trays.

In about ten minutes, pull out the trays, and go over the cookies again with another layer of egg wash.

Bake for about 10 to 15 minutes, until the cookies go golden.

Brown Butter Vanilla Bean Rice Krispie Treats (Vegetarian)

It rained for the first half of Saturday. Sunday was turning out to be a similarly colorless day, aside from a hour-long window of sunlight in the mid afternoon.

I wanted to make something simple for cookie monday. Something with, say... 3 ingredients.

Generally speaking, rice krispie treats are made by melting marshmallows. As is the case for a surprising amount of candy, marshmallows get their springy set from gelatin. Fluff, on the other hand, is pig-pectin free. When planning out my baking for the night, I knew I'd be subbing in fluff for marshmallows.

But, of course, once I got in the kitchen, I started making more changes. I browned the butter (cooking the butter until the milk solids turn all golden and start smelling nutty and rich).

Then, at the last possible moment, when the fluff and butter were melting together, I remembered my cache of vanilla beans, and scraped one into the mix. Once melted, the fluff was smooth and shiny, flecked with black vanilla beans, and brown bits.

Rice Krispie Treats

(Brown Butter and Vanilla Vegetarian Variation)
1/2 stick butter

8 oz Marshmallow Fluff

5 cups puffed rice

1 vanilla bean

First, plan your end game: grease a 9x13 inch pan, and put 5 cups of puffed rice into a big mixing bowl.

In a medium-sized saucepan, melt the butter. Cook over low-medium heat, stirring frequently. The butter will turn clear, foam, and turn yellow-golden, and then brown.

Just as the butter is browning, glop 8oz of marshmallow fluff (one small jar, or half of a bigger tub) into the saucepan. Stir frequently.

Scrape one vanilla bean pod out into the mixture, and cook for about five minutes, stirring. When the butter has been fully mixed into the fluff, and the mixture is smooth, pour it into the puffed rice filled mixing bowl and stir to coat.

While still warm, turn the mixture into your prepared pan, and pat it flat, and refrigerate until set.

You can store this at room temperature for about 2 days, or in the fridge for longer.

PPK Vegan "Milano" Cookies

I'm visiting my sister in Fishers, Indiana, and decided to make cookies for cookie monday, before flying back home tomorrow morning. My sister has a dairy intolerance, so we dove into the archives of post-punk kitchen for this week's contribution: vegan milano cookies.

I ended up making these a bit smaller than the traditional milano, and they came out crisper than would have been the case with more generously sized cookies.

Normally I'd post the recipe, but this one was unadulterated, just as written. I only have one note to add: although the PPK recipe warns of the dough being difficult and sticky, I had no problems handling the dough or patting out little ovoids.

Apple Honey Challah

This bread smells amazing.

It was ten minutes into the baking time, and the house was thick with an eggy, rich aroma.

I've never made challah before, in part because I wasn't sure I'd get a result that was as satisfying as challah from the brookline bakery--a challah that you pulled apart with an eager tug, slightly chewy, rich but almost fluffy... this fit the bill.

The recipe is gently adapted from Smitten Kitchen. I formed the dough into two round braids, rather than one, and I found that Deb's recipe had too many apples for the dough to handle--when I tried it with two medium sized apples, chunks plopped out periodically during braiding.

Apple Honey Challah

from Smitten Kitchen

Bread

2 1/4 tsp active dry yeast

2/3 cup warm water

1/3 cup plus 1 tsp honey

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 large eggs plus 1 yolk

1 1/2 tsp salt

4 1/2 cups bread flour

2 small apples, peeled and chopped into 1/4 inch chunks.

1 large egg, whisked (egg wash)

Combine yeast, 1tsp honey and water. Allow to rest until the yeast gets foamy.

In the meantime, mix the rest of the honey, oil, salt and eggs and egg yolk in a large mixing bowl.

Add the yeast mixture to the other wet. Then add all of the flour. Mix until the dough starts to come together, and then turn it out on a floured surface and kneed unti you have a smooth, elastic dough. Turn it into an oiled bowl, and let it rise for an hour. (Be sure to chop the apples sometime before this hour is over.) After the hour, turn the dough out onto a flat surface and press it out into a oval.

Deposit 2/3 of the apples on one half of the oval. Fold the dough over, and press it down so the apple chunks are sealed into the dough. Repeat this again for the remainder of the apples, folding the dough in half a second time.Tuck the ends of the dough under it, and let rise for 30 minutes.

After the half hour, cut the dough in two. Cut each new dough ball into four sections, and carefully stretch the sections into logs (about 10 inches long).

Place the logs on the parchment where they will be baked, and braid the dough into a rounded loaf (see instructions here for weaving tips). Repeat for the second half, and coat both with the egg wash.

Allow for a third rise (yep. three rising periods in this one.) for about 50

minutes, and then toss it in a preheated oven at 375 degrees F for 35-40 minutes. If the loaf starts to brown too quickly, cover in foil for the rest of the baking time. It will be beautiful.

Checkerboard Cookies

Today's recipe is a time sink. It's the perfect diversion to fill a the Sunday afternoon, when you're stuck inside because of the drippy, windy weather that was supposed to be a category 2 hurricane.

Checkerboard Cookies
(adapted in parts from Baking Obsession, Joy of Baking and Martha Stewart)

I adapted this from a couple recipes on the internet, using a bit less sugar than Baking Obsession, keeping the dutch processed cocoa and baking powder (these don't rise much, at any rate) and adding in lemon zest, so that the white squares have a citrus-y gusto that competes with the deep dark valrhona cocoa that I used.

You could vary the flavors and colors of your batch. (See the notes in the recipe.)

2.5 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks) salted butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 large egg
1/4 cup dutch processed cocoa powder
1 tsp lemon zest

To start, sift together the flour, salt, and baking powder.

In another bowl, combine the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl. Mix by hand or machine until the batter is light and fluffy. Once you've achieved a cloud-like texture that pleases you, drop in the egg and vanilla, beating well.

Add in the flour mixture, and stir until homogeneous.

Here's where the fun begins: Divide your dough in two. If you want to make the traditional black and white checkerboards you'll be adding lemon to one half, and cocoa to the other. You could also do this cookie with a few drops of different food coloring in each half, or different flavorings. (Coconut and lime might be a great choice.) The dough is a basic sugar dough, and it'll take almost any mix-in, from ground hazelnuts to instant coffee.

Knead the flavoring (in my case, lemon and cocoa, respectively) into your dough halves. Subdivide those portions (now you have four mounds of dough--two of each flavor) and wrap in plastic and chill for at least 2 hours.



















After the dough has chilled, take one portion of each flavor, and use parchment paper or wax paper to roll it out to a rectangle. You may have to play with the dimensions of your rectangle. Each of my rectangles was 9cm wide by 17cm long by 1cm thick. You're going to need to cut each of the two dough portions into 9 rectangular strips (1cm by 1cm by the length).


















I recommend chilling again after this step, to avoid breaking the delicate strips. Once the dough is firm again, start laying out your checkerboard. You'll be making two checkerboard logs.

Here's what the log will look like:
xox
oxo
xox

For log 1, use vanilla in place of x, and chocolate in place of o.
For log 2, use chocolate in place of x and vanilla in place of o.















Refrigerate the logs. While you have the fridge open, pull out the two remaining dough portions. Roll each portion out into a 17cm by 13cm rectangle. You'll be using this dough to wrap around each log and give it the nice uniform edge. 17cm is the length of each of my logs, and 13cm is the circumference of each log (12), plus 1cm to account for an inexact fit around the edges.

Once your dough is rolled out, pull out the log, and gently wrap the rectangles around their respective doughs.

Because each log is made up of an odd number of strips, there's a dominant flavor in the log. For example, log 1 has 5 vanilla/lemon strips and 4 chocolate strips. That log needs to be wrapped in the chocolate rectangle. Log 2 should be wrapped in the vanilla/lemon rectangle.

Refrigerate yet again. In fact, if you want, you can freeze this dough for up to 2 months before baking. Once the dough is very firm, and you're ready to go, preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Use a sharp knife to cut the bar into 1.25cm-thick cookies. Bake about 12 minutes, until the bottoms of the cookies just start to turn golden.