I'm a regular Christian college student juggling fellowship, academics, and my love of baking! Follow me in my life full of sweet baked goodies, English papers, poetry, God's blessings, literature, crazy ideas, and my ever-growing journey with Jesus. :)
‘Tis the Season to be Jolly…
… Jolly because of all that butter and sugar you’re consuming. Oh my.
I’ve been baking a bit this winter break…
- Roasted chestnut cookies rolled in cinnamon powdered sugar from smittenkitchen (no photo available)
- two batches of caramel sauce (one with the addition of spiced rum)
- banana cream pie (also no photo available)
- black and white checkered cookies (with a border!!!)
Here are some photos…
Raw and sliced:
After baking:
These were relatively easy to make… I mean, there were no difficult techniques required in forming the dough of making it. It was the time and the effort that tired me out. These cookies are pretty and tasty… but they may only be worth it if you need to impress somebody. It should be noted that this dough can be made ahead of time and frozen for up to a month. The dough took approximately a day… and I baked them the next morning as Elissa from 17andBaking mentioned that it is better to allow the dough to rest in the fridge overnight before slicing and baking. I rather liked the dough and it was crisp and nice… but you need to make sure to slice the dough evenly and thinly to achieve the best results. Refer to the link at the beginning of the post to find the recipe and instructions.
Quick little snippets about each recipe (sorry to do this but I’m too lazy to have separate posts for goodies I didn’t even get the change to photograph!)
The roasted chestnut cookies were DELICIOUS. They are Deb from SmittenKitchen’s take on the traditional “mexican wedding cookie”, which typically uses almonds. There are other version across the world (russian teacakes), but these taste just like Christmas! I happen to love chestnuts so I was munching along as I shelled the roasted nuts, and they are delicious on their own… but these cookies were definitely a great way to allow them to shine. They were admittedly a little too much work for what they produced and were a bit on the expensive side as we bought pre-roasted nuts at a vendor outside the Japanese market, but I thought trying this recipe was very fun and tasty! I would love to make them again if time and cost weren’t an issue. Oh, and another thing… these cookies taste better after they have cooled. I didn’t really like them that much straight out of the oven, but after they had cooled, I couldn’t stop eating them!
The caramel sauce was also a first for me, as I’ve never made caramel before in my life. I also don’t own a candy thermometer and I was terrified that I would burn the sugar and ruin a pot. It turned out to be shockingly easy and I was a little disappointed that there wasn’t more drama between me and my caramel sauce. I think I may have undercooked the sugar a little though, and Joanne Chang, author of Flour and the owner of the bakery Flour and Flour 2, wrote in her book that a good indicator of whether or not your caramel is done through checking the layer of caramel at the bottom of your pot/pan. Simply by tilting the pan a little bit allows you to check the bottom and discover if the actual color of the caramel is a golden amber brown. Sometimes the layers of caramel can be deceptive and appear darker than the true color of the syrup. The caramel was eventually poured into cups of hot chocolate and drizzled over hot cinnamon sugar apples that topped vanilla bean ice cream.
Everything I’ve made I have sampled… except for the banana cream pie which is a Christmas gift. However, I tasted what was leftover of the pudding I made for the pie and it was pretty good… but I think I’d like a more delicate and vanilla-ey flavor next time. I’d also like to try using a vanilla bean for the gorgeous black specks. I used a vanilla wafer crust which seemed tasty, but since I didn’t taste it… I have no idea.
Two things to note: I have also baked a tasty loaf of yeasty cinnamon swirl bread and then proceeded to make even tastier french toast with slices of that bread. I also made homemade thin mints which definitely improved with age… and were oh so tasty without all the bad bad preservatives.
Overall, it has been a pretty great break full of baking. I’m currently reading Joanne Chang’s cookbook, Flour, and I am pretty excited about it so far. She has a great voice in the book. The only thing that makes me a little sad is the lack of photographs. Not that there aren’t any photos… but I’d like a few more.
Next task… marshmallows? I wanted to make them over break but never got a chance… but they’d make a lovely accompaniment to hot chocolate, I think.
Merry Christmas & Happy Baking! :)
