Food traditions

With Pancake Day around the corner, I'm reminded there are a lot of traditions and holidays centered around food. I haven't always followed these traditions due to being busy or just plain lazy. But now that I'm a mom, it's up to me to introduce traditions to my family and make these days special. Christmas wouldn't be Christmas without gingerbread cookies, after all. Think about all the traditions and holidays we use food to commemorate. And even if it's not as simple as a cake on one's birthday (though that's a pretty important food-related tradition!) you have to admit we tend to use food as a way to celebrate almost everything. So I'm going to make a commitment to pay more attention to these foodways traditions in the future and give Charlotte special moments. I have visions of presenting homemade goodies to her and family on special days and even of her helping me prepare meals and treats when she gets older.


Thankfully, I have a good few months before she is able to eat solid food. It will give me time to reflect on my own family's traditions and food moments as well as my cooking/baking repertoire . Though she will be just old enough to try a few bites of these reindeer gingerbread cookies (with pretzel ears, chocolate chip eyes and a Smartie nose) come Christmas time. I made these for the first time this past December so maybe it will be our first food tradition!

Cookie Me Christmas

To kick off the holiday baking season, I decided to start with a fool-proof stand-by recipe: the Tollhouse chocolate chip cookie. This recipe makes a bunch of cookies (as in 40 or so) and is easy to make and bake. It's not diet, or gluten free or even dairy free but it is an old stand-by and I'm sure many of you out there are going to be looking for a great cookie recipe this season.

What you'll need:

2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (I did sub half of the white flour with whole wheat and it worked out fine)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 cup butter (softened)
3/4 cup white granulated sugar
34 cup brown sugar (packed)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 eggs
2 cups chocolate chips + 1 cup nuts (optional)

Preheat oven 375 degrees F

Like many cookie recipes, you make this one in two stages: wet and dry. First combine the flour, baking soda and salt together in one bowl and stir with a whisk to get any lumps out. Second, use a hand mixer or stand mixer to beat together the soft butter, sugars and vanilla. Combining butter and sugar is called "creaming" and you'll know it's done combing when the mixture is lump-free and fluffy. Then you add one egg at a time, combining after each addition, to the wet mixture. Finally, combine the dry into the wet (in batches and slowly so you don't end up with a snow-storm of flour in your kitchen). Stir in the chocolate and nuts by hand with a spatula.

You then drop the cookie batter onto non-greased cookie sheets with a spoon. I use two spoons, one to drop and the other to pry off the dough hanging on to the original spoon. It's a technique that's good if you don't want to get your hands in a mess

Bake each cookie sheet 9-11 minutes until the cookies are just set in the middle and brown on the edges. You may have to rotate and/or turn your sheet in the oven depending on how hot your oven is, if it's convection, if it's old, etc. I recommend not putting more cookie dough on a hot, out-of-the-oven, sheet because it causes the dough to melt a little and screws up the baking time.

Let baked cookies cool on the sheets on top of the stove for a few minutes before transferring them to wire racks to complete cooling. Pour up a glass of milk and enjoy! Merry (early) Christmas!

Switch it up: cookie edition

So remember the thrill I got when I discovered Skor toffee bits? I had a similar feeling when I re-discovered white chocolate chips in the supermarket this weekend. I just had to have them...and make something with them. I decided on a fail safe recipe: reverse chocolate chip cookies. They're chocolate cookies (thanks to cocoa powder) with white chips. There isn't much butter and only one egg so it makes a stiff batter that's easy to handle. Bonus? They're also easy to freeze. I have a feeling my co-workers are starting to get wary of all the baked goods I'm bringing them. Hey, I like baking...but I also don't like gaining weight, hence why I offer goodies to other people. So I baked half this recipe and then froze the rest in a log for easy baking in a pinch.

Here's the easy peasy recipe:

1/2 cup butter (softened)
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 egg
1tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 pk (226 g) white chocolate chips

Cream together the butter and sugar until blended and smooth. Whisk the egg and vanilla in a small bowl and then add to the butter mixture and blend in. Gently incorporate the four and baking soda. Then mix in the cocoa powder and finally the chips. The batter will be tight and easy to mold. To bake, drop onto a ungreased cookie sheet (about 1tbs cookies) and bake at 350 degrees for 9-11 minutes. I found 9 minutes fine but ovens differ. Just be sure to watch the cookies because it's difficult to tell if they're too dark or burning! Once they're done, let them cool on the cookie sheet about 2 minutes before removing. The cookies will be cracked but if you don't over-bake them they'll still be chewy. These will store well baked, or free unused dough sealed tight in plastic wrap. Wouldn't your co-workers love some of these?

Cookie Sheet

Chocolate coconut cookies

This is an adaptation from the Canadian Living Mud Pie cookie recipe. I was on a roll last week in the kitchen and took out my trusted Canadian Living Cooks cookbook. Their recipes are tested until perfect and this one promised to be a cookie version of a brownie. Yum. I had the basic ingredients but not the add-ins so I used what I had: chocolate and shredded coconut. Here is the recipe and what I did:

6 oz chocolate (bittersweet and chopped)
1/2 cup butter (I used a little less)
1 1/4 cup sugar
3 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/4 cup shredded coconut

Line baking sheets with parchment paper and preheat oven to 350F.

In a large heatproof bowl over a saucepan of simmering water melt together chocolate and butter. Remove from heat when almost melted and stir until fully combined.

Then whisk in sugar, eggs one at a time, and vanilla.

In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder and salt. Pour over chocolate mixture and stir until just combined. Add in coconut and combine. Drop by tablespoonfuls, about 2 inches apart, onto prepared pan(s). These cookies tend to spread while baking so take that into account. You can also make them smaller if you wish.

Bake one sheet at a time in the centre of the oven until firm around edges but still soft in the centre. This should take about 10-12 minutes. Let stand on the pan until firm (about 5 mins) before transferring them to racks to completely cool.

The recipe book also says you can make these ahead by layering them between wax paper in an airtight container to be stored at room temp for up to 5 days or freeze up to 2 weeks. This recipe makes a lot of cookies (about 3 dozen) so it's great you can store some if needed! Happy chocolate fix!

Holiday baking

I've posted on the Signal Blog about my holiday shortbread baking-fest. Happy holidays all!

Peanut butter cookies

I'm just going to tell the truth: these cookies aren't healthy and they don't have many redeaming qualities. Except they are awesome. The recipe comes courtesy of Canadian Living.



Ingredients:

1 cup buter
1 cup peanut butter

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup packed brown sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup chocolate chips (my own reciep tweaking)

Line 2 rimless baking sheets with parchment paper; set aside.

In large bowl, beat butter with peanut butter; beat in granulated and brown sugars.

Beat in eggs, 1 at a time; beat in vanilla.

separate bowl, whisk flour with baking soda; stir into butter mixture until blended.

Roll by rounded 1 tbsp (15 mL) into balls.

Place, 2 inches (5 cm) apart, on prepared pans.

With fork, press to flatten to 1/2-inch (1 cm) thickness.

Bake in top and bottom thirds of 350°F (180°C) oven, rotating and switching pans halfway through, until golden on bottoms and edges are darkened, 12 to 15 minutes.

Transfer to racks; let cool.

You can make these ahead of time by storing them in airtight container for up to 1 week or freeze for up to 3 months. Alternatively you can bake off one batch for now and freeze the remainder of the dough in a log-shape wrapped in plastic wrap. This gives you freshly-made cookies on hand any time you want them...or frozen cookie dough. Use as you see fit!

Do not try this at home!

I'm not an amazing baker or anything but there's rarely a time when a recipe I try goes horribly, unbelievably wrong. Last night was one of those rare occasions.

I tried to make cookies...chocolate chunk cookies to be exact. And I used a tried-and-true recipe book Cook This by Amy Rosen. It was, admittingly, the first time I tried this recipe. But I thought, "Hey, it's chocolate chip cookies. Four, eggs, butter, chocolate. How could this go wrong?" Well...

The batter went over well. I must have ate two cookie's worth of batter before baking! If I had known better I would have stopped the whole process there and been content with a big batch of uncooked cookie dough. IN fact, Rosen herself has a tip on the recipe page about how good the dough is to eat raw.

When I did try to bake them, the first attempt resulted in flat, wet circles which continued to spread into flatter, wetter circles in the oven. They didn't cook!

Then I thought of the bright idea to put the dough into my mini-cupcake tin which would enclose the batter so it couldn't run. Bad idea. They came out little burned mini-cupcakes of cookie dough gross-ness.

Anyway, I wasted all those ingredients and a 1/2 hour of my night for nothing. Well, not nothing. Now I can avoid this recipe like the plague and I recommend you do so too.

Chocolate Chunk Cookies:
1/2 cup vegetable shortening
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
2 eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
8 oz semi sweet chocolate (chips, chunks, or broken-up bars)

1. Preheat oven to 375 F and spray cookie sheet with nonstick spray
2. In a large bowl, mix shortening and butter, add sugars and beat until no lumps appear and batter is smooth. Add eggs and vanilla; stir to combine.
3. Add in flour, salt and baking soda. Add chocolate and stir away. You now have cookie batter...[STOP HERE! Enjoy it while you can!]
4. Using hands, roll dough into 1-inch balls, and place on cookie sheet 4 by 4, at equal distances apart. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown [yeah, right!]. Let rest for a minute and remove from tray and let cook on wire rack.

Good luck!