GO Phillies! - Sugar Cookies

Game 5 is underway and my Phillies have a chance to clinch a spot at the World Series tonight. The least I can do to wish them luck is.....bake? Yes, we don't have tickets (we didn't win the lottery the team ran), so we're watching from our living room and enjoying these sugar cookies from Alton Brown. (the icing was store bought because I have learned that I do not possess the skill to make a quality icing from scratch!)




Alton Brown's Sugar Cookies

Ingredients
3 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 cup sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 tablespoon milk
Powdered sugar, for rolling out dough


Directions
Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. Place butter and sugar in large bowl of electric stand mixer and beat until light in color. Add egg and milk and beat to combine. Put mixer on low speed, gradually add flour, and beat until mixture pulls away from the side of the bowl. Divide the dough in half, wrap in waxed paper, and refrigerate for 2 hours.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.

Sprinkle surface where you will roll out dough with powdered sugar. Remove 1 wrapped pack of dough from refrigerator at a time, sprinkle rolling pin with powdered sugar, and roll out dough to 1/4-inch thick. Move the dough around and check underneath frequently to make sure it is not sticking. If dough has warmed during rolling, place cold cookie sheet on top for 10 minutes to chill. Cut into desired shape, place at least 1-inch apart on greased baking sheet, parchment, or silicone baking mat, and bake for 7 to 9 minutes or until cookies are just beginning to turn brown around the edges, rotating cookie sheet halfway through baking time. Let sit on baking sheet for 2 minutes after removal from oven and then move to complete cooling on wire rack. Serve as is or ice as desired. Store in airtight container for up to 1 week.


Recipe Notes
Like alot of others, I found the dough very hard to work with. It kept sticking to my rolling pin even after using the powdered sugar on it. I had one un-iced and it tasted really good though, unlike some reviews stated. I cut the white flour with whole wheat and also used smart balance butter spread instead of real butter. The cookies had to go the whole 9 minutes to brown on the edges in my oven. I would definitely make them again!

GO PHILLIES!!!!

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies

A friend invited us over to his apartment to celebrate his birthday last week. I had been craving cookies all week, so this was the perfect excuse to make them. After all, who wants to show up somewhere empty handed? (As always, changes in italics.)

Peanut Butter Chocolate Chunk Cookies
adapted from Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook, Bridal Edition

Ingredients

1/2 cup super chunk, all natural peanut butter
1/2 cup butter smart balance, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 egg
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1-1/4 cups all-purpose flour- I divided this amount in half, and used whole wheat flour for the other half
1 cup chocolate chunks

Directions
1. In a large mixing bowl beat peanut butter and butter with electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add granulated sugar and brown sugar, baking soda, and salt. Beat until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally. Beat in egg and vanilla until combined. Beat in as much of the flour as you can with the mixer. Stir in any remaining flour. Add chocolate chunks. Cover and refrigerate dough about 1 hour or until easy to handle.(I didn't refrigerate mine and they came out fine.)

2. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Shape dough in 1-inch balls. Place balls 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Flatten the cookies by making crisscross marks with fork tines, dipping fork in sugar between flattening each cookie. Bake about 8 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Transfer to wire racks. Cool. Makes about 3 dozen cookies.

Review
These cookies were delicious. I really love peanut butter. So much, that I think I could probably eat it every day. The recipe says it yields about 36 cookies, which is more than we could eat. The BHG cookbook suggested spooning the dough out as if to make cookies, then putting it in the freezer for about a half hour. Once the dough is firm, remove them from the cookie sheet and store in a plastic bag. Now we'll be able to have a single serving of fresh baked cookies the next time we're in the mood! I hope this works out.

Black and White Chocolate Chip Cookies

Last weekend, we held our annual winter party. This year, the theme was "Ready to Rock" and everyone came in their favorite band's t-shirt. We set up our Rock Band instruments for xBox and the party was quite a success. To keep everyone satisfied, we ordered pizza and I cooked up a bunch of snacks. One of the dessert items were Black and White Chocolate Chip Cookies.

I found the recipe a couple weeks ago on The Hungry Mouse. If you click over to her post, you'll see the cookies I made are much darker than hers. I'm not sure where I went wrong, but the cookies still turned out great. I think I may have used too many oreos (which isn't necessarily a bad thing!).

Black and White Chocolate Chip Cookies
originally from The Hungry Mouse blog

Ingredients:



11 Tbls. butter (that’s 2/3 of a cup)
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. kosher salt
1 1/4 cups chocolate chips
20 Oreos (or other creme-filled chocolate cookies)

Directions:
About a half an hour before baking, take out the butter and let it soften up.

Place the oreos in a gallon sized zip top bag and smash the cookies into small pieces with a rolling pin. When finished, there should be about 2 cups of crushed oreo. Set aside.



Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line two sheet pans with parchment paper and set aside.

Combine the white and brown sugar in the mixer bowl. Add the vanilla extract. Toss in the egg and softened butter. Using the paddle beater, beat on medium-high for a minute until ingredients come together.



Add the flour, baking soda and salt to the bowl and beat on medium-high until the dry ingredients are well combined with the wet, scraping the sides of the bowl when necessary.



Add the chocolate chips. Once the chips are mixed in, add the oreos. Beat on medium-high until well combined.



Drop spoon sized balls of dough onto the cookie sheets, spacing them out evenly. Bake for about 13 minutes at 350 degrees (NOTE: I only baked mine for 10 minutes and they came out perfect) Transfer the cookies to a rack to cool.



Servings: About 2 dozen



Review:
These cookies are really good. They are sort of crunchy. Just like a regular oreo, though go great with a glass of milk. Everyone at the party loved them.

***NOTE*** I will be submitting this to foodblogga's Christmas cookie roundup. Click the picture below for details on how to submit your favorite cookie recipe. The deadline is Sunday December 21st!

Lemon Pistachio Biscotti

Now that I've made an apple tart, I thought I would try my hand at something else that scares me - a twice baked dessert. I was flipping through my Better Homes and Gardens cookbook and found a recipe for Lemon Pistachio biscotti and decided to try it. I wish I wasn't so afraid of baking in the past, because they came out great.

Lemon Pistachio Biscotti
from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook, Bridal Edition

Ingredients:



1/3 cup butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 cups all-purpose flour
4 teaspoons finely shredded lemon peel (I didn't have a lemon to zest for this, so I added a couple squirts of lemon juice to the batter instead)
1-1/4 cups pistachio nuts


Directions:
Lightly grease 2 cookie sheets; set aside. In a large mixing bowl beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add sugar, baking powder, and salt. Beat until combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally. Beat in eggs and vanilla until combined. Beat in as much of the flour as you can with the mixer. Stir in any remaining flour and lemon peel. Stir in pistachio nuts.



Divide dough into 3 equal portions. Shape each portion into an 8-inch roll. Place rolls at least 3 inches apart on prepared cookie sheets; flatten slightly until about 2-1/2 inches wide.



Bake in a 375 degree F oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until golden brown and tops are cracked (loaves will spread slightly). Cool on cookie sheet for 30 minutes.

Use a serrated knife to cut each roll diagonally into 1/2-inch slices. Place slices, cut sides down, on ungreased cookie sheets. Bake in a 325 degree F oven for 8 minutes. Turn slices over and bake for 8 to 10 minutes more or until dry and crisp (do not overbake). Transfer to a wire rack and let cool.



Servings: about 36 cookies

Review:
Since it's only me and the husband around our apartment during the week, I halved the recipe, so I only got about 15 cookies out of it. My only complaint was that the dough was a little hard to work with, so I chilled it for a half hour to firm it up. The cookies are really good and I'm glad I gave this recipe a try. There are some different variations in the book that I'd like to try, including double chocolate biscotti.

Snickerdoodles

I'll start this post by saying that I am going to chronicle my disasters as well as my successes. These cookies were not so much a disaster, as the dough did not have the correct consistency. Some friends of the hubs were coming over, so in addition to dinner, I wanted to make something to snack on. I've always found snickerdoodles to be quick and easy, so of course, I went for it. Unfortunately, I couldn't find the recipe I'd used in the past, so I turned to my BH&G cookbook, and boy was that a mistake.

The cookies came out well, but needed A LOT of tweaking to get there. The amount of flour the recipe called for was far too little. When I tried to form the round dough-balls we're all familiar with, they batter just sort of molded to my hand and wouldn't ball up. I added about a cup and half more flour and it got the job done, though the dough never really reached the right consistency.

After some research, I found that I read the recipe wrong. OOPS! I never chilled the dough and that's probably why it never really firmed up. Oh well - the end result turned out okay and I guess that's really all that matters.

One more complaint about the recipe is that it says it yields about 36 cookies, but even with the extra flour, I barely got 24. I was a little dissapointed since the chocolate chip cookies I made following a BH&G recipe came out so well. I guess they all can't be winners!!

Snickerdoodles
Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook, Bridal Edition

Ingredients:



1/2 cup butter
1 cup sugar
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp cream of tartar
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups AP flour
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp cinnamon

Directions:



In a medium mixing bowl, beat butter with an electric mixer on medium to high speed for 30 seconds. Add the 1 cup sugar, baking soda, and cream of tartar. Beat until combined. Beat in egg and vanilla until combined. Beat in as much flour as possible with the mixer, then stir in any remaining. Cover and chill dough about 1 hour until easy to handle.(that is very important, don't end up like me!)



Combine the two tablespoons of sugar and the cinnamon. Shape dough into 1 inch balls. Roll balls in sugar-cinnamon mixture to coat. Place 2 inches apart on an ungreased cookie sheet. Bake in a 375 degree oven for 10 to 11 minutes or until edges are golden. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool.



Servings: About 36 cookies

Baking Gals - Devil's Food Chocolate Chip and Chocolate Chip Cookies

A couple weeks ago, I joined the webgroup at bakinggals.com .  This is a program where teams are formed and each team is assigned a soldier. Each member of the team bakes as many items as they want, and mails them to the assigned soldier. I think it's a great idea to keep our troops' spirits up. There are about 10 people on my team, so hopefully our soldier will get more than enough goodies! For my package, I decided to make two types of cookies, one traditional and a modified original. Altogether, I made about 100 cookies.

Devil's Food Peanut Butter Cookies

originally from Allrecipes.com, submitted by Deanna Storz

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2/3 cup shortening

1 package devil's food cake mix

2 cups peanut butter chips

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  In a medium bowl, beat the eggs, vanilla, and shortening with 1/2 of the cake mix until light and fluffy.  Mix in the remaining cake mix and the peanut butter chips. Drop dough by rounded teaspoons, 2 inches

 apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes in preheated oven. Remove from cookie sheets to cool on wire racks.

Modifications:

1. I didn't have shortening, so I used butter instead.

2. I thought I had peanut butter chips, but it turned out I didn't, so I used chocolate chips.

3. In my oven, 10 minutes was too long. I baked them for about 9 minutes so they didn't burn.

Review:

These cookies are really easy to make, and have few ingredients. For how quick they take, they are really delicious! I only hope our soldier will like them, too! 

Chocolate Chip Cookies

from the Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook, Bridal Edition

Ingredients:

1/2 cup shortening

1/2 cup butter, softened

1 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

In a large mixing bowl, beat shortening and butter with an electronic mixer on medium to high for 30 seconds.  Add brown sugar, granulated sugar, and baking soda.  Beat until mixture is combined, scraping sides of bowl occasionally.  Beat in eggs and vanilla until combined.  Beat in as much of the flour as you can with the mixer.  Stir in any remaining flour.  Stir in chocolate chips.  Drop dough by rounded teaspoons 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet.  Bake in a 375 degree oven for 8 - 10 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool.

Modifications:

1. Instead of shortening, I used butter.

Review:

After I mixed all of the ingredients, I was a little skeptical about these cookies. The mix wasn't very doughy, so I didn't think it would come out 

that great. Despite my reservations, they came out really well. They actually look a little like store-bought as opposed to homemade though!