FFwD: Pierre Herme’s Olive Sables

By mlb, on April 5th, 2013%

This week’s French Fridays with Dorie is a strange, little cookie. Grated egg yolk. Kalamata olives. Powdered sugar. Potato starch. So strange and yet so delightful — it’s Pierre Herme’s Olive Sables.

I really was a little skeptical about these and they are certainly not the type off cookie you necessarily want to dip in milk or anything, but we both really liked them. I think they’d work well paired with some cheese and fruit for a light dessert. They are a little salty and a little sweet.

Notes:
1. I actually already had potato starch that I had bought for a different recipe, so that was good.
2. I made a 1/3 of a recipe (used the rest of the hard boiled egg chopped up on a big dinner salad), because it did sound a little strange (and there are only two of us).
3. Lemon zest! I added a little to the dough. I was originally thinking orange zest (which I still think would be really great here), but I only had lemons.

Here’s a link to everyone’s French Fridays posts and my photos below.

Pierre <span style= . . . → Read More: FFwD: Pierre Herme’s Olive Sables

Holiday Cookies: Festive Fireplaces (and Skeletons)

By mlb, on December 19th, 2012%

Over the weekend, I had a plan to make holiday cookies, the kind with frosting and everything. And at the end of the day (and a fairly cramped right hand later), I’m proud to say that I ended up with these cute little fireplace cookies.

They’re especially nice because you can make them as Christmas-y as you want or even adapt the decorations to whatever holiday you celebrate this time of year. You could also just make and eat them because it is winter and you are sitting in front of a warm, toasty fire (meta). They are very versatile cookies.

I also made these using one of my new favorite ingredients — black cocoa powder.

Black Cocoa Cookies
Original recipe origin unknown
1 1/2 cups butter, softened (I have also used 1 cup shortening and 1/2 cup butter in this recipe and it works just as well)
2 1/2 cups sifted powdered sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups AP flour
1 /2 Dutch process cocoa
1/2 cup black cocoa powder
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

Beat butter at medium speed with an electric mixer until creamy. Gradually add the powdered sugar, combining well. Add . . . → Read More: Holiday Cookies: Festive Fireplaces (and Skeletons)

FFwD: Honey Spiced (not)Madeleines

By mlb, on September 22nd, 2011%

So, at first I was kind of sad for this French Fridays with Dorie as I don’t currently have a Madeleine pan and thought I’d have to sit it out. Then, I started poking around the interwebs looking for ideas on how to get around that and I found two great ones — a mini-muffin pan (which I have) and spoons (which…I also have).

The spoons, imho, are a great idea but when I tried it out with just two spoons (pilot project!) I learned that you absolutely can not over-fill the spoons. As in you have to severely under-fill them to not wind up with a mess (which I did wind up with). The cookies kind of puff up around and over the edges of the spoon unless you have a great deal of self-control and discipline (which I don’t have), when applying the batter to the spoons. So…mini muffin pans it was!

Some notes on this FFwD:

1. I made a half recipe, which gave me about 10 mini-muffin (not)madeleines.
2. I made the batter Wednesday night and baked the cookies Thursday night.
3. As of 8:30 PM Thursday, all of them were gone.
4. I kind of want to . . . → Read More: FFwD: Honey Spiced (not)Madeleines

FFwD: Salted Butter Break-Ups (Some with Matcha!)

By mlb, on March 17th, 2011%

This week’s French Fridays with Dorie is a cookie recipe. I’ve tended to skip most of the sweet recipes so far (what will two people do with a WHOLE cake??), but these I wanted to try.

A. Because I had everything already to make them and B. how fun would it be to make some of these green (for St. Patrick’s Day) with matcha? The answer – very fun!

Notes/things I learned:

1. Even though the recipe seems very similar to pie dough — it is not pie dough! Don’t roll it out too thin (I think I did this, but they were still good!).
2. Because my dough was maybe a little thin, I decreased baking tiome to about 26 minutes.
3. Adding Matcha* (green tea powder) to half the dough was a good idea!
4. Next time I will score a little deeper with the fork tines.
5. I actually had some Sel Gris. Exciting to use it here!
6. Delicious still warm from the oven!

Okay, on with the photos. And here’s everyone’s cookie recaps at the FFwD site!

Half the dough ready to go!

Making the matcha dough, . . . → Read More: FFwD: Salted Butter Break-Ups (Some with Matcha!)

White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Biscotti Experiment

By mlb, on February 16th, 2009%

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I have always been a little intimidated by biscotti-making — I think the double baking, mostly. I finally gave it a try last weekend and was very pleased with the results. I did notice that after the first baking, my biscotti were quite spread out. That concerned me a little but when I sliced them to bake again, they were just fine.

I added orange zest to the original recipe but otherwise followed it exactly!

White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Biscotti
Recipe from the book, Biscotti, by Lou Seibert Pappas
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons Amaretto
1 tsp orange zest
2 cups plus 2 tbsp AP flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 cups macadamia nuts
2/3 cup white chocolate chips

Using either a stand or hand-held mixer, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, vanilla, orange zest, and Amaretto liqueur. In a bowl combine flour, baking powder and salt. Add to creamed mixture, mixing until blended.

Fold in nuts and chocolate chips. Divide dough in half. On a greased and floured baking sheet pat out into two logs about 1/2-inch high, 1 1/2-inches wide and 14-inches long, spacing them . . . → Read More: White Chocolate Macadamia Nut Biscotti Experiment

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