Alpha Bakers - Gingersnaps

Once upon a time, in a far-off kingdom. No wait, it was a democracy. Or a collective farm. Or a free anarchist experiment in non-authoritarian communism. Once. A strange glow of sunlight streamed in and illuminated...the gingersnap.

I have a real thing for ginger cookies. I once spent the better part of several months testing different versions of large squashy ginger molasses cookies and hard gingerbread recipes to find the best one (verdict--Tartine recipe for cut-out cookies and gingerbread houses, still haven't found the dream squishy sugar-crusted molasses style cookie, and I've already made the ones in TBB). With these gingersnaps, I was on familiar ground, or so I thought. I did everything I was supposed to. I chilled, I weighed out the dough balls (who DOES that?), and I baked with precision. I also forgot to add ginger.

       
Needless to say, this made the first round of cookies out of the oven a little dull, with a pronounced taste of leavening and not much else. For the second round, I sprinkled each cookie with ginger, and for the third, I dumped a large pile of ginger right on to the chilled dough and squished it in. Much improved. I think I'll quite like these when I make them properly. Or with a little extra ginger. With ginger, more is almost always more.

Been baking quite a lot lately, between the 'blizzard' and the wall. Sometimes I bake ahead in TBB, take a picture, and hope I'll remember. I also made these Pecan Potato Chip Cupcakes, from Bay Ridge star bakers the Robicellis. RECOMMENDED. 

French Fridays with Dorie: December Round-Up

Since it's January, it does seem like a good time to clear the decks on the December cooking from Around My French Table (did everyone remember that I was in that cooking group--I did). Back in November I decided that I wasn't going to let cooking clubs take over my blog quite as aggressively as they have my life, and thus I would only do monthly roundups of my French Fridays with Dorie cooking. Somehow that seems to have translated into losing most of the pictures, so this round-up will be mostly text-based, an overview for the curious.


There were five recipes for the month, of which I made four. The butter-glazed carrots will have to wait, but not too long, if I know the carrot fiend with whom I live.

Sweet and Spicy Cocktail Nuts, page 18 -- Made 'em last night.

Photo by Matt Korahais

An egg white, a little sugar, some spice (more and bolder next time), some salt, and as some people in the blogosphere say, causing me to giggle hysterically every time--"Walla!" You know how Bush mentioned the internets and now they're called that? Yeah, unfortunately it's like that. Voila!

I covered the bowl, ate one, and then went back and uncovered it for another. This may go badly. Also, note the lovely bowl, courtesy of Stacey.

My Go-to Beef Daube, pages 244 and 245 -- I bought beef for you, Dorie, and I never buy beef. I made stew for you, Dorie, and I love making stew. My version was a bit quick and dirty, but it was eaten. Stew rarely goes astray. I found it a little acidic for my palate, which is odd given that I eat unripe fruit and suck lemons. But there you have it.


Leek and Potato Soup, pages 66 and 67 -- My Christmas weekend dinner, breakfast, lunch, snack... Somehow, Matt never got any, nor any chance to photograph. I had it all. I made the basic recipe, garnished it with parmesan croutons (from SCRATCHbread's country parma loaves). Then I added more potatoes, because it was like a delicious warm milk. I think perhaps a potato weight would have been helpful. But then I've been whining about the fact that this book doesn't have weights in general, so chalk me up for a whiner and move on. The soup was great.

Photo by Matt Korahais.

Speculoos, pages 406 and 407 - Not my favorites, only in that they were like yet unlike the fiercely spiced, barely sweet gingerbread that I crave. No fault of the cookies themselves, which I had great fun shaping in many shapes. I have a great many cookie cutters and they don't get put through their paces enough.

Photo by Matt Korahais.

Looking forward to another month with this book, which is more than the sum of its parts, making these recipes.

Tuesdays with Dorie: Sugar-Topped Molasses Spice Cookies

A few months ago, I started a Ginger Cookie Project--comparing and contrasting recipes from my books and the internet in the hunt for my perfect (spicy, crackly, chewy) ginger molasses cookie. I had several successes and some lame attempts. Over all, my favorite was the Soft Glazed Gingerbread from the Tartine cookbook. The bootleg recipe for the Black Dog ginger cookies was a dismal failure. I even went so far as to create a comparative spreadsheet for all of the recipes I tried, but haven't yet gotten around to posting it (soon, I promise).

I was reminded forcibly of  my unfinished project when Pamela of Cookies with Boys chose Sugar-Topped Molasses Spice Cookies for this week's Tuesdays with Dorie. Mine came out a little dryer than I would have liked, probably due to some slapdash measuring, but the cookies made by many other TWD participants had exactly the look I usually go for, so I think I'll be coming back to test these again. I'll probably do what I usually do; up the spices, decrease the sugar--they were a little sweet.