We are all about Fantastic Mr. Fox these days. Ben just finished reading the book in school, we loved the movie, we are singing the song and now — eating the cookies! It was Tony who recognized the familiar voice of Rabbit (Mario Batali) in the movie, Ben who kept talking about Mrs. Bean’s Famous Nutmeg Ginger Apple Snaps (and is the only one of us who can get all the modifiers in the proper order) and I was the one who thought to see if the recipe was available on-line. Of course it is. I have never made a cookie — or anything else for that matter — that I first saw in a movie (though I did once make a recipe off a bottle of shower gel) and while our cookies may not look as gorgeous as they do in the movie (because I’m no food stylist) they are deliciously chewy, gingery, appley — they’re fantastic!
sweets
Making Cookies, Making a Mess
by Caroline
I was sharing some of my food writing with a friend recently — mostly stories of cooking with my kids — and she started shaking her head in wonder. “This is just so foreign to me,” she said, “All of your kitchen stories are so. . . happy.”
I reminded her I do have it easy right now, since Tony and I both work from home and have flexible schedules that mostly eliminate the dinner time rush, the source of so much stress and anxiety for so many parents. I do what I call the “accessory cooking,” the fun stuff, on which nobody’s health and well-being rely. But I have to acknowledge that for the most part things do go pretty well in my kitchen — things don’t get burned; things come out tasting good; nobody shouts at each other– and I have been thinking about why that is. Maybe because I learned to cook from my parents, who weren’t too stressed out about cooking (I’ve mostly written about my mom in this context, but will have stories soon about my dad’s calm competence in the kitchen, including the time he and I exploded baked potatoes). And maybe, and I do think this matters, it’s partly because I don’t fret a whole lot about how the end product looks. I put a lot of stock in the love and good ingredients that go into a dish, and if the cake’s a little fallen or the cookies a little unevenly browned, well, it usually still tastes pretty good. And it probably means I was paying as much attention to my kids as the cake, and that’s not going to change anytime soon. Some people can make beautiful food that tastes good while still being present to their children — but right now, at least, I can’t manage it. So I make forgiving cakes and crisps and big batches of candy and, this time of the year, the dreaded sugar cookie.
They’re a mess, but I cave in to the obligation to make cut out cookies this time of year because the kids love to decorate them so much.
Christmas Cookies: Pistachio-Cranberry Icebox Cookies
by Caroline
This is the third Christmas for this cookie recipe, which I found in Gourmet and love for all the reasons I love making candy: it’s quick, beautiful, and makes a lot.
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks (3/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened
1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar (did you make candied orange peel? use your leftover coating sugar in these cookies to give them a bit more orange flavor)
1/2 teaspoon finely grated fresh orange zest
1/2 cup shelled pistachios (2 1/4 oz; not dyed red)
1/3 cup dried cranberries (1 1/4 oz)
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1/4 cup decorative sugar (preferably coarse)
Stir together flour, cinnamon, and salt in a bowl.
Beat together butter, granulated sugar, and zest in a large bowl until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add flour mixture in 3 batches, mixing until dough just comes together in clumps, then mix in pistachios and cranberries.
Gather and press dough together, then divide into 2 equal pieces. Form each piece of dough into a log about 1 1/2 inches in diameter. Square off long sides of each log to form a bar, then chill, wrapped in plastic wrap, until very firm, at least 2 hours.
Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper.
Brush egg over all 4 long sides of bars (but not ends). Sprinkle decorative sugar on a separate sheet of parchment or wax paper and press bars into sugar, coating well. (Of course you can skip this step, and I often do. The cookies are perfectly delicious without the extra coating of sugar, but it does sort of add to the nice stained glass effect).
Cut each bar crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick slices.
Arrange cookies about 1/2 inch apart on lined baking sheets.
Bake cookies, switching position of sheets halfway through baking, until edges are pale golden, 15 to 18 minutes total. Transfer cookies from parchment to racks using a slotted spatula and cool completely.
I forgot to take a picture until we’d given most of the first batch away, but here are the last few, looking prettily Christmasy, I think, all studded with their red and green:
Christmas Candy: Salted Chocolate Pecan Toffee
by Caroline
In his recent New Yorker piece about cookbooks, Adam Gopnik writes, “…cookbooks have two overt passions right now: one is simplicity, the other is salt.” This recipe, originally published in Sunset magazine, offers both. The boiling sugar makes it a poor choice to make with the kids’ assistance; just let them stand back and watch in awe as you put more sticks of butter into one pot than they have ever seen you do before.
2 cups pecan halves
3 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/2 cups butter
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
12 ounces bittersweet chocolate
2 teaspoons fleur de sel or coarse sea salt
Have all the ingredients prepped and ready before you begin, because once the sugar reaches candy temperature, you need to move quickly. Also, keep a bowl of ice water near the stove just in case of accidents; sugar burns badly.
Preheat oven to 350°. Put pecans on a rimmed baking sheet and cook, stirring occasionally, until toasted, about 8 minutes. When cool enough to handle, chop roughly. Divide into 2 batches; chop 1 batch finely. Set both batches aside.
Put sugar, butter, salt, and 3/4 cup water in a 4-qt. saucepan over medium heat. If you have any doubt about the size of your pan, go with a bigger one; you want to let the sugar bubble up quite a bit without having to worry about it boiling over.
When butter and sugar are melted, increase heat to medium-high and cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture is deep golden brown and measures 310° on a candy thermometer, about 20 minutes.
Remove from heat and carefully stir in vanilla (mixture will bubble up, so stand back as you pour, and/or wear oven mitts, just in case) and finely chopped pecans. Pour into a 10- by 15-in. rimmed baking sheet.
Let toffee cool until set, at least 30 minutes. (For even pieces, you can score the toffee by cutting it with a sharp knife after it has set for about 10 minutes, scoring into 5 strips lengthwise and 8 strips crosswise to yield 40 pieces. Wipe knife clean with warm water after each slice for easier cutting.)
Chop chocolate and melt gently in a double boiler (this is where I break out my late mother-in-law’s beautiful copper and ceramic double boiler), but a metal bowl set over a saucepan of water, or the microwave, both work just fine, too.
Pour melted chocolate over toffee; spread evenly with a knife or offset spatula. Sprinkle the chocolate with roughly chopped pecans. Let sit 20 minutes, or until chocolate is cool but still a bit soft. Sprinkle with fleur de sel. Chill until set, about 1 hour.
Gently twist the pan to release toffee, then chop or break into chunks. Store in the fridge, if it lasts that long.
Christmas Candy: Spicy Pumpkin Seed & Cherry Chocolate Bark
by Caroline
I discovered this recipe last year in Catherine Newman’s Wondertime column, and now the only problem is making enough both to give away and keep some in the house for ourselves. I’ve made two batches already, and expect to make at least that much more before this holiday season is over. It is so easy the kids can do it without much supervision (just caution them about the baking pan, which is hot when it first comes out of the oven), and of course you can vary it any number of ways (I might make a semi-sweet version next, with raisins and peanuts), but the spicy pumpkin seeds are my favorite.
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/2 cup raw hulled pumpkin seeds (the green kind)
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon cayenne
2 (11- or 12-ounce) bags semisweet or bittersweet chocolate chips
1 cup dried, pitted sour cherries (we get ours at Trader Joe’s)
Heat oven to 250. Line a 12-by-17-inch jelly roll pan (or rimmed baking sheet) with parchment paper.
In a small saucepan over medium-low heat, heat the oil until a drop of water sizzles on contact, about 3 minutes. Stir in the pumpkin seeds and cook, stirring constantly until the seeds are fragrant, starting to brown, and making popping sounds, about 3 or 4 minutes (sometimes the pumpkin seeds fly right out of the pan, so be careful!). Turn off the heat, stir in the salt and cayenne, and leave to cool about 5 minutes.
Scatter the chocolate chips evenly in the prepared pan. This is a great job for an enthusiastic helper:
Place pan in the oven for 5 minutes, then remove and spread chocolate with a rubber spatula.
Scatter the cherries over the top of the melted chocolate, then scatter the pumpkin seeds; push them in a bit so that they really stick.
Chill at least 2 hours, until firm enough to break into pieces, then store in the refrigerator until ready for gifting.
