Monthly Archives: December 2015

Apple Cider Snaps

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 Have you ever read any of Rose Levy Beranbaum’s work? Well, you should. She is an accomplished baker and writer with several books to her name, the seminal work being The Cake Bible. She’s also written books on pie, bread, cookies, and general baking, and I own almost all of them. I love all her books and reference them regularly, but this time of year I am especially into Rose’s Christmas Cookies. The book is full of old-fashioned, elegant recipes, a million thoughtful tips to ensure success, and even has such categories as “Cookies for Giving” and “Cookies for Sending.” Basically, what I’m saying is that Rose Levy Beranbaum knows what’s up when it comes to holiday baking (and all baking, for that matter).

In the section “Cookies for Holiday Dinner Parties,” she has a recipe for Brandy Snaps Filled with Whipped Cream. They are absolutely stunning–ginger-spiced lacy cookies rolled like cigars and filled with whipped cream. Who wouldn’t want one? Well, children probably. Nothing tastes worse in little mouths than a hint of booze. And I don’t like brandy either. But I do love lacy cookies and whipped cream, so I decided to make a non-alcoholic version of a classic. I rummaged around our fridge looking for something, anything that could work in place of brandy and, lo and behold, we had a half gallon of freshly pressed apple cider. And while apple cider may say autumn to many, it says Christmas to me.     These cookies start by cooking butter, golden syrup, brown sugar, apple pie spices, and salt until they come to a boil. Then the mixture is removed from the heat so flour and apple cider can be stirred in. Drop tablespoons of dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment or a silicone baking mat, lest they become stuck to the pan. These spread about four inches, so there shouldn’t be many on the sheet. I have a tiny apartment oven, so I can do four at a time on two sheet pans. Bake these for 7-10 minutes at 350F, until they are lightly browned and are still flexible. For me, this is almost exactly 7 minutes–any longer and they become difficult to roll. They should not wrinkle when lifted. Speaking of lifting, don’t even think about it without a thin spatula in hand. I use a small offset icing knife with good results.

Now, you must work quickly here. Remove cookies from the sheet pan one at a time and immediately roll them around the handle of a wooden spoon or dowel. Press the edges to seal them. Then, slide the rolled cookie off of the handle and set aside to cool on a rack while you complete the rest. I recommend wearing rubber gloves while you do this, as the cookies will be very hot. The rolled cookies are filled with whipped cream. And while plain whipped cream would be just fine, why not jazz it up a bit? This cream is flavored with an extra little bit of apple cider, just to really drive home the apple flavor. Use a piping bag fitted with a tip to fill each cookie. The whipped cream will start to liquefy again after a little while, so don’t fill these until right before you are ready to serve.

While these cookies are simple, they aren’t easy, but they are worth all the effort. This time of year, it’s so easy to look for shortcuts in all the busyness, but there is something to be said for taking the time to make something the old-fashioned way. I highly recommend spending a little time making these crispy, crunchy, cream-filled cookies with notes of caramel and apple cider. As Ms. Beranbaum says, these cookies would be a sweet ending to a holiday dinner party. Your family and friends will certainly appreciate them.

Looking for more holiday cookies? See my Whipped Shortbread Snowballs, Eggnog Sandwich Cookies, and Red Velvet Peppermintdoodles. Stay tuned for eight more recipes during the Twelve Days of Cookies! Apple Cider Snaps
adapted from Brandy Snaps Filled with Whipped Cream in Rose’s Christmas Cookies by Rose Levy Beranbaum
makes two dozen cookies

Cookies:
10.5 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
2/3 cup Lyle’s Golden Syrup*
1/4 cup light brown sugar*
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
1/8 teaspoon ground ginger
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1 cup all purpose flour
4 teaspoons freshly pressed apple cider

Cider Whipped Cream:
2 cups heavy cream
1 tablespoon light brown sugar
1 tablespoon freshly pressed apple cider
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 350F. Line two sheet pans with parchment paper or silicone baking mats. Set aside.

Make the cookies. In a heavy bottomed saucepan, combine butter, golden syrup, brown sugar, cinnamon, allspice, ginger, nutmeg, and salt. Stir over medium-high heat just until it comes to a boil. Remove the pot from the heat and immediately stir in the flour, followed by the apple cider. Drop tablespoons of the dough onto the baking sheets, leaving ample room for them to spread (at least four inches). Place the pot of dough in a bowl of hot water to keep it fluid. Bake cookies for 7-10 minutes, rotating the pans top-to-bottom and front-to-back at 3 minutes. When the cookies are light golden brown and lacy, remove the pans from the oven. Let cool one minute.

Working quickly, use a small flexible spatula to remove each cookie, and gently wrap it around the handle of a wooden spoon or a 1″ dowel. Press the outer seam to hold the shape. Remove the rolled cookies to a rack to cool completely. Repeat until all dough is used.

Make the Cider Whipped Cream. With an electric mixer, beat cream and brown sugar just until the mixer starts to leave defined marks in the cream. Add apple cider and vanilla, and continue to whip the cream until fluffy. Place it in a piping bag with a tip. Immediately before serving, pipe whipped cream into rolled cookies on each end. Serve immediately.

Un-filled rolled cookies keep covered at room temperature for up to 24 hours. Whipped cream will keep in the refrigerator for up to two days, but will need to be lightly whipped before piping.

Notes:
1. Light corn syrup may be substituted.
2. Dark brown sugar may be substituted in both the cookies and the whipped cream.

Apple Cider Snaps

Whipped Shortbread Snowballs

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 I love shortbread. Have you noticed? I’ve only been blogging regularly for five weeks and have already posted a chocolate chip version and a vanilla-almond version. What can I say? I love butter. So, here’s a third shortbread recipe. Now, before you go thinking that I’m a one-trick baker, you should know that this recipe is different. It’s special. Where the other two recipes are thin and crisp, this shortbread is whipped to high heaven and then baked in a low oven until it is just barely baked through. The cookies won’t turn golden–they’ll just be puffy and airy and buttery and magical. Then they’re coated in confectioner’s sugar, which makes their texture even silkier, and has the added benefit of making them look like little snowballs! I hate this term, but these are the kind of cookies that melt in your mouth. They’ll be absolutely divine on a holiday cookie tray.  This recipe is anything but complicated, but it does require some precision in the mixing. Let two sticks of butter soften to room temperature. You want them just soft enough to give a little when pressed with a clean finger. Don’t let them get melty at all. Our apartment stays cold in the fall and winter no matter how high we turn the heat, so here’s what I do. I cut the butter into 1/2 inch pats, set them on a plate, and then let them sit for 45 minutes to an hour. Perfectly softened butter every time. Once the butter is soft, place it in a large bowl and beat it with an electric mixer for two solid minutes. Then, add in 1/2 cup of confectioner’s sugar, and beat again until it is completely combined. Do not use granulated sugar here–the cornstarch in the confectioner’s sugar is required if you want a smooth texture. And trust me, you want that texture. Add in a touch of vanilla extract, and beat it again.  Now, make sure you have everything you need for the next seven-or-so minutes because you’re in it for the long haul. Beat in the flour, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. And then, keep beating. Beat some more. Beat even more than that. Once the flour is incorporated, you need to beat the dough for six minutes, and no less. This is what makes this shortbread “whipped.” We want this dough to be lighter than air. So, even if it looks like a cloud in a bowl at four minutes, keep going to six. As shortbread has no leavening (hence why it’s “short”), we need all the air we can get into the dough so that our final cookies are domed and gorgeous. The dough, whipped for six full minutes, will look and feel like the fluffiest frosting ever.     

 Use a small cookie scoop to scoop the dough onto parchment-lined sheet pans. Bake them at 275F for 28-32 minutes. Yes, that seems like eternity for cookies, but we aren’t so much baking these cookies as we are drying them out. Once they are just baked through, let them cool on the pans and then on a rack. I like to coat these in confectioner’s sugar because it makes them look like snowballs! Be extremely gentle as whipped shortbread are very delicate.

This recipe is an excellent base for many holiday cookies, and you will definitely see it again before the Twelve Days of Cookies are over. Whipped Shortbread Snowballs will be a welcome presence at any cookie exchange or holiday party, and would make a delightful holiday gift. De-light-ful. See what I did there?

*crickets*

Anyway… Put Whipped Shortbread Snowballs on your shortlist for holiday baking. “Short” list! Get it?

*more crickets*

Whatever. I think I’m funny.

Need more holiday cookie recipes? Check out my Eggnog Sandwich Cookies and Red Velvet Peppermintdoodles, and come back for nine more cookie recipes before December 25th!  Whipped Shortbread Snowballs
barely adapted from Whipped Shortbread by The Kitchen Magpie
makes about three dozen cookies

Cookies:
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1/2 cup confectioner’s sugar
1/2 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour

Coating:
1 1/2-2 cups confectioner’s sugar

Preheat the oven to 275F. Line two sheet pans with parchment paper and set aside.

Place the softened butter in a large mixing bowl. With an electric mixer, cream the butter for two minutes, until fluffy and lighter in color. Beat in confectioner’s sugar and salt, scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Beat in vanilla. Add in flour in two installments. Continue beating dough for 6 minutes, until extremely light and fluffy.

Using a small cookie scoop, place dough onto prepared pans, leaving 2 inches between dough balls. Bake for 28-32 minutes until cookies are baked, but not golden brown at all. Let cool on the pans for ten minutes before removing to a rack to cool completely. You may serve these plain, or coat them.

To coat the shortbread, place 1 1/2-2 cups of confectioner’s sugar in a bowl. Gently coat each cookie in the confectioner’s sugar to coat completely before placing them back on the rack.

Whipped Shortbread Snowballs will keep covered at room temperature for up to a week. The coating may sink into the cookies, but that is easily remedied by coating them again. Enjoy!

Whipped Shortbread Snowballs

Eggnog Sandwich Cookies

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  Welcome back to Twelve Days of Cookies!

Have you ever made old-fashioned eggnog? It is a process. I had a friend who was very into the idea of homebrewing, but thought it was too intense to actually attempt it himself. About five years ago, he obtained an eggnog recipe from the super-geniuses at MIT though, and somehow convinced me that I should attempt it with him. Never mind that I had never tried eggnog and generally thought it sounded gross (we’ll get to my aversion to liquid dairy later). One late autumn Sunday, we collected all the necessary ingredients and got to work. I remember startling amounts of heavy cream, light cream, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, a handle of bourbon, and cracking and separating two dozen eggs. The MIT guys had figured out that whipping the egg whites made for a better final result. We put it in the biggest stockpot I’ve ever seen in a home kitchen, and stuck it all in a fridge deep in the basement of his family home. After three weeks, it was deemed safe enough to try. All I remember is that it was kind of like melted ice cream. It was after this little taste that he told me he was going to let it ferment in the fridge for A YEAR, when it would be “at its peak.” I was secretly grateful when his dad tossed it during a cleaning rampage six months later. Year old eggs and dairy? Not my thing. I’ll stick to the stuff in a box. And to bypass my previously mentioned aversion to milk, I’ll throw it in some cookies and fill them with frosting. That’s an eggnog recipe I can get behind.

These cookies are soft and sweet, full of eggnog flavor, and spiced with cinnamon and nutmeg. When I began thinking about an eggnog cookie recipe about a year ago, I couldn’t imagine that they would be good. Maybe they would taste right, but they’d be cakey. A good rule of thumb is that the higher the ratio of liquid to flour in a cookie recipe, the cakier the final product will be. Luckily, I’ve learned a lot about making chewy cookies in the last several years and have a few baking chemistry tricks up my sleeve. Here, we use two egg yolks, and then replace the volume of egg whites with eggnog. This nixes the possibility of cakey cookies and ensures a soft and chewy texture. To amp up the eggnog flavor, we add 1/2 teaspoon each of cinnamon and nutmeg and a splash of pure vanilla extract. The dough will appear very soft and fluffy after mixing, and will need a chill. This will allow the butter to re-solidify and the flavors to meld. Don’t skip the chill! This is what will give us soft, chewy cookies to fill with a thick eggnog frosting. The alternative are crunchy, possibly lacy cookies. We don’t have time for those this holiday season.      The eggnog frosting filling is a snap to make. Just whip together shortening, confectioner’s sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt, then add in a few tablespoons of eggnog and some vanilla. That’s it. I’ve mentioned my belief in wiggle room when it comes to dessert, but if you are not into using shortening, you may substitute and equal volume of softened unsalted butter. The shortening will have a filling more reminiscent of Oreos, and the butter will have a (you guessed it!) more buttery flavor. Either way, the filling takes these cookies over the top! The soft cookies and the creamy filling together just…well, they’re magical.

No matter whether you enjoy eggnog as a beverage or not, you won’t be able to resist these cookies. Sweet, creamy, spicy, and chewy?! You can’t go wrong with these. Make sure to make room for these on your cookie trays this year!

Looking for more holiday cookies? Check out my Red Velvet Peppermintdoodles and Chewy Pumpkin Ginger Cookies!  Eggnog Sandwich Cookies
makes about five dozen sandwich cookies

Cookies:
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon Kosher or sea salt
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened to room temperature
1 1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg*
2 large egg yolks, room temperature
4 tablespoons eggnog*
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Filling:
1/2 cup shortening*
2 1/4-2 1/2 cups confectioner’s sugar
pinch of ground cinnamon
pinch of ground nutmeg
pinch of Kosher or sea salt
3 tablespoons eggnog
1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside.

In a separate mixing bowl, beat the butter with a hand mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in sugar and spices until completely combined. Add egg yolks one at a time, mixing until combined. Then mix in the eggnog and vanilla. Turn the hand mixer to low, add in the flour mixture in two installments. Cover the dough with plastic wrap and
chill for 90 minutes or up to 2 days.

Preheat the oven to 350F. Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper. Set aside.

Scoop the dough in one teaspoon increments. Roll dough into balls, and set them two inches apart on your prepared pans. Bake cookies for 7-8 minutes, until the tops no longer look doughy. Let cool on the baking sheets for 7-10 minutes before transferring to a rack to cool completely. Repeat process until all dough has been used.

To make the filling, place the shortening in a large mixing bowl, and beat with a hand mixer on low speed. Once it’s smooth, add in 2 1/4 cups confectioner’s sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt in two installments, until smooth. Beat in eggnog and vanilla. If you’d like the filling to be thicker, add an additional 1/4 cup of confectioner’s sugar. If you would like to pipe the filling, place it in a plastic sandwich bag, and snip off a corner.

There are two options for filling.

1. To assemble a sandwich cookie by piping, apply filling by pipe a circle in the middle of the underside of one cookie, leaving about 1/4″ around the edge. Top with a second plain cookie, with the underside filling-side-in. Repeat until all cookies have been used.

2. To assemble a sandwich cookie by spreading, use an offset frosting knife to spread 1/2-1 teaspoon on the underside of one cookie. Top with a second plain cookie, with the underside filling-side-in. Repeat until all cookies have been used.

Sandwich cookies keep covered at room temperature for up to a week.

Notes:

1. I recommend using freshly grated nutmeg. It has a much more pronounced flavor than the pre-ground variety.
2. I use Horizon Organic Low Fat Eggnog.
3. If you do not wish to use shortening, you may use 1/2 cup room temperature butter.