Moving Cookies

I haven't disappeared, but I have been without internet for a few weeks.  Anyway, here's a post I started in the midst of moving.  Far too many things have crossed my mind since I set out to make these, but details don't really matter when you add peanut butter and chocolate chips to a thick and chewy oatmeal raisin cookie, do they?  I'm mostly unpacked and settled in now, but the following paragraphs are a taste of what I was up to when I should have been packing.......

Moving cookies. These are moving cookies. Otherwise known as Melissa has way to many things to be doing/packing/finishing up etc. but can't concentrate on any of them so she just ends up making cookies. Yeah, those kind of cookies.

Our first red flag is cookie justification.  Oh I could take a break and make cookies to give to people who are helping me pack and move. Thank you cookies. Goodbye cookies. Besides, I do have a recipe that needs testing and tweaking. 

The first few minutes of measuring and mixing are indeed a therapeutic zone-out to avoid the task at hand.  But then comes the dough.  Stress eating half a batch of dough and then barely having enough cookies left to give your helpers only heightens the tension and anxiety inside.  But it happens.   Happened.   More than once.   Ugh, will I ever learn?   Note to self: open jars of peanut butter and half-empty bags of chocolate chips are not helpful, especially after all that cookie dough.

It almost seems like an insult to exchange cookies for moving help, these don't come close to repaying all the help I've received.  THANK YOU to all the patient, strong, hard-working helpers.  I wish I had words to express how much I appreciate you.  I just don't know how to thank you, and so by default I make cookies.

Moving Cookies
recipe inspired and adapted from a conglomeration of too many things for me to tell you about right now

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla
1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
2-1/2 cups uncooked quick-oats
1 cup raisins
1 cup chocolate chips
1/2 cup chopped walnuts

Instructions: (Danger! Do not proceed under stressful situations, you will just eat too much dough. Rapid and mindless consumption of dough, leftover ingredients and warm cookies will not help in the long run.)
* Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
* In a large bowl cream together butter, peanut butter, brown sugar and granulated sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and vanilla.
* In a small bowl combine flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon; stir into wet ingredients.  Mix in oats.  Add raisins, chocolate chips and walnuts; stir to combine.
* Scoop mounded tablespoonfuls of dough onto ungreased cookie sheets.  Flatten slightly with palm of hand.  Bake 9-10 minutes or until edges just begin to turn golden brown.  Let cool 1-2 minutes before transferring to wire cooling racks.

Food for Thought: The prudent see danger and take refuge, but the simple keep going and suffer for it. -Proverbs 27:12

Flashback Friday: Camp Cookies

Flashback Friday: Revisiting a recipe from long ago

Camp cookies are a longstanding tradition at our house.  Most of my growing up years we went camping for several weeks each summer.  Whether it was a week at a state park or a 3 week road trip packing in as many national parks as possible, we made lots of memories.  No matter where we went these cookies were a part of each trip, which is exactly why we call them camp cookies.  I know, brilliant, right?

The best thing about these cookies is we were allowed to eat them for breakfast.  Loaded with oats, peanut butter and raisins + the fact that we were on vacation made these a perfectly acceptable breakfast.  Many an early morning my parents would carry us to the car still in our sleeping bags.  Breakfast on the road meant reaching over the backseat and into the trunk to find the ice cream pail full of camp cookies.  Of course they also doubled as dessert, hiking snacks and "are we there yet?" silencers.

Let's see, what else do you need to know about this tradition? True to our last minute form, a gigantic batch of these monster cookies found their way to the oven late into the night or in the wee hours of the morning before we left.  While the cookies baked there was plenty of time to cram things into the car, finish laundry and stuff it into suitcases and gather all the camping gear.

Oh, you also need to be a strategic spiller when you make these.  The M&M's are never measured, just dumped and spilled into the dough.  I usually tried to make sure my mom spilled in a few extra.  Depending on the length of our trip we would make up to 3 big batches. Penciled into our cookbook are measurements for a double and triple batch, which I've included in the recipe below.  I'm not sure we ever made just a single batch, they disappear too quickly.

Three week road trips definitely meant a triple batch, which barely fit into our trusty yellow mixing bowl.  When the bowl is literally so full the dough falls out, you had better eat some.  And trust me when I say this dough is seriously good.  It's probably a good thing cookie dough doesn't travel well or I'd never have had room for smores. Though the days of family camping trips are long past these camp cookies are still a family favorite.

Camp Cookies
adapted from an old church cookbook recipe submitted by Miriam Fokema Rogers to "Our Favorite Recipes, United Methodist Church of Kasson"

Ingredients: (double recipe, triple recipe)
1/2 cup butter, softened (1 c, 1-1/2 c)
1/2 cup peanut butter (1 c, 1-1/2 c)
1 cup granulated sugar (2 c, 3 c)
1 cup packed brown sugar (2 c, 3 c)
2 large eggs (4, 6)
1/4 cup milk (1/2 c, 3/4 c)
1 tsp vanilla (2 tsp, 1 Tbsp)
1-3/4 cup all-purpose flour (3-1/2 c, 5-1/4 c)
1 tsp baking soda (2 tsp, 1 Tbsp)
1/2 tsp salt (1 tsp, 1-1/2 tsp)
3 cups oats (6 c, 9 c) (I used 1-1/2 cups quick oats and 1-1/2 cups rolled oats....or whatever you have on hand at midnight the night before your camping trip)
1 cup peanuts (2 c, 3 c)
1 cup raisins  (2 c, 3 c)
1 cup candy coated chocolate pieces  (2 c, 3 c) (please don't measure here, just dump generously or spill in some extra.  We usually use both plain and peanut candy coated chocolate pieces...which doubles the spilling opportunities.)

Instructions: (if making a triple batch, use an extra large bowl)
* Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
* In a large bowl cream together butter, peanut butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, milk and vanilla.
* In a separate bowl combine flour, baking soda and salt; stir into wet ingredients.  Mix in oats then stir in peanuts, raisins and candy coated chocolate pieces.
* Using a cookie scoop (or ice cream scoop for monster cookies), scoop dough onto ungreased baking sheets.  Bake 10-12 minutes (slightly longer for larger cookies) or until edges are golden brown and centers are almost (but not quite) set. Let stand 3 minutes before transferring to wire cooling racks.  When completely cool, store in airtight containers. (We always used 5-gallon ice cream pails for camping trips.)

Food for Thought: "Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul." -John Muir

Flashback Friday: Good Jumbo Raisin Cookies

Flashback Friday: Revisiting a recipe from long ago

These cookies more than make up for that disappointing Mock Angel Food cake I told you about last Friday.  I expected a rather plain and boring old-lady cookie full of nuts and raisins, but boy was I wrong.  Each lovely bite was soft and just a hint chewy, but not cakey.  You know, like all the goodness of a fresh, warm cookie....only they stayed that way even when they weren't straight out of the oven.  And believe me when I say I taste tested them at multiple stages; as dough, straight from the pan, cooled 5 min, cooled 10 min, 30 min later, 2 hours later, breakfast the next morning, within 20 seconds of walking in the door after work, and, well, you get the idea.  Not even possible to just eat one.

Flashback Friday: Mrs. Alton's Brown Sugar Cookies

Flashback Friday: Revisiting a recipe from long ago

Going through my great-grandma's recipe notebook is going to be a little more time consuming than I first anticipated.  I decided to start off with a recipe she'd copied down twice- Mrs. Alton's Brown Sugar Cookies.  I haven't figured out who Mrs. Alton is yet, but my great-grandma must have liked her cookie recipe.  Though it appears in two separate places, neither recipe gives instructions or lists a measurement for flour. Great-grandma either knew it by heart, or couldn't quite figure out Mrs. Alton's secret.

I can only guess at what Mrs. Alton or my great-grandma might have done. What I wouldn't give to have just a picture or description of the original cookie! Was it a drop cookie or a cut-out cookie?  Do I add enough flour to make a spoonable dough or a rollable dough? (at least in these pfeffernusse cookies she noted to add enough flour to roll the dough like a rope).  There are more possibilities than I have time to test, so I'll just tell you about the assumptions I made.

Flashback Friday: Great-Aunt Eleanor's Sour Cream Raisin Pie

Flashback Friday: Revisiting a recipe from long ago

Old recipes rarely include detailed instructions for the modern day cook.  What was considered common sense in our great-grandmother's generation was passed on from mother to daughter by hands-on experience and not necessarily written down in recipe format.   Details, tips and tricks of the trade were learned at home, and written recipes were intended as guidelines or reminders, not do-it-yourself, fail-proof tutorials.

This sour cream raisin pie recipe from my great-aunt Eleanor is over 100 years old.  It left me guessing in a few places, causing me to look up some of the details I mentioned yesterday.  It would be interesting to go back and make this recipe with her.  I don't think my meringue turned out as intended, but I've no way of knowing what hers was like in the first place.

Tuesday's Twist: Easter Leftovers

Tuesday's Twist:  A basic recipe with a fun twist.  In other words, just another excuse for me to play around with weird recipes I've been dying to try.

I have countless recipes to share with you, but every last inch of our fridge is packed with Easter leftovers.  It would be slightly ridiculous for me to make more food for you today.  I mean, I like you and all, but you're going to get leftovers.  Actually, sharing leftovers means you're practically family.  I'm not even going disguise these leftovers by turning them into something new.  We're just going to reheat and eat.  Or maybe we'll just eat them cold.  I don't know, what do you feel like?  I'm kind of thinking cold, but I suppose you can pick since I've already had them a few times.

While these leftovers taste great, they look a little, well, leftover.  I didn't bother with pictures on Easter so I'll just give you a recap of the recipes and events of the day.

* This Lemon Orzo with Asparagus is the only thing that looks, what shall we say, not-quite-as-leftoverish?  What's not to love about a dish that's flavorful, simple and comes together quickly?  I guess I can dig out the camera, but only for this one or we'll never empty out that fridge.

* These hot cross buns were one of the first things I ever made with candied ginger.  Needless to say I've been hooked (and slightly obsessed) with it ever since.  Candied ginger, golden raisins and dried cranberries are kneaded into a whole wheat dough flavored with spices and orange and lemon zest.  But you should have some of the leftover plain white rolls, I don't really want to share these.

*Save room for red potatoes roasted with rosemary and a touch of honey.  Sorry, no recipe here, I just chopped, tossed and roasted.

* The same goes for the salad, minus the roasting of course.  Chopped romaine layered with sweet peas, crunchy celery, radish slivers, green onion and a sprinkle of cashews, lightly dressed with a dill vinaigrette.

* I also threw together a quick fruit platter with strawberries, red and green grape clusters, fresh pineapple and oranges.

* Oh yeah, I almost forgot, ham.  Just help yourself.

* I'll even get you a clean plate for dessert, Grasshopper (mint) pie.  Well, sort of.  The crust was too hard and the filling didn't really set up, not a recipe I'd use again.  But if you throw the leftovers in the freezer it's just about right.  Actually, forget the plate, let's just eat it right out of the pan.

My mom's coworker brought us this fresh herb pot, ahhh so fragrant.  Rosemary and oregano have poked through so far, but the label has quite a few others listed.  Let's hope I can keep it alive long enough to see what else comes up.

After dinner we spent the afternoon viewing old family slides from the 60's and 70's.  My aunt and uncle have been diligently sorting boxes and boxes of slides from my grandma's house.  It was fun to see pictures of my dad's side of the family and hear the stories that went along with them.  After a few hours of that we got out the munchies like this Cranberry Orange Party Mix.

Food for Thought: "If we let ourselves, we shall always be waiting for some distraction or other to end before we can really get down to our work. The only people who achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while the conditions are still unfavorable. Favorable conditions never come." -C.S. Lewis

Random Recipe Wednesday: Gingered Carrot-Pineapple Slaw

I have a stack of old magazines lingering in my room.  And by lingering I mean collecting dust.  Don't get me wrong, I read them cover to cover multiple times, but when the pile is literally knee-deep it's time to do some recycling.  About a third of these magazines are food magazines.  I decided (again) to page through them just one more time before tossing them for good.

Random Recipe Wednesday: Banana-Raisin Brown Bread

Once again I fell for a deal.  I really need to stop checking the kitchen section of the thrift store every time I get groceries.  But they're right next to each other and you just never know what someone might get rid of.  I've always got my eye out for All-Clad pans, vintage Pyrex bowls, cute props and cookbooks.  Thankfully I don't find what I'm looking for most of the time.  This time, however, I couldn't pass up these shimmering measuring spoons and a miniature ceramic loaf pan.  I literally stood there for 5 minutes trying to decide if I was really going to buy them.  Then I walked around another 10 minutes hoping to change my mind.  As you can see that strategy didn't work.

Random Recipe Wednesday: Carrot Cake Breakfast Bites

Sometimes I get things a little backwards and eat cookie dough for breakfast.  This time I made what some would call breakfast cookies and ate them for supper, snacks and pretty much everything but breakfast.

I hesitate to even say breakfast cookie, because these really aren't cookies.  Let's call them breakfast bites.  Without any butter, oil or sugar you can not have a cookie.  What we do have is a hearty and satisfying breakfast/snack that leaves you feeling full, healthy and energized.  Dried fruit, nuts and oats are ground in the food processor then mixed with shredded carrot and apple and a mashed banana.  See, it's breakfasty but it's not a cookie.

Flashback Friday: Swedish Rye Bread

Flashback Friday: Revisiting a recipe from long ago

What can I say, I felt like baking bread again.  After Tuesday's citrus soup and Wednesday's casserole with caraway a loaf of bread featuring both citrus and caraway seemed appropriate.  A few weeks ago I shared my Great-Grandma's Rye Bread with you.  There are several rye bread recipes in the family all of which are fairly similar.  One can almost piece together the recipes, tracing the transformations created by passing the recipe from one family member to the next.

Rather than try all the variations, I decided to combine the overlapping features for an all-inclusive loaf.  What is boils down to (errr, bakes up to) is a rye loaf sweetened with molasses and laced with orange, caraway and raisins.  Orange takes center stage in this sweet loaf while caraway lingers in the background.  Raisins make an occasional appearance as well thanks to my Great-Aunt Irene.

Festive Friday: Yulekaga - Our Christmas Morning Tradition

Festive Friday: You can always find room to squeeze in a few more treats around the holidays.

Christmas mornings in our family have always involved Yulekaga, a Scandinavian Christmas bread.  My mom remembers her mom making this bread on Christmas Eve and giving it as gifts to the neighbors.  The tradition has continued in that our Christmas mornings still involve this family bread.  I grew up calling it you-la-clog-la, which still gives my mom and I a good laugh.  I wish I had been old enough to make it with my grandma just once, but I never had the chance.  Fortunately my mom was able to watch my grandma one year and took notes.

My grandma never really followed a recipe and didn't necessarily do things the same each year.  Similarly, we tend to pull out the faded note card but seldom write down our exact adjustments.  I wasn't about to change that this year, but the recipe below is fairly close to our tradition.  I typed out the notes from the recipe card my mom used while watching my grandma and then reformatted it to a style closer to the recipes I usually post here.  As one of my friends says, this is a follow your heart kind of recipe.  I wasn't thinking of pictures on Christmas morning, but here are a few slices we had left the next day.

Yulekaga (Scandinavian Christmas Bread)
recipe from my Grandma as observed by my mom
makes 4 coffee cakes

Heat 2 cups milk to scalding, cool in bowl. Put 2 packages yeast in 1/2 cup lukewarm water (she puts 1 in water and 1 in milk). Add 1 cup sugar to milk. Melt butter to make 1/2 cup and add ~2-3 tsp ground cardamom. Add to milk. Add yeast mixture and 3 eggs. Add enough flour to make dough like most bread (approx 3 cups per 1 cup liquid.) Knead. Let rise. Roll in rectangle. Butter surface. Cover with brown sugar. Cover with fruit and raisins. Put on cookie sheet in crescent  shape. Make slits across top. Let rise. Bake 20-30 minutes at 350 or 375 if bread needs to rise. Frost when cool. .

modified version we used this year 
Ingredients:

Bread:
1 cup milk
2-1/4 tsp active dry yeast
1/4 cup lukewarm water
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup butter, melted
1-2 tsp cardamom seeds, finely crushed
2 large eggs
1 tsp salt (this must have been forgotten on the handwritten copy. Salt is an essential ingredient in yeast breads.)
 4-5 cups all-purpose flour

Filling:
melted butter (about 2 Tbsp per loaf)
brown sugar
ground cinnamon
candied fruit
raisins

Frosting:
powdered sugar
butter, softened
milk or water
vanilla, optional


Instructions:
* Heat milk to scalding, let cool to lukewarm. Dissolve yeast in warm water, add milk and sugar. Stir in butter, cardamom, eggs and salt.  Add flour, 1 cup at a time, until dough is stiff enough to knead. Turn dough onto floured surface and knead until smooth and elastic, adding flour as needed. Let rise in a warm place until doubled in size.
* Cut dough in half and roll each half into a rectangle. Spread with melted butter. Cover with brown sugar and sprinkle with ground cinnamon. Top with candied fruit and raisins. Roll into a log, sealing edges well. Transfer log to a greased baking sheet and form into crescent shape. Cut slits across top, cover and let rise until almost doubled. Meanwhile, open Christmas presents. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes. Let cool. Stir together frosting ingredients until desired consistency is reached. Spread over bread.

Food for Thought: "Let us make one point, that we meet each other with a smile, when it's difficult to smile. Smile at each other, make time for each other in your family." -Mother Theresa 

Weird Recipe Wednesday: Pumpkin Wild Rice Salad

Weird Recipe Wednesday: Because some recipes are so weird I just HAVE to try them.  My curiosity always gets the better of me.

This warm autumn salad is packed with fall flavors.  Loaded with healthy ingredients this cozy side boasts a delicate balance between sweet and savory.  Caramelized onions and roasted cauliflower blend with the nuttiness of wild rice.  Sweet, delicate pumpkin notes mingle with crisp apples, soft raisins and a subtle hint of warm cinnamon.

Tuesday's Twist: Monster Cookie Popcorn

Tuesday's Twist:  A basic recipe with a fun twist.  In other words, just another excuse for me to play around with weird recipes I've been dying to try.

Between my obsession with peanut butter and my love of popcorn, it's not too surprising for me to combine the two.  I've been making peanut butter caramel corn for a while, but decided to jazz it up a bit for this week's twist.  Popcorn coated with the quintessential ingredients of a monster cookie leads to inevitable munching.

I can justify the munching, no problem.  You see, eating this crunchy snack is much healthier than just eating cookie dough.  Popcorn is a whole grain, so are rolled oats. Win, win.  Peanuts and peanut butter provide protein and raisins count as fruit.  Chocolate is made from cocoa beans so it's practically a vegetable. Wait a minute, that doesn't sound right. Don't believe everything you read.  Are cocoa beans similar enough to black beans to aid in our justification?  Hmmm, maybe we should just go with all things in moderation.

Fermented Friday: Rosemary Rum Raisin Biscotti

Fermented Friday: recipes featuring yeast, wine, beer or some form of fermentation

By the time you read this, I will likely be on the road for an extended four day weekend trip. I'll be back sometime Monday so there may or may not be a Monday post.  Fortunately for you, I squeezed in some time to bake cookies before I left.
  

Rather than our ususal beer, yeast or wine recipe, this week's featured fermented ingredient is spiced rum.  Rum is produced by fermenting and distilling sugar byproducts such as molasses.  While rum is often aged for a year or more, you don't have to wait that long to crunch away at these enticing biscotti.

Fermented Friday: Oatmeal Stout Raisin Cookies

Fermented Friday: recipes featuring yeast, wine, beer or some form of fermentation

The characteristic smoothness of an oatmeal stout comes from the addition of oats to the mash. If you're interested, this article gives a brief overview on the science of brewing oatmeal stout.  While brewers need to understand the gelatinization, viscosity and gum content of oats, you just need a reason to make cookies with beer.

Oatmeal stout seems like a good enough excuse to stir up a batch of oatmeal raisin cookies.   But how will we infuse beer into our cookies?

Not to worry, I've come up with a recipe, you just need enough patience and self-control for a decent portion of dough to make it to the oven. I've got less than zero advice in that area.  Unless you need an example of what not to do?  Ummm, let's just get to the recipe.