This Is Not Your Usual Toaster Strudel...

It's actually just a strudel... A strawberry strudel! Think homemade poptart crossed with an appel strudel minus the apples plus a lot of Daring Bakers goodness. That and powdered sugar. And ahem,

The May Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Linda of make life sweeter! and Courtney of Coco Cooks. They chose Apple Strudel from the recipe book Kaffeehaus: Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague by Rick Rodgers.

Yay! I hope all of you are feeling well because I'm really excited to be back here on the blogging dealy. It's been too long... Long enough for me to have turned into a sophomore in college. Yikes. And now I'm home... and after two weeks I'm almost ready to go back. There's this odd sort of feeling like I don't belong in my family's home anymore - I'm ready to be out if only I had the money.

But I don't have any money (which is why I wake up at 6am every morning to go to work) and living at home this summer means loads more baking and blogging than I could ever hope to accomplish scraping by in a dingy apartment elsewhere.

I know you're here for the baking, so I won't keep you waiting any longer. For some reason when I read this challenege back at the start of the month I had this image in my head that strudel was a cobbler of sorts. I quickly found out otherwise as soon as I saw completed challenge posts with pictures of flakey fruit-filled (or meat/cheese/etc filled) logs popping up all over the place. Good thing I like surprises.


In any case, within 48 hours of getting back to the midwest I had this strawberry concoction in my head and soon on my countertop. I had to take advantage of actually having a kitchen after all. I found the recipe to be rather straight forward but since I don't like apples in my baked goods (gasp!) I veered off into the jungle of fruit desserts and made one up on the fly. I thought it was pretty tasty for a fruit dessert, not my favorite, but recipes with room for improvement are always fun too. Something that wasn't fun: trying to make a warm flakey strudel look decent on camera. Seriously these things are not photogenic. I think I'm too OCD for photographing this dessert - it hurt a little on the inside. But I hope you like it as much as my mother said she did...

Prep Time
Total: 2 hours 15 minutes – 3 hours 30 minutes
It's worth it.
15-20 min to make dough
30-90 min to let dough rest/to prepare the filling
20-30 min to roll out and stretch dough
10 min to fill and roll dough
30 min to bake
30 min to cool
Strawberry Strudel
Ingredients
2 quarts of fresh strawberries (plus another to eat while you bake obviously)
ground cinnamon to taste
2 teaspoons vanilla
1/2 c. sugar
1 stick butter, melted, divided
1/3 c. fresh bread crumbs
strudel dough (recipe below)

Instructions:
1. Wash and cut up your strawberries into quarters, add sugar and vanilla.
2. Heat 3 tablespoons of the butter in a large skillet over medium-high. Add the breadcrumbs and cook whilst stirring until golden and toasted. This will take about 3 minutes. Let it cool completely.
3. Put the rack in the upper third of the oven and preheat the oven to 400°F. Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper. Make the strudel dough as described below.
4. Spread about 3 tablespoons of the remaining melted butter over the dough using your hands. It'll be nice and warm - enjoy it :)
5. Sprinkle the buttered dough with the bread crumbs. I discovered too late that you don't have to use all the breadcrumbs and you don't have to coat the dough. It's better if you just give it a light sprinkling because a heavy hand will give you a strudel like you see in the picture - totally separated layers. Weak sauce.
6. Pour the strawberry mixture in a line on the dough and sprinkle with cinammon as you see fit. It tastes good I promise.
7. Fold the short end of the dough onto the filling and keep on rolling. You might want help... Then transfer the strudel to the prepared baking sheet by lifting it. Curve it into a horseshoe to fit. Tuck the ends under the strudel. Brush the top with the remaining melted butter.
8. Bake the strudel for about 30 minutes or until it is deep golden brown. Cool for at least 30 minutes before slicing. Use a serrated knife and serve either warm or at room temperature. It is best on the day it is baked.

Strudel Dough
from “Kaffeehaus – Exquisite Desserts from the Classic Cafés of Vienna, Budapest and Prague” by Rick Rodgers
Ingredients
1 1/3 cups (200 g) unbleached flour
1/8 teaspoon salt
7 tablespoons (105 ml) water, plus more if needed
2 tablespoons (30 ml) vegetable oil, plus additional for coating the dough
1/2 teaspoon cider vinegar (or any vinegar really... It's a 1/2 tsp for crying out loud)

1. Combine the flour and salt in a stand-mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix the water, oil and vinegar in a measuring cup. Add the water/oil mixture to the flour with the mixer on low speed. You will get a soft dough. Make sure it is not too dry, add a little more water if necessary.
2. Take the dough out of the mixer. Knead until you get a soft dough ball with a somewhat rough surface.
3. Continue kneading by hand on an unfloured work surface. Knead for about 2 minutes. Pick up the dough and throw it down hard onto your working surface occasionally. The bf had a ton of fun chucking the dough around while I did dishes and I'm sure you'll have fun too.
4. Shape the dough into a ball and transfer it to a plate. Oil the top of the dough ball lightly. Cover the ball tightly with plastic wrap. Allow to stand for 30-90 minutes (longer is better).
5. Here are the directions that were given to me: It would be best if you have a work area that you can walk around on all sides like a 36 inch (90 cm) round table or a work surface of 23 x 38 inches (60 x 100 cm). Cover your working area with table cloth, dust it with flour and rub it into the fabric. Put your dough ball in the middle and roll it out as much as you can.Pick the dough up by holding it by an edge. This way the weight of the dough and gravity can help stretching it as it hangs. Using the back of your hands to gently stretch and pull the dough. You can use your forearms to support it.
6. Still the directions that were given: The dough will become too large to hold. Put it on your work surface. Leave the thicker edge of the dough to hang over the edge of the table. Place your hands underneath the dough and stretch and pull the dough thinner using the backs of your hands. Stretch and pull the dough until it's about 2 feet (60 cm) wide and 3 feet (90 cm) long, it will be tissue-thin by this time. Cut away the thick dough around the edges with scissors. The dough is now ready to be filled.
5. & 6. What I did: pull at the sucker till it was thin and glorious. I wasn't too technical about it since the only thing I could walk around to pull the dough was a kitchen stool...

P.S. A few small holes in the dough is not a problem since the dough will be rolled, making the holes pretty much invisible. Besides who cares what it looks like as long as it's tasty, right?

I'm a hypocrit...

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Make It Work - Chocolate Peppermint Patty Cheesecake Style

Please note that… (Drum roll)…. The April 2009 challenge is hosted by Jenny from Jenny Bakes. She has chosen Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake as the challenge. Yay!
It’s that time of month again… Well, the good time of the month when you can count on a regular update from me thanks to the amazing-ness that is Daring Bakers! April’s recipe was a new take on the traditional cheesecake – all we had to do was take the cheesecake recipe and make it lovely. After a stroll through the aisle of Bear Nasties (Cornell’s convenient store. The name is awful I know), I found my inspiration – peppermint patties. Who doesn’t have a thing for mint and chocolate? It’s decadent and refreshing all at once and I haven’t come into contact with a concoction that doesn’t melt in my mouth. As Martha would say, that’s a good thing.

What turned out to be not such a good thing was the serious lack of materials and preparedness thanks to yours truly. You see, I procrastinate. And assumed I would make the cheesecake in the free time I don’t actually have. Usually it works out somehow, but for the past week and a half I’ve been mostly a nauseous zombie in class wishing I was a nauseous lump in bed. It’s weeks like those that I’m glad I have engineering friends because they’re robots and apparently don’t sleep either. In any case, it was a party all night long. Literally.


But back to the baking. The bit about sleep deprivation is important because I never went to the grocery store to get ingredients for the cheesecake challenge… Yeah… Ultimately my friend Charles (the unofficial and seriously skilled baking buddy at school) and I did some crazy improvisation on this recipe because it was a last minute, gosh let’s make cheesecake (!) moment. So I’m giving you the Cornell student’s modified version below, complete with crystal light powder mix and chocolate milk instead of heavy cream. Note that the recipe below is 1/3 of the original recipe only because Bear Nasties was mean to me and only had one 8 oz container of cream cheese. Read on. I’m sure you’ll get a good laugh out of it.

Daring Bakers April 2009 - Cheesecake Centerpiece
Abbey's Infamous Cheesecake (a la Brie)

makes about 12 muffin-sized cheesecakes
Modified Crust Ingredients
1 cup crushed oreos
1/3 stick butter, melted
1 tsp. vanilla extract (extra vanilla = an extra good time)
About 12 peppermint patties (more for garnish… and then even more for snacking on)

Seriously Modified Cheesecake Indgredients
8 oz cream cheese, room temperature
1/3 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/3 cup heavy cream/chocolate milk mixture
Cocoa powder to taste
1/4 tsp powdered crystal light (the kind that makes 2 quarts)
1 tsp. vanilla extract (or the innards of a vanilla bean)
No liqueur for college students (on such short notice anyway haha)

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Begin to boil a large pot of water for the water bath.
2. Mix together the crust ingredients and press into your greased muffin tins. You can press the crust just into the bottom, or up the sides of the pan too - baker's choice. Put a peppermint patty in each muffin cup on top of the crust, preferably in the middle. I suppose you could crush up the patty if you wanted, I liked having the little surprise in there. Set crust aside. I would suggest using those silicon baking cups if you have them in the muffin tin… I was having issues getting the cheesecake-ettes out.
3. Combine cream cheese and sugar in the bowl of a stand-mixer (or in a large bowl if using a hand-mixer… or just mixing by hand… you know how it goes) and cream together until smooth. Add eggs and fully incorporate it. Make sure to scrape down the bowl. Add heavy cream/chocolate milk, vanilla, lemon juice, and cocoa powder and blend until smooth and creamy.
4. Pour batter into prepared crust and tap the pan on the counter a few times to bring all air bubbles to the surface. Place muffin tins in your cake pan full of water. Don’t mess up and put them under water.
5. Bake 20 to 35 minutes, until still a little jiggly. You don't want it to be completely firm at this stage. Close the oven door, turn the heat off, and let rest in the cooling oven for one hour. This lets the cake finish cooking and cool down gently enough so that it won't crack on the top. After one hour, remove cheesecake from oven and lift carefully out of water bath. Let it finish cooling on the counter, and then cover and put in the fridge to chill. Once fully chilled, it is ready to serve. I dumped mine out upside down and then garnished just because I liked the look of it better. But hey, do whatever makes you happy.

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A Spinach "Surprise"

I’m going to be honest… As much as I’d like to think I’m a goddess at all things culinary, cooking in general makes me a little nervous. Baking is easy – how can sugar go wrong? With baking it’s a lot easier to make cookies or cupcakes look lovely by adding pretty colors or a fun dollop of frosting or a spray of sprinkles. A piece of meat or a pile of potatoes… They’re just very bare and it’s easy to appreciate them when you eat them but when it comes to photographing them or even just looking at them, it’s less inspiring than some other sugary confection. That would be the reason I’m in Daring Bakers as opposed to Iron Chef. Not that I'll ever be on that show anyway…
Then the Daring Bakers March Challenge turned out to be lasagna. Make your own pasta. And white sauce. And meat sauce. Cue intimidation. And now cue failure. Because, as you can see from the pasta above, this is in no way, shape, or form lasagna. Oops. I really think my pasta is the best of both worlds - it's a cute shape like sugar cookies and it's healthy for you in that neat Popeye way. Regardless, I followed the basic instructions of making my own spinach pasta and sauce and the result ended up surprisingly satisfying, here's my first feeble attempt at home made pasta for your viewing pleasure.

I’m convinced that the recipe provided is perfectly good and I’m just bad at life. I don't know what went wrong - it went from pile of flour to lumpy mess (so far so good, when you read the directions), but never went past the lumpy mess. I kneaded for about a half hour before giving up and winging the rest of the recipe by adding more water and shaping/testing as I went. The sauce was simple enough and came together and for that I'm forever grateful. If you want to make the legit lasagna then please visit my links and I’m sure you can find the recipe – or feel free to email me and I can send the real recipe right over. But from here on out it’s going to be spinach pasta hearts. My initial failure turned into heart-shaped pieces of goodness for my parent’s impromptu anniversary dinner while I was home over spring break. After a lot of trial and error, it’s surprisingly tasty. That, paired with either the béchamel sauce or a simple tomato sauce (my personal preference), fresh greens with a homemade citrus vinagrette, and a sense of humor, equalled a dinner I'm actually sort of proud of. Sort of.

The March 2009 challenge is hosted by Mary of Beans and Caviar, Melinda of Melbourne Larder and Enza of Io Da Grande. They have chosen Lasagne of Emilia-Romagna from The Splendid Table by Lynne Rossetto Kasper as the challenge.

Spinach Egg Pasta (Pasta Verde)
**Modified from The Splendid Table: Recipes from Emilia-Romagna, the Heartland of Northern Italian Food by Lynne Rossetto Kasper (published by William Morrow and Company Inc., 1992).
Preparation: 45 minutes
Makes enough for 6 to 8 first course servings or 4 to 6 main course servings

Ingredients
2 jumbo eggs
6 ounces frozen chopped spinach, defrosted and squeezed dry

3 1/2 cups all purpose unbleached flour

Equipment
A roomy work surface
A rolling pin
Plastic wrap to cover rolled-out pasta waiting to be filled
A cookie cutter of your desired shape

Directions
1. Mound the flour in the center of your work surface and make a well in the middle. Add the eggs and spinach.

2. Use a wooden spoon to beat together the eggs and spinach. Then gradually start incorporating shallow scrapings of flour from the sides of the well into the liquid. As you work more and more flour into the liquid, the well’s sides may collapse. Use a pastry scraper to keep the liquids from running off and to incorporate the last bits of flour into the dough. Don’t worry if it looks like a hopelessly rough and messy lump.

3. With the aid of the scraper to scoop up unruly pieces, start kneading the dough. Once it becomes a cohesive mass, use the scraper to remove any bits of hard flour on the work surface – these will make the dough lumpy. My dough never became a cohesive mass until I gradually started adding water during the kneading. If you want to attempt to follow my example/your dough sucks at life, i added about a 1/4 cup of water by the end of my kneading adventure.

4. Knead the dough for about 3 minutes. My dough's consistency ended up very thick and heavy and not very sticky. Continue kneading about 10 minutes.

5. After you feel as though you've reached a point of exasperation or you feel that you can work with the dough somewhat easily, divide the dough into manageable chunks and begin rolling them out no thicker than 1/4". Cut with your lovely cookie cutter, making sure to wrap up the bits you aren't working with so that the dough won't dry out.

6. Bring salted water to boil over stovetop, add your pasta, cook until al dente (about 10 minutes), drain, and enjoy your fun little pasta shapes. Add sprinkles and a dollop of - ha, just kidding.

Lynne’s Bechamel
From The Splendid Table: Recipes from Emilia-Romagna, the Heartland of Northern Italian Food by Lynne Rossetto Kasper (published by William Morrow and Company Inc., 1992).
Preparation Time: 15 minutes

Ingredients
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
4 tablespoons all purpose unbleached (plain) flour
2 2/3 cups milk
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
Freshly grated nutmeg to taste

Directions
1. Using a medium-sized saucepan, melt the butter over low to medium heat.

2. Sift over the flour, whisk until smooth, and then stir (without stopping) for about 3 minutes.

3. Whisk in the milk a little at a time and keep the mixture smooth.

4. Bring to a slow simmer, and stir 3 to 4 minutes, or until the sauce thickens. Cook, stirring, for about 5 minutes, until the sauce thickens. Season with salt, pepper, and a hint of nutmeg.

5. Eat, and be merry.

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Dark Chocolate Goodness

Wow, where did the time go? All of a sudden it's almost April, spring break is over, and I'm in the home stretch of my freshman year of college... Yikes. And yikes for this post being so overdue. I don't really have an excuse for that - life is crazy, sure, but the older I get the more I realize that life will be crazy now and forever. Amen. (Yes, that was a Catholic joke/reference. I'm Irish... forgive me). Now I just have to get to a point where I can manage the frenzy enough to buckle down and get my stuff together. Bear with me, at times I can be a slow learner, especially when it comes to time management. In any case, seeing these cookies a month later makes me want to make them and eat them all over again. Tasty isn't enought to describe them - they're rich, decadent, and everything you need when the economy is (still?) failing, tuition is increasing at a scary rate, and financial aid gets cut. Actually, I think I'll go make them right now...

In other news, this post-spring break era of the semester means that I baked cupcakes gallore and the Daring Bakers March Challenge is coming up! So get excited! But onto the good stuff:

Dark-Chocolate Cookies

Modified from Martha Stewart's Cookies "Milk Chocolate Cookies"

Yield: 3 dozen

Ingredients

1 c. all purpose flour

1/2 c. unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

8 ounces good-quality dark chocolate (I used Chirardelli's 70% bittersweet cocoa chips), 4 oz. coarsely chopped, 4 oz. cut into 1/4" chunks

1/2 c. unsalted butter

1 1/2 c. sugar

2 large eggs

2 tsp. pure vanilla extract

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325°F. Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl

2. Melt 4 oz. coarsely chopped chocolate with the butter in a small heatproof bwol set over a pan of simmering water; let cool slightly. I used the microwave but I wouldn't suggest this method as I like the added control of the simmering pan of water.

3. Put chocolate mixture, sugar, eggs, and vanilla in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed until combined. Reduce speed to low; gradually mix in flour mixture. Fold in chocolate chunks. If hand mixing, I suggest tag-teaming the mixture on this one. It's more fun and less pain that way.

4. Roll dough into 1" balls, drop dough onto parchment paper-lined baking sheets, 2 inches apart. Bake until cookies are flat and surfaces crack, about 15 minutes (cookies should be soft). Let cool on parchment on wire racks. Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in airtight containers at room temperature up to 3 days. Technically. Unofficially according to the Bf and me, these cookies are good any time. Seriously. They're super tasty. Go make them.

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Chocolate + Hearts = Life

The cookie madness continues, this time with a tasty remix of your standard cut-out cookie. They've got a hint of cinnamon going on which I was a little wary about at first but after tasting them I have to admit that the cinnamon became a magical little ingredient. It just adds an added dimension of flavor to these pretty simple chocolate cookies that bumps the tasty factor up a notch. I think the beauty of this cookie lies in the simplicity of it. They aren't saturated with flavor but they aren't some tea cookie either. The cut-outs aren't the prettiest cookie, even when heart shaped, but they've got that good homey hand-crafted feeling going on. The imperfect aesthetic in these cookies gives them a certain comforting charm, like the kind of cookies your grandma would make for you when you would come to visit. As lactose intolerant as I am, I have to admit that these cookies would be absolutely perfect heated up in the microwave with a cold glass of milk.

These cookies were also sent to the Bf in the Valentine's package of love and in the two days between receiving these cookies and contracting some downright nasty salmonella/bronchitis, he managed to eat a neat little package of these and promptly gave them a thumbs up. If you really can't stand the plain simplicity of the cookie as I made it feel free to add some colorful sprinkles before baking. I think they could hold up with frosting or even in ice cream sandwiches too. Their simplicity makes the versatile so don't hate on them! Also, a word of advice: don't hand mix with this recipe - it's absolute death. I'm pretty sure I have carpel tunnel.



Chocolate Cookie Cutouts
adapted from Martha Stewart's Cookies
Yield: 3 to 4 dozen

Ingredients
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
1/2 c. plus 2 tbsp. unsweetened cocoa powder
1/8 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon
3/4 c. unsalted butter, room temperature
1 1/2 c. sifted confectioners' sugar
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
Optional: sprinkles for loveliness

Directions
1. Sift flour, cocoa powder, salt, and cinnamon into a bowl. (I didn't do this because as a poor college student sifters aren't in any sort of budget. And if they were the money would promptly go to studio supplies anyway. That being said, I would highly recommend this step anyway)
2. Put butter and confectioners' sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. Mix in eggs and vanilla. Reduce speed to low. Gradually mix in flour mixture. Wrap dough in plastic wrap. Refrigerate until firm, 1 hour or overnight.
3. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out dough to 1/8 inch thick. Transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Chill in freezer 15 minutes.
4. Preheat oven to 350°F. Using your cookie cutter of choice (Martha recommends a 3" cookie cutter), quickly cut out shapes from dough. If dough begins to soften, chill it in freezer 3 to 5 minutes. Re-roll and cut scraps. Transfer shapes to prepared baking sheets, spacing them 2 inches apart. Brush flour from shapes. Sprinkle away now if you're into that sort of thing. Chill in freezer until firm, about 15 minutes.
5. Bake cookies until crisp, about 8 minutes. Let cool completely on sheets on wire racks. Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in an airtight container at room temperature up to 1 week according to Martha. I don't know about you, but my cookies don't last a week at any temperature...

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The Mistake That Went Right

It turns out this week of cookies has been prolonged to a week and a half. Oh gosh. I have to apologize and I hope I can make it up to you... With lovely cookies! Hooray!

These cookies are supposed to be those "soft and chewy" chocolate crackles compliments of Martha's cookie book... But that depended on baking powder and I had only baking soda. I figured it wouldn't make much of a difference untill the cookies started spreading out like crazy and i was left with a panful of flat chocolate and powdered sugar. In Victoria's Secret terms, think more of a sports bra compared with the B-cup these cookies are supposed to be. The issue at hand was that this travesty happened at 2am and I had to mail the Bf his valentine's day package the next day so I went with it regardless - heart shaped cookie cutters to the rescue! In any case, I ended up with a cookie thats more of a combination of crisp, chewy, and full of chocolatey goodness. And decidedly "Brietarded" in their character. Hope you'll find them as tasty as the Bf did...

(Flatty) Chocolate Crackles

adapted from Martha Stewart's Cookies

Yield: about 5 dozen

Ingredients

8 ounces bittersweet chocolate (I used Ghirardelli 70% bittersweet chocolate chips, unchopped. I'm lazy like that)

1 1/4 c. all-purpose flour

1/2 c. unsweetened cocoa powder (Dutch-process if you're a Martha purist...)

2 tsp. baking soda (use baking powder if you want your cookies to be B-cup, use the baking soda if you'd like to try my trainer version)

1/4 tsp. salt

1/2 c. unsalted butter, room temperature

1 1/2 c. packed light brown sugar

2 large eggs

2 tsp. pure vanilla extract

1/3 c. whole milk

1 c. granulated sugar

1 c. confectioners' sugar

Directions

1. Melt chocolate in a heatproof bowl over a pan of simmering water, stirring (I used a microwave, not going to lie...). Set aside and let cool. Sift together flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt in a bowl.

2. With an electric mixer (or by hand if you want to be unfortunate like me), beat butter and brown sugar on medium speed until pale and fluffy, 2 - 3 minutes. Mix in eggs and vanilla, and then the melted chocolate. Reduce speed to low; mix in flour mixture in two batches, alternating with the milk. Divide dough into four equal pieces. Wrap each in plastic; refridgerate until firm, about 2 hours.

3. Preheat oven to 350°F. Divide each piece into sixteen 1-inch balls. Roll in granulated sugar to coat, then in confectioners' sugar to coat. Space 2 inches apart on baking sheets lined with parchment paper.

4. For my flatty cookies, bake 10 minutes rotating halfway through until cookies look pretty solid. Take the sheet out of the oven, count to ten, then take a cookie cutter (if you want them to look pretty at all) and cut out your lovely shapes. Transfer to wire racks, dip in some more powdered sugar when cooled for looks, then feed the scraps of leftover cookies to your hungry pre-med friends. Or anybody. The scraps are tasty too, trust me.

5. For Martha's real version, bake until surfaces crack, about 14 minutes, rotating sheets halfway through. Let cool on sheets on wire racks.

6. Cookies can be stored between layers of parchment in airtight containers at room temperature. Martha says for up to three days, but they're good way past that. Can cookies even go bad?

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Cake + Chocolate Chip Cookies = Madness

Though this isn't the first time I've ever baked for a long distance package, it's defintely the first valentine's day away from the bf. Well technically it's only the second v-day but that's not the point. Basically this whole week has been full of happy couples holding hands around campus and various fliers and coupons and sales letting me know that yes, this Saturday is one of those Saturdays you don't want to be alone on. And yes, I am a little bitter about it. So I harnessed that bitter energy and went all out on a bake-athon to create sweetness for valentine's day. After all, I've been slacking on fattening up the significant other. Not as easy as you'd think from 600 miles away. That combined with the almighty stress that is school. In case you were curious, in my world, stress equals hardcore baking. I whipped out the brand spanking new Martha Stewart Cookies book and went for the four recipes that seemed the most comforting and tasty. Eating my feelings through tester cookies? No, never. Not me. Anyway, that means that the rest of the week will be cookie week! Get excited.




Aw, look at that lonely little cookie. Anyways, this first recipe, compliments of Martha herself, is the traditional chocolate chip cookie with a cake-y twist. Since I can't resist anything with the word cake in it, naturally I had to test these out. And I've found that things that are traditional with a snazzy twist are just plain tasty. And lovely. As well as snuggly and exciting all at the same time. Oh, I sense symbolism. No worries that's about as deep as I'll get. Back to the sugar. These cookies have a little less sugar and butter in them to get a thicker and fluffier texture than your standard tollhouse result. As a result they're a little less sweet than I'm used to, but I have to admit that Martha did good on this one.

Onwards to the good stuff...

Cakey Chocolate Chip Cookies
yield: 3 dozen

Ingredients
2 1/2 c. flour
1/2 tsp. baking soda
14 tbsp (1 3/4 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 c. granulated sugar
1/4 c. light brown sugar
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vanilla extract (add an additional tsp. if you want to follow my "always add extra vanilla rule)
2 large eggs
2 cups semi sweet chocolate chips (use mini chocolate chips for the best cookies. trust me)

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees

2. Whisk together flour and baking soda in a bowl
3. Put butter and both sugars in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. I did it all by hand. I don't recommend it.
4. Reduce speed to low. Add salt, vanilla, and eggs; mix until combined, about 1 minute. Add flour mixture; mix until just combined. Stir in chocolate chips.
5. Drop heaping tablespoons of dough onto baking sheets (lined with parchment paper if you'd like), spacing about two inches apart. Bake until cneters are set and edges are colden, 10 - 12 minutes, rotating sheets halfway through.

6. Let cool on baking sheets 2 minutes. Transfer cookies to wire racks; let cool completely. Eat and be merry!

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