Coconut Refrigerator Cookies

I love old cookbooks. It's not so much the recipes--because they sure did like to use a lot of lard back then--but really more about the style. Classic '50s illustrations. Faded black and white photos. Sometimes even handwritten directions. At least, if you find an old cookbook at a used bookstore, there's a definitely possibility of unearthing a handwritten treasure. Recall my Beacon Hill Brownies post and you might remember that I once discovered a collection of old recipes hidden together in the pages of a worn, antique cookbook before. So I was delighted upon purchasing The Family Circle Cake and Cooky Cookbook to discover that it, too, contained newspaper recipes from the 1970s, unidentifiable magazine cut-outs and a lovely little handwritten paper detailing how to make Coconut Refrigerator Cookies.

I love coconut! And this tropical fruit is perfect for summer! I had to test this one out (here it is word for word from the paper, with my notes in parentheses or bold).

Ingredients:

1/2 c. shortening (I used non-hydrogenated vegetable shortening--NOT lard)
1 c. gran. sugar (granulated)
1 egg, unbeaten
2 teasp. vanilla flavor
1 teasp. lemon flavor (I used lemon extract we had in the cabinet)

1 3/4 c. sifted flour (I went with my staple: whole wheat pastry flour)
3/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 c. shredded coconut (the brand I used this time was Fancy Flake Coconut (Sweetened) from Albertsons)

Directions:

1.) With spoon, work shortening against sides of bowl till creamy. Add sugar gradually working in till fluffy.

2.) Add egg, flavorings, blend. Sift together next 3 ingredients. Add gradually with coconut to first mix.

3.) Turn onto waxed paper (or plastic wrap). Form into 2 in. roll (basically, a log that's 2 inches high. This can be a bit tricky--if the dough is too dry some of the pieces fall off. You can either add a little more liquid, or just use the "fallen" dough for taste testing). Wrap in paper (again, plastic works well too). Chill several hours or overnight.

4.) Cut into 1/8 to 1/4 inch slices (I used a serrated bread knife but had a little trouble with fallen dough again). Bake on greased cooky sheet (I prefer using parchment paper instead of the greasing) in mod oven 375 -- 12 minutes or more (I cut back to about 8 minutes for most of them since the coconut flakes sticking out started to brown quickly).

I also cooled these cookies on their baking sheet for five minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely. That's it!

I love that this mysterious home cook/recipe writer abbreviates and keeps things simple as much as I do! The use of "till" and "cooky" was adorable, though I did have to analyze her (I'm assuming "her") cursive handwriting (a lost art) for several minutes to decipher "mod oven."  Could that be "med" oven? "Mool" oven? I still wouldn't be quite sure if it wasn't for other recipes in the cookbook calling for a "moderate oven," which I'm assumed meant "not too hot" (Further research determined it to mean between 325 and 375 degrees).

But back to the results--quite pleasing indeed!  The texture of these cookies turned out to be light but with a sturdy crunch. They're sweet, but the overwhelming lemon flavor helps to balance that out (and when rolling the dough into a log, I seriously could not stop eating the fallen pieces). The coconut was a nice touch that gives these cookies just a little something extra.

Best of all, the recipe was so easy! Aside from having to wait a few hours for the dough to chill in the fridge (and now I would also recommend letting it come to room temperature before slicing to hopefully keep the dough more together) this really takes no time at all. Thank you mysterious home cook/housewife/magical recipe collector! Our paths will surely cross again as you've given me an excellent treasure trove to dig into.

Dirt Cup Pudding

Before the heat of summer rolls around we can still all enjoy the fun activities that spring has to offer! For some people, spring is the time for planting flowers in the dirt. For me, it was making "dirt cups" for kids at the public library to go with our "Spring" story time theme on March 31!

On the agenda for story time was reading There was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Bugs by Johnette Downing, When Will It Be Spring? by Catherine Walters, and Diary of a Worm by Doreen Cronin. We also planted our own Morning Glories in a real cup of dirt before ending the program with a much tastier kind of "dirt!" I promise, this pudding is not as "gross" as it looks!

Dirt Cup Pudding

Ingredients:

2 cups cold milk
1 small package (3.4 oz.) chocolate pudding mix (I used JELL-O brand)
8 oz. whipped topping (like Cool Whip), thawed, not frozen
16 oz. crushed Oreo cookies (I crushed them by hand by pouring them into a large zipped-top plastic baggie)
10 gummy worms and 10 clear cups

Directions:

1). Mix the pudding and milk together in a large bowl. Let sit 5 minutes.

2). Stir in the whipped topping and half the crushed cookies.

3). Drop about 1 teaspoon of crushed cookies into each clear cup. Fill 3/4 of the way full with the pudding mixture. Top with the rest of the cookies.

4). Refrigerate at least one hour (if possible). Garnish each cup with a gummy worm and eat up with a spoon!

Special thanks to Cooks.com for helping me find the perfect dirt cup recipe to try and to all the Saturday Drop-In story time kids at the library who were my eager taste testers!

Easter Treats--2012!

For me, holidays are all about tradition. Family, of course, and tradition, and often times religious backgrounds. I know the true reason Easter exists, but I'm here today to talk about the foods it has inspired me to make from such secular traditions as honoring the iconic animals that have come to symbolize a holiday right smack in the beginning of spring. How could I not dye eggs and bake something for bunnies? Thus I present to you first my recipe for Colored Easter Eggs (my traditional go-to every year) and then a new attempt using a box mix (gasp--yes, I was in a hurry) to create Carrot Cake Muffins.

Colored Easter Eggs

Ingredients:

1 teaspoon white vinegar

Hot tap water

Food coloring

Directions:

1.) Fill paper cups about 2/3 of the way full with hot tap water. Add the vinegar and stir.

2.) Place 10-20 drops of food coloring into each cup, stir again, and carefully submerge your egg into the colored water. To get the exact shade of a color you'd like, follow the number of drops recommended on the back of the box. My favorite brand is McCormick, and their food coloring drop tips can be found here.

3.) Leave in 5-10 minutes depending on how dark you want your colors to be. Carefully remove each egg with a plastic spoon and store in the egg carton. Refrigerate overnight and enjoy on Easter morning!

Carrot Cake Muffins

Ingredients:

1 pouch Duncan Hines Decadent Carrot Cake Mix

1 cup hot tap water

1 pouch of carrots and raisins (it comes in the box)

2 eggs

1 stick softened butter

1 cup oats

Directions:

1.) Follow the directions on the box for "Carrot Cake Cookies" but place in a muffin tin lined with paper cupcake liners instead (my cookie attempt did NOT end up tasting as delicious as when I put these into muffin form). First preheat the oven to 350 degrees and rehydrate the carrots and raisins by soaking them in the hot tap water for about 5 minutes. Drain and pat dry with paper towels. 

2.) In a large bowl, combine the cake mix, butter and eggs, stir in the oats, then stir in the carrots and raisins.

3.) Fill the muffin cups about 3/4 of the way full and bake approximately 12-15 minutes before removing from oven to cool.

Despite the "cookie" recipe, these really did taste best in muffin form. No frosting necessary--they were already quite sweet on their own. And, of course, presentation is everything. I used the Wilton brand Pink Petal baking cups as paper liners to make my muffins look like garden flowers. In the end, both my families (the one at home and the one at the library) were able to enjoy my favorite holiday tradition of all--sharing and eating delicious food together.

The back of the box--recipe at the bottom!

My cookie attempt--in the shape of carrots...kind of....

A beautiful garden!

Sour Cream Cheesecake

Yes, I am lactose intolerant. So, yes, as a general rule, I cannot eat such delicious foods as cheesecake--or pretty much anything with the words "cheese" or "cream" somehow buried in them. This is not to say I don't occasionally tempt fate, in very small portions, especially for the sake of dear friends, and with the help of a Lactaid pill. But you don't want to know about my dietary deficiencies. You want to know how to make that delectable-looking slice of heaven that even this non-dairy eater here is raving about from the minimal sliver she used for taste testing.

I owe this one to my dear friend Janice (that's her in the picture under step 2) who wanted to try out a recipe that another friend gave her. We've often created baking experiments together, and it's always fun to teach and learn and just spend time together--especially when it results in delicious food. So dairy product or no, I was gung-ho to try out her friend's recipe labeled "Cream Cheese Pie."  Accidentally glossing over the word "pie" on the paper she handed me, I baked both our Sour Cream Cheesecakes in cake pans (we doubled the recipe to make one for each of our families). This essentially created an easy cheesecake recipe (because cheesecakes are actually rather complicated to make under normal circumstances--they require hot steam baths to prevent cracking and everything!). But whatever you call it, and however you vary the recipe, it's still going to taste great and be a fun project to put together with friends!

Ingredients:

For crust:
1 and 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/3 cup melted butter
1/4 cup sugar

For filling:
2/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla
8 ounces light cream cheese (softened)
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs

For topping:
2 cups light sour cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:

1.) Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Crush a box of graham crackers to create crumbs (we crushed ours by hand in plastic baggies). Mix crumbs, butter and sugar together, saving a few crumbs for the topping. Press the mixture into the cake pan, bake 8 minutes, then remove from oven to cool.

2.) In a bowl, beat the eggs, then add the sugar, vanilla, cream cheese and salt. Combine everything with an electric mixer until the mixture is smooth. Pour the mixture on top of the crust and bake 20 minutes.

3.) Let the cheesecake cool while making the topping: mix together the sour cream, sugar and vanilla, along with remaining crumbs. Pour on top and bake another 10 minutes. (I also accidentally glossed over the fact that the crumbs in the original recipe are supposed to go on the very top of the cake, not inside the topping mixture. But, oh well, this does not affect flavor--only presentation. See below).

4.) Cool the cheesecake completely before refrigerating at least 30 minutes, though overnight is best.

Using the light cream cheese and sour cream makes this one just a touch healthier than most cheesecakes, and I believe made it slightly easier for my tummy to digest. Don't let the three different mixtures (crust, filling, topping) scare you away from a relatively easy recipe that's still under five steps to make! Thank you Janice, and thank you Janice's friend!

Next up, my Easter escapades!

Donuts, Part Deux

While I preferred the taste of my first attempt at donuts--Bacon Cake Donuts that didn't quite taste like bacon but were still so delicious--I did prefer the look (i.e., the toppings) of my second donut attempt shown here. In this second attempt at baked (not fried!) dough, I pretty much just followed Wilton's Baked Cake Donut recipe on the back of my pan, except I doubled the amount of batter so I could have enough treats for my family and my coworkers. They were tasty, but I think the addition of a little bacon grease and brown sugar instead of white sugar really made a difference in the overall flavor (and color--this week's caked donuts turned out rather pale underneath the toppings). However, my second donut attempt still received many compliments and make a nice treat for anyone--especially with chocolate and sprinkles on top!

So if you'd like to recreate the recipe, I'll still share what I did below. The recipe for an awesome chocolate topping--also from the Wilton's donut pan but with a little more chocolate--follows!

Chocolate Cake Donuts

Ingredients:
4 cups cake flour, sifted

1 and 1/2 cups granulated sugar

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

2 teaspoon salt

1 and 1/2 cups buttermilk

4 eggs, lightly beaten

4 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions:

1.) Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Spray your donut pan with nonstick cooking spray or line a cupcake pan with paper cupcake liners (I got lazy and decided that instead of trying to fill my six-donut pan over and over again, I would make a batch of donut-flavored cupcakes to finish off the batter).

2.) In a very large mixing bowl, sift the cake flour, sugar, baking powder, nutmeg and salt. Add in the buttermilk and eggs. Make sure your melted butter has cooled slightly before adding it last. Beat carefully until all ingredients are just combined--no more flour should be visible, but the batter shouldn't be overmixed.

3.) Fill your donut pan or cupcake liners approximately 2/3 to 3/4 full and bake for about 9-10 minutes (mine still came out pale at 10 minutes even though the original recipe calls for 7-9 minutes. And I did three separate batches in the oven rather than try to fit all my filled tins in there at once, so who knows why they still came out so light?).

4.) Let the donuts cool about 2-5 minutes before prying them gently from the pan with a couple of toothpicks. Place on a wire rack to cool completely before dipping them in a bowl of chocolate glaze and then a bowl of sprinkles. Recipe for Chocolate Glaze is below.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup plus 1/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

2 Tablespoons unsalted butter

2 Tablespoons light corn syrup

Directions:

1). In a microwave-safe bowl, combine the 1/2 cup of chocolate chips, butter and corn syrup. Microwave on 50 percent power for 50 seconds.

2). Carefully remove the bowl from the microwave (it will be hot--I used potholders) and add the extra 1/4 cup of chocolate chips, stirring while you add. The mixture should turn from thin drizzle to thick frosting consistency. And it tastes as good as it looks!

That's it! But don't forget these key details in the donut-making process:

1. Donuts taste best when fresh. They will get stale quickly when left out and attempted to eat two days later. All is not lost, however, if you want to eat donut leftovers! Place them in an airtight plastic baggie to stave off staleness as long as possible! If all else fails, dip rock-hard donuts in coffee to instantly soften them up!

2. These donuts can be made into cupcakes! Because they rise so much (and because I got lazy), I thought it made perfect sense to try filling a few cupcake liners with donut batter too! It worked! Just be careful peeling off the paper as they tend to stick.

3. The dipping in chocolate and sprinkles is the fun part! I try to get just the right amount of glaze on each one, turning the donuts so they leave a smooth design of chocolate and an evenly spread sprinkling of sprinkles. If you really want to be daring, you can try the chocolate glaze on top of the Bacon donuts mentioned earlier. Use bacon bits instead of sprinkles to top the chocolate and enhance the bacon flavor. Doesn't that sound good?

4. Despite bacon, chocolate, butter and sugar...these donuts are healthy! Somewhat healthy! They're baked (not fried!) and made with all-natural homemade ingredients. So that's a start!

All-in-all, I'd say donuts are a success in my book no matter how you make them. It was a fun experiment for me to try, having never ever made a donut before this month! But I will definitely be baking them again!

Single-Portion Sugar Cookies!

Happy St. Patrick's Day! While not necessarily known as a typical dessert holiday (like Thanksgiving, Christmas and Valentine's Day for me), I love any excuse to bake anything--even if it turns out green. Especially if it turns out green (my all-time favorite color!).

While I could have picked Irish Soda Bread or even Green Eggs and Ham to make and post about for this occasion, I'm choosing to write about sugar cookies instead. Why sugar cookies? Because they're the most classic holiday cookie you can eat (Chocolate Chip does not count as a "holiday cookie" to me, but rather an "anytime cookie"). Sugar cookies are the proverbial pot of golden deliciousness at the end of the rainbow. And what makes this recipe even more magical is that you can whip up one of these cookies for yourself in an instant! The recipe is individually portioned--an original creation I used at the public library where I work in our quarterly children's baking program this very afternoon!

If you're a regular reader of my blog, or a regular patron/staff member at my library, you may already be familiar with the "Bake With Me" program I set up every season for kids ages 2-6 to get hands-on baking experience with their parents or caregivers. You may have seen how excited and frazzled I get on a "Bake With Me" day, or how proudly I beamed when the program was mentioned two years ago in the national Association for Library Services to Children (ALSC) e-newsletter (scroll about halfway down the page to find the writeup and two more single-portion recipes!). When you combine baking, kids and libraries, how can the results be anything but awesome? I can't help but want to share them!

So even if you've never seen the program, the beauty of this blog is that I can show the same recipe we used so you can recreate the experience with your kids, parents, friends or just you when you're craving a cookie. You don't even have to make it green if you don't want to. Just make it fun!

Shamrock Sugar Cookies


Ingredients:
1/2 Tablespoon butter, softened
1 Tablespoon sugar
1/2 Tablespoon egg or egg substitute (the substitute makes for easier pouring--anything like Egg Beaters will work)
1/8 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 Tablespoons whole wheat pastry flour (That's what I always use, but any flour will do)
1/16 teaspoon baking soda (I just filled a 1/8 teaspoon half full)
1/16 teaspoon salt (Or a pinch. That works too)
6 drops green food coloring

Directions:

1). Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and place a square of parchment (NOT wax) paper on a baking sheet.

2). Use a fork to mush the butter in a small bowl and combine it with the sugar. Add the egg and vanilla, then mix again and set aside. In a slightly larger bowl, combine the flour, baking soda and salt.

3). Add the sugar mixture to the flour mixture. Drop in the food coloring and mix well. At this point it helps to use your hands to knead the dough a little--the green color spreads more evenly that way. Then flatten the dough with your hands and use a shamrock cookie cutter (or any cookie cutter, really) to press out the shape.

4). Bake on the parchment papered baking sheet for about 6-7 minutes, then let cool slightly before eating.

With a wee bit o' luck, you'll end up with a cookie that's quite a charm! Enough to make even the leprechauns green with envy. Enjoy!

"Donuts, I got Donuts"

If you're a Simpsons TV show fan, go ahead and say it with me: "Mmm...donuts." Or we can sing Chief Wiggum's donut song: "Donuts, I got donuts...."

Don't know what I'm talking about? D'oh! Oh well, just check out the awesome pictures and the recipe below for my first ever attempt at homemade donuts!  Finally, finally, another success!  I owe it all to shopping with my mom at Bed, Bath & Beyond where I swore I wasn't going to buy anything, until I saw it: a shiny, enticing, never-before-owned-by-me donut pan, complete with recipe ideas attached. I happen to absolutely without a doubt love donuts, and absolutely without a doubt never eat them because I don't eat fried foods anymore. Le sigh.

However, one of my favorite types of donuts used to be the glazed "cake" donut (pancakes, shortcakes, birthday cakes--do you see a pattern in my favorite treats?). And everyone knows cake is baked, not fried. (Yay, healthier already!). So I took the Wilton's recipe for standard Baked Cake Doughnuts that came with my new pan, and twisted it up with the one food item I'd been wanting to incorporate into my baked goods forever. The one item I knew could dress up a standard donut recipe and make it shine--or perhaps sizzle. Bacon.

Now these donuts did not turn out overwhelmingly bacon-y in taste (is that good or bad?) so I might have to experiment with adding just a little more bacon grease and bits next time. But the result was still fluffy, sweet, and so delicious.

Bacon Cake Donuts

Ingredients:


2 cups cake flour, sifted
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
1 and 2/3 Tablespoons melted butter
1/3 Tablespoon (1 teaspoon) bacon grease
1 teaspoon bacon bits (cooked bacon, chopped)

Directions:


1). Preheat the oven to 425 degrees a spray a donut pan with nonstick cooking spray (or, if you don't have a donut pan, I suppose you could use a muffin tin and see what happens!). In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, nutmeg and salt.

2). In a separate bowl, combine the brown sugar, buttermilk, eggs, melted butter and bacon grease. (The grease is easy enough to collect from bacon heated on the stove--I used about nine small pieces of precooked Trader Joe's Fully Cooked Uncured Bacon to get a teaspoon of grease, though). It helps if the butter and grease has cooled a little before adding them to the mixture--otherwise they'll curdle the eggs.

3). Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and beat gently until just combined. Bake approximately seven minutes, then remove from oven and let sit at least five minutes before removing from the pan carefully with a couple of toothpicks on the sides of the donuts to turn them out. Let cool slightly, then drizzle with icing or dip in frosting if so desired.

My intention was to create a "Maple-Bacon" breakfast kind of donut, actually, but I just couldn't get my frosting to taste or look quite right. So that's an experiment for another day. Rather than wait until I had a perfect maple syrup frosting recipe concocted before writing this post, I figured I'd best just get it up here and you can either use your favorite canned frosting, try out one of my previous recipes like eggnog frosting or just eat them plain (that's what I did!) with a side of coffee for dunkin'. Tasted perfect to me! You won't have to say "D'oh!" and "Nuts!" separately ever again. Mmm...donuts....