December 13, 2006

• Now hear this: Now hear this: Crunchies. That is all.
• But what *are* crunchies and how do you make 'em?
• Grandma Underpants Monster's Sour Cream Cookies 1/2 cup shortening 1 tablespoon butter 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar 2 eggs 1 cup sour cream 2 3/4 cups flour 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 teaspoon vanilla extract Cream shortening, butter, and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream, and vanilla. Combine dry ingredients and add to wet mixture. Chill dough 1 hour. Drop by spoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. Grase bottom of a drinking glass, dip in sugar, and press cookies to 1/2 inch thickness. Bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes. Easy-Schmeezy Peanut Butter Cookies 1 14 oz. can Esweetened condensed milk 1 cup chunky peanut butter 1 egg 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 c. biscuit baking mix (Bisquick to us Yanks) Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Beat sweetened condensed milk, peanut butter, egg and vanilla until smooth. Add biscuit mix; mix well. Chill at least 1 hour. Shape into 1 inch balls. Place 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets. Flatten with fork. Bake 6-8 minutes or until lightly browned.
• It starts with the usual Chex Party Mix: 1/4 c. butter 1 1/4 tsp. seasoned salt 4 1/2 tsp. Worcestershire sauce 8 c. Chex (corn, rice and/or wheat) 1 c. salted mixed nuts 1 c. pretzel sticks But the magic happens when you throw in your own favorites . . cashews . . tabasco . . NO SHREDDED WHEATS (you godless commie bastards!) . . umm. . double the butter portion . . oo, those oyster cracker things . . . stuff like that. Crunchies, thy name is crack. *crunch*munch*crunch*munch*crunch*munch*
• Monkeyfilter: NO SHREDDED WHEATS (you godless commie bastards!)
• Shortbread. It takes one pan, no rolling and if you make it now, it will be good for Christmas (can be held for months, and just gets tastier).

  Short Bread 1 lb of butter 1 cup of sugar Beat with electric beater until creamy (about 5 minutes) ½ cup of rice flour Pinch of salt 5-6 cups of flour (add one at a time) Mixture should look crumbly when mixed. Pack half of the recipe into a 8” by 8” pan. After you have packed it down (Make it about ½ to ¾” thick) take a fork and insert holes up and down the pan. Bake 20 minutes at 350 degrees. Cut into blocks before cold.

  Then you put the squares in a tin for at least 2 weeks, better yet for 4, and when they come out they are the most buttery, melt in your mouth amazing things ever.
• Anything with basil and mole sauce is good.
• You make party mix into cookies?
• Well done, TUM. This thread is in good hands. This GramMa prefers to eats cookies, not bakes them.
• This recipe is very easy, yet the results look fancy, and taste like a peanut butter cup! CHOCOLATE COVERED PEANUT BUTTER BALLS 1 cup peanut butter 1 cup confectioners sugar 1 tablespoon butter 1 teaspoon vanilla Mix well; shape into balls and refrigerate for at least one hour. Melt 1 package semi-sweet chocolate chips with 1/4 cup paraffin wax. Dip balls using form and put on waxed paper. Chill well.
• That's "dip balls using FORK.."
• Thanks, Frau. As a newcomer, I am sure you are perplexed as to why this site does not have a preview button. Well, let's just say we ALL are, and we "know" wherein the "problem" "lies". so to speak. But there is just nothing we can do about it that doesn't inviolve wicker and flame. And now, the classier types here can insert their Alec Baldwin Schweatty Balls SNL jokes at will.
• Grandma Underpants Monster's Sour Cream Cookies We called them "sour cream sugar cookies", and they're my favorite!
• Please to be attempting to stick to the topic, as with all non-chatty CG questions.
• This recipe makes about 7 dozen. The chocolate chip manufacturer calls them "Sierra Nuggets," but I think of them as "(Everything but the) Kitchen Sink" cookies. Lighty grease cookie sheets. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In a medium bowl, combine: 1 1/2 cups unsifted flour 1 1/4 tsp. baking soda 1 tsp. salt 1/2 tsp. mace 1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon 1/4 tsp. nutmeg 1/2 tsp. powdered cloves In a large bowl: Cream 1 cup softened butter 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar 1 1/2 cups granulated sugar Mix in: 3 tablespoons milk 1 1/2 tsp. vanilla 3 large eggs, lightly beaten One at a time, stir in just until incorporated: 1 cup cornflakes,(dry, not crumbled) 3 cups quick cooking rolled oats 1 cup shredded coconut 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips 1 cup pinenuts, peanuts or chopped walnuts (Note, the dough gets pretty hard to stir with a spoon by the time you've added everything. I generally wind up using my hands.) Drop dough by well-rounded teaspoons full onto greased cookie sheets. Bake for 10-12 minutes. Let stand for a minute or two before removing from cookie sheets You can also do them as pan cookies: Prepare dough as directed. Spread in greased 15"x10" pan. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes. Cool before cutting into 35 two-inch squares. This might not be economical if you don't have things like cornflakes and oatmeal on hand generally, but the cookies are addicting and keep well.
• My BFF makes them chocolate dipped peanut butter balls. They tuck rather nicely into the roof of one's mouth.
• My grandmother made Russian Tea Cakes at holiday time. The older I get, the better they taste: RUSSIAN TEA CAKES 1 cup butter, room temperature 1/2 cups confectioners' sugar 2 1/4 cups flour, sifted 1 tsp vanilla 3/4 cup walnuts, finely chopped confectioners' sugar for rolling Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Cream the butter adding sugar gradually until light and fluffy. Stir in flour, vanilla, and walnuts or pecans. Roll between hands into 1-inch balls and place on an ungreased baking sheet. Bake for 12 to 14 minutes. Remove from oven and while still warm, roll in confectioners' sugar. It just galls me that Cooks.com apparently stole the recipe from her posthumously, seeing as how I always thought it was a carfully guarded family secret.
• Ralph: 'Taint the same without the occasional tyop.
• Right, but we need to keep to the topic at hand, so here's a little something for TUM and her BFF!
• This one is so simple even a kitchen incompetent [c'est moi] can make it without major disaster. [ingredients in bold type] Bourbon Balls 1 cup of vanilla wafer crumbs, made by crushing an appropriate number of vanilla wafers (Nabisco works) into a powder 1 cup powdered sugar 1/4 cup bourbon whiskey Mix these together, forming into balls roughly the size of a cherry or a grape Sprinkle cocoa onto a clean plate, and roll each ball around on it until its coated. (You may wish to add some powdered sugar to this. You may wish to roll the balls in more bourbon before doing this. Rum works with this, too, in place of bourbon.) You can double, triple, etc this recipe. Store the bourbon balls in a tightly covered container until serving.
• oops - should have bolded cocoa, too
• I really like Ina Garten's coconut/jam thumbprint cookies. (from Food Network's website) Ingredients 3/4 pound (3 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature 1 cup sugar 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract 3 1/2 cups flour 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt 1 egg beaten with 1 tablespoon water, for egg wash 7 ounces sweetened flaked coconut Raspberry and/or apricot jam Instructions Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. In an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar until just combined, and then add the vanilla. Separately, sift together the flour and salt. With the mixer on low speed, add the flour mixture to the creamed butter and sugar. Mix until the dough starts to come together. Dump on a floured board and roll together into a flat disk. Wrap in plastic wrap and chill for 30 minutes. Roll the dough into 1 1/4-inch balls. (If you have a scale, they should each weigh 1-ounce.) Dip each ball into the egg wash and then roll it in coconut. Place the balls on an ungreased cookie sheet and press a light indentation into the top of each with your finger. Drop 1/4 teaspoon of jam into each indentation. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, until the coconut is a golden brown. Cool and serve. I also love magic cookie bars and sleeping cookies. Magic cookie bars (from Eagle Brand's website) Ingredients 1 1/2 cups graham cracker crumbs 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, melted 1 (14-ounce) can Sweetened Condensed Milk (NOT evaporated milk) 2 cups (12 ounces) semi-sweet chocolate chips 1 1/3 cups flaked coconut 1 cup chopped nuts Instructions Preheat oven to 350°F (325°F for glass dish). In small bowl, combine graham cracker crumbs and butter; mix well. Press crumb mixture firmly on bottom of 13X9-inch baking pan. Pour condensed milk evenly over crumb mixture. Layer evenly with remaining ingredients; press down firmly with fork. Bake 25 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool. Cut into bars or diamonds. Store leftovers covered at room temperature. Sleeping cookies: (from Recipezaar) Ingredients 2 egg whites 2/3 cup sugar 1 dash salt 1 cup walnuts, chopped 1 cup chocolate chips or butterscotch chips Instructions 1. Preheat your oven to 350 degF. 2. Beat the egg whites until stiff, then gradually add the sugar and salt. 3. Beat until sugar is dissolved. 4. Stir in walnuts and chocolate or butterscotch bits. 5. Drop by teaspoon on oiled, foil covered cookie sheet. 6. Put into oven and turn off oven. 7. Leave in all night- (DO NOT PEEK)-or during the daytime and left in the oven until it is cold. I like to sprinkle a little red and/or green colored sugar on these cookies before I stick 'em in the oven. I've got tons more around here, somewhere...
• My family doesn't make cookies, per se, but we do dip whatever we can get our hands on into chocolate! Here are my favorites, which are all super easy and keep well in tins: Chocolate: Use that "almond bark" stuff, chocolate chips, or whatever you like. Melt it in a double boiler (We usually melt 2 kinds of chocolate at once, like milk and white, or milk and dark.) This is really the only step that requires any cooking skill -- just watch the chocolate to make sure you don't burn it. Yummy 1: coconut! Dump a bunch of coconut into the chocolate and stir to coat. Take out the coconut a big spoonful at a time and put it on wax paper. Top with a pecan or walnut. (An alternate version is to use corn flakes or chocolate cereal if you don't like coconut.) Yummy 2: peanut butter crackers! Get some Ritz crackers and make little peanut butter sandwiches out of them. Dip in chocolate and put on wax paper. (An alternate version of this is to just dip oreos in the chocolate) Yummy 3: pretzels! Dump pretzels in the chocolate, lay out on wax paper -- I prefer salted pretzels, but if you know someone trying to limit salt intake, non-salted pretzels are a way to go. Yummy 4: cheesecake bites! Buy a cheesecake and freeze. Using a large melon-baller or a little spoon, scoop out bits of the cheesecake and dip in the chocolate. Place on wax paper. You can fancy this up by rolling these in nuts or crushed graham crackers before the chocolate sets.
• "Norwegian Lace Cookies" 1/2 cup butter 1 1/2 cups rolled oats 1 egg 2/3 cup sugar 1 tablespoon flour 1 teaspoon baking powder Melt butter in a sauce pan and pour over oats in a medium bowl. In a small bowl, beat the egg until light, then beat in sugar, baking powder, and flour. Combine the oats and egg mixtures. Drop by spoonfuls on a greased and floured cookie sheet. Not too close together cause they spread out. Bake 350F about 8 minutes. Cool a minute before removing from the cookie sheet. Note these are mostly butter and sugar, so have your cardiac specialist and dentist on standby.
• I just made some Russian Tea Cakes. =)
• Recipe: Sand Tarts Cream: 0.75 C butter Gradually mix in: 1.25 C sugar Beat in: 1 egg 1 egg yolk (save the second egg white - you'll need it later) 1 tsp vanilla extract 1 tsp grated lemon rind Gradually stir in: 3 C all purpose flour You can usually start the flour with the mixer, but eventually you will have to stir by hand or even knead a little. Chill the dough for several hours. Roll the dough very thin, cut with cookie cutters and place on a greased tin. Use a pastry brush to brush the egg white over the tops of the cookies (I told you you'd need it later). Decorate with sugar (or nonpareils - red hots will melt, though, so be careful). Bake in a quick oven at 400 F for about 8 minutes.
• This one seems to be similar to the Russian Tea Cakes, but with a different nut Recipe: Butterballs The original recipe for these calls for almonds, but I think they are scads better with pecans. I suppose they could probably be made with any kind of nut, really. But I like pecans. creme: 1 C butter add: 1 C sifted confectioners sugar ½ t salt stir in: 2 C ground pecans 1 t vanilla add: 2 C flour shape into smallish balls (maybe 2-3 cm diameter) on ungreased pan bake 15 minutes at 365 ° when done, roll in confectioners sugar and let cool I usually don't so much "roll" them in the sugar as put a little sugar in a paper sack, drop a couple of cookies in the sack, and shake gently. You have to be gentle to avoid too much breakage, but that works pretty well. Honestly, I don't know if you have to sift the confectioner's sugar, but it sure cuts down on lumps. If you don't have a sifter, you can use a mesh strainer for about the same effect. A sifter is actually a pretty handy baking tool, if you can get ahold of one. It gives you a lot better control when adding dry ingredients. Oh, the recipe also says that you can substitute brown sugar for confectioner's sugar (in the dough, I presume, not the rolling stage). I've never tried that, although I suppose it would give the cookie a more butterscotchy flavor.
• I may have to try those Russian Tea Cakes. Na zdrovye!
• *taps thread on shoulder* Uh, a lot of these recipes seem to include big mounds of butter...are there recipes for things with less of teh fat?
• Christmas is all about the butter. Not just butter in the recipes, but as a major flavour (and thus you cannot substitute it). It's a rule. The other special Christmas cookies I make are sugar cookies - really light and crispy, though they do take more time to lay out (because you have to roll them or spoon them onto the pan). and besides, transfat may have fewer calories, but they now think those calories are much, much worse for you, so I wouldn't be ready to jump on the low-fat bandwagon. Just be sensible, and only eat a half dozen pieces of shortbread at a sitting, instead the full dozen. ------------------- Sugar Cookies Set the oven at 350 degrees – Cook a few cookies in the first batch to see if you need to lower the temp. Cream until light and fluffy (about 4-5 min) ½ cup butter Beat in ¾ cup sugar Add 1 egg (don’t beat it first) ½ teaspoon of vanilla Beat thoroughly. Add 1 tablespoon milk Sift together 1 1/4 flour ¼ teaspoon of salt ¼ teaspoon of baking powder Stir into the butter mixture and blend well. Can arrange by teaspoonfuls on cookie sheet or rollout and cut into to shapes. Remember to use icing sugar to roll out cookies to prevent them from getting tough. Bake for about 8 minute or until the edges are very light golden brown. ------------- These are really nice - all of the English people I gave them to last year hadn't had anything like them, but they are very simple biscuits/cookies. And beautifully buttery. You can roll them out to make christmas shapes and decorate with coloured sprinkles (which kids love doing), or be lazy like I was last year and just drop them from a little teaspoon (not quite as thin or delicate, but they spread out a lot - so space them with lots of room). I think this recipe makes about 60 small cookies (which is what you want for this), but I can't remember if I already halfed it or not.
• Storybored's Healthy Heart Cookie 12 lbs butter (whipped) 1 carrot (small) Blend ingredients at high speed. Fold mixture into heart shape and place on cookie sheet. Bake for ten minutes. Makes one large cookie.
• My mother's recipe for coffee cookies. (I add olive oil and reduce the other fat, but being an ad-libber, I don't have that variation.) --------------------------------------------- half cup shortening {margarine works well} two thirds cup sugar two tablespoons instant coffee cream together until very light. add: 1 egg slightly beaten three quarters cup flour quarter teaspoon salt half teaspoon vanilla [half cup chopped nuts] Mix well. put on greased cookie sheet by teaspoonfuls. Bake at 350 till the edges are firm and the tops dry [about 12 mins.]. Remove from sheet immediately. makes 36.
• In my family we make Holly Cookies. A variation on the rice-krispy-treat theme, they actually come out looking more like big green amoebas than leaves of holly. They are addictive LIKE THE CRACK. 1 stick butter (4 oz) 35 large white marshmallows 1 teaspoon green food coloing 1 teaspoon vanilla 4 cups cornflakes 1 container Red Hots (little red round cinnamon thingies) Melt butter in large saucepan; add marshmallows. When melted, turn off heat and stir in vanilla and green food coloring. Add cornflakes and toss quickly to coat. Drop little clusters of gooey cornflakes onto waxed paper. Stick a couple of Red Hots onto each cluster to represent berries. Leave to cool. EAT EAT EAT!
• Interestingly all of those same ingredients can be used in a different combination to make napalm. Um, are there any more . . ?
• This is my family's all-time favorite Christmas cookie recipe -- my great-grandmother brought it over with her from Germany. They also work for Halloween, or the Fourth of July, or like Tuesdays. A batch makes several dozen, depending on how big a cookie cutter you use. Old Fashioned Tea Cakes 2 c sugar 1 c butter 1/2 c buttermilk (you can fake this by adding 1/2 tbsp of vinegar to 1/2 c regular milk and letting it sit for a few minutes) 1 tsp baking soda 1/2 tsp vanilla 3 eggs 5.5-6 c flour (I personally don't think I've ever used less than 6 cups) Cream butter and sugar together, then beat in the next four ingredients. Add the flour a cup or so at a time until it's stiff and un-sticky enough to roll out. I roll it out to a little less than a quarter-inch thick, using extra flour sprinkled on the rolling surface and the top of the dough. Then cut out all sorts of fun shapes, and sprinkle them with some colored sugar -- press it down into the dough slightly or it'll just fall off, and that's no good. Anyway. Bake at 350 degrees -- the recipe says 10-12 minutes, but I always do them more like 8 or 9. They're done when you press down slightly and meet a little resistance -- don't wait for them to start browning, unless you like your cookies on the dry and crisp side, and if you do, well, I just don't know what to say.
• /passes petebest a few extra holly cookies They turn your poo green. Just so you know.
• I would like to point out that Pallas Athena DID NOT tell me that interesting little bit about the poo colorization before we made TWO BATCHES of holly cookies, and ate most of one of them. She's a devious sort, she is. However, she helped me with my family Christmas tradition this week, so I guess I can't kill her YET. My mom does the full-tilt Insane German Christmas Baking every year, and most of her recipes are way the hell too complicated for ordinary mortals like me. But one thing we do is decorate our tree with cookies-- they're just plain sugar cookies, iced with royal icing and then painted with food coloring. Every year I get stuck in Cookie Bondage, painting the darn things-- though if I'm lucky, PA is around to help out. This year I went a little crazy towards the end of the day: I don't have the recipe... but if you'd like to decorate your tree with little Carries, any sugar cookie recipe will do, just slap on the royal icing and paint away. When they're dry, we drill holes in them with a very fine drill bit, thread them on wire, and hang them on the tree.