Peanut Blossom Cookies

Adapted from Cook’s Country Magazine

Makes about 4 dozen

Any Hershey’s Chocolate Kiss—dark, milk, white, or “Hugs”—works in this recipe. For best results, the cookies should be baked on the middle rack, one baking sheet at a time. This recipe can be cut in half.

- 2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

- 1/2 teaspoon table salt

- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

- 1 cup roasted salted peanuts

- 16 tablespoons unsalted butter (2 sticks), softened

- 3/4 cup packed dark brown sugar

- 3/4 cup granulated sugar

- 1 cup creamy peanut butter

- 2 large eggs , at room temperature

- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

- 48 Hershey’s Chocolate Kisses, ready-to-use or wrappers removed

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

2. Whisk 1 3/4 cups flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder together in medium bowl. Process remaining 1 cup flour and peanuts in food processor until ground, about fifteen 1-second pulses, then stir into flour mixture.

3. Beat butter and sugars together in large bowl with electric mixer at medium-high speed until fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add peanut butter and continue to beat until combined. Add eggs, one at a time, beating after each addition, until incorporated, about 30 seconds, then beat in vanilla, stopping to scrape down sides of bowl, if necessary. Reduce speed to low, add flour mixture in two batches, and mix until incorporated. Cover bowl and refrigerate dough until stiff, about 30 minutes.

4. Roll 1-inch balls of dough and space 2 inches apart on baking sheet. Bake until just set and beginning to crack, 9 to 11 minutes, rotating baking sheet from front to back halfway through baking (while cookies are baking, place additional balls of dough on second baking sheet).

5. Working quickly, remove baking sheet from oven and firmly press one Kiss in center of each cookie. Return baking sheet to oven and bake until lightly golden, about 2 minutes. Transfer baking sheet to wire rack to cool for 5 minutes, then transfer cookies directly to wire rack to finish cooling. Repeat rolling and baking remaining cookies. Cool completely. (Cookies will be cool enough to eat after about 30 minutes, but Kisses will take 2 hours to set completely.)

Chewy Sugar Cookies

Adapted from Cook’s Illustrated.

Note:  The final dough will be slightly softer than most cookie dough. For the best results, handle the dough as briefly and gently as possible when shaping the cookies. Overworking the dough will result in flatter cookies.

Ingredients

• 2 1/4cups (11 1/4 ounces) unbleached all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon table salt
• 1 1/2 cups (10 1/2 ounces) sugar , plus 1/3 cup for rolling
• 2 ouncescream cheese , cut into 8 pieces
• 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted butter , melted and still warm
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1 large egg
• 1 tablespoon milk
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Instructions

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 large rimmed baking sheets with parchment paper. Whisk flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt together in medium bowl. Set aside.
2. Place 1½ cups sugar and cream cheese in large bowl. Place remaining 1/3 cup sugar in shallow baking dish or pie plate and set aside. Pour warm butter over sugar and cream cheese and whisk to combine (some small lumps of cream cheese will remain but will smooth out later). Whisk in oil until incorporated. Add egg, milk, and vanilla; continue to whisk until smooth. Add flour mixture and mix with rubber spatula until soft homogeneous dough forms.
3.  Divide dough into 24 equal pieces, about 2 tablespoons each (or use #40 portion scoop). Using hands, roll dough into balls. Working in batches, roll balls in reserved sugar to coat and evenly space on prepared baking sheet, 12 dough balls per sheet. Using bottom of drinking glass, flatten dough balls until 2 inches in diameter. Sprinkle tops evenly with 4 teaspoons of sugar remaining in shallow dish (2 teaspoons per tray), discarding any remaining sugar.
4. Bake, 1 tray at a time, until edges are set and just beginning to brown, 11 to 13 minutes, rotating tray after 7 minutes. Cool cookies on baking sheets 5 minutes. Using wide metal spatula, transfer cookies to wire rack and cool to room temperature.

Chocolate Chip Muffins

I caught a small break the other day.  The baby went right back to sleep after a morning feeding and I had a chance to make some muffins.  My mother used to make chocolate chip muffins for us when I was a kid.  She was a great cook when it came to Albanian food but American cuisine….ehhh….not so much.  She used a hand mixer for the muffins and she used regular sized chocolate chips.  Over-mixing made the muffins tough and the chocolate chips were too heavy and sunk to the bottom of the muffin.

I love this recipe from The America’s Test Kitchen Baking Book.  I used the Mocha-Chip variation for my recipe but left out the coffee flavor.  There are about seven variations to this recipe like Lemon-Blueberry, Banana-Walnut and Raspberry Almond but Chocolate Chip is my favorite so that’s the one I’m including today.

3 cups (15 ounces) all-purpose flour

1 cup (7 ounces) sugar

1 tablespoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon table salt

1 1/2 cups whole or low-fat plain yogurt  (I make my own yogurt which I prefer over the store-bought brands)

2 large eggs

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 cup mini chocolate chips

1.  Adjust an oven rack to the middle position and heat the oven to 375 degrees.  Grease a 12-cup muffin tin. (Try not to use paper liners because the muffins don’t bake up as tall and you lose a fair amount of muffin goodness to that liner)

2.  Whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt together in a large bowl.  In a medium bowl, whisk the eggs and then whisk in the yogurt until smooth.  Gently fold the yogurt mixture into the flour mixture with a rubber spatula until just barely combined, then fold in the melted butter followed by the mini chocolate chips.

3.  Using a greased 1/3-cup measuring cup, portion the batter into each muffin cup.  Bake until golden brown and toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out with just a few crumbs attached, 25 to 30 minutes, rotating the pan halfway through baking.

4.  Let the muffins cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then flip out onto a wire rack, and let cool for 10 minutes before serving.

Pancakes

Pancake stack

Since I discovered this recipe in my ATK cookbook, I have not bought another box of pancake mix again.  These pancakes are easy to make and taste better than any boxed mix.  There is one change that I insist upon in this recipe.  The original recipe says to use vegetable oil in the skillet when cooking the pancakes but I use butter because it tastes much better and it makes this crisp edges that are so addictive.

New York-Style Crumb Cake Muffins

Here’s a recipe that is German in origin but perfected in New York City, one of my favorite cities.   Although these are called Muffins, these are more like miniature crumb cakes.   They are made with cake flour so they are quite tender like a cupcake.

New York-Style Crumb Cake Muffins

Adapted from AmericasTestKitchen.com

If you can’t find buttermilk, you can substitute an equal amount of plain, low-fat yogurt. When topping the muffins, take care to not push the crumbs into the batter. Cooled leftovers can be wrapped in plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to 2 days.

12 muffins

Crumb Topping

- 1/3     cup granulated sugar (2 1/3 ounces)

- 1/3     cup dark brown sugar (2 1/3 ounces)

- 3/4    teaspoon ground cinnamon

- 1/8     teaspoon table salt

- 8        tablespoons unsalted butter (1 stick), melted and still warm

- 1 3/4    cups cake flour (7 ounces)

Muffins

- 1 1/4   cups cake flour (5 ounces)

- 1/2      cup granulated sugar (3 1/2 ounces)

- 1/4      teaspoon baking soda

- 1/4      teaspoon table salt

- 6          tablespoons unsalted butter (3/4 stick), cut into 6 pieces, softened but still cool

- 1           large egg

- 1           large egg yolk

- 1           teaspoon vanilla extract

- 1/3       cup buttermilk

Powdered sugar for dusting

1.  FOR THE TOPPING: Whisk sugars, cinnamon, salt, and butter in medium bowl to combine. Add flour and stir with rubber spatula or wooden spoon until mixture resembles thick, cohesive dough; set aside to cool to room temperature, 10 to 15 minutes.

2.  FOR THE MUFFINS: Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position and heat oven to 325 degrees. Line standard-sized muffin pan (cups have 1/2 cup capacity) with baking-cup liners.

3.   In bowl of standing mixer fitted with paddle attachment, mix flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt on low speed to combine. With mixer running at low speed, add butter one piece at a time; continue beating until mixture resembles moist crumbs, with no visible butter chunks remaining, 1 to 2 minutes. Add egg, yolk, vanilla, and buttermilk; beat on medium-high speed until light and fluffy, about 1 minute, scraping once if necessary.

4.   Using 1/4-cup measure or ice cream scoop, divide batter evenly among muffin cups; using small rubber spatula, spread batter into even layer. Break apart crumb topping into large pea-sized pieces and spread in even layer over batter (about 1/4 cup of crumbs per muffin), beginning with edges and then working toward center. Bake until crumbs are golden and wooden skewer inserted into center of muffin comes out clean, about 18 to 21 minutes. Cool muffins in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack at least 20 minutes. Dust with powdered sugar just before serving.

German Apple Pancake

There are occasions that I make certain recipes just for my son and husband.  This was one of them.  I’m not a fan of cooked fruit…never have been.    Fresh fruit I like.  The crispness, juiciness and sweetness of an apple that’s cool from the fridge is what I prefer.  Once it’s cooked, it completely loses its appeal with me.  It can smell great but there’s something about the texture and the warmth of cooked fruit that doesn’t compute with me.  My boys like it though so I found this recipe for a German Apple Pancake in my favorite baking book and used up some apples that weren’t getting any younger in the fridge.  They both loved this pancake.  It’s a fairly quick and easy dessert or great as part of a brunch.  It was fun for me to make because I liked watching it puff up in the oven.

Chocolate Roll Cake

Delicious chocolate roll cake

Oh those chocolate cake cravings!  They will not relent until they are satisfied with the real thing.  I’ve tried eating a piece of candy or cocoa-covered almonds but to no avail….a chocolate cake craving must be met with the real thing and quickly too.  No store-bought cake will do and there are no decent bakeries or pastry shops in this city so I needed a recipe that was fairly quick to make but rich in taste.  My favorite baking book came through once again but with a few adjustments.  The roll cake recipe in the book calls for marshmallow creme in the filling but since I didn’t have enough left in the cupboard and I certainly didn’t want to waste time running to the store, I decided on something even better…a whipped ganache filling.   I’ve made ganache in the past but only the type used to pour over a cake or pastry so whipped ganache was new to me.  This baking book did not have a whipped ganache recipe so in my hurry to get this cake made and silence those chocolate demons, I failed to thoroughly research whipped ganache and used a faulty recipe from AllRecipes.com.  Ganache must NOT be overwhipped.  The recipe I used failed to mention this so mine turned out a bit grainy……I tried fixing it by cooling it and re-whipping….Fail.  I tried to warm the ganache and re-whip it…..Fail.  Lessons learned: there is no way to rescue over-whipped ganache and always take the time to do the proper research when it comes to making something new.  So the filling was darker than what it should have been and not so smooth but it tasted so good.

Petulla – Albanian Fried Dough

Deep-fried alien-looking dough

Yeah, yeah I know….. fried dough doesn’t sound all that inviting…it’s not as pleasant-sounding as doughnut or as exotic as beignet but trust me, Petulla are fried pieces of heaven to our family.  There are many variations in the world when it comes to fried dough.  These petulla can be eaten alone (the way I like them) or with feta cheese or with honey or both as my husband and son like them.  They can also be covered with powdered sugar…to do this I place some powdered sugar in a clean paper lunch bag….toss in a couple of petulla and shake until they are coated with the sugar.   My son and I like to look at the odd shapes and see if we can identify objects in the shapes just like you would do with clouds in the sky.

Three petulla

I grew up on these but my mother didn’t teach me the recipe.  She is old school so she doesn’t measure her ingredients with measuring cups and spoons and I don’t like to cook or bake without those measuring devices.  I came across my recipe in the most unexpected of places….The Sopranos Family Cookbook.  I bought the cookbook because I loved the TV show and I love Italian food….but the recipe I’ve used the most in this book was the Zeppole recipe.   I was floored when I saw the Zeppole picture….they looked exactly like Petulla!  So I tried the recipe but I was slightly disappointed…it was close to my mom’s petulla but something was missing.  I thought back to the way my mom made it and I realized that she put eggs into her batter.  I tried the altered recipe and SUCCESS!  I turned an Italian zeppole recipe into an authentic Albanian petulla recipe.

How I Sabotaged my Husband’s Diet AKA my Pecan Pie

To help celebrate my husband’s safe return, I made his favorite pie as a surprise.  He was happy and a little upset at the same time.  He loves this pie but he had worked hard over the past year and lost 34 pounds.  I kinda sorta sabotaged his hard work.  Oops!  This pie is great but it uses a homemade crust which means it’s bit more complicated to make.  Yes, I suppose you can buy a pre-made pie crust but I don’t care for them much.  Those refrigerated pie crusts are usually made with lard which is a big no-no for me and the frozen crusts don’t have any butter in the crust which means they lack flavor.  So I make my own….it’s not too too hard…my biggest problem right now is that it’s crazy hot here and my pie dough can melt right before my eyes as I am rolling it.  That’s just what happened to me and that is why you don’t see the pretty, fluted crust I normally make in the picture above.  I wish I could have shared step-by-step photos with you but unfortunately my kitchen has no windows so that means no natural light to take decent pictures.  I found some videos that might help if you are unsure about making your own pie dough.

A video on how to roll out pie dough.

A video on how to move pie dough into a pie plate.

A video on how to crimp the edges.

A video on how to bake blind…pre-bake a pie crust.

Here is the recipe for the pie dough followed by the pecan pie recipe.

Black Bottom Cupcakes

Cupcake Trio

Guess who had a chocolate craving today.  Once again I turned to my favorite baking book:  America’s Test Kitchen Baking Book for something new to bake in order to satisfy this insatiable sweet tooth.  I found this recipe for Black Bottom Cupcakes that fit my needs which were as follows:  it had to be for only 12 cupcakes not 24 like most recipes; I had to have the ingredients on hand and it had to be uncomplicated.  This recipe fit all of my requirements.  Before proceeding, I did a little research online for black bottom cupcake recipes so I looked at other foodie websites and blogs and I found that all the recipes out there used vegetable oil in the cupcake batter.  The recipe I used had melted butter which is so much more flavorful than oil.  My son and I really enjoyed these cupcakes.  He tried his warm while I like mine cold from the fridge because of the cheesecake texture of the center.  These cupcakes are more humble than pretty but they taste wonderful.