Cookie Confab turned Cookie Bust!

This year – our plans did not gel. Not sure why -with this thing or that we just could never get the time together to bake. Debbie did stop over for a little while and dropped off some spritz cookies and have a little tipple.

Rose and Debbie knocking one back.
So Debbie's  sister can tell - Debbie is the one on the right.

Debbie helped me decorate these.. after the knocking back.

Not that I was going to let a lack of teamwork get me down! I had cookies to make dammit! I have people counting on me for their holiday excess!! I made Tony step up to be my kitchen bitch – roll this, wash that, where the hell do you think you're going – get me that flour out of the pantry. He cried like a little girl “But its 1 am!” Breakin' weak - marathon cookie baking is not for timid.

Here he is making the stroopwaffles... I cropped the picture so you can't see the shackles.

This is a new recipe from A Baker's Odyssey.
The are called Nuspatchen (or something like that).
They are a hazelnut and cinnamon topping on a spice cookie.
Next year...the bottom will be chocolate for that Nutella-like flavor combo!!

Every year I make a new cookie – I have to. If I made the same damn thing over and over where is the challenge in that? Lord knows that I am a glutton for punishment.

My first thought was to try a recipe I found in the LA Times. They took recipe submissions and I was intrigued by the recipe for Nana tea cakes. It seemed simple – the dough had three ingredients and the filling could be varied to give different flavors. However, the write up as provided in the original posting seemed a little too basic. Trust me – if there is one thing I learned, Nana never measures anything and she usually never describes the nuances of the prep work.

I make up a batch of the dough and let it chill up over night. I roll it out, cut and fill it, set to oven to 350 as instructed and tossed in the first sheet. Ten minutes later, I pull the cookies out and they are still raw. Where is the flaky goodness? I put them back in for five more minutes – still no love. I pull these out and toss them.

I pump up the oven temp 25 degrees and bake four cookies. 20 minutes later, too brown on the bottom, raw on the inside. Into the trash with those as well.

What the hell Nana? This is not working out at all...

I pump up the oven 50 degrees – take that cookies!!! Oooooo puffy action! They are rising!! They are bursting open!!!! Shit. Four more cookies not right- this time they are edible and we scarfed them up.

Last four cookies – what to do? It is a steam issue. Hmmmm...I'll try docking the jam pocket to let out the steam, bake at 425 and get them just the tiniest bit brown. Bingo!!

A couple hours of work for four good cookies. We ate them before I thought of getting a picture. Shit again.

The funny thing, this recipe made the final 10 best recipes and the LA Times test kitchen published the recipe with the same time and temperatures as the original submission. What the hell, LA Times? Are you sure you really test these? Tony says “LA Times is a lyin' bitch!”

I ended up not using that recipe.

Instead I pulled out an old mini fruitcake recipe. Oh before you start your bad jokes and bellyaching, this is one of the best fruit and nut filled, booze infused treats ever created. Tony, who hates fruitcake, begs for these. Of course, he also begs for oxygen when he can't remember the safe word.

This recipe comes from the Cookie Lover's Cookie Book by Richard Sax. I love this little book. It has been out of print for years and it's hard to find. It is worth the effort though – this recipe is a gem.

And no - there are no pictures of these. 1) they look lumpy and ugly but taste great 2) they are all gone!!!

BABY FRUITCAKES

You'll need miniature muffin tins for these guys, though a regular-size muffin pan can also be used. Paper muffin liners make this recipe easier to remove from the pan and store, but you can use non-stick pans if you have them.

The original recipe called for the neon colored cherries you usually find in fruit cakes. I substituted in dried cherries, but they do not look as festive. If you think they need a little color, you can add a glace cherry half to the top when you glaze.

Makes 2 dozen 1 1/2-inch miniature cupcakes, or 1 dozen muffin-size

2 cup of mixed fruit (mix and match from the following): raisins, golden raisins, dried currants, dried cranberries and chopped dates

1/3 cup chopped dried pineapple

1/3 cup chopped dried cherries

3 tablespoons chopped crystallized ginger

3 tablespoons bourbon or brandy (or apple cider)

¼ cup (1/2 stick) unsalted butter, softened

1/3 cup light brown sugar

1 egg

½ cup flour

¾ teaspoon ground allspice

½ teaspoon cinnamon

½ teaspoon fresh-grated nutmeg

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

¼ teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon baking powder

1/8 teaspoon baking soda

1/3 cup each coarsely chopped walnuts, pecans, and almonds

BOURBON GLAZE:

2 tablespoons light corn syrup

2 teaspoons bourbon or brandy (or apple cider)

1.  Place the mixed fruit, pineapple, cherries, and crystallized ginger in a bowl. Toss with the bourbon and set aside to soak at least 30 minutes. It is best to not to let it set overnight.
2. Preheat the oven to 300°F., with racks in the center and bottom of the oven. Place a pan of hot wa­ter on the lower rack.  Line miniature or regular-size muffin tins with paper muffin liners. If you don't have paper liners, butter the pan(s) generously.
3.  Cream the butter and brown sugar in an electric mixer until light; then add the egg, mixing until smooth. Meanwhile, sift together the flour, allspice, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, salt, baking powder, and baking soda onto a sheet of wax paper.  Using a spatula, stir in the flour mixture to the creamed mix­ture, mixing just until blended, no longer. Stir in the fruit mixture with its soaking liquid, along with the walnuts, pecans, and almonds, mixing just until incorporated.
4.  Bake the fruitcakes until lightly golden and a toothpick inserted in the center emerges clean, about 30 minutes (or 35 for regular-size muffin tins). Cool in the pan(s) for about 5 minutes and remove from the pan(s) (leave the paper liners on). If they seem to be sticking, then run the tip of a knife blade around the cakes.  Placing them on a wire rack over a sheet of wax or parchment paper.

Bourbon Glaze: Place the corn syrup in a small pan and heat gently, just to thin it. Remove from heat, stir in the bourbon, and brush the tops of the fruitcakes with the glaze. Let stand until set; then store airtight.

These keep well for at least a week, and can be mailed.  I have also frozen them with great success. Just thaw at room temperature in their packaging. To brighten them up before serving, reglaze so the tops are shiny.

Adapted from the Cookie Lover’s Cookie Book by Richard Sax

Book Review: The Christmas Cookie Cookbook by Ann Pearlman

It's coming time for the big Cookie Confab – though once again this year it is going to be downsized. Gail, Debbie and I have no days off in common anymore. It's sad. I love getting together to bake cookies and chew the fat. And drink. And bitch. And eat.

I have been pouring over my cookie books and even asked to review one. So yes – being the cheap chiseling food whore that I am - I got another free book.

The book I requested was The Christmas Cookie Cookbook, from Atria Books. This book is written by Ann Pearlman,  who also authored The Christmas Cookie Club, a book about a group of women who get together every year to trade cookies and share their lives.

Now ya know me – I am not a chick lit kinda gal. My family was filled with evil harridans who smiled nicely at each other in public and cut each other to ribbons with their razor sharp tongues behind closed doors. Family gatherings were not the sappy sweet female bonding experiences that you find in so many books aimed at women. So needless to say I haven't read the novel The Christmas Cookie Club.

But I do love cookies and have been running The Cookie Confab for almost 10 yrs now so I was very intrigued by the premise for this book.

All that being said – I really enjoyed reading The Christmas Cookie Cookbook. Ann talks about how the club got started, about the women involved, and the deep bonds that have developed over the last 20 years – yes 20 years. That is some stamina right there!! Plus, you get concrete advice on how to start your own club, hints on how to make the event a success from setting the date to passing out the goodies.

There are recipes too. Now, do not expect any ground shattering breakthroughs in cookie baking technology. Many of these recipes have seen print elsewhere – including the recipe that I made as a test batch. (In fact, the Ultimate Double Chocolate Cookie is from the Ghiridelli website, modified to make the dough a little easier to handle when shaping into log. I, and my boss, have made a couple other changes which I will share below.)

Other recipes are included for appetizers and buffet dishes to keep everyone on the edge of sobriety, plus cookie making tips.

Oh yeah – and then there are the Rules. The Rules are brilliant. The Rules are awesome. They are the work of someone who understands how to organize and maintain.

This is my snarky non-chick lit interpretations of the rules. If you want the nice friendly PC version, then you will just have to go and buy the book.

1. Cookie variety – no chocolate chip or oatmeal raisin – it's freakin' Christmas so act like it whydoncha?
2. No Goo – cuz too messy is no good...
3. Exclusive membership – No one wants to bake 20 dozen cookies for a party, so no – you don't get to come!
4. Commitment - what?! You came one time and now you wanna back out!!!?? Bitch!
5. Life Membership- well if we can put up with you, you can put up with us every year... or in other words the only way to leave the cookie club is feet first!
6. Packaging – Thou shalt invest in something pretty to hold your cookies – no paper plates ya lazy ho!
7. Share a dish – we need some food to soak up all this booze!
8. Charity – spread the love – and calories – around!
9. More Fun – do things that will be memorable - memorable enough to cut through the alcohol-induced haze.

I think the one thing I would have like to see with the cookie recipes were “keeping instructions” - a consistent addendum to each recipe talking about how long the product would keep, and the proper way to store them. One would assume that these recipes have been made and tested by the ladies who submitted them and those ladies would have some idea of how long these different types of cookies keep. Maybe that is kinda nit-picky but I'm just sayin'...woulda been nice.

Overall, I would say buy this book, especially if you have ever dreamed of running a cookie exchange or even another seasonal event every year. The advice is sound, the tone supportive and if you are lucky enough to have friends and family who actually like each other then I say give it a try!

Now your reward for putting up with my ramblings – the recipe!!!

Here is the recipe for Ultimate Double Chocolate Cookies. They demand something like milk or, even better, the slight bitterness of black coffee.

Here is the recipe as it is written in the book.

Ultimate Double Chocolate Cookies Yield: 24 cookies 12 ounces Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips 11 1/2 ounces 60% Bittersweet Chocolate Chips 6 tablespoon unsalted butter 3 eggs 1 cup sugar 1/3 cups all-purpose flour 1/2 teaspoon baking powder 1 cup chopped walnuts Directions In double boiler over hot water, melt bittersweet chocolate chips and butter. In large bowl, beat eggs and sugar with an electric mixer until thick. Stir in chocolate mixture. Set aside. In small bowl, stir together flour and baking powder. Stir in chocolate mixture. Gently mix in semi-sweet chocolate chips and walnuts (dough will be gooey). Chill for 30 minutes to firm up. On a sheet of plastic wrap, form dough into two logs, each 2 inches in diameter and about 8 inches long. Wrap tightly. Refrigerate at least 2 hours or until firm. Shinny Shiny cookies...yummmy.... Pre-heat oven to 375°F. With sharp knife, cut into 3/4-inch slices and place on greased or parchment-lined cookie sheet. Bake 14 minutes or until shiny crust forms. Cookies should be soft inside. Transfer cookies to rack to cool. Differences from the original recipe on the Ghiridelli sight: The original recipe does not call for the 30 minute chill before shaping. This does make it easier to handle when shaping. The shape of the logs is 2” in diameter and 12” long. Even though the recipe in the book says 8” - the logs did come out about 12” during the test. The original recipe stipulates that you unwrap the logs before cutting. Duh. The original recipe kept the cookies on the pan until cool. These are kinda delicate and I would cut the difference between the two recipes and let the cookies cool for a few minutes before removing them to the rack. The original recipe called for 12-14 minutes. 12 minutes did the trick for me. The original recipe states that these will keep up to one week. I hid a cookie and just pulled it out. A week is kinda pushing it – they were much better the first couple of days, but I still would not turn my nose up at one of these that was a week old. Changes that I made to the recipe: I would say chop the walnuts into medium to small pieces. Larger pieces taste good but are a bitch to cut. Use a serrated knife when cutting the log. This is for two reasons: first, the sawing motion means you do not have to press down as hard on the log so you do not flatten it out or cause the dough to crumble. The second is it will cut through the chocolate chips when they are cold. I also froze one of the logs of dough, then thawed it in the fridge overnight before baking. Turned out just as awesome as the non-frozen dough. Lastly – this can easily be made gluten free! My boss, Melissa, substituted ½ cup of commercial gluten free flour and they turned out fantastic.

Some Veggies for Stacy

Before Christmas, I had lunch with my friend Stacy. We were talking about food - as always - and she asked me what I did for veggies in the winter.

Of course, eating local in an Ohio winter is almost impossible unless you've had the good fortune to freeze or can your own. I did get some strawberries and peas frozen but that was about it.

At present, I have been haunting ethnic groceries. Being a poor house owner, I haven't been able to eat out like I used to. So I have been learning a lot about Indian and Asian cooking, which are two of my favorite types of eat out food.

My most recent visit was to CAM grocery over on Bethel Road. They have a great selection of fresh produce, meats and seafood, plus a lot of staple items like soy sauce and rice. The prices of the produce are pretty amazing. I picked up 1.5 pounds of baby Shanghai bok choy for $2.50.

Chinese veggies like baby bok choy are great for quick dinners because they cook so rapidly.

A quick way to make a side dish from baby bok choy:

1. Clean and cut apart the bunches of greens. It's ok if they are not totally dry.
2. Thinly slice a clove or two of garlic and grate a little fresh ginger if you have it (if you don't its not the end of the world)
3. Heat up some oil in a non-stick skillet.
4. When the oil is hot, toss in the garlic and ginger.
5. Now toss in the moist baby bok choy into the pan, and toss until the leaves just start to look wilted.
6. Take out of pan and put onto plates. Hit it with a couple shots of soy or sprinkle with salt. Also, you could toss the warm leaves with a little oyster sauce before plating if you are partial to oyster sauce.
7. Done!

I served it up with sliced roast pork and mashed sweet potatoes. I like the unadorned flavor of greens so a lot of people may find that pretty minimal.

The other thing I did was make "Fabulous Fake Asian Noodle Soup".

I love soups like pho and egg drop soup, so I kinda came up with my own version.

This serves two.

Faux Asian broth

3 cups of homemade no-salt chicken stock (See notes below about commercial broth)

A piece of ginger, cut about 1/4" thick and smashed with back of a knife (you want it kinda beat up to release flavor)

A clove of garlic, smashed

A couple slices of onion, thin

A small dash of five spice powder OR a mixture of star anise, cinnamon bark, Szchuan peppercorns and cloves (I will be truthful and tell you I use just a little piece of cinnamon stick and the peppercorns because my hubby hate anise and cloves!!)

Put all the spices into the broth and simmer for about 30 mins while you are prepping the rest of the soup items. You can also do this ahead of time and freeze or refrigerate the strained broth.

Soup Fixin's

1/2 pound of baby bok choy or other greens, cleaned and blanched

3 or 4 white button mushrooms or any other mild mushroom of choice, thinly sliced

1/4 pound of meat, thinly sliced or diced (I've used shredded leftover chicken and pork roast. The main thing is that the pieces will fit in a spoon.)

1/2 pound of fresh noodles, either Chinese or Italian (Cook according to the instructions)

2 green onions, finely sliced

Soy Sauce

Fish Sauce (if you have it)

Asian sesame oil (if you have it)

Here is how I streamline my prep. If you have it, use a hot pot to get your water to a boil quickly. Put it into a saucepan on the stove over high heat to keep it boiling. Have a bowl with ice water sitting next to the stove. Plunge the greens into boiling water for about a minute (until they look bright green). Using a slotted spoon, fish out and put into the ice water. Let the blanching water return to a boil and throw in the noodles. Cook until finished (I let mine go until they are no longer al dente. I like soft noodles in soup.) Drain and rinse the noodles.

Assembly

Split up the veggies, noodles and meat between two large soup bowls.

Remove the flavoring agents from the broth.

Now here comes the tricky part - the salty part.

I use unsalted broth because I want the salt to come from soy sauce and fish sauce. How much you use of each is fairly subjective - I would estimate about 1 -2 Tablespoons of soy sauce and a teaspoon of fish sauce does it for me. Make sure you taste the broth after you add the minimal amounts of the salty agents and adjust as needed. The flavor should be very light. If you put too much soy sauce it will over whelm the flavor of everything else. If you choose to use low sodium commercial broth, please be very careful as things can go bad very quickly - nothing is worse than too much salt in a soup.

Once you are happy with the broth, ladle over the ingredients in the bowls.

If you have some Asian sesame oil, you can add a couple of drops to each bowl.

This is a very light soup - I usually eat it when I don't want to get filled up. You could add more veggies, meat and noodles to it if you would like to make it more filling. Everything but the cooking of the noodles and the bok choy can be done the day before, so all you have to do is heat up the broth while you finish the noodles and greens. You could even use the stock to cook the noodles, I suppose, and add the bok choy just before you take it off the heat. It might muddy up the broth though... something to think about though...

(Still no camera. My daughter took the pictures of the baby bok choy for me. Thanks Annie!!!)

So what have I been cooking?

So what have I been cooking?

Hmmmmmmm let's see.

Banana Foster pancakes - ham - chicken curry - homemade dinner rolls - pot roast - bean soup - lentil soup - jambalaya - steaks - baked potatoes - a 20 pound turkey - cookies - OH YEAH! The cookies!!!!

So after not seeing each other for almost nine months - I get Debbie and Gail into my new house. Ah, the excitement! Ah, the alcohol!! And we roll and we scoop and we sweat over our cookies and what happens?

Cookie Rustlers!!

Dag Nabit! We turn our backs for one minute and woosh! So if you did not receive you allotment of cookies from me this year - Blame it on the rootin', tootin' varmits!

However, I will not let this dastardly deed crush the spirit of the Cookie Confab.This was a time of togetherness. A time to catch up on the last twelve months and remember what friendship is really about. A time to ooooh and ahhhh over pictures of grandbabies. A time for us to drink pina coladas and Irish coffee while waiting on the timer to ding. But mostly it was a time for us eat all the “broken” cookies and swap recipes.

Who needs elves? Keebler - eat your heart out!

This was a rather rushed affair this year – no pre-Confab planning lunch or shopping trip. Our new work schedules kept us from getting down to that kind of detail this year, but we still managed to coordinate enough that we actually got some baking done.

The cookies weren’t the only thing getting baked!!

We baked some of our old favorites: Gingersnaps, Cut-outs, Pecan Sandies plus few more. Truth be told, I still do not have all my cookbooks unpacked yet, so I was relying on some of my old typed recipes, magazines and Internet sources this year.

Snickerdoodle Roses from Gail

Oh GingerSnaps!

New on this year’s roster was a lemon cut out with pistachio topping. Debbie found the recipe in one of the every present Christmas cookie magazines that start showing up in the checkout lane in October. I think her magazine was from Taste of Home. I was worried they would taste like they had been dipped in Lemon Pledge, but the flavors were just right. Annie kept sneaking in and eating them “to save you from yourselves.” Thank you Annie for throwing yourself on that grenade!

Debbie Cookies

The other recipe I tried was from Better Homes and Gardens. These cookies were supposed to remind you of a certain famous coconut and almond candy bar. The flavor was close, but almost too sweet. The almond flavor was over whelmed by the sweet coconut. The biggest disappointment was the chocolate topping. I melted the bittersweet chocolate as instructed, but it never really set up once it was on the bars. I tucked it into the fridge and the chocolate got so hard you couldn’t cut it without breaking even after setting out for about 30 minutes. I couldn’t help thinking there had to be a better way to do this…maybe something like almond -coconut tassies? More work than a bar cookie, which is one of the reasons I was drawn to this recipe, but the current recipe just isn’t working for me…

However, these were one of the cookies the rustlers favored - so maybe they were worth making a second batch.

Here is the original recipe

Now here is what I did to change it!

Coconut and Almond Bar Cookies - Rosie Style!

Makes 36 bars

ingredients

2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1-1/2 cup whole almonds, toasted
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
2/3 cup butter, melted
1 14-ounce package flaked coconut
1 14-ounce can (1 1/4 cups) sweetened condensed milk
12 ounces dark chocolate chips

directions

1. Preheat oven to 350F. Line a 13x9x2-inch baking pan with foil, leaving enough hanging over the edge to form a cookie sling. Place graham cracker crumbs, 1/2 cup of the almonds, and the brown sugar in a food processor. Cover and process until almonds are finely chopped. Add butter; cover and pulse with four or five on-off turns or until mixture is well combined. Press crumb mixture onto bottom of the ungreased, lined baking pan. Bake in preheated oven for 12 minutes. Allow to cool until just warm to the touch.

2. Combine coconut and sweetened condensed milk in a medium bowl. Spread mixture evenly over crust. Sprinkle remaining 1 cup almonds evenly over coconut layer. Now sprinkle the chocolate pieces on top of the almonds and coconut. Bake for 10 minutes.

3. As soon as you remove the pan from the oven, spread the now-melted chocolate chips evenly over top of baked bars. Cool completely in pan on a wire rack. (If desired, chill in the refrigerator until the chocolate is set.) Once cooled, but before the chocolate gets really hard, pull the bars out of the baking dish using the foil sling. Using a long sharp knife,cut into bars. If your chocolate is too hard, score it with a paring knife along your intended paths of destruction to encourage even breaks. And if you try everything and they still come out looking crappy - the taste will be just fine.

To store: Place bars in a single layer in an airtight container; cover. Refrigerate for up to 1 week or freeze for up to 3 months. Let stand for 30 minutes before serving.

Reasons why I think my version is better:

1. I use one less bowl. Less clean up means more time to drink.
2. I use a single bag of chocolate chips. It means you spend less and you don't have a half bag of chips looking for a use - or ending up as snacks which don't really taste good with pina coldas .
3. The chocolate is thinner and allows for easy cutting.
4. The foil sling lets you liberate your pan for another batch of cookie. I don't know about you, but I only have two 13x9x2-inch pans and they are in constant use during cookie season.
5. I remove a whole step by melting the chocolate on top of the cookies instead of in another bowl. Why is this important? See reason 1.

If anyone would like any of this year's cookie recipes, please let me know. I will be happy to share them with you!

I've been hiding...

I am sorry about not posting lately. It's because I have a secret. I can't tell yet...but soon, very soon.

Since it is coming time for the 2009 Cookie Confab, I thought I would add a cookie widjet from Better Homes and Gardens to keep you amused.

Next week I can tell you more...I promise!!

Book Review: Eat Feed Autumn Winter

I've been a bad girl for the last few months...I've been sitting on a copy of the wonderful Eat Feed Autumn Winter by Anne Bramley , published by Stewart, Tabori and Chang (who always publish rockin' cookbooks!). It's not that I didn't want to share, but merely that I was distracted by other things. Plus I really didn't want to share. There I said it! It's mine! You can't have any of these wonderful recipes!!

As we know, eating seasonally is easy in the summer, when we have lots of top quality produce just laying around at the markets, but what about fall and winter? If you have to ask that question, then this is the book for you! Anne uses focuses on what is in season during the various cold months, and ties those items in with holidays and events. And we are not just talking about American holidays like Valentine's day or Christmas. There are menus for events such as Burns' Night from Scotland or Twelfth Night , which we generally don't celebrate here. However, with these new recipes in hand, I may just have to start celebrating these holidays just so I have an excuse to make this food.

One of the things I liked best about this cookbook was the use of all different types of ingredients in a variety of new and different ways. For example, most of us don't think of beets except as pickled or roasted. How about beet fries? With blue cheese dressing on the side? What about pumpkin seeds? What if I told you that they were used in a stuffing for chicken breasts? Intrigued? I was! If you are timid, don't let things like beet fries scare you away. There are still good solid fare for the less adventurous as well, such as a beef and ale pie, puddings and roast beef.

And the desserts are not forgotten either. With dishes ranging from items such as traditional English puddings to the sinfully decadent triple chocolate stuffed mocha cupcakes (OMG, the photos for those made me swoon!)

Criteria number one: Food porn - Lots of porn action here. However, the book isn't just about looking good. There is a depth of content here which ensures that this book will be staying in my collection, and will be come out again and again whenever there is a nip in the air..

Criteria number two: Ingredients - Most of the ingredients are readily available - the right time of year. Remember, this is a "seasonal" cookbook. Plan on plonking down some cash for things like lamb, caviar or lobster but there are still plenty of other recipes with ingredients that are cheap in season, like mushrooms, apples, pears and citrus fruits.

Also, a couple recipes call for specialized equipment like a pudding mold. If you have one, great. If not - it would have been nice to have explicit instructions on an acceptable substitute along with photo illustrations. Sometimes a picture can be all the encouragement that's needed to try out something new.

Criteria number three: Difficulty - This book would be accessible from an intermediate beginner on up. There are not a lot of fiddly recipes that require a degree from the CIA to accomplish. I love looking in a cook book and the recipe is only half a column long - I am more likely to try something that I don't have to sweat over in the kitchen - especially when I am entertaining (IE eating like the glutinous pigs we are).

Criteria number four: Recipes - Anne covers the gambit from appetizers to desserts to drinks. I have quite a few tagged for future investigation, mostly in the main dish category, like pasty pie and chili lime shrimp. Most of the recipes are straight forward - nothing ground breaking with recipes like roasted root vegetables - but still a nice mix when pared with the holidays she details in the side notes.

Criteria number five: Author - I will confess, I had not heard of the author before receiving this book. Anne Bramley is co-founder and host of Eat Feed, a podcast that focuses on eating seasonally, no matter the time of year. She is a professional foodie - she obviously loves her craft. The books shows a certain flair for understanding the day to day workings of a home kitchen, something often lacking in other "pretty" cookbooks.

So in celebration of St. Patty's day, I decided to make the "Irish" dinner - the last menu in the book. The other reasons I decided on that was 1) the lamb shoulder chops were on sale because they were *gasp* seasonal, and 2) the recipes were easy and I had all the other ingredients on hand. (And yes - I do keep Guinness in the house at all times. It's that kinda house, baby!)

I will tell you - the hubby LOVED these lamb chops. He has been talking about paying full price for more chops just so he can have them again. That is pretty high praise in this cheap-ass household.

If you get a chance this week - please make this dish. You will not regret it one bit!




Here is the recipe for

Stout-Glazed Lamb Chops with Colcannan

Salt

Freshly ground black pepper

4 lamb shoulder chops (6 to 8 ounces each)

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 cup stout, such as Guinness

3 tablespoons packed brown sugar

Generously salt and pepper the lamb chops. Heat the oil over medium-high heat in a large skillet. Add the chops to the skillet and brown 3 minutes on each side. Remove the chops to a platter. Deglaze the pan with the stout, scraping up any browned bits. Stir in the brown sugar until it
dissolves. Re­turn the chops to the sauce. Cover and simmer for 15 minutes. Turn and cook, covered, for another 15 minutes. Remove the lid and turn the heat to medium-high. Cook the sauce and chops for a final 8-10 minutes until the sauce is thick and syrupy and the chops are tender. Turn the chops to coat in the glaze every 2 minutes or so. Serve the chops on a bed of colcannon (recipe follows) and drizzle with the sauce.

Serves 4

Colcannan

(I will admit to cheating a little bit on this recipe. I did not use two pots. I put the potatoes in a large pot of water and when they were done enough, I simply added the cabbage in with them and cooked them the last . Such a cheater - I know! - R)

2 pounds potatoes, peeled and cut in quarters

6 tablespoons butter

1/2 cup warm milk

3 cups cabbage, thinly sliced

Salt

White pepper

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil Add the potatoes and cook until soft, about 20 minutes. Drain. While the potatoes are cooking, bring a medium pot of salted water to boil and cook cabbage for 5 minutes Drain. Mash potatoes with the butter. Stir in the milk and cabbage. Salt and pepper to taste.

Serves 4