4 posts tagged “cookies”

Raspberry Struesel Bars

I am loving my web subscription to CooksIllustrated.com - much handier (and less paper) than subscribing to the magazine.

Today was cold, rainy, and windy. A perfect day for making these Raspberry Streusel Bars.

Toffee Butter Cookies

The Chocolate-Oatmeal cookies were fantastic, but what I really wanted to make were these Chocolate Toffee Butter Cookies, which call for Heath Bits o' Brickle Toffee Bits. I somewhat foolishly burned time going to four different stores in search of Toffee Bits with no luck.

Now, I've become fixated on getting a hold of Toffee Bits so I can try the recipe. I can get them online but the smallest order I can place is for six bags. That seems ridiculous, though if the recipe works out I could always give a few of the bags away, along with the recipe.

However, I am imaging Mr. Thifty's (aka Drake's) reaction when I open up a package containing six bags of Toffee Bits. Or his face when he sees six bags sitting in the pantry. Maybe I'll keep looking locally.

Cookies!

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I am a terrible sucker for cooking magazines. I recently accepted a "trial" subscription to Cooks Country magazine, but of course wound up just keeping it. Cooks Country is kind of cross between Cook's Illustrated (which publishes it) and Taste of Home (which, by the way is the top-selling cooking mag in the U.S.).

This recipe is from Cooks Country web site. The only substitution I made was using chopped bittersweet chocolate instead of semisweet chips. The "secret ingredients" here are using ground oats in place of some of the flour and mixing in melted milk chocolate into the dough. These were fantastic. These are the cookies mentioned here.

1 3/4 cups old-fashioned oats
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon table salt
10 tablespoons unsalted butter , softened but still cool
1 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 ounces milk chocolate , melted and cooled
1 cup coarsely chopped bittersweet chocolate
1 cup toasted* pecans, chopped

1. Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower- middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Place 1 cup oats in food processor or blender and process until well ground, about 30 seconds. Transfer to large bowl and stir in flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

2. With electric mixer, beat butter and brown sugar together on medium-high speed until well blended and lumps are gone, about 1 minute. Scrape down sides of bowl. Add egg and vanilla and beat until light and fluffy, about 30 seconds. Add melted chocolate and beat until incorporated, about 20 seconds. Add flour mixture and beat on low speed until just incorporated, about 15 seconds. Add remaining 3/4 cup oats, chocolate chips, and nuts and beat on low speed until evenly distributed, about 10 seconds.

3. Roll 2 tablespoons of dough into balls and space 2 inches apart on baking sheets. Bake, rotating and switching position of pans halfway through baking time, until cookies are cracked and set on top but look moist within cracks, 14 to 16 minutes. Cool cookies on baking sheets on wire racks for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack to cool completely.

* Toast pecans in a 350F oven for 5 to 7 minutes.

It reminds me of hanging out with my girlfriends in high school. We made these all the time. Of course, we had the youthful metabolism to get away with it. Mostly we ate the dough, despite our mothers' dire warnings of what that might do to us.

My "extra evil" version of Toll House cookies makes these substitutions:

• dark brown sugar for light
• 1 1/2 cups, rather than 1 cup, of walnuts. I toast the walnuts for 10 minutes in a 350 oven to bring out the walnutty flavor
• a whole bar (9.7 oz) Scharfenberger bittersweet chocolate (chopped up) for the 12 oz. of semi-sweet chocolate chips