double-chocolate sour cream cookies

An enabler--er, friend came over Wednesday and we baked. I made the almond cream sticks and tried something new that was an instant hit: Chocolate sour cream cookies. Kind of like a soft sugar cookie, but with chocolate. I got the recipe off Recipezaar.com. Full instructions are there.

1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar, packed
1 egg
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup baking cocoa
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (I used about 1 1/4 c organic dark choc chips)

The original recipe called for vanilla chips, as well, but I left those out. These were very good; dense, rich and not overly sweet. That and the use of brown sugar makes me suspect this is an older recipe (like: pre-seventies). The sour cream in this recipe makes up half the shortening (ordinarily there would be a full cup of butter to 2 cups sugar). This uses about 40% less sugar and adds the complexity of sour cream.

They make up a fairly thick, sticky batter and don't spread much as they bake. They were decent right out of the oven, but like most things with sour cream they were better the next day, and even better after that.

My Sparring Partner loved them. So did I; I ate six for breakfast the morning after I made them. That was good for an extra pound or four. I'd make another batch if I had a modicum of self-control.

I was intending to make a pound cake, too. I bought some dried Bing cherries and rehydrated them in a little orange & lemon juice, with a splash of almond extract. I figured I'd layer the minced cherry & almond comfit in the middle of a pound cake, but I got to feeling poorly on Thursday and let the project go. The cherries, however, have been marinating in the fridge and they are awesome. I've been eating them straight from the bowl. They're about gone.

Honeymooning is hard on the waistline. We've not been good little tai chi students. We haven't been training much. We've both put on a few pounds this month. Sigh.

nothing and everything

Have you ever been frightened by your own desire for something, because you knew it left you vulnerable? Have you ever gotten what you wanted and found that it exceeded your expectations? Have you ever been in a situation so perfect that in the back of your mind, you're terrified you'll wake up? That you figure it must've been a mistake, because you haven't been all that good in this life, much less the previous, and pretty soon the universe is going to up and sweep it all away?

Seriously--these Peppermint Bark candies are that good.

And the boy's not bad, either.

sugar jones

I am having this obscene urge to bake. Cookies, pound cake, pies, apple turnovers.... 'Tis the season, I guess. It's not really the eating I crave, it's the making. The smells and textures of butter, sugar, flour and eggs. The implements of baking--the pans, wooden spoons, spatulas; the cold fine-edges of cookie cutters in adorable little intricate shapes; the blunt smooth-grained weight of a cherrywood rolling pin, given to me by a mom who shared my passion for baking and is herself a champion bread-baker.

So I was scanning back through my recipe box and pulling out favorites, plus a few new things I'd like to try. Here's the litany of calories:

• The family favorite is coconut-sour cream cookies, a cakelike little pillow of heaven with a very fine texture, dense but very soft and moist. You can really only make them at Christmas. Once when I was a pre-teen I made a batch in summer, and they sagged into a mound of sugary mortar at the bottom of the cookie jar. We had to keep them in the fridge and dig out a serving with a spoon. But in winter, they keep very well. In fact they are better after two or three days.
• Almond cream sticks. These are fine-grained and slightly flaky, somewhere between shortbread and a pie crust. They are full of butter and cream cheese and are very rich, but oddly light. You can eat a whole lot of them before you realize the danger.
• Brownies made with Baker's bittersweet chocolate and swirled with cream cheese. (Are ya seeing a pattern, here?) My favorite brownie recipe. Moist and rich. Make a thin layer in a broad flat pan, cut into small bites and freeze the bulk.
• Chocolate- and butterscotch-chip cookies with oatmeal and pecans. I grind the rolled oats into flour and finely chop the nuts. That way they are more about flavor and texture than chunks. Most people will eat these, even those who claim to dislike pecans. Both additions are useful for upping the fiber contect and reducing the sweet, so you can tell yourself they semi-healthy.
• Grandma Rella's oatmeal with raisins and pecans. Now these ARE healthy. They have about 30-40% less sugar in them than most modern cookie recipies, and you make them with old-fashioned rolled oats. They're cakey and chewy, filling and satisfying. In my mom's house there is no shame in eating these for breakfast or dinner, preferably with milk. Hell, if you broke them in a bowl and poured milk over, you couldn't tell the difference.
  
  I keep thinking I can do a variation on this theme, with dried apples, maybe some almonds, and cut into bars.
• The perfect sugar cookie. Alas, I have not yet found it. I keep trying. I think there must be more dairy fat involved, somehow. (I have no interest in the dry cardboard-like cutout-type recipes. Blech.) A couple years ago I was experimenting with Madeleines: they kept coming out dry, so I added some sour cream. The Madeleines fell all apart but the batter was fantastic. It puffed and then sank into a wonderful chewy moist cookie-like substance. Must attempt this again.
• Something involving cherries and almond flavor. I don't know what form it will take, yet... maybe the base recipe for the coconut sour cream cookies, which strongly resembles a poundcake. I just bought a bottle of Almond extract from Penzey's--the real stuff, made with bourbon. But what form should the cherries take? Dried? Fresh? Canned? Pureed? Preserved? Comfited? I don't know, but I am undaunted.