Cookies

Snickerdoodles: the perfect road trip companion

~ Hilary ~ 1 Comment

For those of you who were maybe hoping this was some sort of Thanksgiving post, then I must apologize (however one of those will come in the very near future!!).  These cookies were actually made for a road trip that my friends Iman, Kristina, Jase-Face (okay, his actual name is Jasen) and I took to Montreal last weekend.  I wasn’t originally even supposed to go on this little trip, but after I found out that cutest couple in the universe, K & J, were popping over to our neighbouring province, I knew I had to pester them into letting me go.  This being said, I felt semi-guilty for bumming a ride in the car just so I could shop, so I decided I needed to bake something to apologize for my absurd inviting abilities.

Normally when I decide to bake something, I usually lean towards cheesecakes or cupcakes.  Knowing that the first would be rather difficult to cut in a moving vehicle and since I just made the latter, I decided to switch it up a little and try out a new cookie recipe.

This Snickerdoodle recipe came from one of my favourite blogs, Annie’s Eats.  Now in case you’re just as curious as me as to where this silly name comes from (it sounds like it should be followed by a singing of “supercalifragilisticexpialidocious“), I did a little bit of searching on my favourite research site (Wikipedia) and came up with this…

“Snickerdoodles are probably German in origin. … The name is probably a corruption of the German word Schneckennudeln, which means “snail cookies.” … Yet another hypothesis suggests that the name has no particular meaning or purpose and is simply a whimsically named cookie that originated from a New England tradition of fanciful cookie names.  There is also a series of tall tales about a hero named “Snickerdoodle” from the early 1900s which may be related to the name of the cookie.”

Anyways, kind of cool!

Baking these cookies for half the time and at 75 degrees less in our oven meant that they were perfect and soft on the inside, with a crunchy, sugary crisp on the outside.  ALSO, look at Annie’s Eats, she actually makes baked goods every single day.  If I were her kids I would LOVE homemade lunches.

Happy Birthday Doug (what better way to express birthday wishes than through a cookie pizza?)

~ Hilary ~ 1 Comment

When my co-worker and good friend Kristina approached me a few weeks ago to help her make cookies for her boyfriend Jasen’s dad, I knew this couldn’t just be any normal baking session.  What Kristina proposed was that, since Doug loved cookies, we make him a plethora of different varieties, in hopes of satisfying his apparent sweet tooth.  Of course, I saw this as an opportunity to do something creative and different – the cookie pizza was born!

Now I must admit I cannot take complete credit for this cookie pizza idea.  Ever since I was an 11 and ate cookie dough by the bowlful, I have known about cookies and their remarkable ability to double as pretty awesome birthday cakes.  The idea for this cookie pizza was actually inspired by two sources.  The first was Ariel, one of my beloved, school-year roommates.  Ariel had made a cookie pizza back in March, and could not stop bragging about how good it was (I unfortunately did not get a piece, which makes me extremely upset, considering I heard about it for weeks on end). The second was a search through trusty google images, to find this gorgeous picture and recipe for a dessert pizza.  Drawing a little inspiration from each, Kristina, Elisabeth (my super cool friend from Norway!) and I managed to churn out something which I think is pretty wonderful.  Ridiculous thing that never happens in my kitchen: somehow Kristina does not own dry ingredient measuring cups, so things like flour and brown sugar were measured in a gravy mixer.

Anatomy of the Cookie Pizza:
– Chocolate chip cookie (using mom’s recipe, of course – mom, I know you love it when I give you shout-outs, so here we are)
– Buttercream icing
– Red sprinkles (to make up for the fact that we completely forgot to dye the icing red…)
– Shredded coconut
– Red chocolate moulding wafers
– M&M’s, star sprinkles, baking gums and whatever your heart desires.
– Chocolate glaze piped through a sandwich-size Ziploc bag (try not to make your letters obese like my “H”)

Result: sugary birthday treat, perfect for a grown up sweet tooth.  Hope he liked it!

I realize that reading my blog right now is like looking into a candy store.  As of tomorrow, this sugar-streak will end and I will once again return to my attempts at healthy-almost-including-vegetables meals.  Apologies.

Ginger Molasses Crinkle Cookies

~ Hilary ~ 2 Comments

No matter what delicious food I make in the future, I am positively sure that cookie dough will remain my favourite snack for the rest of time.  As always, I ate about 1/3 of the prepared cookie dough prior to it being baked, a task which quickly threw my stomach into a state of mass chaos.  Was it worth it?  Of course.

I made these cookies at the request of one of my co-workers, Diandria (shout-out!!).  She is a huge fan of the Starbucks ginger molasses cookies, so I knew I had to try my very best to recreate their treat.  Not having ever made ginger cookies of any kind, I had no idea what recipe to use.  Of course I turned to Canadian Living to fix my problem, and easily found the recipe for their Ginger Molasses Crinkle Cookies.  Not sure where the “crinkle” comes in (since the word kind of reminds me of Christmas wrapping paper), but I’m not complaining.

I haven’t brought in a Friday treat for awhile, since our Fridays have been completely occupied by Summer Orientation sessions.  Since today was our LAST Friday session (I can’t believe it), I decided to make these cookies to celebrate/mourn.  Also, it’s weird, but I’m getting some sort of inner-gut feeling when something is done in the oven.  Maybe that’s a super Foodie Freak thing to say, but it’s happening.  Okay, or it might just be that my paranoia makes me check the oven every minute so things don’t burn.  Either way, I’m learning.

PS: Sorry about the bland pictures.  There is only so much you can do with cookies.