Molasses Crinkles

If you have time to make only one batch of cookies this year, I would highly recommend that it be these molasses crinkles. Forget chocolate chip and sugar cookies, these cookies are the essence of Christmas. Like eggnog and bourbon balls, these cookies will wrap you in a holiday glow, and the warm spiciness of the cinnamon, cloves, ginger and allspice will make your house feel like the best place on Earth. Add a roaring fire and a fragrant, glowing Christmas tree, and you've got holiday magic.

These chewy, sophisticated cookies are so awesome that the first year Nick brought them to work, people came within a hair of getting in a fistfight over them. The next year, they didn't come to blows, but they resorted to stealing the unattended cookies and hiding them in their desks. That's why I always make at least a double batch these days--I wouldn't want anyone to get hurt.

My coworkers are not quite so dramatic, but when I mention that I've brought in a batch, their eyes light up and they ask, Those cookies from last year? Those are awesome! A lot of us can barely remember yesterday, so for these cookies to be remembered a year later is really saying something.

If that's not enough to convince you to make these, how about the fact that they're fun and easy to make? And, after you've made these once, you'll have the ingredients on hand for future batches. I'm sure you can see why they're a holiday staple in our house.

Molasses Crinkles

(From Epicurious)

• 2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening at room temperature
• 1/2 stick (1/4 cup) unsalted butter, softened
• 1 cup packed dark brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1/2 cup molasses (not robust or blackstrap)
• About 1/3 cup sanding or granulated sugar* (I used Sugar in the Raw) for tops of cookies

Whisk together flour, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, allspice, cloves, and salt in a bowl until combined.

 

Beat together shortening, butter, and brown sugar in a large bowl with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes in a stand mixer (preferably fitted with paddle attachment) or 6 minutes with a handheld. Add egg and molasses, beating until combined. Reduce speed to low, then mix in flour mixture until combined.

 

Put oven racks in upper and lower thirds of oven and preheat oven to 350°F.

 

Roll 1 heaping teaspoon of dough into a 1-inch ball with wet hands, then dip 1 end of ball in sanding sugar. Make more cookies in same manner, arranging them, sugared side up, 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets.

 

Bake cookies for 8 minutes, then cool on sheets 1 minute. The original recipe calls for the cookies to be baked for 10 to 12 minutes, but I found, as did a lot of the reviewers on Epicurious, that 10 minutes is too long. You want to take the cookies out when they still look almost raw--they should just be developing cracks on the surface, and they should not have taken on any color. The edges will have started to set, but the middles will still be puffy and almost wobbly. You have to trust me on this one--if you overcook these cookies, they're still tasty, but they end up being more like gingerbread and that certain something is gone. Don't worry if the cookies don't look as dark as they do in the pictures--they get darker and more crinkly as they cool.

Transfer to racks to cool completely. Make more cookies with remaining dough on cooled baking sheets.

 

 

 

Bourbon Cranberry Sauce

For years and years, I searched for the perfect cranberry sauce. I tried adding allspice, cloves, Zinfandel, and orange zest. I tried simmering, boiling, and marinating the cranberries. And then a couple years ago, I stumbled upon the ultimate cranberry sauce, courtesy of Epicurious.

The secret is bourbon, but don't let that scare you off. I make things like bourbon balls for the holidays because I have some bourbon lovers in the family, but I personally can't really handle the spirit. In cranberry sauce, though, it's magical--it adds just enough punch to play off the tartness of the cranberries, and it brings out all of the fruit's complexity. Somehow, it also adds a hint of an orange flavor, and it tones down the mouth-puckering sweetness of the sauce.

And the best part may be the fact that you don't have to watch a pot on the stove--you just throw 3 ingredients together in a baking dish and throw the whole thing in the oven for an hour; it's almost ridiculously simple and easy. And! for some reason, the baking dish even comes clean really easily. So if you want a complex, interesting cranberry sauce instead of the usual cloying culprits, you need to try this sauce for your next holiday get together. 

Bourbon Cranberry Sauce

(Slightly adapted from Epicurious)

• 1 pound (about 4 cups) cranberries
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 cup bourbon

Preheat oven to 350°F. Combine first 3 ingredients in 9x13-inch baking dish. Cover tightly with foil and bake until cranberries are tender and sugar is dissolved, stirring once, about 1 hour. Remove from oven and stir in bourbon. Refrigerate cranberry sauce until well chilled. (Can be prepared 1 week ahead.) Transfer to bowl and serve.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

It's almost time for the holidays, and for me, the holidays mean cookies. In fact, one year I made so many cookies that I lived on a Starbucks and cookie diet. I actually lost weight that year, but I think it's because I was working in a very busy restaurant; when I tried the same experiment as a nurse, it had the effect one would anticipate.

While a cookie diet is not advisable unless you're burning about 3,000 calories per day, making cookies with wheat flour might make one feel a little less guilty about eating a few here and there. There's still a lot of butter and sugar in these bad boys, so they're by no means healthy, and that's not the point, really. The point of using wheat flour is that it lends the cookies a nice toasty depth of flavor, and it tames the sometimes cloying sweetness of the timeless treat. Once cooked, the wheat in the dough is not really noticeable, but it makes these cookies just a tiny bit more interesting than your standard chocolate chip (not that there's anything wrong with the standard chocolate chip).

Here's the difference between these cookies and your 'normal' chocolate chip cookies: when I bring a tray of normal cookies in to work, they get eaten through the course of the night, and people tell me that they're good. When a tray of these cookies are placed on the counter and I disappear into triage for a while, I return to the floor to be greeted by cries of "Leah! Yay!", and an empty plate. I would say that's a wholehearted endorsement, wouldn't you?

I made these cookies because Molly from Orangette highly recommended them, and even said that she might like them better than the famous New York Times recipe, which is quite a recommendation. Like the New York Times recipe, I find that chilling the dough in the fridge overnight makes for a more complex flavor, but it's certainly not necessary. In her post, Molly discusses whether it's best to use whole wheat flour, or white whole wheat flour. I decided to go with a combination of the two, and I thought it worked nicely. Feel free to play with the ratios, though. Just be sure to use bittersweet chocolate as opposed to milk chocolate, as the wheat would overwhelm the generally underwhelming milk chocolate.

Whole Wheat Chocolate Chip Cookies

(Adapted from Good to the Grain, by Kim Boyce, and Molly from Orangette)

• 3 cups whole wheat flour (see note above)
• 1 ½ tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 ½ tsp. kosher salt
• 2 sticks (8 oz.) unsalted butter, cut into ½-inch cubes (see note above)
• 1 cup lightly packed dark brown sugar
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 tsp. vanilla extract
• 8 oz. bittersweet chocolate, roughly chopped into ¼- and ½-inch pieces, or bittersweet chips

Position racks in the upper and lower thirds of the oven, and preheat to 350°F. Line two baking sheets with parchment. (If you have no parchment, you can butter the sheets.)

Combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl, and whisk to blend.

Put the butter and sugars in the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. With the mixer on low speed, mix just until the butter and sugars are blended, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in the vanilla. 

Gradually add the flour mixture to the bowl, and blend on low speed until the flour is just incorporated. Add the chocolate, and mix on low speed until evenly combined. (If you have no stand mixer, you can do all of this with handheld electric beaters and/or a large, sturdy spoon.) 

Using an ice cream scoop (not a huge one, though), scoop mounds of dough onto the baking sheets, leaving enough space for the cookies to expand a bit.

Bake the cookies for 10 to 20 minutes, rotating the sheets halfway through, until the cookies are evenly browned. I found that the cookies are perfectly cooked when the middle parts are still very soft and fluffy and look almost raw, and the edges are getting a little bit firm, a little bit golden, and a little bit drier than the rest of the cookie. Transfer the cookies, still on parchment, to a rack to cool. Repeat with remaining dough.