My loss, your gain

I’ve been dithering for years about entering the Scharffen Berger annual chocolate adventure contest, never quite pulling the trigger until finally, this winter, I got myself together enough to do some testing and submit something.  I have to admit I didn’t love this year’s theme of sandwich cookies, but I went for it anyway, never really expecting I had a chance.  And, of course, I didn’t, because I didn’t even get an honorable mention.

But my loss, as the title says, is your gain, because I already have the pictures taken and the recipe written up, and since Scharffen Berger has no further claim on it, you all can have it instead.  The point of the contest, besides using their chocolate, is to incorporate at least one “adventure ingredient”, which this year included coconut milk or coconut cream, sweet potato, tapioca or tapioca flour, tequila, banana, chili pepper, pine nuts, corn meal, Sumatra coffee, fresh ginger, yerba mate tea, and cacao nibs.

I ended up using coffee and coconut milk in a sandwich of coffee-flavored shortbread rounds, rolled in coconut and pressed around a coconut milk and milk chocolate ganache spiked with coconut rum.  They’re good, but apparently not good enough. Oh, well. Maybe next year.

Coconut Mocha Buttons
Makes approximately 3 dozen cookies

For coffee shortbread:

2 tablespoons coffee liqueur
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons finely ground Sumatra coffee
1 tablespoon instant coffee
8 ounces (16 tablespoons) cold, unsalted European-style butter, cut into tablespoon-sized cubes
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 3/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
6 tablespoons cornstarch
Unsweetened, finely shredded coconut for rolling

For coconut milk chocolate ganache:

8 ounces Scharffen Berger Extra Rich Milk Chocolate, finely chopped
4 ounces (1/2 cup) coconut milk (not low-fat)
1 tablespoon unsalted European-style butter
1/8 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons coconut rum

Combine the coffee liqueur, vanilla extract, Sumatra coffee and instant coffee in a small bowl.  Allow to sit for 5 minutes.

In a food processor, blend the butter, granulated sugar, brown sugar and salt until a fluffy paste forms.  Scrape down the bowl and add the coffee mixture, processing again until fully incorporated.  Whisk the flour and cornstarch together in a medium bowl and add to the creamed butter, pulsing just until a ball of dough begins to form around the blade.

Divide the dough in half and shape the first half into a roll 1 1/2 to 2 inches in diameter on a sheet of parchment paper.  Sprinkle several tablespoons of coconut along the edge of the cookie dough and roll it through the coconut until fully coated.  Tightly wrap the roll in the parchment paper, repeat the process with the second half of the dough, and chill the wrapped rolls until very firm, 2 hours to overnight.  (The dough can also be further wrapped in plastic or a zip-top freezer bag and frozen up to a month.)

While the dough is resting, prepare and chill the ganache filling.  Place the chopped chocolate in a medium mixing bowl.  Combine the coconut milk, butter and salt in a liquid measuring cup and microwave just until simmering.  Pour the hot coconut milk over the chocolate and whisk until the chocolate is fully melted and the ganache is glossy, then whisk in the coconut rum.  Allow to cool to room temperature, then cover and refrigerate until ready to assemble the cookies.

Preheat oven to 325 F and line several baking sheets with parchment paper or silicone baking mats.  Remove one roll from the refrigerator and, using a sharp knife, slice off rounds 1/8 inch thick, rotating the roll a quarter turn between slices to preserve its round shape.  Place cookies 2 inches apart on the baking sheets and bake until the coconut is golden and the bottoms of the cookies are just beginning to darken, 12-15 minutes.  Remove cookies to a wire rack to cool completely, and repeat with the second roll.

When the cookies have cooled and the ganache has firmed up, place 2 teaspoons of ganache on the bottom of one cookie and place a second cookie right-side up over the filling, gently pressing down just until the filling reaches the edges.  Repeat with remaining cookies.  If not serving immediately, store cookies in refrigerator for up to a week.  Leftover unfilled shortbread keeps very well in an airtight container at room temperature for several weeks.

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You Can Keep Your Oreos

Well, hello there, strangers.  Long time no see!

While I was off in my start-of-the-year teaching crunch, which left me no evenings or weekends free to blog, I understand we had the 100th anniversary of America’s favorite sandwich cookie.  I can appreciate the basic charms of the Oreo as much as anybody, and when I was a teenager in Mexico I was obsessed with them, because this everyday All-American snack couldn’t be had by anyone not affiliated with the US Embassy and thus, they were the perfect symbol for my expatriate adolescent angst. I would insist on my father bringing as many packages as he could from his business trips back to the home office, just so I could feel “normal” for the few days they lasted.

But that phase is mercifully in my past now, and as a grown-up I can also look critically at the little hockey pucks and acknowledge the fact that they’re not really all they’re cracked up to be, which is why I’m going to make up for my latest intermittent silence with a recipe for what I think is the best sandwich cookie in the world.

Alfajores are to Argentina what the chocolate chip cookie is to the U.S.  They’re ubiquitous and can be found in iterations from the mass-produced, individually-wrapped Hostess-equivalent kinds purchasable at the convenience store to the high-end boutique variety in beribboned boxes. When I was growing up and into my adulthood, every relative who visited was expected to bring us at least one box of my personal favorite brand. (Are we sensing a theme about international cookie commissioning by me as a kid?  I was way ahead of the curve on free trade.)

So what are alfajores?  Well, besides being sadly unknown in this hemisphere, confusing to pronounce (all-fah-hor-es) and what I think should replace the macaron as the next fad, they’re shortbready disks faintly hinting at lemon pressed around a layer of dulce de leche, although you can also find fruit-filled ones.  The commercial kind are generally enrobed in either a crackly, powdery sugar glaze or a smooth semisweet chocolate one, which is wonderful but way too much bother for home baking.  Home bakers instead make an easier but no less delicious version in which the cookies, made with cornstarch (the maizena of the name below) for a perfectly delicate crumb, are filled and rolled in coconut to keep the dulce de leche from sticking to your fingers.

Like the Oreo, this is one of those things that sounds too basic to be all that great, but is actually dangerously addictive instead.  The cookies are buttery and tender and neither too oily nor too soft, the dulce de leche adds just the right amount of sweetness to the not-very-sweet cookies, the hint of citrus makes everything sparkle just the tiniest bit, and it all just really, really works.

If you absolutely insist on chocolate in your sandwich cookies, I still have you covered, because not having enough regular dulce de leche on hand, I made part of the batch with chocolate dulce de leche I picked up on sale at the local Whole Paycheck.  Personally, I remain unconvinced by the chocolate kind, which tastes generically fudgy to me and lacks the lovely milky, caramely flavor I think dulce de leche really ought to put front and center in order to live up to the name.  Man, did my coworkers disagree with me, though, because the chocolate ones were by far the favorites and were gone in a blink.

I also filled some with the hurricane plum jam I previously posted about, which worked so splendidly that I hoarded them at home and took none to work. If you use jam, be sure to use a very firm one so that the cookies don’t ooze apart.  You may need to cook it down a bit if what you have is too runny.

However you fill them, seriously, you have to try these.  The minute you do, I know you too will recognize their undeniable awesomeness.

Alfajores de Maizena
Makes about five dozen small cookies, or 2-3 dozen larger ones

For cookies:
1 ½ cups (200 grams) unbleached all-purpose flour
2 ½ cups (300 grams) cornstarch
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon sea salt
14 tablespoons (200 grams) unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾ cup (150 grams) granulated sugar
3 large egg yolks
1 tablespoon brandy
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Zest of one medium lemon

For assembly:
One 16-ounce jar dulce de leche or very thick jam
1 cup shredded unsweetened coconut

Preheat oven to 350 F and line three baking sheets with parchment paper.

Sift the flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda and salt through a fine sieve twice, the second time onto a large sheet of parchment or wax paper for easy transfer, and set aside.

In the bowl of a standing mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together the butter and sugar.  Add the yolks one at a time, scraping down between additions. Beat in the brandy, vanilla and lemon zest.

Add the dry ingredients in three batches at low speed, mixing until just combined.  Turn onto a Silpat or the reserved parchment sheet that held the dry ingredients, and gently roll to a thickness of about a quarter of an inch or half a centimeter for thinner cookies, and double that for slightly puffier ones.  (Dust the rolling pin with cornstarch if sticking starts to occur.)

Cut the dough with 1½ to 2-inch diameter round cutters, being as careful as you can to minimize the waste.  Use a bench scraper or spatula to transfer the cookies to the baking sheets, spacing about an inch apart.  Gently pull the scraps together and re-roll to use up all the dough.

Bake the cookies just until firm and barely gold on the bottom.  Do not allow to brown on the top or sides.  Remove to a cooling rack immediately and cool completely.

Once the cookies have cooled, form sandwiches by spreading a teaspoonful of dulce de leche or jam onto the bottom of one cookie, and covering with a second. Squeeze gently, just enough to push the filling out to the edges of the cookies.  Place the coconut in a small, shallow container and roll the edges of the cookies in the coconut to evenly coat the exposed filling.

Store the filled cookies in an airtight container, and consume within the next day or two.

Notes:

Because of the very high proportion of cornstarch to flour, the dough is much more resilient on re-rolling than standard dough, but it’s still a good idea to treat it gently to ensure tender cookies.

This is my mom’s recipe, by the way.  I just did the conversions from metric and put back the coconut, which she hates.  Thanks, Mom!

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A Balm for Writer’s Block

Blogging is going to be light this month, because I have more pressing matters to attend to. I’m still baking for the coworkers every Sunday because they’ve made it clear it’s no longer optional to bring in treats on Monday morning, so there will be things to blog, but it’s bound to be more hit-and-run in nature than I’d normally like.

So, since I have a daily word quota hanging over my head, here’s a very quick write-up of the perfect cookie for the November insanity. Not only are they the kind of yummy calories your brain needs for heavy thinking, but they are practically instantaneous to make because there’s no creaming of butter and they go straight from bowl to oven.

Interestingly, making these cookies last night for a lunch with students today also kicked me out of what had been a pretty weak start to this year’s NaNoWriMo. I was really organized about preparing for it last week, but I was also still pretty tired from a very busy October so the words weren’t coming as fast as they should have. Having fixed fifteen-minute windows between batches actually made me more productive than I had been with unstructured evenings on Monday and Tuesday, and since then I’ve been much more enthusiastic about the whole thing.

These cookies are adapted from the recipe for chewy sugar cookies in this month’s Cook’s Illustrated. Normally, I am no fan of sugar cookies, because almost every one I’ve ever had has been the equivalent of a white canvas — not in a stripped-down-to-essentials, purity of ingredients way like a good shortbread, but in a bland, bland, boring, nothing but flavorless-fat-and-sugar way. I gave this recipe a try, though, because His Lordship loves a chewy cookie, and the recipe relied on the same liquid-fat-ratio math that recently produced the first batch of brownies to really meet his chewiness requirement. I made changes to inject some interest, though, because I still wasn’t buying the whole plain sugar cookie idea.

The texture of these cookies was everything that was promised: crackly on the outside and beautifully chewy on the inside. With my additions of toasted coconut and macadamia nuts, they also have rich coconutty flavor and tender crunch, enough to inspire at least a couple of hundred words.

Since I now have cookies and an awesome new caffeine delivery vehicle, I have no excuses. Back to work!

Coconut-Macadamia Sugar Cookies
(Adapted from Chewy Sugar Cookies, Cook’s Illustrated, November/December 2010)
Makes 4 dozen cookies

1/2 cup finely shredded unsweetened coconut
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups granulated sugar
2 ounces cream cheese, in 8 pieces
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg
1 tablespoon coconut milk (or regular milk)
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup unsalted roasted macadamia nuts, coarsely chopped
Additional sugar for rolling

In a small nonstick skillet, toast the coconut on medium-low heat, stirring frequently, until golden brown. Set aside.

Preheat oven to 350 F and line multiple baking sheets with parchment paper.

Place the sugar in a large bowl and scatter the cream cheese cubes over the surface. Melt the butter and pour it over the sugar and cream cheese while still warm, stirring and folding with a spatula until most of the cream cheese has melted (streaks and a few small lumps are OK). Switch to a whisk and mix in the oil, then the egg, coconut milk and vanilla until smooth.

Whisk together the flour, baking soda and powder, and salt, and add to the wet ingredients. Whisk until almost incorporated, then stir in the toasted coconut and macadamia nuts.

Fill a shallow bowl with about half a cup of sugar. Scoop up heaping tablespoon-sized bits of dough and roll into balls, dropping them into the sugar and rolling to coat. Set the balls on the baking sheets, two inches apart.

Bake on the middle rack for 12-13 minutes, until turning golden at the edges. Allow to cool to room temperature on the sheets. Store in an airtight container for up to a week.

Notes:

This makes a very soft, oily, weird-looking dough, but it will come out fine, I promise!

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The Holiday Madness is Upon Us

For a variety of reasons too personal and too mundane to relate, I have had a harder time this year summoning up any holiday spirit. I’m not quite bah-humbugging, but I’ve been decidedly meh about the post-Halloween happenings, and I’m actively participating this time in His Lordship’s annual anti-giftgiving and no-carols grinchery.

That said, something, however limited, did finally awaken over the weekend, because I stayed up on Saturday night turning the overpriced and underwhelming quinces I bought at Thanksgiving into jam, complete with sterilized jars and heat-sealing. I also brought our one box of holiday decorations up from the basement and threw together a minimalist arrangement of blue, silver and white ornaments in our front window, and filled a few vases and bowls full of the remaining ornaments and scattered them around the house.

I can probably attribute it to the fact that we had our first snowfall on Saturday — to be more precise, it was our first encounter with the evil and invasive form of precipitation known as “wintry mix”. The finger-numbing cold and the dusting of white on the ground, however momentary, were enough to flip the switch. I’m also not discounting the effects of peer pressure, since a third of the residents of our very small block had already gone Full Metal Christmas by the time we left the house on Black Friday to catch a noon matinee, and we’re at over half the block lit up and garlanded a week later.

Whatever combination of factors it was, I can’t deny that it’s really and truly happened, because I followed the jam-making and decorating spurt by getting up Sunday morning and kicking off the cookie baking, and I didn’t do it by halves, either. I came up with the most insanely ambitious use I possibly could for the leftover egg whites that had been sitting in my fridge for a week, making my first-ever attempt at a cookie that came out of nowhere a few years back and rapidly become so common on food blogs that it’s practically played out. I speak, of course, of the macaron.

I imagine at least a few people will be shocked to learn that I had never had a macaron before. It is, in fact, possible for me to miss a food fad, although I smugly pride myself on having been-there-done-that with quite a number of things years and even decades ago that people are now acting like they invented, like dulce de leche, Mexican Coca-Cola, Peking duck, panettone, and salads made of fresh fennel, whole milk mozzarella, and/or roasted beets. (Along with the exponentially amplified teen angst and the unrelieved sense of never quite belonging anywhere, there are some advantages to growing up in a peripatetic immigrant household.)

This fad, though, I let totally pass me by. In part this is because my obsession with madeleines has always been too all-consuming to permit any French cookie rivals. The love affair began in Proustian manner when I chose one in a mid-afternoon cafe stop during my first visit to Paris when I was 14, and no tuile or sable has ever been able to turn my head since. I still mourn the loss of the one bakery I ever found in the U.S. that could produce a truly acceptable madeleine, which His Lordship used to bring me during my grad school exams, making regular expeditions for these much-needed fortifications in beribboned cellophane bags. Besides my madeleine monogamy, I also disdained macarons because they seemed like too much bother for not enough payoff, and since I never had one during any of my visits to France, I would have no baseline to tell whether I had succeeded or not.

However. I had this bowlful of egg whites that had been sitting in the fridge since their corresponding yolks had gone into Thanksgiving leftovers quiches, and I had an unexpected burst of energy. I could have wussed out and made plain old macaroons, or even my beloved cacao nib amaretti, but instead my crazy holiday brain said, “Hey, why not finally try macarons?” There was no one to act as the voice of reason, so I charged forward.

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So Not Your Grandmother’s Oatmeal Cookie

Brown Butter Coconut Oatmeal Cookies

While driving home through a particularly nasty thunderstorm yesterday afternoon, I had a good long think about what I wanted to do for Sunday Night Cookie Blogging. I really wanted a simple cookie, without any chocolate after last week’s brownie blitz, and with a strong butterscotch flavor.

On getting home, I rummaged through the cupboards for more candidates in the pantry elimination, and, noticing the unopened tub of old-fashioned oats, remembered the recipe for crisp oatmeal cookies I’d been meaning to try from Cook’s Illustrated several months back. Digging the magazine out of the pile on top of the microwave, I was pleased to see that the coconut variation conveniently called for exactly the amount of sweetened coconut I had left. The decision practically made itself.

While the recipe sounded great, I didn’t think it would have quite the butterscotch depth I was craving, so I decided to really amp things up by browning the butter first. Because I also prefer smaller cookies, I cut the size of the cookies in half.

The resulting cookie not just met but exceeded all my expectations, and was wildly popular with the coworkers, who snarfed them all up well before lunchtime. It’s unassuming in appearance, but those humble little freckles pack a wallop of noisette intensity, and the texture is shatteringly crisp and light. It’s a very grown-up oatmeal cookie, elementally airy and earthy at the same time, and I’ll absolutely be making it again. Next time, I might make it even more sophisticated by trying the suggestion of sprinkling with flakes of Maldon salt or fleur de sel on top before baking.

Flecks of Toasty Buttery Goodness

In the win-win-win column, it also used up all my remaining coconut and half the oats, but the important thing is that these are spectacularly delicious.

Brown Butter Coconut Oatmeal Cookies
( Adapted from Cook’s Illustrated January/February 2008 )
Makes 5 dozen

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
1 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla paste
2 cups rolled oats (old-fashioned, not instant or quick)
1 1/2 cups sweetened coconut

In a small saucepan over medium heat, melt the butter and bring to a simmer. Lower heat as necessary to maintain a vigorous simmer and continue to cook, swirling occasionally, until butter separates into a dark golden liquid layer and a deep brown layer of caramelized milk solids and gives off a nutty aroma. Be careful not to let the solids turn black.

Pour butter into a liquid measuring cup, making sure to get all the delicious brown solids out of the pan. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate until it solidifies.

In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

In a standing mixer with a paddle attachment, beat butter and sugars until fluffy, scraping down the sides once. Beat in the egg and vanilla. With the mixer running on low, mix in the dry ingredients until just combined. Scrape down again, return to low, and mix in the oats and coconut until uniformly incorporated. Cover the dough and chill until firm enough to roll into balls, at least half an hour.

Preheat oven to 350, and line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Scoop dough by rounded tablespoons (I use a small scoop) and roll into balls. Place balls on sheet 2 inches apart and flatten to 1/2 inch thickness with your fingertips.

Bake until golden, 14-16 minutes. Remove from oven and allow cookies to cool completely on the sheet. Once cool, store in airtight containers to maintain crispness.

Notes:

In case you’re nervous about browning butter and want to have an idea of what it should look like, here’s an expert’s take on it.

If you’re not a coconut fan, you could leave it out and increase the oatmeal to the 2 1/2 cups in the original plain version, although I still urge you to brown the butter.

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Nibby Nanaimo Squares: Abandon All Hope Ye Who Enter Here

Unless you’re from or have visited the Great North, you might not have fallen into the diabolical snare that is the Nanaimo Bar. I still simultaneously bless and curse the Canadian friend who brought over a tray of them as a thank-you gift for dogsitting, because my first bite of this odd little confection of crack-like addictiveness set off a cycle of periodic cravings that nothing else seems to satisfy. I usually avoid temptation by making sure one of the key elements is missing from my cupboard, but every now and then the ingredient matrix aligns and the inevitable conclusion will be preparing a batch and scrambling to give away as much as possible in order to avoid inhaling half of it by myself.

That’s what happened last week when, as a result of helping a friend move out of state and inheriting the contents of her pantry, I suddenly had a box of chocolate graham crackers on my hands. One thought led to another, and before I knew it, I had come up with a half-dozen tweaks to the definitive Nanaimo Bar recipe, as democratically determined by the good citizens of Nanaimo, BC, and found myself in front of an entire 8×8 panful of sweet, rich, creamy temptation reinforced with the perfume of Kahlua and the cocoa crunchiness of cacao nibs. The only thing that saved me from complete annihilation this time was that I finished making them so late on Sunday night that my bed’s siren song was just that bit louder than my rumbly tummy.

The essential thing to know about Nanaimo Bars, besides that they have an abuse potential akin to opiates, is that they are the ultimate butter delivery vehicle. A cookie/candy chimera, they begin with a fudgy base of graham cracker crumbs, coconut and nuts bound together with butter and cocoa. The top layer is a simple cap of snappy semisweet chocolate smoothed out with more butter. Sandwiched between them is a thick layer of fluffy vanilla custard buttercream, which is firm just out of the fridge but silky and decadent at room temperature. There’s probably more saturated fat in just one Nanaimo Bar (which, don’t fool yourself, you are never going to limit yourself to) than in three Big Macs, but trust me, this is the worthier way to clog your arteries.

If you value your cardiac health, don’t even think about making these, indescribably delicious though they may be. If you do make them, make sure you have a heavily-populated somewhere to take them immediately after they’ve chilled enough to be portioned, because willpower will avail you for naught here. You’ll need all the help you can get.

Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

Nibby Nanaimo Squares
Makes approximately 36 clean 1-inch squares, plus a dozen or so rounded edge bits for the baker

Bottom Layer
1/2 cup roasted cacao nibs
1 1/4 cups chocolate graham cracker crumbs
1 cup sweetened coconut
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup natural (not Dutch-processed) cocoa powder
1 egg, beaten
1 tablespoon Kahlua

Middle Layer
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
3 tablespoons cream or milk
3 tablespoons Bird’s Custard Powder
2 cups confectioner’s sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Top Layer
4 ounces semisweet chocolate, chopped
2 tablespoons unsalted butter

Line an 8×8 glass baking pan with a sheet of parchment paper or foil just wide enough to cover the bottom and long enough to hang over two opposing sides. This will serve as a sling to remove the finished block easily and cleanly for slicing.

For the bottom layer:

In a food processor, pulse the nibs until finely chopped but not yet sandy or powdery. Mix with graham cracker crumbs and coconut and set aside.

In a double boiler, melt together butter, sugar and cocoa, stirring frequently, until smooth. Remove from heat. Temper the egg by slowly adding a small amount of the hot mixture, then add the warmed egg back into the double boiler. Put over the water and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes, until the mixture has thickened and become glossy.

Off the heat, stir in the Kahlua, then mix in the crumbs, nibs and coconut. Press firmly into the pan, cover with plastic wrap, and chill.

For the middle layer:

In a mixer, cream the butter, cream, custard powder and sugar together until light, adding additional cream or milk as required to achieve a fluffy spreadable consistency.

Beat in vanilla, then spread over bottom layer and chill until firm.

For the top layer:

Melt the chocolate and butter together in a double boiler or microwave until smooth.

Cool until room temperature but still liquid, then spread over second layer. Refrigerate until set.

To serve:

Using the overhanging parchment or foil, lift the chilled block out of the pan and onto a cutting board, running a sharp knife around the sides of the block to release from the pan if needed. To get a clean slice without cracking the chocolate layer, dip the knife into hot water and wipe off between cuts. Trim off the rounded sides, then cut remainder into neat 1-inch squares.

Squares are best still cool but close enough to room temperature for the middle layer to soften slightly. Store leftovers in the refrigerator or freezer, well-wrapped to prevent the buttercream from absorbing any off flavors.

Notes:

I used chocolate grahams because that’s what I was given. Regular will work just fine.

Bird’s Custard Powder can be found in specialty shops and, frequently, at Indian or Pakistani groceries. I’ve heard vanilla pudding mix can be used in a pinch, but the real thing is shelf-stable forever and handy to have around when you’ve run out of eggs.

Very small squares are advisable since they’re closer to a bonbon than a cookie. It will also contribute marginally to the probably futile effort to deflect or at least slow down the consumption of one after another until you’re left wallowing in your own crapulence.

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The Return of Sunday Baking: German Chocolate Cupcakes

I won’t even bother with the usual feeble attempt at excusing the lags in blogging. Let’s just look at the pretty picture and forget all about it, OK? Right, moving on…

This lovely little morsel evolved out of my interest in this recipe, which I ran across mid-week and knew I wanted to try over the weekend. I love dulce de leche and I love coconut, so the idea of combining them was irresistible. I stocked up on coconut milk and happily boiled away until I had two and a half cups of caramel, which was…

…to be honest, not everything I had hoped for. I had wanted a clean coconut and caramel flavor, but the brown sugar flavor was a bit overwhelming and it imparted a less than stunning greyish cast to the finished gel. It was still tasty, though, and I still love the idea, so I might try it again soon with white sugar instead.

In the meantime, I had two and a half cups of this interesting goo. In trying to find uses for it, it occurred to me that the taste and texture were very much like the filling for German chocolate cake, only more coconutty. A few quick mental hops later, I had pulled together the following recipe by adapting one of my favorite old-fashioned chocolate fudge cake recipes, from Scharffen Berger’s house cookbook, The Essence of Chocolate. I carried the coconut theme even further by substituting coconut milk for the heavy cream in the frosting, which worked seamlessly. Since coconut milk is shelf-stable and always in my cupboard, unlike cream, which I have to make special trips for, I will probably do this all the time in the future.

As I discovered when I brought them to work this morning, German chocolate cake has a massive fan base. There are a fair amount of steps involved here, but these were such a huge hit that I will definitely pull out the recipe for special occasions. If you’re so inclined, you can turn this back into a full-sized cake by following the baking instructions for the original recipe.

German Chocolate Cupcakes

Makes 36

For the coconut caramel:
2 14-ounce cans unsweetened coconut milk
1 1/2 cups light brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

For the coconut ganache:
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1 cup unsweetened coconut milk
5 ounces unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped
8 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the cupcakes:
2 cups granulated sugar
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup natural cocoa powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
1/2 cup canola oil
1 cup milk
2 teaspoons espresso powder
1 cup boiling water

For the coconut-pecan topping:
1 cup coconut caramel
1 1/2 cups pecans
1 1/2 cups unsweetened shredded coconut

To make the caramel:

Whisk ingredients together in large heavy pot over medium heat until sugar has dissolved and mixture comes to a boil. Lower heat and simmer vigorously, stirring occasionally, until mixture has thickened to a caramel texture and reduced to approximately 2 1/2 cups, about 30-40 minutes.

Transfer to glass jars and cool completely. Cover and refrigerate once cool.

To make the ganache:

In a heavy saucepan, combine the sugar and coconut milk and bring to a boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally. Reduce the heat and simmer for 6 minutes.

Remove from heat, add the chocolate and butter and stir until melted. Pour into a bowl and stir in the vanilla. Cool until thickened to a spreadable consistency.

To make the cupcakes:

Preheat oven to 350 F. Line 3 cupcake tins with paper liners.

In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, combine the sugar, flour, cocoa, salt, baking powder, and baking soda on low speed.

In a liquid measuring cup, mix together eggs, oil and milk. Add liquid ingredients to mixer and beat on medium speed for 2 minutes.

Dissolve espresso powder in boiling water. Reduce mixer to low speed and add water mixture, blending just until a very liquid batter forms.

Ladle batter into lined cupcake tins, filling each cup just over half full. Bake for 20 minutes, or until tester inserted into a cupcake comes out clean. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely in tins.

To finish the cupcakes:

While the cupcakes are cooling, spread the pecans and the coconut on separate quarter-sheet pans and toast in the oven for 10-15 minutes, until pecans are fragrant and coconut is pale gold. Stir midway through toasting to prevent the coconut from burning. Set aside to cool while frosting the cupcakes.

Frost each cupcake with a generous amount of ganache, then set aside briefly to set up while finishing the topping.

Chop pecans medium-coarsely and mix together with coconut and approximately one cup of the caramel, or just enough to bind the pecans and shredded coconut together. Top each cupcake with a large scoop of the sticky mixture, and serve.

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Sunday Night Cookie Blogging: Multigrain Anzac Biscuits

I’ve been intrigued by Anzac biscuits for some time, because of their somewhat romantic history and their position as the pseudo-national cookie of Australia and New Zealand, and also because the combination of oats and coconut is always appealing to me. Despite the fascination in principle, I’d never actually tried one, so I decided to give it a go for this week’s Sunday cookie blogging. It was only after tracking down what seemed to be the most-cited recipe on the web that I realized I did not have any plain rolled oats left, after using them up on last week’s rhubarb bars. I did have a multigrain rolled cereal instead – comprising oats, wheat, rye, and barley – which His Lordship likes to have for breakfast on occasion. What the hell, I thought, and decided to give them a try. I also opted to add some ginger.

The recipe was very quick to prepare and left a minimal mess in my kitchen, since you don’t use the mixer, making it a good candidate for Sunday-night baking. The cookies turned out rather darker brown than I’d expected, but are very crisp and pleasant-tasting. I’m not sure if you really notice the fact that it’s multigrain, but in this context, I think that’s probably a good thing. You might be able to sneak some whole grains into your kid’s diet this way.

Next time, just to see if I can tell the difference, I think I’ll try it with plain oats, use light brown sugar instead of dark, leave out the ginger, and add macadamia nuts, based on one of the other variations I found on my Google trek.

Multigrain Anzac Biscuits
Makes 3 1/2 dozen

1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup mixed-grain rolled cereal (or rolled oats)
1 cup dried unsweetened coconut
1 cup brown sugar
1 tsp ground ginger
1/2 cup unsalted butter
2 tbsp Lyle’s Golden Syrup
1 tsp baking soda
2 tbsp boiling water
Preheat oven to 350 F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.

Combine the flour, cereal, coconut, sugar and ginger in a medium-sized bowl.

In a Pyrex liquid measuring cup, melt the butter and Golden Syrup together in the microwave. Mix the baking soda with the water and add to the butter mixture, then pour the mixture into the dry ingredients and stir until combined.

Scoop tablespoon-sized balls of dough onto the baking sheet, leaving two inches between cookies. Bake for 15 minutes, or until golden brown and firm.

Cool completely on a wire rack, and store in an airtight container.

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