Baking
Earl Grey Shortbread
Happy Monday, everyone. 
Did you all have a great holiday? Hubs had a nice day out in the city on Saturday. Our friends came to visit and they took us to one of the best submarine sandwich shops I’ve ever been to: Submarine Center in the West Portal district of SF. I’m not a big sandwich person and I still loved this place to pieces. The bread they use is delicious–just the right amount of crunch and softness. And the dressing that they slather onto the sandwich is so good. My mouth is watering just thinking about it.
After lunch, we attempted to see the brand spankin’ new California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park, but tickets were completely sold out, so we visited the de Young museum of art instead. It was just ok. After Hubs and I visted the amazing museums in Europe this summer, it was hard to be impressed by our tiny museums in SF. Also, we weren’t willing to pay an extra $20 to see the special Yves Saint Laurent exhibit, although I’m sure it would’ve been interesting.
Today, I’m going to share the delicious recipe for the Earl Grey cookies that I made last week. When high quality tea is used to make these cookies, they are so fragrant, the whole kitchen smells like tea. But, when they are eaten, the tea flavor is mild and the shortbread is rich and buttery. I think these shortbread cookies are simply perfect with a cup of English breakfast tea. Just a warning: the recipe was given to me by my coworker who is a professional pastry chef, so everything is in grams. I don’t know what the conversions are, so it would be best to make these with a food scale. It’s good to have a food scale in the kitchen anyway, since I’ve found than many of the best recipes I find on the internet are all listed in grams.
First, I’ll share with you the mess that was supposed to be a batch of oatmeal cookies with dried cherries and apricots:
I baked two sad trays of these. The second tray dripped batter onto the bottom of our oven that is now charred and stuck. Now, every time I bake something, the smoke alarm goes off.
This is what a raw cookie is supposed to look like. Here are the Earl Grey shortbread cookies before they went into the oven.
Earl Grey Shortbread Cookies
Ingredients:
- 400g butter (a little less than 4 sticks), room temperature
- 160g powdered sugar, sifted
- 40g egg yolks (a little less than 2 large egg yolks)
- 10g salt
- 450g all purpose flour, sifted
- 2g Earl Grey tea, crushed
- Granulated sugar (for sprinkling)
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350.
- Sift together flour, salt, and Earl Grey tea and set aside.
- Cream the butter and sugar just until combined. Do not over cream or the cookies will not have a flakey, shortbread texture.
- Slowly add in egg yolks, being careful not to over cream.
- Add in dry ingredients, mixing lightly and only until dry ingredients have been combined. Dough should be a little sticky to the touch, but not super sticky.
- Take the dough and flatten it between two sheets of parchment paper. This will make rolling the dough out easier. Then, chill in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
- Roll out chilled dough into 1/4 inch thickness, being careful not to over handle. Cut shapes using cookie cutters and arrange on a metal sheet lined with parchment paper.
- Bake for 8-12 minutes, or until edges just turn golden brown.
- Remove cookies from oven and sprinkle with granulated sugar while hot. The sugar will melt a little bit and stick to the cookies. If available, vanilla infused sugar complements the cookies nicely.
- Cool cookies on sheet for 10 minutes. Then, remove and cool completely on a wire rack.
Jam Thumbprint Cookies
Yesterday at work, we had a cookie swap. Fun! Everyone on the team made different types of cookies, and we all went home with a an assortment of yummies. My goodie bag included chocolate chip cookies, cranberry biscotti, lemon bars, rocky road clumps, and peanut butter cookies, all made by my coworkers. I baked up a batch of jam thumbprints using the same recipe I tested with my girlfriend last week. It was from this year’s Cooks Illustrated holiday baking special. Deelish.
The recipe is so super easy, delicious, and fast. Everything was mixed and baked in an hour. If you ever need to make some fast and impressive cookies, these are sure to please.
Jam Thumbprints
From Cooks Illustrated
Ingredients:
1/2 cup raspberry jam (Cooks Illustrated recommends Smucker’s Red Raspberry Preserves)
2 1/4 cup (11 1/4 ounces) unbleached all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
12 tablespoons (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup (4 3/4 ounces) sugar
3 ounces (6 tablespoons) cream cheese, softened
1 large egg
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Directions:
- Adjust oven racks to upper-middle and lower-middle positions and heat oven to 350 degrees. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper. Fill small zipper-lock bag with jam. Whisk together flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder in a medium bowl.
- Using hand mixer or stand mixer, beat butter and sugar together on medium speed until light and fluffy, 3 to 6 minutes. Beat in cream cheese, egg, and vanilla until combined, about 30 seconds, scraping down bowl and beaters as needed.
- Reduce mixer speed to low and slowly add flour mixture until combined, about 30 seconds.
- Working with 1 1/2 teaspoons of dough at a time, roll dough into balls and lay them on prepared baking sheets, spaced about 1 1/2 inches apart. Use wet thumb to make indentation in center of each cookie.
- Bake until cookies are lightly browned around the edges and just beginning to set, about 10 minutes. Remove cookies from oven and, working quickly, gently reshape indentations with bottom of teaspoon. Snip small corner off bag of jam and carefully fill each indentation with about 1/2 teaspoon of jam. Rotate baking sheet and continue to bake until lightly golden, 12-14 minutes.
- Let cookies cool on baking sheets for 10 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and let them cool completely, about 30 minutes, before serving.
Yummy!
Cupcakes = Happiness!
Who can resist cupcakes? Especially luscious red velvet cupcakes with tangy cream cheese frosting. Mmmmm. Using the cake recipe that I posted in my last entry, I made a dozen of these for a get together last Saturday. Delightful!
It’s no coincidence that my KitchenAid is also red.
I piped the icing onto each cupcake using a plastic tip from Wiltons.
Oops, the little guy on the left became a casualty of my hand. He still tasted yummy!
Happy Friday, loves! I wish you a cupcake filled weekend!
A Red Velvet Weekend
Darling readers, I have received the BEST EVER recipe for red velvet cake. My co-worker, who used to be a pastry chef at the Ritz Carlton, is starting her own cupcake business. I told her that I wanted to make a red velvet birthday cake for a girlfriend and she gave me her fool proof recipe. Since I know there are only a whopping two people who read this blog, I can share her secret with ya’ll.
But first, the scrumptious pictures:
Here’s red velvet, pre frosting. Two yummy layers separated by a whipped butter cream. MMMM.
And my first ever attempt at icing a cake. I know it looks funny, but it still makes me want to go NOM NOM NOM.
Yes, the handwriting could use a little work. I melted a few dark chocolate squares and squeezed the letters out through the tip of a pastry bag.
As a finishing touch, I added chocolate sprinkles around the side. Or, a more accurate depiction would be that I chucked chocolate sprinkles at the cake by the handful because I didn’t have a tilting cake turntable to help me out.
It’s not the prettiest red velvet cake, but I promise it was delicious. It was the perfect texture: moist, fluffy, and scrumdiddlyumptious. In fact, it was so good that I ate it three days in a row. *burp* Most importantly, Janet liked it, so I was very happy.
Now, for the yummy recipe! (It’s in grams because my co-worker is a pastry chef and she measures everything with a scale.)
RED VELVET CAKE
Ingredients:
328g All Purpose Flour
288g Sugar
4g Baking Soda
6g Salt
10g Cocoa Powder
286g Veg. Oil
252g Buttermilk
2ea Eggs
2 Tbsp Red Food Coloring
6g White Vinegar
6g Vanilla Extract
Directions:
- Preheat oven to 350 (measure your oven with an oven thermometer to ensure accurate temp).
- Combine all dry and sifted.
- Combine all wet (I combined the sugar with the wet ingredients).
- Add dry into wet and mix lightly.
- Bake for 20 minutes. Touch the top of the cake. If it springs back with slight resistance, it is done. Otherwise, bake for 5 minutes and check again. Or, insert a toothpick diagonally into the center of the cake. It should come out mostly clean with a few crumbs attached.
- Cool the cake to room temp before decorating.
BUTTER CREAM ICING
(I found this recipe on Chowhound and it worked perfectly with the cake)
Ingredients:
2 Tbsp Cornstarch
1 Cup Whole Milk
1 Cup Butter (softened to room temp)
1 Cup Superfine Sugar
1 tsp Vanilla Extract
Directions:
- Mix cornstarch with milk. Cook on medium heat until thick, whisking the entire time. Set aside to cool.
- Cream butter until fluffy.
- Add vanilla and cooked cornstarch mixture slowly. Beat until it feels like whipped cream. The sugar should be dissolved and the frosting should not be grainy.
- Ice your cake!
Happy eating, folks!
