MOM’S SPRITZ

I said that coconut-apricot cookies are my favorite holiday treat that I make, but I am a good Scandinavian, and there’s no doubt that spritz are my favorite cookies that my mom makes. It wouldn’t be Christmas without them.

A few years ago, A’s mother handed down her family’s cookie press to me, and I eagerly set about trying it. But I made one misstep: I decided to use Carole Walter’s spritz recipe from Great Cookies instead of my mom’s. Before you go pointing your fingers at me and hissing, “Ungrateful daughter! Ungrateful daughter!”, keep in mind that since I already knew my mom would be making her spritz for Christmas, there was no point in my making the exact same recipe; plus, it would be fun to try something new, and Walter’s recipes are always impeccable, so maybe it would even be a fancy improvement. But of course, even though there was nothing wrong with the recipe, it wasn’t the spritz I craved. It was more like your standard butter cookie. So I relearned my lesson: mother knows best.

Even though my mom takes care of the spritz-making for our family, I still make spritz every Christmas for my friends in California and for A’s family—I figure that since I’ve been entrusted with the family cookie press, I should repay the kindness in cookies, because no one (at least, no one Swedish) should have to endure a spritz-less holiday. And I stick with the old recipe. The thing that seems to make it unique among the recipes I’ve compared it to—Walter’s and the one in the Betty Crocker Cooky Book—is that it uses powdered sugar instead of regular granulated. Maybe that’s what gives it such a perfect tender texture. That’s the big attraction for me, along with the almond flavor.

I think spritz tend to be underrated. They’re a regular feature of the holiday cookie plate, at least in Minnesota, most of the time the emphasis tends to be on form rather than flavor. They’re just sugar cookies that have been colored and shaped. I made the mistake of bringing some in for my office’s holiday cookie exchange one year, and I had an embarrassing amount of leftovers. A convinced me that people have just been conditioned to expect bad spritz, so few people even tried mine. Or maybe I just love spritz more than the average person. Anyway, I now bring a sexier (usually chocolate-based) cookie to the exchange and save the spritz for myself and others who appreciate them. But if you think spritz are nothing special, do try these and see if they change your mind.

These are really easy to make. The dough is really basic, and dying it with food coloring and sprinkling colored sugar on top is technically optional, though I recommend it for the full just-like-mom’s experience. Using the cookie press is really the only thing that requires a little expertise, or at least finesse, and even that’s not complex—it’s basically just a grown-up version of that device that used to force the Play-Do into different shapes, like star-shaped ropes or spaghetti strands . I’ve heard that if you buy a good-quality new one, like Wilton’s, you don’t need to swear at it quite so much, but I sort of enjoy having to do a bit of wrangling. It makes me that much prouder of the finished product. And luckily, even the deformed spritz taste good. (Although I do recommend sticking to the larger, rounder shapes, like the wreath and the tree or holly leaf or whatever that triangular thing is—it helps keep the cookies from overbrowning.)

1 cup butter, softened
1¼ cup powdered sugar
½ teaspoon almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg
2½ cups flour
⅛ teaspoon salt
Red and green food coloring
Granulated sugar or sanding sugar

1. Stir together the flour and the salt in a medium bowl.

2. Using an electric mixer, cream together the butter and the sugar in a large bowl. Mix in the almond and vanilla extracts and the egg. Gradually add the dry ingredients and mix until blended.

3. Divide the dough in half and place each half in a separate bowl. Add a few drops of red food coloring to one bowl and a few drops of green to the other. Mix each one (I use my hands for this) until the color is distributed throughout, adding more coloring if necessary to achieve your desired hue.

4. Wrap each dough ball in plastic wrap and chill for at least 1 hour.

5. Preheat the oven to 375 and remove dough from refrigerator.

6. Press dough through a cookie press onto ungreased baking sheets.

7. Put a spoonful or two of granulated or sanding sugar into each of two bowls. Put a few drops of red food coloring into one bowl and green food coloring into the other, and stir each bowl until the color is distributed throughout the sugar. Sprinkle a pinch of colored sugar atop each cookie.

8. Bake for 6–8 minutes until firm but not browned, being careful not to overbake.

Yield: Maybe 4 dozen?
Time: 1½ hours, plus 1 hour chilling time
Leftover potential: Good; these keep well in the freezer.

LEMON GARLIC CHICKEN

It was the photo that lured me into making this recipe from The Kitchn (go and look at it, because my picture sucks with a suckiness I can only attribute to the distractingly mouthwatering aroma emanating from the plate, demanding that I sit down and eat, or possibly also the second night of the 24 season premiere, with Jack Bauer demanding that I sit down and eat), although I’m also unable to resist the keywords “lemon” and “garlic” and I continue to be on the lookout for easy weeknight main dishes I can pair with more complicated side dishes, like my favorite salad. (Which I wanted to make last week because A’s mom gave me walnut oil for Christmas. The recipe calls for walnut oil in the dressing, but I’d always used olive oil in the past because walnut is expensive. It turns out walnut oil is really, really tasty, and I’ve been using it in most of our salad dressings for the past month. Thanks, B!)

When I started cooking, I suddenly realized that this was basically just a simplified version of a recipe that’s already in my repertoire, but with garlic instead of potatoes and asparagus. Thus, I assumed it wouldn’t be a keeper. I mean, I figured it would make a fine dinner, but nothing special. So I was surprised when this easy, breezy little toss-it-into-a-pan-and-bake concoction turned out to be exceedingly delicious, worthy of celebration in its own right and not just as a quick-and-dirty desperation dinner. It yields moist, flavorful chicken with little effort (and, unusually, no added fat), and we enjoyed it so much that A mentioned it several times in the following days (“You know, that chicken we had the other night was really good…”).

So it turns out that this is, after all, a keeper. It was great with The Salad, but I found myself wishing for a side dish of potatoes (maybe these), the better to soak up extra super-lemony, super-garlicky juices.

8 pieces bone-in, skin-on chicken (1 whole cut-up chicken, or 4 halved breasts, or 4 thighs and 4 drumsticks)
3 lemons
15 cloves garlic, peeled
Salt and pepper to taste
2 tablespoons fresh thyme leaves

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2. Wash the lemons, slice them in half, and juice them. Place the lemon halves and juice in a 9-by-12-inch baking dish with the garlic cloves. Arrange the chicken pieces in the dish, skin side down, and sprinkle with salt and pepper and half of the thyme. Turn the pieces over so that they are skin side up, and sprinkle with salt and pepper and the remaining thyme.

3. Put the dish in the oven and bake the chicken for 30 to 40 minutes, basting every 10 minutes. When the skin gets crispy and the meat is cooked through, it’s done.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Good

COCONUT-APRICOT COOKIES

Of all the treats I routinely make for Christmas, these may be my favorite—and they don’t even have chocolate in them. Almost every recipe I’ve tried from Carole Walter’s Great Cookies has been spectacular, but this is the most delicious and unique of the lot, and has earned an ardent following among those who’ve tasted the result.

It’s hard for me to detail what makes these cookies so fantastic without wanting to run to the kitchen and bake a batch for inspiration, but I’ll try to break it down for you from memory:

1. They’re a coconut lover’s dream—not only is coconut mixed into the dough and then rolled onto the outside of the cookies, but coconut extract also adds a megahit of flavor. They’re like coconut macaroons that have ascended to a higher plane.
2. Excellent use of apricots. I don’t especially like dried fruit in cookies, but the apricots taste great with the coconut and look so prettily stained-glass-like when the roll of dough is sliced.
3. The texture: moist, tender, buttery, and a little chewy inside, surrounded by a crisp shell of browned coconut.
4. The unusual egg yolk/milk wash that’s painted on the cookies just before baking gives them a sunny yellow color that makes me think of Easter.

Come to think of it, there’s nothing particularly Christmasy about these cookies; Christmas just happens to be the time when I’m in the mood to put a little more effort into my baking. And these do require more effort than your traditional drop cookie; you’ve got to divide the dough, roll it into logs, paint them with egg white, roll them in coconut, chill them, slice them, and then paint them with the egg yolk. But this technique is what makes them so special, and besides, having to chill the dough means you can divide the work over multiple days if you want to—I mixed it up and formed the logs one weekend, stuck them in the freezer, and then sliced and baked the next weekend.

1 10-ounce package sweetened, flaked coconut
2¼ cups all-purpose flour, spooned in and leveled
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup (6 ounces) dried apricots, chopped into ⅛-inch pieces
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly firm
¾ cup sugar
1 large egg
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
½ teaspoon coconut extract
1 large egg white
2 teaspoons water
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon half-and-half or milk

1. Place the coconut in the work bowl of a food processor fitted with the steel blade. Pulse five or six times, then process until finely chopped. Set aside.

2. Strain together the flour, baking soda, and salt in a small bowl. Remove 2 tablespoons of the dry ingredients and toss with the apricots in a second small bowl. Set aside.

3. In the large bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the butter on medium-low speed. Pour in the sugar in a steady stream, and mix for 1 to 2 minutes. Add the egg and mix for 1 minute longer, scraping down the bowl as needed. Mix in the extracts.

4. Reduce the mixer speed to low and blend in 1¾ cups of coconut. Add the dry ingredients in 2 additions, mixing only to combine after each addition. Using a large rubber spatula, mix in the apricots.

5. Shape the dough into three logs, each measuring about 8 inches long and 1½ inches in diameter. Place the remaining coconut on a 15-inch sheet of wax paper. Whisk together the egg white and the water in a small bowl. Brush one log of dough with the egg wash, then place the log on the coconut, positioning it so that the length of the log is parallel to the short sides of the wax paper. Grasp each side of the wax paper, lift the paper off the counter, and, moving your hands up and down, roll the log to coat it with the coconut. Wrap the log in plastic, twisting the ends of the wrap tightly to secure. Repeat with the remaining two logs, and then refrigerate all three for at least 1 hour or until firm. (This dough will keep in the refrigerator for up to 3 days or may be frozen for 1 month.)

6. When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

7. Using a sharp knife with a thin blade, slice each log of dough into ⅜-inch-thick slices, turning the log every two or three cuts to maintain the shape, and place on ungreased baking sheets about 2 inches apart. If the dough tears when slicing, press it back together.

8. Using a fork, mix the egg yolk and the half-and-half or milk in a shallow bowl, then lightly brush the tops of the cookies with the glaze.

9. Bake for 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned around the edges (to ensure even browning, rotate the baking sheets from top to bottom and back to front near the end of the baking time). Do not overbake. Remove from the oven and let stand for 1 minute before loosening with a thin metal spatula. Transfer to cooling racks.

Yields: 6 dozen 2-inch cookies
Time: 1¼ hours, plus 1 hour chilling
Leftover potential: High; can be frozen

PIZZA WITH KALE PESTO, CARAMELIZED FENNEL, AND SAUSAGE

Even though I consider myself a major vegetable fan, I hadn’t really tried fennel before (the bulb, I mean; my father loves fennel seed and instilled an appreciation for it in me, even though I don’t really care for other licorice-flavored items). I’m pleased to report that it is delicious, at least when caramelized and heaped onto pizza. Also delicious: kale pesto! If you’re unsure about trying kale, kale pesto is a good gateway drug. Although it tastes quite different from basil pesto, it’s not especially kale-like, just garlicky and green (if you gave it to me in a blind taste test, I might have guessed that it was spinach pesto, although in my opinion it also had a certain ineffable something that made it tastier than spinach). It’s a genius way to get your winter veggies, or to use up any extra kale that you might have lying around, and I imagine it tastes great in any context where you might use pesto (on pasta, bread, etc.).

I also love sausage and needed to make a new batch of pizza sausage anyway, so this recipe from Eggs on Sunday was an all-around win for me, heaped with bold, hearty, wintry flavors that complimented each other tremendously well. It was a bit more labor-intensive than my other pizza recipes, but having premade my own sausage cut down on the work, and there’s no reason you couldn’t make the pesto or caramelize the fennel ahead of time, too. But even if it took hours I’d still be panting to make it again—and you can bet I’ll be bookmarking more fennel recipes posthaste.

(You may notice that I rearranged the order of the items in the title, and that's because when I told someone I was making “pizza with sausage, caramelized fennel, and kale pesto,” they thought that meant that all three items were ground up together in the pesto, which...is less appetizing-sounding.)

2 cups (packed) trimmed kale
¼ cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 clove garlic
Salt to taste
¼ cup + 1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large fennel bulb (or 2 smaller ones), thinly sliced
1 pinch sugar
½ pound hot Italian sausage
1 pound pizza dough
1–2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

1. Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large skillet over medium heat. Add fennel, a pinch of sugar, and a pinch of salt. Reduce heat to medium-low, and cook until soft and caramelized.

2. Meanwhile, remove casings from sausage and brown in a skillet over medium heat, crumbling with the back of a spoon. (Or you can use 8 ounces of ’Atsa Spicy Pizza Sausage and skip this step.)

3. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and blanch the kale for 2 minutes. Drain and squeeze out excess water. Add kale, Parmesan, garlic, and salt to the bowl of a blender or food processor and puree until fairly smooth. Add the olive oil and process until a smooth, loose paste forms.

4. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Roll out the pizza dough and place on a cornmeal-dusted baking sheet. Spread the kale pesto over the dough, then top with shredded mozzarella, caramelized fennel, and sausage.

5. Bake until the crust is golden and cheese is bubbly, about 8 minutes.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour 15 minutes
Leftover potential: Good, especially if reheated in the oven

CURRY COOKIES

Aaaaand…we’re back to cookies. Spice cookies (gingerbread, pfeffernusse, etc.) are traditional at Christmas, but I can never muster up much enthusiasm for them—especially when I could be having chocolate instead. Still, when planning my holiday assortment, I feel compelled to add the quintessential wintry flavors to the mix, and Carole Walter’s Madras Cookies (from Great Cookies) fit the bill perfectly. They’re festively redolent of spice and orange zest, but the curry powder defies the usual ginger/cinnamon hegemony, and coconut and almond—two tastes I find it hard to resist—play major supporting roles. The cookies have a complex flavor, but they’re still subtle enough to be crowd-pleasers. In other words, you don’t bite into them and say, “Oh, curry”; it just adds a certain je ne sais quoi. These are just basically just a spice cookie with a twist, but it’s a good one.

I won’t lie; Carole Walter is always a demanding mistress (I appreciate the careful specificity of her instructions, down to precisely how many minutes to run the stand mixer at each stage, but occasionally while making one of her recipes I find myself rolling my eyes at some of the hoops she wants me to jump through, even though I’m sure they do make the cookies better), and this recipe is a bit fussy, what with needing to toast the curry powder and grind the almonds and chop the coconut and everything, but I assure you that in this case, all the steps are important. I once substituted almond meal for grinding the almonds myself, and the cookies just weren’t the same—the nubbly texture I achieved in my wimpy mini food processor gave them so much more character. So put your trust in Carole.

2 teaspoons mild curry powder
2½ cups all-purpose flour, spooned in and leveled
1 cup plus about 50 (scant ½ cup) unblanched whole almonds, toasted
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly firm
1 teaspoon grated orange zest
⅔ cup granulated sugar
⅔ cup lightly packed brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup sweetened flaked coconut (Carole likes you to chop your coconut in a food processor ahead of time; I don’t always do this, but I admit that it does improve the texture of the cookies by eliminating long, troublesome strands)

1. Heat the curry powder in a small, heavy skillet over low heat for 15 to 30 seconds until fragrant. Set aside to cool.

2. Place the flour, 1 cup of almonds, toasted curry powder, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon in a food processor bowl fitted with the steel blade. Pulse 10 to 12 times, then process for 1 minute or until the mixture is finely chopped and cakey. Set aside.

3. In the large bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the butter and orange zest on medium-low speed until creamy and lightened in color. Add the granulated sugar in a steady stream, then add the brown sugar and mix for about 1 minute. Add the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each, then add the vanilla, scraping the bowl as needed. Add the dry ingredients in three additions, mixing just until blended after each addition. Using a large wooden spoon, fold in the coconut.

4. Chill the dough for 20 to 30 minutes, or until firm enough to roll into balls.

5. When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 375 degrees and moderately butter your baking sheets.

6. Roll the dough in the palms of your hands to form 1-inch balls and place about 2 inches part on the baking sheets. Gently press a whole almond into the center of each cookie. Using the heel of your hand, flatten the cookie into a 1½-inch disk.

7. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes or until the edges are golden brown (toward the end of the baking time, rotate the baking sheets from top to bottom and front to back). Remove from oven and let stand 2 to 3 minutes before loosening with a thin metal spatula. Transfer to cooling racks.

Yields: 50 2-inch cookies
Time: 1½ hours, plus 30 minutes chilling
Leftover potential: High; can be frozen

BROCCOLI SALAD WITH BACON, CHIVES, AND TOMATO

We interrupt Cookiefest to bring you a salad break—and I’m sure we could all use one, right? This recipe from Jamie Oliver (via Serious Eats) is a real winner, jazzing up barely-blanched broccoli (cooked just enough to lose that raw bitterness, but not enough to sacrifice crunch) with bacon and an addictive bacony-vinegary-mustardy-garlicky dressing that seeps into every little crevice of the broccoli. Tomatoes add nice color and acidity and the chives a subtle oniony flavor, but the real star is the broccoli. Even if you never envisioned yourself downing the green stuff by the bowlful, this might change your ways. Both A and I loved it, and although I served it on the side of some salmon, in the summer it could make a fine main dish on its own.

This most exciting thing about making this recipe was that I got to use my brand-new cast-iron skillet for frying the bacon, woohoo! There’s not too much else to note; I followed all directions as written, except that I decreased the olive oil from 6 tablespoons to 4, both because that seemed like a lot of fat for a dressing that already included bacon grease and because I could see that we weren’t going to need all that dressing anyway (I don’t like my salad drowning in dressing, so I didn’t use the whole bowl). Besides, I prefer an acidic dressing (I make my usual one with about half lemon juice and half oil). I also subbed in cherry tomatoes, because I like them so much in salads and they’re better this time of year than Romas, When summer comes, a mix of red and yellow cherry tomatoes will be so pretty against the green of the broccoli.

2 heads of broccoli, about 1½ pounds
4 slices thick-cut bacon, cut into matchsticks
2 roma tomatoes, halved, seeded, and finely chopped (or about a cup of cherry tomatoes, halved or quartered)
1 bunch fresh chives (15 to 20), finely chopped
1 clove garlic, peeled and minced or pressed
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
4–6 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to boil. Meanwhile, trim the woody ends from the broccoli and trim the heads up into small florets of about equal size. When the water comes to a boil, blanch the broccoli for 1–2 minutes, until they are starting to get tender but still have bite in the middle. Drain in a colander and spread out on a kitchen towel to steam dry, about 15 minutes.

2. In the meantime, cook the bacon in a large skillet with a splash of olive oil over medium-low heat until the fat renders into the pan and the bacon is crisp but still slightly chewy.

3. Drain the fat collected in the bacon pan into a bowl and add the garlic, dijon, and vinegar. Whisk well to combine into an emulsion, then add the olive oil slowly in a stream, whisking constantly. Season to taste with salt and pepper and taste also for acidity, adding more vinegar or oil if needed.

4. Toss the broccoli with the tomatoes, bacon, chives, and dressing.

Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: OK if eaten within a few days

CHOCOLATE PEPPERMINT BARK COOKIES

Even though my favorite way to celebrate Christmas is by making, giving, receiving, and eating homemade goodies, one of my most beloved holiday treats is a storebought product: Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s, the limited-edition version of Trader Joe’s take on Oreos. Ordinary Joe-Joe’s are plenty good too, by the way, made without preservatives and with a far superior texture than Oreos and actual vanilla-bean flecks in the filling, but I can still resist them most of the time in favor of my homemade fare. When Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s appear on the shelves, however, I must buy them and hoard them (I currently have one stashed in my freezer, awaiting the time when my post-holiday healthy eating kick wears away and I can fulfill my longtime plan of making Candy Cane Joe-Joe cookies-and-cream ice cream). They’re like Thin Mints on crack, or possibly made with crack, featuring a strong but not toothpastey peppermint flavor and a nice crunch from real bits of candy canes in the filling. They have become my gold standard for all things chocolate-peppermint, a combo I always crave when December rolls around.

I have longed to share the joy of Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s with my loved ones, but handing out $2.99 boxes of prepacked cookies at the holidays seems gauche. Yet I’d never considered trying to make my own chocolate-peppermint treats until I saw this recipe for peppermint bark chocolate cookies a couple of years ago. Perhaps it would capture the Candy Cane Joe-Joe's magic in a homemade form? I made them last Christmas, and they were…fine, but not what I was hoping for. The chocolate flavor wasn’t very intense, and the texture was uninspiring (I think I overbaked them a bit, which didn’t help). So this year I decided to try subbing peppermint bark into Carole Walter’s recipe for chocolate chocolate-chip cookies. I hadn’t tried this exact cookie before, but nearly everything in Great Cookies is, well, great, and having sampled some of her other chocolate-cookie recipes, I knew the chocolate flavor would be there.

The result? Much improved, definitely chocolatey, and complimented by many who tasted it, but still not the chocolate-peppermint cookie of my dreams. Maybe I should have put some peppermint extract in the cookie itself? Or maybe I should just make peppermint bark next year and skip the cookie entirely, which would be much less labor-intensive and equally enjoyable to eat? Besides, maybe there’s a classy way I can give away Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s, after all: This year I spotted a fancy new version of them for sale, dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with crushed candy canes. Purely for research purposes, I bought and sampled them, and they were indeed delicious, but it was verging on highway robbery—the package cost more than a box of the unadorned cookies and was half the size. It would be a simple and much more affordable matter to dip them in melted chocolate and decorate with candy cane pieces myself! Hmmm…

In the meantime, however, if you love chocolate and peppermint and don’t live near a Trader Joe’s, or have to wait 11 months before Candy Cane Joe-Joe’s season arrives again, these cookies are an excellent choice. And if for some reason you hate peppermint with chocolate, you can revert to the original recipe by substituting 12 ounces of good-quality bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chunks or chips for the peppermint bark and have yourself some darn fine chocolate chocolate chip cookies.

8 ounces good-quality bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped
1 cup all-purpose flour, spooned in and leveled
2 tablespoons Dutch-processed cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking powder
¼ teaspoon salt
½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, slightly firm
¾ cup granulated sugar
½ cup lightly packed dark brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons hot water
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
12 ounces peppermint bark, cut into ¼- to ½-inch chunks

1. In a medium bowl over a pot of simmering water on low heat, slowly melt the 8 ounces of chocolate and keep warm.

2. Strain together the flour, cocoa, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl and set aside.

3. In an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, mix the butter on medium-low speed until smooth and creamy, about 1 minute. Add the granulated sugar, then the brown sugar, and mix until well blended and lightened in color 2 to three minutes. Add the eggs, mixing until well combined, scraping the bowl as needed. Blend in the warm melted chocolate, then the hot water and vanilla extract.

4. Reduce the mixer speed to low and blend in the dry ingredients in two additions, mixing until just combined. Using a large rubber spatula, fold in the peppermint bark chunks.

5. Chill the dough for 1 hour.

6. When ready to bake, preheat the oven to 350 degrees and moderately butter your baking sheets.

7. Drop 1½-inch mounds of dough from the tip of a tablespoon onto baking sheets, placing them about 3 inches apart. Scrape down the side of the bowl occasionally to endure even distribution of peppermint bark.

8. Bake for 10 to 11 minutes, rotating the baking sheets from top to bottom and front to back towards the end of the baking time. The cookies will look underdone, but they will firm up as they cool. Remove from oven and let stand for 1 or 2 minutes, then loosen with a thin metal spatula. When firm enough to handle, transfer to cooling racks.

Yield: About 4 dozen
Time: 1 hour, plus 1 hour of chilling
Leftover potential: High; can be frozen

PEPPERMINT BARK

We always have almond bark for Christmas, but I’d never really heard of or eaten peppermint bark before I got an itch to make peppermint bark cookies last Christmas (the cookies are a whole separate saga in themselves and will be discussed in a later post). So I made peppermint bark using this recipe and, although I accidentally bought “mint extract” (i.e., spearmint) instead of peppermint extract, giving my bark a distinct hint of chewing-gum flavor, I was impressed by how easy, pretty, and tasty the finished product was. I always think I don’t like white chocolate, but it does often have an allure, especially with the mint enhancing its cool creaminess…sort of like the inside of a peppermint patty, but less cloying. I used the peppermint bark in my cookies as planned, but noticed that the leftover fragments of the bark on their own were also well received.

So this year I thought I’d one-up myself by making this awesome-looking triple-layer peppermint bark to put into the cookies. Then I got sort of tired and scaled back to just two layers, one white one dark, basing my efforts on this recipe—although I added some peppermint extract (actual peppermint this time) to one layer because I liked the mintiness of the white chocolate last year. It was a cinch to make and turned out so deliciously that next year I’m thinking of skipping the cookies entirely and just concentrating on the peppermint bark! This is one of the simplest holiday treats around (melt, pour, and repeat!), but it looks fancy enough to make a nice gift when packaged in a cute bag or tin.

This year, I noticed peppermint bark for sale in stores everywhere at holiday time, often for upwards of $10 a pound. People, I implore you, please don’t waste your hard-earned money on that when you can do it yourself without breaking a sweat (well, unless you get a bit too aggressive while crushing those candy canes) for half the price!

1 pound dark (semisweet or bittersweet) chocolate chips (or a bar cut into squares)
1 pound white chocolate chips (or a bar cut into squares)
6 ounces (1 regular package) candy canes
½ to 1 teaspoon peppermint extract

1. Unwrap the candy canes, place them in a plastic zip-top bag, and crush them with a rolling pin, mug, mallet, or small hammer. Don’t pulverize them; you want the pieces to be pretty fragments, not sand—but you don’t want huge chunks, either. A variety of sizes and textures is nice.

2. Line a large baking sheet with waxed paper.

3. Melt the dark chocolate over a double boiler until smooth. Spread (with an offset or rubber spatula) in an even layer on the baking sheet. Place in refrigerator or freezer to harden, approximately 30 minutes.

4. Melt the white chocolate over a double boiler until smooth, then stir in peppermint extract. Spread white chocolate on top of the dark chocolate layer. Working quickly before the white chocolate sets, sprinkle the crushed candy canes on top and gently press into the chocolate. Refrigerate until complete hard and set, at least 2 hours.

5. Place a second sheet of waxed paper over the top of the slab of peppermint bark (to protect your hands from the sharp peppermint pieces and keep the chocolate from melting) and break bark into pieces. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator or freezer.

Yield: 2 pounds
Time: 30 minutes hands-on, plus 2½ hours of hardening
Leftover potential: High. Keeps great in the freezer.

ROSEMARY ROASTED CASHEWS

Happy new year! I know that after the holidays know we’re all sick of sweets and snacks and trying to eat light and healthy fare. Believe me, one of my goals for the month (possibly the year, but I’m not making any promises) is along the lines of “more kale, fewer cookie plates.” But I’ve got all these recipes from my Christmas baking burning a hole in my pocket now—I didn’t share them in December because I didn’t really want to reveal the secret formulas right before I gave everyone treat assortments as gifts,* and also because I needed time to photograph them all—and I don’t want to wait a whole year until they’re more seasonally appropriate to post. So: things are going to be retroactively cookie-intense around here for a little while. But I’ll try to at least throw a few kale recipes into the mix as well.

(*I still feel a little shifty about sharing the recipes, like it’ll ruin the magic or something. I already posted all my jam recipes (and jam featured heavily in my gift-giving this year) when I was desperate for material during NaBloPoMo, so I guess I’m already on the slippery slope. I’m counting on all of you to forget this little peek behind the curtain by the time next Christmas rolls around and I hand you your treats. Or at least be too busy or lazy to simply whip them up yourself now that you’ve seen how easy they are.)

I’m always hoping to make more savory goodies to share at holiday time, because everyone (including me) gets so overloaded on the sweets, but the only savory recipe I’ve managed to get around to is this one. Luckily, it’s a doozy. I’ve made it for the past two years, and only financial concerns (cashews can be pricy) prevent me from making dozens of pounds at a time. This year I made a triple recipe and barely had a handful for myself. But that’s probably for the best, because I think I could eat these addictive little gems until I burst—which is why, even though they’d be perfect for any party or just a relaxing evening in front of the TV, I try to forget about them for the other 11 months of the year. They’re not particularly unwholesome if eaten in moderation (only a touch of butter, sugar, and salt), but moderation is hard to achieve when these are around. They’re just the perfect mix of salty, sweet, spicy and savory, with a festive green pine-needle zip from the rosemary. (Don’t skimp on the rosemary! Spice-phobes can cut back the cayenne and sodium-watchers can dial down the salt, but the rosemary makes the recipe.)

The recipe is from the Barefoot Contessa; taking a tip from the commenters, I modified the procedure slightly to add the butter and then the spices to give everything to stick to the cashews. It’s still a struggle, but you’ll have a better chance of success with this method—and luckily, I’ve found that most snackers find the stray crumbs of butter-sugar-spice-herb debris quite as tasty as the cashews themselves. Aside from the mixing issues, this recipe is hard to mess up—as long as you don’t scorch the cashews! For the love of all that’s good and holy, watch those cashews in the oven like a hawk, because there is nothing sadder than spending upwards of $5 per pound on some nuts and then ruining them right off the bat. I speak from experience. However, I can also attest that as long as they aren’t blackened, even the overcooked cashews are pretty tasty when the seasoning is applied, so you can always save that batch for yourself and make better ones to give away.

1¼ pounds unsalted cashew nuts (this is sort of an odd amount; at Trader Joe’s the cashews come in one-pound bags, so that’s what I usually use and it’s fine)
2 tablespoons coarsely chopped fresh rosemary leaves
½ teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 teaspoons dark brown sugar
2 teaspoons coarse kosher salt
1 tablespoon melted butter

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.

2. Place the nuts on an ungreased baking sheet and bake for about 10 minutes until they are warmed through. (Watch them very closely to avoid burning. You don’t really want them to get especially brown; you just want them to be lightly toasted and activate their oils enough for the seasonings to stick.)

3. Meanwhile, combine the rosemary, pepper, sugar, and salt in a small bowl. Place the melted butter in a separate small bowl (or just use the container you melted it in). Have a large empty mixing bowl and a rubber spatula ready.

4. When you remove the nuts from the oven, immediately pour them into the large bowl, and working quickly, drizzle the butter over them, add the seasonings, and then toss well with the spatula. Serve warm or (once cooled) store in an airtight container (they’re even better the next day). Can be frozen for longer storage.

Yields: 1¼ pounds
Time: 20 minutes
Leftover potential: High, if you don’t scarf them all down immediately. They’ll stay fresh in the freezer for weeks.

CREAM BISCUITS

Holy cow, I made biscuits! Honest-to-goodness, delicious biscuits! And it was so incredibly easy!

OK, biscuits may not be the hardest thing in the world to make, but I’ve always avoided them for some reason, probably because I have an irrational fear of any recipe that involves cutting butter into flour (pie crust, etc.), plus I’ve made a heck of a lot of baking-soda breads that haven’t turned out well. But when I saw this recipe so highly praised at The Smitten Kitchen and realized that it used cream instead of butter, there went my feeble excuse for avoiding biscuit-making. Even with my questionable dough-handling abilities, I was pretty sure I could manage to stir melted butter and heavy cream into some dry ingredients, pat the dough out flat, and cut it into circles (not owning a biscuit cutter, of course, I just used the top of a drinking glass). I was skeptical the entire time, waiting for flat, dry lumps of sadness to emerge from the oven, so imagine my thrill when they came out light, flaky, and puffy, just like real biscuits! (“But they are real biscuits,” A had to keep reminding me.)

We served these with a cider-braised chicken dish (from the St. Paul Farmers Market Cookbook) that turned out a little disappointingly, but the biscuits so wildly exceeded my expectations that I didn’t even mind. Now that I know I can whip them up with no trouble on an average weeknight, the possibilities are endless! They’ll be great dipped into soups, or spread with homemade jam, but when I get back to cooking after New Year’s, my first order of business will be to try them with creamed chicken on top.

The biscuits are best straight from the oven, but I still found them pretty tasty the next day, after a brief zapping in the microwave. But if you don’t want to eat 10 biscuits right away, you can either freeze the leftover biscuits or—and this sounds like a brilliant idea I’ll certainly be trying soon—freeze the dough rounds to bake later.

3 tablespoons melted butter
2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting the surface
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1½ cups heavy cream

1. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Melt butter in a small pot or microwave dish, and set aside.

2. Sift 2 cups flour, the baking powder, and the salt into a large bowl. Fold in 1¼ cups cream. If the dough is not soft or easily handled, fold in the remaining ¼ cup cream, little by little. (I ended up using about 2 additional tablespoons.)

3. Turn dough onto a floured surface, mound it into a ball, and, using your hands, press it to a thickness of about ¾ inch. Cut into rounds, 2½ inches in diameter. Gather dough scraps, press them flat again, and continue to make rounds. Dip the top of each round in melted butter (or brush it generously with butter if that seems easier) and arrange biscuits on the baking sheet.

4. Bake until golden, 12 to 15 minutes. Serve immediately, or freeze for future use. (You can also freeze the uncooked dough rounds; they can be baked straight from the freezer, although a few extra minutes of baking time will be needed.)

Yield: About 10
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good, if frozen

POTATO-LEEK PIZZA WITH BACON

Oh, yum. I spotted this why-didn’t-I-think-of-it recipe in Pioneer Woman’s brand-new cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks. I love her humor and her tantalizing concoctions (accompanied by dazzling step-by-step photographs), even though they’re a bit richer and heavier than I’d usually cook for our little Southern Californian household of two, one of whom has a petite appetite and the other of whom hunches over a computer in a cubicle all day instead of performing grueling, calorie-burning ranch labor on the wide-open prairie. (Really, the only other PW recipes I’ve actually made are the fabulous ranch dressing and oatmeal-jam bars.) But this twist on the iconic flavor combination of potatoes and leeks, with some bacon thrown in, sounded too good to pass up—and you know how I love pizza.

It was fully as delicious as it sounded. The only real changes I made were to omit the goat cheese (because even though I keep on trying it, I just don’t like goat cheese), and halved the amount of mozzarella (because a pound is a lot of cheese). I can see that the goat cheese would add a zippier flavor, and if I’d had some asiago or Gruyere, I might have thrown a bit on there, but we both loved it plenty well as is. If I were making this just for myself, I might have reduced the bacon (to, say, 4 slices) and increased the leeks (to at least 4), but A was horrified when I mentioned it the idea (if anything, he wanted more bacon and fewer leeks—but then, this is the man who got bacon chocolate chip cookies for Valentine’s day, and he doesn’t share my adulation for leeks). So we’ll just keep that ratio the way it’s written.

Tips: Do be sure to use fresh mozzarella, because you need the moisture it provides, and do be sure to slice the potatoes paper-thin. This is the only potato pizza recipe I’ve tried where the potatoes aren’t cooked beforehand, and while that does make things easier, I worried the whole time about ending up with crunchy potatoes, especially since I’d sliced them by hand (a mandoline seems useful, but so very sharp and scary, and where would I keep it?). In the end, while the potatoes were not raw as I’d feared, they did have a bit more bite than usual. I liked the chewy, slightly al dente texture that resulted, but I certainly wouldn’t have wanted them any less cooked than that. So keep ’em thin!

1 pound pizza dough
Extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
6 slices thick-cut bacon, diced
3 leeks, rinsed well to remove grit and thinly sliced
5 small red or Yukon Gold potatoes
8 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced thin
Freshly grated Parmesan cheese to taste
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 500 degrees. Roll out the pizza dough on a baking sheet, drizzle it lightly with olive oil, and sprinkle it lightly with salt.

2. In a skillet over medium heat, fry the bacon until cooked but not completely crisp, then remove with a slotted spoon and set aside on a paper-towel-lined plate to drain. Pour off most of the grease, but do not clean the skillet. Return it to the stove and, over medium-low heat, saute the leeks until soft, about 3 minutes. Remove the leeks from the heat and set aside.

3. Using a sharp knife or mandoline, slice the potatoes very thin. Arrange the potatoes in a single layer all over the crust, slightly overlapping the edges. Sprinkle the potatoes lightly with salt, then lay the mozzarella slices in a single layer on top. Place the leeks on top of the cheese, then sprinkle the fried bacon pieces over the top. Add a generous dose of grated Parmesan and a sprinkle of pepper.

4. Bake 8 to 11 minutes, until the edges of the crust are golden brown and the cheese is melted and bubbly.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Good

APPLE BUTTER

I know this photo looks pretty much exactly like the one for pear butter, but it's just a trick of the light, I swear! The apple butter is a much darker shade of brown.

I’ve been making and canning this apple butter from Simply Recipes as a holiday treat for at least three years now and am always pleased with the results—sweet, tart, and spiced, with a velvety consistency, great on toast, on pancakes, or in oatmeal. Apples are cheap and plentiful at this time of year (I usually use Fujis because I can buy seconds—small and slightly flawed but perfectly tasty—at the farmers’ market for $1.50 a pound); the recipe is clever (I love that you initially cook the whole apple, peel, core, seeds, and all, to maximize the flavor and natural pectin content) and fairly easy, although I can always be heard swearing when it comes time to put the boiled apples through the food mill. Why does it seem that I need three hands to work a food mill effectively (one to turn the crank, and two to hold it steady so it doesn’t jump around)?

This year I finally bought my own food mill ($25 at Bed Bath and Beyond with their 20% off coupon), after always having to borrow one in the past. I’m a bit reluctant to own such an infernal device, plus it seems silly to have a largish kitchen item that I’m only going to use once per year (although by that token, I wouldn’t have a cookie press, either), and it feels redundant to now possess four different machines for pureeing food (although unlike the blender, small food processor, and immersion blender, the food mill has the obvious advantage of straining out peels and seeds). Ideally, I’ll find a few more uses for the food mill (I could have used it on the pear butter, for starters), but even if I only ever use it for my annual batch of apple butter, it'll earn its keep admirably.

By the way, this is officially my last canning project until 2010 (sigh), both because I need to concentrate on holiday baking and because all those little glass jars are threatening to take over the apartment.

4 pounds good cooking apples (e.g., Granny Smith or Gravenstein; I used Fuji)
1 cup apple cider vinegar
2 cups water
Sugar (about 4 cups; see cooking instructions)
Salt
2 teaspoons cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground cloves
½ teaspoon allspice
Grated rind and juice of 1 lemon

1. Prepare jars and closures as in steps 1-2 here.

2. Cut the apples into quarters, without peeling or coring them (much of the pectin is in the cores and flavor in the peels), and cut out any damaged parts.

3. Put the apples into a large pot, add the vinegar and water, cover, bring to a boil, reduce heat to simmer, and cook until apples are soft, about 20 minutes. Remove from heat.

4. Ladle apple mixture into a chinois sieve or food mill and force pulp through the sieve or mill into a large bowl below. Measure resulting puree. Add ½ cup sugar for each cup of apple pulp. Stir to dissolve sugar. Add a dash of salt, and the cinnamon, ground cloves, allspice, lemon rind, and lemon juice. Taste and adjust seasonings if necessary.

5. Cook uncovered in a large, wide, thick-bottomed pot on medium-low heat, stirring every 5 minutes to prevent burning. Cook 1 to 2 hours, until thick and smooth when a bit is spooned onto a cold plate and allowed to cool.

6. Fill jars and process for 10 minutes, as in steps 7-9 here.

Yield: 14-16 4-ounce jars
Time: 4 hours
Leftover potential: Yes!

PROSCIUTTO-AND-BASIL-WRAPPED CHICKEN FINGERS

This brilliant, easier-than-pie little chicken recipe from The Hungry Mouse tastes about like what you'd expect, but that's hardly anything to be ashamed of when what you expect and receive is chicken wrapped in basil and thin, salty ham. For about the quickest chicken dish I can think of, the end result is disproportionately pretty, or at least it would have been if I hadn't found the paper-thin slices of Trader Joe's prosciutto so unexpectedly hard to manipulate without tearing (it was worse than working with phyllo!). I just ended up sort of hamhandedly (hee! sorry) draping them as best I could around the chicken, but they still cooked up elegantly, the prosciutto forming a crisp, translucent shell around the tender chicken.

This recipe is the perfect solution for when you want a little protein to accompany a more labor-intensive dish; I was desperate for arugula, potato, and green bean salad, which is, let's face it, kind of a lot of work for a salad, what with toasting the walnuts, boiling the potatoes and then the green beans, washing and drying the arugula, and making the dressing, so I wanted something with it that I could just throw in and out of the oven, and this fit the bill perfectly. I especially liked the more manageable two-bite, hand-holdable size of the little chicken tenders; sometimes I get daunted when faced with a huge slab of chicken breast that I have to saw my way through with a knife. These would probably be a hit with kids, or as part of a party spread.

An equivalent number of chicken breast tenders (or chicken breast sliced into strips), prosciutto slices, and large basil leaves; I used 8 of each
Kosher salt to taste
Freshly cracked black pepper to taste
Olive oil to taste

1. Preheat your oven to 425 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set it aside.

2. Place a basil leaf atop each piece of chicken (it should mostly cover the chicken; if it’s too small, use two).

3. Starting at one end of a piece of chicken, wrap a slice of prosciutto around the chicken, keeping the basil in place. Set the wrapped chicken on your prepared baking sheet, and repeat with remaining chicken pieces.

4. Drizzle a little olive oil on each piece of chicken, then sprinkle with a little kosher salt and freshly cracked black pepper.

5. Bake for about 15 minutes, until chicken is cooked (juices should run clear) and prosciutto is nice and crisp.

Serves: 3–4 as a main dish, more as an appetizer/snack
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good; these reheat fairly well.

BEEF, BEAN, AND BEER CHILI

I still have several pounds of beans from the Rancho Gordo samplers I received last Christmas, and now that the weather’s grown cool enough to simmer something on the stove for hours, I’ve been looking for ways to cook them. This has been a bit challenging; I’ve used up the most straightforward beans (i.e, white beans and black beans), and I’ve found a great recipe for Christmas lima beans, so what’s left are the more unusual varieties, the kinds a recipe is unlikely to call for specifically. And of course you can always just cook up some beans and eat them, but A doesn’t really like straight-up beans and I’m not great at improvisation.

So the obvious answer was chili, especially when I was staring at a bag of pebble beans that said “great in chilis” on the label. (Yes, Texans, I’m sorry, I know you think it’s a travesty to put beans in chili, but I’m from the Midwest and that’s how we eat it there.) One problem: I wasn’t sure I liked chili. The only time I really remember eating it was when my mom made it when I was a kid, and I was always a little suspicious of it, as I was of any concoction containing a lot of different ingredients mixed together, particularly when one of those ingredients was beans. (How ironic that I used to dislike chili because it contained beans and now I needed to make chili because it contains beans!) But it sounded sort of good to me now, and I figured A would be down with eating anything that was spicy and had beef in it.

The next ordeal was finding a recipe, and let me tell you, it was formidable. I wanted it to contain beef, 1 pound of dried beans, beer, and nothing else that was too specialized or weird. This recipe on Epicurious was a contender, but the enormous volume of comments scared me off—most people liked it, a lot of people made adaptations, and a small but strenuous minority thought it was bland and awful. I dutifully read through all 296 of them, took copious notes, and tried to figure out how I would scale the recipe down (it served 10 and called for three pounds of beef but only 15 ounces of canned beans), but ultimately I gave up, went to Food Blog Search, typed in “chili beef beans beer,” and immediately found this recipe from Pinch My Salt. It called for three cans of beans, the equivalent of 1 pound of dried beans, so I didn’t have to mess with the proportions at all. It had a modest amount of beef, it had beer, it had a bell pepper and a jalapeno (I liked the idea of at least getting a little bit of fresh veggie in there), and it didn’t have particularly baroque seasonings.

I did incorporate a few details from the Epicurious recipe. I increased the garlic, used a dark beer (Negra Modelo), and used beef broth instead of the water originally called for. I made sure to buy brand-new chili powder, because old chili powder may have lost its flavor. I also may have added pinches and dashes of the following secret ingredients various Epicurious commenters swore by: unsweetened cocoa powder (maybe 1 teaspoon?), Worcestershire sauce (a generous dash), ketchup (a few squeezes), powdered mustard (a couple of pinches), and black pepper (a few grindings). I’m not sure whether any of these made a difference, but what I do know is I FREAKIN’ LOVED THIS CHILI. All along, as I cooked, I was suspicious. Would it be bland? Would it be unbearably spicy? I kept tasting it, and it seemed to be both at the same time—so spicy it made me cough, and sort of flat and blah due to the lack of salt (salt is added at the end). But with the long cooking, everything blended or mellowed out or something, because when we sat down to eat it was absolutely perfect. I loved that it was hearty but not heavy, simple but complex. I loved how it was spicy enough to be interesting, but not enough to be annoying or painful. I loved the smoky taste from the chipotle powder and fire-roasted tomatoes. I loved loading it up with toppings (I highly recommend cheddar, green onions, cilantro, and corn chips). I loved the leftovers the next day (and the next, and today).

Oh! And the beans? Exemplary. I finally achieved true tenderness (yet without being mushy), and I owe it all to this amazing new method of cooking them: Don’t soak, just cover them with water, bring it to a boil on the stovetop, cover, cook in a 250-degree oven for 75 minutes, and drain. Easy, efficient, and effective (as well as an apt use for my Dutch oven). I cooked the beans while assembling the chili and then dumped them in when they were done, about halfway through the chili’s simmering time—the recipe says to add them right away with the tomatoes, but since they’re already cooked you can really do it whenever you want; in fact, Epicurious has you do it at the end, but I like giving them a chance to absorb the flavor of the chili.

I’m so pleased to have found my go-to chili recipe on the first try. I’ll be trying it again soon, next time with Vaquero beans. At this rate, I’ll have to hope I get Rancho Gordos again for Christmas! (Ahem.)

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 large yellow onion, chopped
1 large bell pepper (I used red), seeded and chopped
3 large cloves of garlic, minced
1 large jalapeno, minced (seeds and all)
1 pound ground beef
3 tablespoons chili powder
2 teaspoons chipotle chili powder
2 teaspoons cumin
1 bottle dark beer (I used Negra Modelo)
1 14.5-ounce can fire-roasted diced tomatoes
114.5-ounce can crushed tomatoes (if you can’t find crushed tomatoes, which I never can, just puree a can of whole or diced tomatoes)
1 cup beef broth (preferred), chicken broth, or water
1 6-ounce can tomato paste
1 15-ounce can each of pinto beans, black beans, and kidney beans, drained and rinsed; OR 1pound dried beans in a variety of your choice (I used pebble beans), cooked until tender
2 teaspoons kosher salt, or to taste
Optional extra seasonings such as unsweetened cocoa, Worcestershire sauce, ketchup, mustard powder, black pepper
Optional toppings for serving such as shredded cheddar cheese, sliced green onions, chopped fresh cilantro, sour cream, and corn chips

1. In a large saucepan or dutch oven over medium heat, cook onion and pepper in olive oil until softened, about five minutes. Add garlic and jalapeno and cook, stirring, for another minute, then add ground beef. Cook, breaking up the meat with a wooden spoon, just until meat is no longer pink. Drain the fat from the pan, then return to heat.

2. Add the two chili powders and cumin, and cook the spices and the meat together, stirring, for half a minute or so. Add the beer, stir, and allow to cook while you open all the cans and drain and rinse the beans. Add all the tomatoes, broth or water, tomato paste, and beans; stir well. Bring mixture up to a slow boil then turn the heat down to low and simmer, partially covered, for at least an hour.

3. As the chili simmers, stir it occasionally, and taste to see if you need/want more chili powder, cumin, or other seasonings (don’t add salt until it’s done cooking). Once chili has reached the thickness you like add salt to taste.

Serves: 6–8
Time: 2 hours
Leftover potential: High—tastes even better the next day, and can easily be frozen.

BROWN SUGAR CARDAMOM PEAR BUTTER

Searching for a pear butter recipe to add to my burgeoning jam collection, I found this one on Epicurious and was instantly smitten with the revolutionary idea of using brown sugar instead of white sugar in canning. I love brown sugar, and have been known to sneak small bits of it straight whenever I’m measuring it out for a recipe. And indeed, the brown sugar adds a nice, rich note to this otherwise straightforward pear butter—if not quite strong enough, in my opinion, to merit the original title of Caramel-Pear Butter, which, coupled with the presence of salt in the ingredient list, had led me to dare to hope that it might taste like salted butter caramel in a jar.

This is slightly more labor-intensive than my previous two jam recipes. For one thing, seven pounds is a lot of pears. I scored a great price of $1 a pound at the farmers’ market (though I should have let them ripen a little longer—their tarter flavor wasn’t a problem, but the finished pear butter was a bit grainy), but they were small, and going over 20something pears with a vegetable peeler is a thankless job. There’s no added pectin here, either; the mixture thickens the old-fashioned way, with slow cooking, and must be tended constantly so it doesn’t stick or scorch.

When everything was done and I tasted the pear butter, I wasn’t sure whether it had all been worth it. It tasted good, but pretty average, like sweetened pear, without a really detectable brown-sugar flavor. But maybe the constant tasting and smelling of sugar over the course of the afternoon head deadened my tastebuds, or maybe the little leftover half-jar I set aside in the fridge mellowed and deepened overnight, because the next day, when I spread it over toast, I was really impressed. This is some fantastic stuff. Even if it doesn’t taste like caramel, it has a dark, complex, ineffable quality worthy of gobbling by the spoonful. And look at that nice, thick, spreadable, buttery consistency, so thick it stands up in peaks in the photo above!

Two notes: The original recipe called for nutmeg, but I wanted to use cardamom, my favorite spice, and was not disappointed; it’s a great match for pears. Also, being sans food mill, I used an immersion blender on the pears instead. (I wouldn't recommend blitzing them in a blender or food processor, though, because you want to retain a little of that whole-fruit texture; if you don't have a food mill or immersion blender, try a potato masher.)

¼ cup apple juice
6 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, divided
7 pounds ripe Bartlett pears
3 cups (packed) golden brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
¾ teaspoon coarse kosher salt

1. Prepare jars and closures as in steps 1-2 here.

2. Combine apple juice and 4 tablespoons lemon juice in a large, deep, heavy pot. Peel, core, and cut pears, one at a time, into ½- to ¾-inch pieces; as soon as they are cut, mix pears into juice mixture in pot to prevent browning.

3. Cook pears over medium heat until they release enough juice for mixture to boil, stirring frequently, about 16 minutes. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until pears are very tender, stirring frequently, about 20 minutes.

4. Remove pot from heat. Press pear mixture through the fine plate of a food mill into a large bowl and return the pear puree to the same pot. (Alternatively, you can use an immersion blender to puree the pears in the pot to your desired consistency, or for chunkier pear butter, crush pears by hand with a potato masher.) Add 2 tablespoons lemon juice, brown sugar, cardamom, and ¾ teaspoon coarse salt.

5. Bring to boil over medium heat, stirring until sugar dissolves. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer uncovered, stirring every 5 minutes to prevent scorching, for about 1 hour until pear butter thickens and is reduced to 8 cups.

6. Fill jars and process for 10 minutes, as in steps 7-9 here.

Yield: About 16 4-ounce jars
Time: 4 hours
Leftover potential: Of course.

HUNGARIAN GREEN BEAN SOUP

Ta-da, my collection of pureed green soups is now complete! Actually, it didn’t occur to me that this soup might be a dead ringer for several others in my repertoire until I set out to take pictures of it and felt a strong pang of déjà vu; there are only so many ways to photograph pale green liquid in a blue bowl in a poorly lit kitchen, after all. I’d had the recipe bookmarked in my copy of The St. Paul Farmers’ Market Cookbook for several years, mostly because I’d never heard of a green bean soup before, and green beans are one of my favorite vegetables, but also because the sour cream/dill combo (the thing that makes it “Hungarian,” I guess) sounded alluring.

This is an easy recipe, assembled along the ol’ boil-and-puree line, and (I feel like I say this all the time) I feared it would be bland, but it wasn’t. A feared it would be super-green-beany, and it wasn’t that, either. It mostly tasted like dill and sour cream (well, I used crème fraiche, and plain yogurt, preferably Greek, would also work), sort of like a lighter, fresher, tangier, less oniony potato-leek soup, but with a vague green undertone. It didn’t bowl me over with its uniqueness (at least, I’m not sure I could identify it as green bean soup if I were blindfolded), but I enjoyed it and will certainly make it again, not least because it’s so versatile—lemony and green for spring, delicate enough for summer, and accessible enough for winter (the recipe says you can even use frozen green beans). We ate it with dill, red onion, and cheddar drop biscuits (a good way to use up the rest of that bunch of dill), but garlic bread would also make a good accompaniment.

3 cups good-quality chicken broth (or vegetable broth, for a vegetarian version)
½ pound fresh green beans
2 small russet potatoes, peeled and cut into chunks
1 small onion, quartered
¼ cup butter
2 tablespoons snipped fresh dill
2 garlic cloves, crushed
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
¼ cup sour cream or crème fraiche (can also substitute plain yogurt)
Juice of 1 lemon

1. Combine broth, beans, potatoes, onion, butter, dill, and garlic in large saucepan and bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer until vegetables are tender, 20 to 25 minutes. Season generously with salt and pepper.

2. Transfer soup to a blender or processor in batches and puree until smooth, then return to saucepan (or leave in the pan and use an immersion blender). Stir in sour cream and lemon juice. Warm over low heat until heated through.

Serves: 4
Time: 40 minutes
Leftover potential: Good

VANILLA-BOURBON PEACH JAM

I don’t even remember how I stumbled across this recipe, but once I saw it, I knew that I’d have to try it, and that it would be well worth departing from the safety of Ball-approved recipes. I mean, peaches, vanilla bean, lime juice, bourbon, and almond extract? Be still my heart! I rushed out to the farmers’ market and snatched up some of the last peaches of the year (literally; they were labeled with a sign that said “Last chance!”), speed-ripened them overnight in a paper bag with a ripe banana, and whipped up what may be the most delicious jam I’ve ever made. I didn’t think it would be possible for it to live up to my feverish expectations, but it really did: savory with almond, rich with vanilla, and with a slight alcoholic bite from the Jim Beam. So far I’ve just been spreading it on toast, but I suspect it would be great on ice cream as well. I can’t wait until peach season rolls around next year so I can make more!

A few recipe tweaks: The original recipe called for half a vanilla bean, cut into pieces, but I wanted big vanilla flavor without actual chunks (I just love those specks of vanilla bean), so I used a whole bean but removed the actual pod part before putting the jam into jars. I also found that the original recipe’s instructions (add sugar, then pectin later) were exactly the opposite of those that came with my box of pectin (add pectin, then sugar later), so I decided to trust the authority of Sure-Jell and everything turned out fine; my modified version is below.

1 package low-sugar pectin (I used Sure-Jell for less or no sugar needed recipes, in the pink box)
3½ pounds ripe peaches
3 cups sugar (or whatever the instructions in the pectin box say)
¼ cup freshly squeezed lime juice
1 whole vanilla bean
¼ cup bourbon
1 teaspoon almond extract

1. Prepare jars and closures as in steps 1–2 here.

2. Blanch the peaches in boiling water for 30 seconds, then submerge in an ice bath. Slip off the skins and chop peaches into ¼-inch dice, removing the pits.

3. In a glass pie plate or flat-bottomed bowl, place a single layer of peach pieces. Using a potato masher, crush peaches until they reach your desired consistency and transfer to a large, deep, stainless-steel saucepan, repeating until all peaches are mashed and placed in saucepan.

4. Measure sugar into a large bowl and set aside.

5. Mix ¼ cup sugar from measured amount with the pectin in a small bowl. Add pectin-sugar mixture and lime juice to the peaches in the saucepan. Slice the vanilla bean in half lengthwise, scrape out all the seeds with a small spoon, and add the seeds to the peach mixture. Add the vanilla bean halves and stir peach mixture well. Add ½ teaspoon butter to reduce foaming, if desired.

6. Bring mixture to a full rolling boil (a boil that doesn’t stop bubbling when stirred) on high heat, stirring constantly.

7. Stir in remaining 2¾ cups sugar quickly. Return to a full rolling boil and boil exactly 1 minute, stirring constantly. Remove from heat, skim off any foam, remove and discard vanilla bean halves, and stir in bourbon and almond extract.

8. Fill jars and process for 10 minutes, as in steps 7–9 here.

Yield: About 14–18 4-ounce jars
Time: 3 hours
Leftover potential: Leftovers are kind of the point here.

COCONUT OATMEAL COOKIES WITH PECANS AND KRISPIES

This recipe is a favorite of mine from Carole Walters’ indispensible Great Cookies. The original name is “Chock Full of Crunchies,” which is so darn cutesy I can’t manage to repeat it without rolling my eyes. My version may be less catchy, but at least it’s more descriptive. Walters calls them “a crunch-lover’s dream,” but “crunchy” isn’t really the first thing that springs to mind when I think of these cookies. The cereal does add little chewy-crispy morsels and there are some nuts too, but the main event is a nice, tender, buttery oatmeal cookie, with a nice lacy crispness around the edges and a moist middle thanks to the coconut. I’m a sucker for oatmeal cookies and for coconut, but mostly I think these cookies appeal to me so much because the first time I tasted them, I had a vivid sensory flashback to a kind of cookie my mom used to make when I was a kid, involving coconut and Grape-Nuts (I think we called them “crispy cookies”?), which I’d entirely forgotten about until that moment--so these have a Proustian quality for me. Sure, chocolate-chip cookies hold the top spot in my heart, but for a non-chocolate cookie, these are hard to beat.

2 cups all-purpose flour, spooned in and leveled
¾ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon baking powder
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, slightly firm
¾ cup lightly packed light brown sugar
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 cup rolled oats (old-fashioned, not quick-cooking)
1 cup finely chopped sweetened, flaked coconut
1 cup crispy rice cereal (i.e., Rice Krispies)
1 cup coarsely chopped toasted pecans

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees and moderately butter the cookie sheets.

2. Strain together the flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder in a large bowl. Set aside.

3. Using an electric mixer (if using a stand mixer, use the paddle attachment), mix the butter on medium-low speed until smooth and creamy. Add the brown sugar, then the granulated sugar, and mix until well blended, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, then the vanilla and mix for 1 minute longer. Reduce the mixer speed to low, then add the dry ingredients in three additions, mixing just until blended. Using a large rubber spatula, fold in the oatmeal, coconut, rice cereal, and pecans.

4. Drop walnut-size mounds from the tip of a tablespoon onto the cookie sheets, about 2 inches apart. Scrape down the sides of the bowl frequently to maintain an even combination of dough to textured ingredients. Bake for 9 to 11 minutes, rotating the pans top to bottom and front to back toward the end of baking time. Bake until the edges begin to turn a golden brown. Do not overbake.

5. Remove the cookies from the oven and let stand for 2 minutes. Using a metal spatula, carefully loosen and transfer to cooling racks.

Yield: About 5 dozen
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: High; these cookies freeze well.

BALSAMIC STRAWBERRY JAM

When my friend P left the country for a month and gave me temporary custody of all her canning supplies, it seemed like a good time for me to get back into jam-making. I’ve done most of my canning with P and other friends, so I was a little nervous about undertaking it on my own—it can be so laborious (when, say, you’re peeling seven pounds of pears), as well as a little scary (as you obsessively sterilize everything to make sure you don’t give any of your loved ones botulism), so it’s nice to have company. But it’s also nice to be able to can whatever you want whenever you want it, and I was excited about my solo adventure.

Still, I wanted to proceed with caution. I don’t normally spend a lot of time worrying about food safety, beyond washing all my fruits and vegetables and making sure I don’t touch everything in the kitchen with raw-chicken-covered fingers. But canning is one area where I feel strongly about following the proper procedures: using recipes only from reputable sources, following them precisely (because the pH of canned goods is carefully calibrated to prevent bacterial growth, you shouldn’t mess with the proportions of fruit, sugar, and acid), and processing the jars correctly; I’m no expert, but I’ve read enough to shudder when food blogs mention improvising jam recipes, canning things that shouldn’t be canned (for instance, pumpkin butter, which is sadly one of the few things that can’t be safely preserved), or “sealing” jars by flipping them upside-down instead of boiling them. It’s not hard to can things the right way, so why take a risk?

For my inaugural attempt, I went right to the highest authority: The Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving. And right at the front was a recipe for strawberry jam, presented as a simple master recipe to walk you through every single step of the canning process before you move on to more complex endeavors. Strawberries were still available at my farmers’ market for relatively cheap, and strawberry is my favorite kind of jam. Perfect!

I had never made jam with pectin before—I’d just done it the old-fashioned way, slow-cooking pure fruit and sugar until thickened. Even though I know that pectin is a naturally occurring substance that’s found in fruit anyway, it felt a little funny to be emptying that box of powder into my pot, but it sure as hell turned out to be liberating not to have to stand over a pot of simmering, spattering jam for hours on end. With pectin, you only have to cook the jam for a few minutes, making this a doable Saturday-afternoon project that doesn’t make you feel enslaved to the kitchen.

The recipe offered several variations, all of which sounded good (vanilla strawberry, lemon strawberry, and black pepper strawberry may all be in my future), but I was intrigued by the balsamic option, remembering how good balsamic vinegar tasted with the strawberries in this salad. The finished jam doesn’t taste identifiably like balsamic vinegar, but I do think it adds a nice depth of flavor and helps balance out the sweetness. I prefer a less-sweet jam and think this one is right on the verge of being too sugary, though I’m certainly capable of downing several pieces of toast slathered with it, as well as sneaking straight spoonfuls out of the jar on the fridge on occasion.

I was grateful for how incredibly methodical and detailed the Ball recipe is. Heating up the jars in the canner while you prep the ingredients is a stroke of genius that keeps things moving right along—the jars are nicely sterilized by the time the jam is done cooking, and it doesn’t take too much longer to bring the water to a boil after you put the filled jars back into it. Mine took a bit longer because I used 16 4-ounce jars instead of 8 8-ounce ones, meaning that I had too many to fit in the canner at the same time and had to do two rounds of sterilizing and processing—but it was worth it, because those little jars are so dang cute. I want to give them as gifts, and they’re a much more manageable size to transport, as well as to consume before they end up sitting half-eaten in the back of the fridge for months, as big jars of jam tend to do around my house.

You guys, canning is so fun! I love the nifty tools (a funnel, magnetic lid lifter, and jar lifter are invaluable and cheap—I’ll be acquiring my own when I return the borrowed ones to P), the tasty fruits, the scientific precision, and the sense of accomplishment I feel when I’ve amassed a stash of pretty little glass jars full of deliciousness. If you’ve never canned before, this recipe is a great place to start, and even if you’re an old hand, the balsamic twist is worth trying.

7 cups granulated sugar
8 cups whole strawberries
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 tablespoons good-quality balsamic vinegar
1 package (1.75 ounce/49 to 57 grams) regular powdered fruit pectin

1. Place 8 clean 8-ounce mason jars on a rack in a large, deep pot that is at least 3 inches deeper than the height of the jars. Fill the jars and pot with cool water that covers the top of the jars. Cover and bring water to a simmer over medium heat; do not boil.

2. Prepare 8 two-piece closures. Set screw bands aside. Place lids in a small saucepan and cover with water. Heat just to a simmer over medium heat, but do not boil. Keep lids warm until ready to use. Do not heat screw bands.

3. Measure sugar into a bowl and set aside. (Sugar is added to the boiling jam all at once, so measuring it ahead of time prevents errors in quantities and eliminates cooking delays.)

4. In a colander placed over a sink, wash strawberries in cool running water. Drain thoroughly and, using a strawberry huller, remove hulls.

5. In a glass pie plate or flat-bottomed bowl, place a single layer of strawberries. Using a potato masher, crush berries and transfer to a 1-cup liquid measure. As you accumulate each cup, transfer crushed berries to a large, deep, stainless-steel saucepan. Repeat until you have 5 cups of crushed strawberries.

6. Add lemon juice and vinegar to crushed strawberries in saucepan. Whisk in pectin until dissolved. (To reduce foaming, you may also add ½ teaspoon butter, if desired.) Bring to a full rolling boil over high heat, stirring frequently. Add sugar all at once and, stirring constantly, return to a full rolling boil that cannot be stirred down. Boil hard, stirring constantly, for 1 minute. Remove from heat and, using a large slotted spoon, skim off foam.

7. Fill one jar at a time. Using a jar lifter, remove jar from canner and empty hot water back into canner (do not dry jar). Place jar on a tray or towel-covered counter and place a canning funnel in it. Ladle hot jam into hot jar, leaving ¼ inch headspace. Slide a nonmetallic utensil, such as a rubber spatula, down between the jam and the inside of the jar two or three times to release air bubbles. With a clean damp cloth or paper towel, wipe jar rim and threads to remove any food residue. Using a magnetic lid lifter, lift hot lid from water and center it on jar. Place screw band on jar and, with your fingers, screw band evenly and firmly, just until resistance is met, then increase to fingertip-tight. Do not overtighten. Return jar to canner rack and repeat until all jam is used.

8. When all jars are filled and placed in canner, ensure that jars are covered by at least 1 inch of hot water. Cover canner and bring water to a full rolling boil over high heat. Continue boiling rapidly for 10 minutes, starting timer only when water reaches a full rolling boil. At the end of the processing time, turn heat off and remove canner lid. Wait 5 minutes, then remove jars, without tilting. Place jars upright on a towel in a draft-free place and let cool, undisturbed, for 24 hours.

9. After 24 hours, check lids for seal. Remove screw bands and press down on the center of each lid with your finger. Sealed lids will curve downward and will show no movement when pressed. Jars that haven’t sealed properly must be refrigerated immediately or reprocessed. Rinse and dry screw bands. Wipe jars with a damp cloth or paper towel and loosely reapply screw bands. Label jars and store in a cool, dry, dark place.

Yield: 8 8-ounce jars
Time: 3 hours
Leftover potential: Duh.