Ack! Beware of oncoming Christmas

[jennlk]

I think I'm going to use that for the title of this year's Christmas letter. Which I haven't started yet. And won't until sometime Monday. Had two "um, sorry this is late, can you do a quick layout/turnaround?" projects that I just shipped off to recipients -- they took priority over something that's already late (I usually have the letter written by now, even if the cards aren't done).

Baking for 'xmas around the world' is almost complete. Russian Tea cakes and "Norwegian Macaroons" are baked (I have no idea what makes them 'norwegian'--they came from a church cookbook, and they're good, but norwegian?). The gingerbread dough is resting --there's not time to roll, cut, and bake before SR and I head off to Madrigal Dinner at the HS, so I'll get to those later. Neglected to start springerle yesterday, so no springerle for tomorrow. Will probably mix up a batch of lemon-cardamom cookies while the gingerbread is baking. Maybe some anise drop cookies (at least get the springerle flavor). Thought about spritz cookies, but I can't find the plates for my cookie press, which rather complicates the process. (Couldn't find my cookie cutters either, but I found Mum's, so that's OK.)

Tomorrow is all about music. And driving to/from a concert.

Comments

[jennlk]

Cardamom cookies

1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground cardamom
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temp
1/2 cup granulated sugar
2/3 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 egg
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp orange or lemon zest

Heat oven to 375 deg. Line baking sheet with parchment paper or slipat mat. In large bowl, cream butter & sugars until fluffy. Add egg, citrus zest, and vanilla. Mix well. In second bowl, sift flour, soda, salt & cardamom together. With mixer on low speed, add dry ingredients in 3-4 portions to the butter mixture. Drop dough in 1" balls onto baking sheet, abt. 1" apart. Flatten slightly with tines of a fork. Bake 8-9 minutes until lightly browned. Cool on sheet for 5 min. Glaze if desired. Makes about 4 dozen

Glaze:
Mix zest of 1 orange or 1 lemon, 2 Tbsp orange or lemon juice, 3/4 cup powdered sugar.

I used 1 tsp lemon oil instead of zest (no lemons in the house, dried zest doesn't work so good for cookies). They spread farther on parchment than they do on silpat (only one silpat sheet, a few more cookies than would fit, roll of parchment paper in the basement...). the 1" spacing was fine on the silpat, but most of the cookies on the parchment paper grew together, although they didn't make one big cookie. The flavor is nice -- not real strong, but definitely not a plain sugar cookie. I suppose you could use more cardamom, and maybe change the brown/white sugar ratio.

There are probably a billion recipes for Russian Tea Cakes out there (I exaggerate, slightly). This is the one I used. (it's from a Ukranian Orthodox church cookbook.)
1 C butter
1/4 t salt
1/2 C confectioner's sugar
1 t vanilla
2 1/2 C flour
3/4 C finely chopped walnuts (measure after they're chopped)

Combine all ingredients. Form into balls. Bake at 400F for 14-17 minutes. Roll in confectioner's sugar while hot. Cool and roll once more in confectioner's sugar again.

(You may notice that there's no size given. That's because everybody knows how big to make these cookies, right? I made smaller cookies (1" diameter or so), and only baked for 10 minutes.)