oatmeal cookies

Here's a life lesson for all of you: if you want to be liked, bring cookies. Who doesn't like a cookie? Bring homemade cookies somewhere, and you'll be welcomed with open arms. It's my number-one secret to parties, social interactions, and man-winning.

For these cookies, I took a cue from Jen & Juice and swapped the raisins for dried cranberries.

A word about oats... Conventionally harvested oats are often contaminated with trace amounts of wheat. Because I am merely gluten-intolerant, oats & oat flour have never bothered me. But if you have celiac disease, make sure to use certified gluten-free pure oats & oat flour.

OATMEAL COOKIES

Makes 2-3 dozen

3/4 cup shortening

1 3/4 cup sugar

1 tbs molasses

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 cup water

1 1/2 cups flour*

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

3 cups oatmeal

1 cup dried cranberries

1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, beat together the first six ingredients by hand.

When smooth, add in the flour, baking powder, and salt.

Last, add in the oatmeal, cranberries, and chocolate chips.

Drop by spoonfuls onto the baking sheet. Bake for 10-12 minutes, until lightly browned on top.

* For gluten-free, substitute 1 cup of oat flour and 1/2 cup white rice flour.

sweet potato hash

Carbs are my number-one vice. If I had to choose my last meal on earth, it would probably be a heaping bowl of spaghetti, garlic bread, and a side of mexican beans & rice. Maybe some mashed potatoes too, just for good measure.

Nonetheless, I have a conscience, so I don't feast on starches every single night. Most starches do undesirable things to my body (stomach and waistline alike.) For the most part, I avoid excessive carbs, and feel much better for it.

There is one starch, however, that always treats me kindly: my good buddy, the sweet potato. It has more vitamins, more fiber, and a lower glycemic index than white potatoes. When I'm not making them like this or this, I like to dress them up with a mix of sweet & savory spices in a simple hash. (If you're feeling up to it, top this with a fried egg--oh baby.)

SWEET POTATO HASH

serves one

1/2 large sweet potato

2-3 tbs olive oil

salt & pepper

1/4 large onion, diced

1/2 cup chicken stock (water will work in a pinch)

1/4 tsp cumin

1/8 tsp red pepper flakes

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to broil. Peel & dice the sweet potato into small, 3/4" cubes. Rub a cast-iron or oven-proof skillet with the olive oil. Add the sweet potatoes with a small shake of salt & pepper. Toss to coat.

2. Put the potatoes under the broiler for 5 minutes. Turn the heat down to 350 degrees and bake for another five minutes. (This will allow the potatoes to form a crispy outside.)

3. Remove the pan from the oven and set it on the stove over medium-high heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring frequently for 3-4 minutes, or until the onion starts to become translucent.

4. Add 1/4 cup of the chicken stock, and cover the pan. Once the liquid evaporates, add the rest of the stock & repeat. (This will steam the potatoes to cook them through.)

5. Add the spices & toss to coat. Taste, & add salt & pepper if needed.

connie's lemon pudding

This is another lovely recipe I learned from my mom. Recently, I've realized that this is essentially lemon curd. But who wants to eat "curd" when you can eat pudding? "Pudding" speaks of childhood, of stove-top treats poured from a box long ago. "Curd" is just a weird four-letter word. It's the new year, and I'm closing in on my last few months of teenagerism. Let me eat my pudding before I'm old.

Tirade of vocabulary and quarter-life crisis complete.

I'm a citrus fanatic, so I prefer my pudding almost bracingly tart. If you like yours a little sweeter, up the sugar to 1 cup. This recipe is frighteningly simple, but it does takes a little time. The lemon pudding is indeed a labor of love.

Oh, and happy new year!

LEMON PUDDING

2 eggs

3/4 cup sugar

2 tbs flour

1/8 tsp salt

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 cup freshly-squeezed lemon juice plus the pulp, if you can get it

1/4 cup water

1. In a skillet off the heat, beat the two eggs. Add the sugar, flour, and salt and beat until very well combined. Finally, beat in the baking powder. The mixture may foam up a little--this is normal.

2. Put the skillet over medium-low heat and add the lemon juice, then the water, stirring vigorously. It is very important to keep the mixture moving, lest you get lemony scrambled eggs. (Foam is still okay.)

3. For a few minutes, continue to stir steadily until the mixture just barely begins to boil. At this point, you will see that the mixture turns from a "cloudy" yellow to a "clear" bright yellow. It's done.

4. Divide the pudding into ramekins, or pour off into a bowl. Allow to cool, then refrigerate. Best if served chilled.

Fills 8 small ramekins.

cranberry bars

So, I made these weeks ago. I'm just posting them now because I had to wait for my film to be developed. Oh, my anachronistic photo techniques really catch up with me sometimes. Now I'm looking at these cranberry bar pictures, wishing I was actually eating one now. They were so good--the perfect thing for my holiday cranberry fix.

I followed this recipe from Good Life Eats, a really lovely blog. For the crust I tweaked the gluten-free flour blend suggested by Die Hard Foodie. It was perfect. Totally worth pulling out every single one of my jars of flours.

I know the holidays are over, but you should really make these. Cranberry is a humble berry that needs its love too, beyond the holidays.

GLUTEN-FREE CRANBERRY BARS

(Wheat-phages: if you want to make these with regular flour, just follow this recipe.)

crust:

1 cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup almond flour

1 cup rice flour

1/2 cup potato starch

2 tsp xanthan gum

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 cup butter (cold)

1 egg

filling:

1/8 cup orange juice

2/3 cup sugar

1 tsp vanilla

1 tbs cornstarch

4 cups cranberries (fresh or frozen & thawed)

Preheat the oven to 350. Grease a 9x13 baking dish.

In a small bowl, mix together the dry ingredients for the crust. With a fork or your hands, cut in the butter & egg, until the mixture is crumbly & cohesive. Pat one half of the dough into the bottom of your dish.

In another bowl, mix together the first 4 ingredients for the filling. Add the cranberries and toss until they are well-coated. Pour the cranberries in an even layer over the top of the crust.

Crumble the remaining dough over the top of the cranberries. Bake for 45-55 minutes, or until the top is browned.

Allow to cool in the refrigerator completely before eating (I know this is hard, but I'm serious! If you try to eat them warm, you'll be eating crumbly crust and scalding hot jam.)

chewy gingersnaps

As soon as December rolls around, I start to hear this little voice in the back of my head. It wakes me up in the night, growing ever louder and more persistent...

"Amanda...bake...the gingersnaps!"

Okay, so maybe it doesn't happen like that. But as soon as I see Christmas lights up, I start craving these cookies. It's like Pavlov's dogs. Hear "Jingle Bell Rock," drool, bake cookie.

These are everything I could ever hope for in a cookie. Thin, crispy on the outside, melty on the inside, and full of flavor. I'm not a huge fan of ginger (so sue me,) and these cookies don't actually have ginger in them (sue me twice.) I guess if we're going to get technical here, they're more like molasses cookies. But hey, we're all cool with that, right?

CHEWY GINGERSNAPS

Makes about 2 dozen

1 stick butter

1 cup sugar, plus a little for coating

1 egg

1/8 cup molasses

2 cups flour*

1 tsp cinnamon

2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1. Preheat oven to 350.

2. Cream butter & sugar.

3. Add egg & molasses, and mix well.

4. Sift in the dry ingredients.

5. Refrigerate the dough for 30 minutes, or as long as you can stand it.

6. Roll the dough into balls the size of walnuts, coat in sugar, and bake for 8-9 minutes.

7. Remove from the pan asap. They will get firmer and crispier as they cool, so don't overbake!

* I substituted a gluten-free flour blend (honestly couldn't tell you what's in it), but all-purpose flour works great as well.

chocolate pecan pie

So, after tasting this pie, I realized that it deserved its own post.

While I was searching for a special pecan pie recipe, my mom suggested chocolate pecan pie. And really, what could be better? It's pecans...it's chocolate...it's pie. I'm in. So I adapted a recipe out of our ancient Betty Crocker Cookbook. I accidentally underbaked mine a bit, but honestly that worked to my advantage. I ended up with an ooey-gooey chocolate pecan pie. Oh man. I'm double in.



For my pie crust, I made half a recipe of Smitten Kitchen's all butter pie crust. Though I only had a little sample (to avoid the wheat hangover), it was a really great crust, and very easy. But, if you want to substitute your own pie crust recipe or a frozen pie crust (hey, I know how it goes), that's cool too. The point is, you need one pie crust in a pan to serve as a vessel for chocolate and pecans.

I have to admit that this is probably the world's easiest pie. It's almost embarrassing. All the more reason you should make it.

CHOCOLATE PECAN PIE
(makes 1 10-inch pie)

1 pie crust
4 eggs
3/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup butter, melted & cooled
1/2 cup corn syrup (I know, I know, but this is tradition we're talking about!)
1/2 cup pure maple syrup

1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 1/2 cup pecan halves
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 375. Press pie dough into a 10" pie pan.
Beat together eggs, sugar, butter, cocoa, and syrups. Stir in pecans. Pour into prepared pie pan.
Bake for 40-50 minutes, or until the pie only quivers slightly in the middle when you jiggle the pan.

what i'm baking today

Traditional Apple Pie

Chocolate Pecan Pie (Oooo it looks like the surface of some foreign and delicious planet.)

Apple Galette (This was a happy accident because it was just leftover apple pie stuff. I had no recipe and no idea what I was doing, so this is more-or-less a miracle.)