Ava Catau :: The Dark Side

PEPPERMINT PATTIE COOKIES

noreply@blogger.com (Ava Catau) — Mon, 21 Dec 2009 07:47:00 +0000

We decided to organize a friendly cookie bake-off at work this holiday season to raise money for charity. The event's aim was getting wide participation, and so there were two ways for the staff to participate. For those that liked to bake, they could enter the competition free of charge as a baker, needing to pay only for the ingredients required to bake their recipe. Everyone else had the option of becoming a judge of the competition for a small donation of $5. What did a judge receive for his/her $5 donation? … A chance to taste as many of the cookies they wanted, of course! Each baker’s entry was assigned a number and the judges were asked to vote for their favorite cookie. The winner was to be decided by whichever cookie received the most votes. The winning baker would get to donate 100% of the proceeds to the charity of his/her choice, and the pride of being crowned the company baker champion.

On the day of the event we had an amazing 13 bakers participating (ironically, a baker’s dozen), and had enlisted a total of 60 judges at $5 each! After the judge’s bellies’ were filled and the final votes tallied, to my surprise, I won the bake-off with my Peppermint Pattie cookies! I’m suspicious that I only won because my cookies were the biggest, but I have to admit that they were quite tasty. As the winner I got to donate the $300 dollars that we raised to my charity of
choice: UNICEF. It was an amazingly successful event; bringing people together for a good cause while having some fun in the process. We hope to make it an annual tradition!

Here’s the recipe that scored me the win. I hope you enjoy!

PEPPERMINT PATTIE COOKIES
Makes 20 sandwich cookies

Chocolate Cookies:
½ cup all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
2-1/2 cups plus 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
4 tablespoons butter
4 eggs
1-1/3 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Peppermint Filling:
½ cup (1 stick) butter, at room temperature
½ cup confectioners sugar
1 cup marshmallow cream
1 teaspoon peppermint extract

red and white nonpareils for decoration (optional)

Preheat oven 350 degrees.

In small bowl sift together the flour and baking powder. Stir in 1 cup semisweet chocolate chips. Set aside.

In a separate microwave safe bowl combine the butter and the remaining 2-1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips. Microwave for 1 minute and stir well. Continue to microwave in 30 second increments stirring in between until the chips have melted. Approximately 1-1/2 to 2 minutes total. The mixture will be thick.

Meanwhile use an electric mixer to beat the eggs, sugar, and vanilla extract. Add the melted chocolate mixture and beat until completely combined. Add in the flour mixture and mix until just combined, do not over mix. Allow the dough to rest 10 minutes to firm up a bit.

Scoop approximately 2 tablespoon mounds of the dough onto parchment paper lined baking sheets at least 3 inches apart. You may have to bake in batches as you can probably only fit 12 cookies per sheet and this recipe makes approx 40 cookies. Bake for 10 minutes rotating the baking sheet once after 5 minutes. Allow cookies to cool completely before filling.

To make the filling beat together the butter, confectioners sugar, marshmallow cream, and peppermint extract until smooth. Spread 1 heaping tablespoon of the peppermint filling on the undersides of half the cookies. Alternatively you can use a decorative tip to pipe on the filling. Sandwich with the remaining cookies. Sprinkle the edges with the nonpareils if desired. Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator.

Honey Beer Bread

noreply@blogger.com (Ava Catau) — Thu, 03 Dec 2009 01:50:00 +0000

Welcome to The Dark Side! As sort of a “soft opening” approach, for my first post I’ve made a simple beer bread to accompany a delicious Ginger-Lemon Carrot Soup on avacatau.com. Once you see how easy it is to make this bread yourself, you’ll never buy one of those overpriced beer bread mixes again. I choose to use a 50/50 mix of whole wheat pastry flour and all purpose flour, but you can use just 3 cups of all purpose flour if you wish instead. It is very important not to over mix the batter or the bread will be chewy and tough.

Honey Beer Bread

3 cups flour*
1 tablespoon aluminum free baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 12-ounce bottle beer
4 tablespoons honey, divided
½ melted butter

*I used a mix of 1-1/2 cups unbleached white flour and 1-1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour, but feel free to use 3 cups all purpose flour instead.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

In a large bowl combine the two flours, baking powder, and salt. In a separate bowl combine the beer with 3 tablespoons honey. Pour the beer over the flour mixture and stir until just combined. DO NOT OVER MIX—it’s ok if the batter is lumpy. Pour half of the butter into the bottom of a metal loaf pan. Pour the batter into the pan and then pour the remaining butter over the batter. Drizzle with the remaining 1 tablespoon of honey. Bake for 30-40 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool slightly before slicing.

Photos

noreply@blogger.com (Ava Catau) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 02:50:00 +0000

Click image to view larger, click name to view recipe:

Honey Beer Bread

recipe index

noreply@blogger.com (Ava Catau) — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 02:14:00 +0000

drink recipes

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HONEY BEER BREAD

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vegetarian recipes

HONEY BEER BREAD