Accio Cookies!

So life has been hectic lately. Maybe not the best excuse for my absence, but there it is. Also, I was planning a party and it consumed most of my time for three weeks. In the build-up to the last Harry Potter film I decided we needed to have a themed party to celebrate...and, okay, to mourn a little bit the conclusion of a franchise that I have been invested in since I was 11 years old.

A lot of planning went into it. I painted banners, I made loot bags with tiny labels, and of course I made cookies. I can't resist a good excuse to make adorable decorated sugar cookies. And these ones turned out brilliantly if I do say so myself. Honestly, I was nearly giddy with how well they turned out.

I made the snitches using a bat-shaped cookie cutter and then attaching a round cookie over the bat's body. I was a little nervous about them before they were decorated because they really did just look like beach balls with bat wings. But, oh, they ended up looking like snitches in the end!

But the sorting hats were my pride and joy. The wands were cute, but the sorting hats. I don't really like to brag, but I wanted to preserve one for all eternity in a glass case. I didn't, of course, but it was tempting. Fair warning, the rest of these are mostly pictures of the party. I will end the post with a Butterbeer recipe (because how can I not?), but I really just want to show you how hard we geeked out at this party.

House banners, painstakingly hand-painted: Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw, and Slytherin respectively.

Hogwarts Coat of Arms. Also, hand-painted. For those of you who don't know, the motto translates into 'Never Tickle a Sleeping Dragon.'

Liquid Luck, used to great effect by Harry in Half-Blood Prince. This version consists of whiskey and pearl petal dust.

Amortentia, the most powerful love potion in the world, though the most this version will do is make you squeaky clean and smelling lovely, as it is only body wash.

Loot bags courtesy of Honeydukes.

The best assortment of wizarding candy.

I had far too much fun making these.

And here we all are, bedecked in our wizarding best and enjoying every moment of it.

Butterbeer Floats

Vanilla Ice Cream
Butterscotch Schnapps
Club Soda

Drop a scoop of vanilla ice cream into a glass. Pour some butterscotch schnapps over top (about 1 1/2 oz). Top up with Club Soda and enjoy!

Many recipes call for Cream Soda, but the thought of it alone was near enough to induce diabetic shock, so I decided Club Soda would work as a good, less-cloying substitute. Everyone seemed to enjoy, so I'd say it was a success.

And for all you Harry Potter fans out there, don't forget to check out Pottermore, launching in October!

Easter Eggs

Happy Easter everyone! Yes, I am a week early, but my parents are headed to Charleston for a wedding Easter weekend, so we had Easter dinner yesterday and I took the liberty of making some sugar cookies. In case you haven't notice I'm a little bit addicted to decorating sugar cookies.

I love the endless possibilities that Easter eggs afford. There are so many different ways to decorate them. I decided to go for more traditional pastel colours and slightly old-fashioned designs. Like the filigree and dots for example.

The flowers are outlined with icing and dipped in sugar. I would have used coarse sugar had I had some handy, alas I am woefully ill-equipped.

And of course what is Easter without chicks? Half of them I dipped their whole bodies in sugar and the other half just their wings...to make them look kind of fuzzy.

The design on these ones is one I used on the Christmas tree cookies I made over the holidays and I think it works just as well for Easter eggs.

I saved my favourite for last. My favourite because I've never actually done brush embroidery until now and I am unabashedly, indescribably, ridiculously in love with brush embroidery. Who knows why? But it's just so elegant and pretty.

So there you have it. My decorated, decidedly non-chocolate Easter eggs. I still want to participate in an Easter egg hunt. Unfortunately my parents decided that once you've reached your twenties you're too old for such things. Oh well. Happy hunting nonetheless!

Perfectly Peanut Butter

Yesterday I made peanut butter cookies. There was a time in my life where I didn't like peanut butter cookies. Which is odd for several reasons. One being that I have yet to meet a person who doesn't like peanut butter cookies (those with allergies aside). Another is that I love peanut butter and I love cookies, so you'd think the two together would create my ultimate love. Not the case. All this in spite of my tendency to eat peanut butter straight out of the jar.

But then I started working at this place called Sweet Flour, where we make the most divine peanut butter cookies. And well, I sort of fell in love with peanut butter cookies.

Since I am surrounded by peanut butter cookies at work I haven't felt the need to make them at home. But yesterday I was sitting on the couch, browsing through my Harrowsmith cookbook for a good cookie recipe and the peanut butter cookies caught my eye.

Carlene Blankenship, who submitted this recipe to Harrowsmith (a magazine, for those of you who have never heard of it), calls them Perfect Peanut Butter Cookies, and I am inclined to agree. They are delicious. And easy.

Now I have an admission to make. I didn't technically follow the recipe. And it wasn't until after the batter was mixed that I even realized I hadn't. As previously mentioned, I make cookies at work. So when I get a recipe for standard drop cookies I tend not to really read through the recipe. Which is bad because, no matter what, you should always read through a new recipe before starting. Even if you're sure the entire quantity of sugar is supposed to be creamed in at the beginning.

Anyway, as you can see, they turned out fine. I don't actually think it makes that much of a difference, but the next time I make them I'll do it properly. And if you make them before I do, properly, without my apparently haughty I-don't-need-recipe-instructions attitude, let me know how they turn out.

Perfect Peanut Butter Cookies

1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup pack brown sugar (divided)
1 egg
3/4 tsp vanilla
1 1/4 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt

Cream butter, peanut butter, white sugar, and 1/4 cup brown sugar. Beat in egg and vanilla. Combine flour, baking soda and salt, then beat in. Sprinkle remaining 1/4 cup brown sugar on top of dough and fold in so sugar granules are still visible. (Yes, that was the bit I missed when I made them)
Scoop dough using a 1" ice cream scoop (or just roll them into tablespoon sized balls) and press into 1/4"-thick circles on a baking tray. Bake at 375F for 10 minutes.

You don't actually need to use a fork to press the cookies, but there's something that is just very peanut butter cookies about using a fork. I have a memory of pressing peanut butter cookies as a child and, despite my dislike of peanut butter cookies at the time, I remember feeling like it was something special, putting the finishing touches on those cookies. I can't even remember who was making them, just the fork pressing into the dough to make those distinguishing cross-hatches.

So I would recommend using a fork, if just for nostalgic purposes.

Sea and Sun

Ah, sun and warmth. I had almost forgotten what they felt like. I have used the past week to acclimatize to the cold after coming back from the Bahamas, the beautiful, sunny, warm Bahamas. It is raining right now. And I wish I was back here.

It really was just what the doctor ordered. Apart from some unfortunate food poisoning on my sister's part and some inordinately itchy sand fly bites. But it was nice to get away from the cold and snow for a while. The moment we stepped off the plane it smelled like summer. Like heat, and earth, and sweet flowers on the air. Heady and humid and the greatest relief from the persistent chill of home.

These vacations never last long enough. Especially when you come home to a fresh layer of snow. Especially when I managed to avoid sustaining any serious sunburns (a feat previously unheard of when I'm in tropical climes). Especially when the water is this blue.

For the most part we stayed on the resort, lying by the pool, walking on the beach, drinking margaritas and pina coladas at 11:00 am. And all that was fantastic. I finished reading The Count of Monte Cristo and unblocked some serious writer's block that I'd had going on. Already I'm 9000 words into my next book. It's amazing what a little sun and relaxation will do.

But let's be honest. The reason I'm mentioning this vacation here at all is because of food. The day we went into town for some shopping we stopped for lunch at this little Italian restaurant called Cafe Matisse. It was tucked away in the midst of some legal buildings, it's walls covered in the lively, colourful works of Matisse.

It was here that my family and I made a rather important discovery: we're not really resort people. While the resort food was decent, it had nothing on this place. This home of the best calamari I've ever tasted. Of beautifully plated decadence and food that you could continue eating long after you're full. We are absurdly spoiled food snobs. But I'm okay with it. We know better now. It's not just that we want to go to different restaurants when we travel, I think we need to. Isn't that part of the fun of traveling?

But I'm holding you in suspense, aren't I? You want to know what this beautiful concoction of red and green is. Well let me tell you. This dessert is avocado mousse with raspberry coulis. It was easily one the best things I've ever tasted. The term mousse is used rather loosely here I think. It wasn't actually set with anything as a mousses usually is. It had more of the consistency of slightly runny pudding. I wish I had a better way of describing it because I fear nothing I say is really going to do it justice. It was smooth and subtly sweet. Avocados lend such an unbelievable buttery texture to everything that it was like eating liquid silk. Sweet, creamy liquid silk.

The raspberry coulis provided a lovely tangy quality that offset the sweetness, but if I were to make this, I wouldn't put as much of it. You have to dig quite a bit through the coulis before you get to the avocado. If you ever go to Nassau, Bahamas, I insist that you cannot miss this. Order the calamari and the avocado mousse. You won't be disappointed.

On a completely separate and unrelated note, I do not forget the last promise I made to provide a recipe this post. So here is one for some cookies I made a few days before we left for vacation. They are Banana-Walnut Chocolate-Chunk Cookies from Martha Stewart and they got rave reviews from everyone that tried them. They're like a hybrid between chocolate chip cookies and banana bread. Truly warm and comforting on a cold day.

Banana-Walnut Chocolate-Chip Cookies

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 large egg
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup mashed ripe banana (about 1 large)
1 cup rolled oats
8 ounces chocolate chips
1/2 cup coarsely chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 375F. Combine flours, salt, and baking soda in a bowl.
Cream butter and sugars until pale and fluffy. Add egg and vanilla and mix until combined. Mix in banana. Add flour mixture and mix just until combined. Add oats, chocolate, and nuts.
Using a 1 1/2 inch ice cream scoop, or two spoons, drop dough onto a baking sheet about an inch apart. Bake 13 minutes.

This recipe doubles easily without being excessively large. It will still fit nicely in your large mixing bowl. Also, I used pecans instead of walnuts, since that's what I had in the cupboard. I also didn't have enough chocolate, but that's the glorious thing about what gets mixed into a dough. The quantities aren't really important. So pour a glass of milk and enjoy!

Cookies and Chocolates

Well, that was not the month I had planned. I seem to remember saying that part of my New Year's Resolution was to write on here more. That's what I get for voicing my intentions. A jinx. Oh well. I'm here now. And I have for you some cookies and chocolates.

As it were I think cookies and chocolate may be one of the only redeeming qualities of Valentine's Day. As my sister said, it either makes or breaks a relationship or succeeds in making single people feel even more single. It also transforms normally respectable looking places into venues that appear to have been vomited on by giant pink marshmallows.

Then again, it gives me the excuse to make cute cookies and pretty chocolates and I can forgive any holiday that allows me to do that no matter how cheesy or nauseating it happens to be. And I get to use filigree. Which I only recently learned how to do and am rather excited about. Look how pretty it is?

And I got to make cookies look like candies. Candy message hearts to be exact. You know the ones. They cross so far over into the realm of the absurdly corny and saccharine that they're cute. It is impossible for them to function in any form that is not ironic. I was quite happy with how they turned out.

Oh, and the chocolates of course. Which I made with one of the lovely new chocolate moulds I got from my mom for Christmas. They fit so perfectly in the little pink boxes I got. Yes, I realize I am a giant hypocrite. Hating on Valentine's Day and then unabashedly flaunting all the trappings that go along with it. Well, such is the world we live in. And aren't they pretty?

Recipes next time. I do promise. I recently made some delicious cupcakes that deserve mention here, but I didn't get a chance to take any pictures so they will have to wait until I make them again.

World Cup Cookies

Hello again! I feel a bit bad because it's been a while since I posted anything. My original intention was to write about carrot muffins in my next post, but two recipes later I'm still not satisfied with the result. I have a couple more recipes to try though, so it is forthcoming. I'd rather not write anything at all than give you a dodgy recipe. Really I thought that getting my hands on a good carrot muffin recipe would be fairly easy. Apparently not. Oh well. I have something else for you today.

My sister and I had a party last night in celebration of the World Cup. (Well done Spain!) In honour of this celebration I made cookies decorated like soccer balls and the flags of the four quarter-final teams.

I'm going in a slightly different direction with this post. Rather than give you the recipes, I'm going to give you a bit of a decorating lesson: How to Flood Cookies! I swear my next post will be accompanied by a recipe. I already have one in mind. One that is fabulous and summery and won't have you slaving over a hot stove.

The reason I'm not giving you the recipes is that sugar cookies and royal icing are fairly standard and in no short supply. Everyone seems to have their personal preference regarding these two recipes and, in any case, they won't be hard to find should you not have a preferred recipe. Flooding cookies is fairly simple if you have a steady hand, albeit time consuming. They're certainly not something you can whip up the day of.

First, make your royal icing. (Well, actually, first make your cookies in the desired shapes and have a design in mind.) Make sure it's nice and shiny and dye it whatever colour you need it to be. Slowly add water to the icing, a tiny bit at a time (do NOT add too much, you can always add more water, you can't take it away). You want it to be just runny enough that it falls back in on itself when you drizzle it in the bowl. It still needs to have enough substance to stay where you put it and not run all over the place.

Any colours that will rest right next to each other need to be done on separate days so the colours don't run into each other. I'm using the Spanish flag as the example here. Make an outline with the icing like so (apologies for the blurriness)....

Then scribble inside as desired and move the icing around to fill in the gaps. You can use your finger to do this, or a brush, but I usually just use the tip of my piping bag, which works just fine.

The end result should look like this....

Once you have all the initial designs done (as below with the flags), let them set over night.

Repeat the process with the rest of the design. You can pipe on top of the set icing like I did with the sun on the Uruguay flag. To make the subtle lines on the white part of the soccer ball pipe them on first and let them set a bit, like so....



When you fill them in they should end up like this....



If you mess any of them up, perhaps by not leaving enough room for the fourth blue stripe in the Uruguay flag, just eat it. No one has to know!



Have Fun!