De Baking Psychopath

It's Fall! I had a hankering to make something pumpkin-y, so I decided these soft, cakey cookies fit the bill! I sort of messed with the recipe, decreasing the sugar in the recipe by about 1/4 cup and throwing in an extra egg white that was left over from another recipe, as well as throwing in a handful of toasted pecans, so I am not sure if my cookies represented the correct texture, but regardless, they were soft and moist, gently spiced, and not too sweet. Definitely a repeater. Everyone enjoyed them very much! Pumpkin Toffee Cookies (Adapted from Two Peas and their Pod ) Ingredients: 3 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon baking powder 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg 1/4 teaspoon ground allspice 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/2 cup unsalted butter (1 stick), at room temperature 1 & 1/4 cups granulated sugar (original recipe had 1 &1/2 cups) 1 cup canned pure pumpkin puree (unsweetened) 1 large egg + 1 egg white (origina...

Our Costco has stocked these lovely tea cookies in three-sleeve packs for a long time now. After years of glancing wistfully at them, I finally lacked enough self-restraint one day last year to buy a box and try them. Bad idea. Imagine crisp mild-flavored gingersnaps with a lemony icing filling. Yeah, the perfect thing to go with a cup of tea. Then, as always happens with me when I discover a new food love, our local Costco stopped stocking this cookie. (enter sad violin music) It was probably good for my waistline/hips, but alas I mourned the loss and have only purchased it at much greater cost for single-sleeve packs at fine imported foods stores. Until yesterday! It has come back to our local Costco. If you are so fortunate to find this cookie on your food store's shelves, don't waste time! Life is short! and will be made better by eating these cookies with your tea! If you can't find it in person, they sell it on Amazon, in all di...

The hubby has a new job! And right after he started, Boss Appreciation Day rolled around and everyone at work chipped in to throw a little dessert party in honor of the supervisors. He did all the hands-on work for this recipe, with just a few guiding tips from me, who stood in the background sneezing up a storm (in a direction away from the cookie-making area). They were a big hit, and the cayenne really gives a boost to the warm fall spicy flavors in this cookie. We made them too big to be crunchy, but the sturdy chewiness was very satisfying so we didn't really mind anyway. The browned butter is just barely noticeable as a nutty aftertaste in the cookie, and it really gives it more depth of flavor. Aren't these just picture-perfect with the crackly tops? Good job, spousal unit! Brown Butter Gingersnaps (adapted from Cookie Madness ) Ingredients: 12 tablespoons unsalted butter 2 cups + 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons baking soda 1/2 ...

Sugar Cookies from Baking: From my home to yours "Toffee" cookie bars from Pioneer Woman More sugar cookies... Single-headed gingerbread men Cranberry Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies Milk chocolate-dipped anise biscotti, Jess's mum's recipe Only edible gifts from me this year...

Six months have passed since my Comprehensive Examination ; the deadline for reassembling my committee for my thesis proposal and first official committee meeting had come. I had been considering different recipes for this committee meeting for a long time before the appointed day, way before I even started preparations for the presentation itself. (Certainly you can see my priorities are in order.) I am glad to announce that my committee meeting occurred this past Friday, and it went well by all accounts and in all aspects: we finished in a timely manner without sacrificing thoroughness (very important due to the time constraints of the professors in my committee), my preliminary data were generally convincing, and the proposed experiments and overall aims of my thesis proposal were accepted with only few minor changes (big thanks to my mentor who helped me make the aims statements much more elegant-sounding). So now I can officially change my status to a "PhD candidate" w...

You know, one of those days. Where even though you have "more important" things to do (i.e. an application for research funding due by midnight the next day), baking seems infinitely more urgent, and important to your mental health. And you realize you have some pantry cleaning to do. On Sunday, I really wanted a chocolate chip cookie. And while flipping through a few cookie books and finding more chocolate chip cookie variations of interest, I was reminded that 1) I haven't in recent memory given either AB's CCC or the NYTimes CCC a try, and 2) I have some bread flour I really need to start getting rid of. Alton Brown's The Chewy: up close and personal The premise of Alton Brown's The Chewy cookie (and the NYTimes-featured cookie, although I didn't make that recipe this time) is that since bread flour has a higher percentage of protein (gluten) in the flour, the moisture you give it (in the form of water from melted butter) and the time you let it rest t...

When I was a Senior in college, my Jewish roommate wanted a Chanumas tree. My other roommate and I obliged, and hilarity ensued--involving two fake mini-lawn trees (the kind with pointy plastic trunks intended to be skewered into the dirt) skewered instead into a printer paper box, blue and white lights, YouDee dolls, mini bacteria stuffed toys, and bar crawl wrist bands.... So when I visited aforementioned Jewish college roommate recently in upstate NY where she's now a grad student, it seemed only fitting that the Chanumas/Chrismukkah theme came up again in our exploits. Namely, these black and white cookies she's been making for many years now, the recipe for which comes out of a festive and cheeky Chrismukkah cookbook. More cake than cookie, this New York-associated confection is somehow ubiquitously familiar, yet no two recipes are seem even remotely similar to each other in their components or ratios....I've seen recipes with milk, some with sour cream, some with bu...

One of my lab co-workers is leaving us soon (*sob*) to go to grad school. She's not leaving our institution, so we'll still get to see her, but it's still sad that she's leaving the lab. As a parting gift, I made a special batch of white chocolate macadamia nut cookie dough for her. I baked up a dozen or so, but left more than half of the dough raw for her and her boyfriend to enjoy. They love eating dough, especially him. Apparently in some areas of the country, this flavor combo is available in the refrigerated cookie dough selection in supermarkets, and it's sorely missed by my co-worker and her bf after moving here. I'm not much of a raw dough eater myself. Probably because I get my fill of raw ingredients along the way by licking stuff that gets smeared onto my hands during the process of making things. (Disclaimer: I do wash my licked fingers/hands before continuing the baking process!) I got this recipe from one of my favorite baking blogs, Cookie M...