and now...The Snickerdoodle

Snickerdoodles!

I don't tend to discriminate when it comes to cookies. I'm an equal opportunity muncher. Oatmeal raisin, peanut butter, oreos, sugar, and of course chocolate chip are all pretty equal in my mind...or in my belly. I'd like to think that I make all these cookies with equal deliciousness but there's ONE cookie that drives people smack into their happy place: the snickerdoodle.

'What is it, Laura, about this particular cookie that makes folks so happy?' you ask.

well maybe...

Cinnamon makes people stupidly happy.

The slightly crispy outside and the buttery inside makes people stupidly happy.

Donut glaze makes people stupidly happy.

Free cookies make people stupidly happy.

The first time I made these was while performing in Hilton Head, SC around Christmas of '08. There was this local holiday cookie competition and I entered thinkin' 'ooo fun' and frickin won. So...yeah...these things are tasty.

I also baked these for Madison Square Eats and they sold out in a day-and for the next week of the festival everyday someone would come by saying 'Hey, do you have any snickerdoodles?' It makes a girl monstrously proud.

And also kinda giggly...I mean what's funnier than a grown man saying 'snickerdoodle'?

So here's my recipe and here's hopin' you like 'em!

Snickerdoodles w/ Donut Glaze

Stuff you'll need

set oven to 375/ use ungreased cookie sheets

2 1/4 cups flour

1 t baking powder

1 t salt 1

1 1/2 T cinnamon

2 sticks room temperature butter

1/2 cup white sugar

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 t vanilla

2 room temperature eggs

3 T plus 1 T cinnamon for rolling

Combine first 4 ingredients in small bowl

Cream butter and sugars

Add vanilla

Add eggs one at a time

Beat in flour in 3 incorporations

About to add eggs and vanilla to creamed butter/sugars

(*optional-let dough rest for half hour in fridge*)

Roll balls of dough in cinnamon/sugar mixture

Bake for 8-10 mins

Fancy cookie scoop

balls...

All rolled in cinnamon sugar 'bout to go in the oven

DONUT GLAZE

Stuff you'll need

2 t hot milk

1/2 t vanilla

1/2 cup powdered sugar (10x sugar)

whisk together and let set for a sec til it's kinda room temp. (how frickin' easy was THAT?)

pour over cookies or dip cookies into the glaze.

nom

You're welcome.

Don't forget to lick the beater!

NYC Day

Hi-Oh

I've been pretty busy (can't remember the last time i grocery shopped) lately and it is way past time i updated this bloggie thingie.

'What's been keeping you so busy, Laura?' you say?

Auditions...as always.

Singing at cabarets...old favorite past-time

Breaking hearts...new favorite past-time

Working at a bakery...Stupidly fun

Along with the usual baking, packaging, etc. at Hot Blondies (hotblondiesbakery.com) I've been working at their booth for Madison Square Eats. A big ole market of spiffy restaurants and trucks, Madison Square Eats has been a joy for my mouth and an enemy to my hips.

'Lobster roll?' Why, yes, thank you.

'Prosciutto and kale pizza?' Don't mind if I do.

'Beer, beer, and more beer?' Well, you only live once, right?

And who needs grocery shopping when you've got cute guys throwing steak tacos your way? Exaaaaactly.

It's been a hell of a lot of fun AND i'm picking up little tips about running mobile food services. That could come in handy someday...

Anyhoo-attached is a little video of a pretty bad-ass day involving an audition, a haircut, baking, working the booth, some RIDICULOUSLY cool news, and singing karaoke in Queens.

Devilish Lemon Squares

Where oh where do i begin?

Sean 'Forget your troubles c'mon it's sean bell' Bell and Julius 'late twenties' 'bettywhite' Thomas came over for dinner tonight and it was kinda awesome.

Sean and I started immediately hitting the wine and cheese while Julius hit the kitchen and made some CRAZY TASTY shrimp n' grits.

Not one to let everyone else bring allllll the goodies I offered to make dessert:

DELICATE LEMON SQUARES!

Note: 10x sugar=confectioners' sugar

These are pretty gi-gundo crowd pleasers. The batch I made tonight, though, seemed a wee bit sweet. Don't know what that was about but...it's not gonna keep me from eating 'em.

Some notes!

-Don't let the butter get quite to room temperature. Take it out of the fridge and squish it into the flour and sugar letting the heat from your hands soften it up. It'll make the crust WAY more manageable.

-No need to grease the pan

-zest the lemon before you cut and squeeze it. it's kind of a DUH thing but...ya know...

-go easy on the powdered sugar on top of the squares. these things aren't exactly crying for more sugar, ok?

-wait til the squares come just to room temp before cutting and serving. everyone loves a little squiggy dessert but...just go with me on this one.

-topping them with various berries is always a good call, too! Blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, snozzberries...wait...

Super nom.

Happy Holidays...?

WAR DAMN EAGLE...have a biscuit

HAPPY FIRST GAME O' THE SEASON, SEC FANS!!

No video of me this week cause:

a) rolled out of bed, threw on my Auburn shirt, and got straight to watchin' them frickin SQUEAK by Utah State. UTAH STATE?!? REALLY AUBURN??!!!

b) i wasn't sure this recipe was gonna turn out well and I don't want to fail that hard

c) laziness

So I'll refer you to the video of Alton Brown makin' southern biscuits. I followed his recipe pretty closely and tastiness was produced.

like...MEGA tastiness...

some notes first:

-I sifted the dry ingredients first for lightness. It's an easy step and you'll be glad ya did.

-No need for the butter to be super cold. Just take it out of the fridge and use.

-I used a combo butter and shortening. Now...you can use one or the other but the butter is really necessary for flavor and the shortening for flakiness. Just use both.

-When he says 'the dough will be sticky,' he means it. It looks as though you'll need to add some more flour before you turn the dough out of the bowl but DON'T do it. You'll add that flour in the 'patting out the dough' process.

-I didn't have any buttermilk BUT I had milk and white vinegar. So I made my own!

Put 1 Tablespoon vinegar in a 1 Cup measure

Add as much milk as it takes to fill the cup

Let stand for 5 minutes

VOILA! BUTTERMILK!!

-Using a rolling pin is totally unnecessary. Using a good amount of flour on your work surface, hands, and top of the dough is necessary, though. And I worked on parchment paper instead of a counter...it just made cleanup easier.

-When you turn the dough onto your parchment paper, fold in half then turn a quarter of the way. Repeat. This will give you layers! And pat gently...there will be NO man-handling of the dough! Got it?

-Flour your biscuit cutter well pre-biscuit cut and cut all the way through your biscuit before you turn the cutter.

-Thought they'd need an egg wash to make the tops all pretty but they browned up all by themselves.

Here's Mr. Alton Brown's Southern biscuit video AND recipe:

http://youtu.be/d3QuQSdjMVE

• 2 cups flour
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons shortening
• 1 cup buttermilk, chilled (CONSULT RECIPE ABOVE)

Directions

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. (I ONLY WENT TO 410)

In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Using your fingertips, rub butter and shortening into dry ingredients until mixture looks like crumbs. (The faster the better, you don't want the fats to melt.) Make a well in the center and pour in the chilled buttermilk. Stir just until the dough comes together. The dough will be very sticky.

Turn dough onto floured surface, dust top with flour and gently fold dough over on itself 5 or 6 times. Press into a 1-inch thick round. Cut out biscuits with a 2-inch cutter, being sure to push straight down through the dough. Place biscuits on baking sheet so that they just touch. Reform scrap dough, working it as little as possible and continue cutting.

(Biscuits from the second pass will not be quite as light as those from the first, but hey, that's life.)

Bake until biscuits are tall and light gold on top, 15 to 20 minutes.

Best served with a HUGE dollop of butter.

Mess o' biscuits (see the layers??)

Mess o' dishes

Raise Your [brownies] High And [eat] To ZTA Tonight!

Zeta Tau Alpha

Alpha Nu Chapter

Birmingham-Southern College

'Favorite Cheer'

(screaming as loud as you can)

*ahem*

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO

YOU WILL BE A ZETA IF YOU KNOW WHAT'S GOOD FOR YOU

SO LISTEN WHILE WE SING TO YOU OUR SONG OF GREY AND BLUE

OUR CREST IS BEST BY TEST YOU'LL SEE/

WE'LL ALWAYS TREAT YOU RIGHT

SO

(*loud as humanly possible*)

RAISE YOUR GLASSES HIGH AND DRINK TO Z-T-A TONIGHT

OH YOU WILL FIND THE GIRLS AS NICE AS THEY CAN BE

SO COME ALONG AND JOIN

THE BEST FRATERNITY

WE'VE GOT THE PEP THE GO THAT MAKES YOU WANNA SAY

'HALLELUJAH! I'M CONVERTED AND I'LL BE A Z-T-A!'

'HALLELUJAH! I'M CONVERTED AND I'LL BE A Z-T-A!'

I graduated college in '05 and I have NO problem remembering that cheer. Ah, there's nothin better than being a Zeta: the great girls, fun mixers, cynicism, finding friends you'll truly keep for a lifetime...and the marshmallow brownies we make for rush.

Rush, as I'll tell ya in the video, is tough: the long hours, panhellenic's ridiculous list of rules, the rehearsals, the meetings, the decorations, and on and on and on... The thing that made it tolerable, though, was seein all the sweet new girls running up the hill with their bid cards on bid day and the leftover brownies after skit night. These brownies should really come with a warning-

1) they're addictive as hell

2) they're sugary as hell

3) glass of milk is NECESSARY for true enjoyment

You could seriously run the risk of slipping into a diabetic coma from one of these bad boys. However, if you're a 20-year-old Zeta you're gonna need that sugar to not only get through the night's bid meeting, but also set up decorations for pref night. (I'm not about to go into details about what a 'skit' night or a 'pref' night is...i lived through it 3 times y'all...don't make me do it again). Now that I'm 28 I like to shovel these into my mouth just to see how my body'll react.

I like to keep my pancreas on its toes.

Brownies:

1 C butter, melted

2 C Sugar

1/2 C unsweetened coca powder

4 large eggs, lightly beaten

1 t vanilla

1/8 t salt

1 1/2 c all purpose flour

1 10.5 oz bag mini marshmallows

Whisk together melted butter and next 5 ingredients. Stir in flour. Pour batter into greased and floured 9' X 13' pan and bake at 350 for 25-30 mins or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Take out of oven and sprinkle with marshmallows. Return to oven for 5 minutes.

Remove from oven and spread with Chocolate frosting while still warm.

Do NOT overmix!

Frosting:

1/4 cup butter, softened

1/2 cup milk

1 16 oz box powdered sugar (sifted)

1/3 cup unsweetened coca powder

Beat all ingredients til smooth. Eat at your own risk.

I'll correct myself quickly here-in the video I say '4 egg YOLKS' but it's really '4 whole eggs'.

Many thanks to my 'Big' Georgina Simmons Perry for getting this recipe to me. Best of luck for recruitment this year!

ZLAM Y'ALL

Bobby Fischer-Where is he? I DUNNO I DUNNO!!!

So I know the title of this blog is pretty dumb...but we're making Chess Pie today!!

Chess...Bobby Fischer...get it?

Anyhoo, there's something about chess pie that's massively southern and kinda nostalgic for me. It reminds me of Gibson's Bar-B-Q off Memorial Parkway in Huntsville, AL. They've got everything: piggie mascots, old lady waitresses, paneling from the '70's, long lines on Sunday after 'Big Church', barbque stuffed baked potatoes and PIE! And even though I've never had the chess pie at Gibson's, I associate this pie with this place. Funny, huh?

I've recently seen a chocolate version of chess pie at a place in Astoria, Queens. It's served in a jar and topped with peanut buttery stuff. Although that sounds delicious I call bull ca-ca. That ain't chess pie. Just 'cause it's served in a Ball Jar doesn't make it 'southern'. So now I give you: Lemony chess Pie (feat. whipped cream tutorial and apple pie interlude):

Recipe:

(I subbed the juice and zest of 2 small lemons for the vanilla and you GOTTA try that)

I cut myself a piece the next day and 'hold-onto-your-hats!' this is my new favorite. It's total 'GOOP' pie and the lemon-ness is PERFECT!!! I can't WAIT to make this again for company cause this sucker is all mine. Maybe Bobby Fischer woulda been pleasant if he had had a piece...

*Big credit to Dawn Harris for her general brilliance behind the camera*

Blueberry Cream Pie!

Hi-Oh!

It's your buddy back for action and ready to COMPETE! Twice a year there's a 'Jazz Age Lawn Party' that's held on Governor's Island (off the southern tip of Manhattan) and I finally went! There's an incredible big band, charleston lessons and general '23 skidoo'-ness. And best of all...there's a pie baking contest.

Oh it's on now.

So I decide to bake my mom's (hereafter referred to as 'Mama Wynn') blueberry cream pie with pecan topping. Now... I remember her making this once and I never got a piece. It just sat in the 'beer fridge' in the garage awaiting company and taunting me. Anyhoo, here's the recipe card and 2 little videos of my sad attempt to make pretty crust and my successful attempt to make tasty pie.

Mama Wynn's recipe shorthand:

Big 'T'=Tablespoon

little 't'=teaspoon

As you can see, super tastiness was produced. The judges, however, failed to see the brilliance of my pie and I was awarded diddly squat.

I WAS ROBBED!

So what does one do when defeated? Comfort eat. I'll spare you the gory recipe details (we'll make this together soon) but here are some pics of the Mini Pecan Pies:

A more successful crust! I decided to roll it out on wax paper. That helped tremendously :)

Since these pies are 'mini' I used a wide mouth glass to cut out mini crusts. Ingenious, no?

The dough's still gonna be a jerk so I'm using a sharp knife to gently loosen the rounds from the wax paper. Then I gently pressed them into the muffin tin. No greasing necessary!

Pie: pre-baking time

Pie: pre-GET IN MY BELLY-time. With fresh vanilla whipped cream, of course.

everybody sing: (tune: sound of silence)

Hello pecans my old friend...I've come to eat with you again...