I know. They aren’t cookies. Sue me. I love butter mints.

When I made these last year, they were about the only thing I snuck handfuls of when I wasn’t supposed to. Which was pretty much all the time. There’s just something about these though that make me want to eat myself into a diabetic coma. Maybe it’s the peppermint. Maybe it’s the hint of vanilla. Maybe it’s the fact that they are just so…portable.

In the midst of making these, I realized I was out of powdered sugar, and I had no intention of going out for more. So I did what any lazy baker with an internet connection does: google “how to make powdered sugar.”

Turns out, it’s just sugar and cornstarch, put in a food processor. I tried my food processor. Eh. Not so processed, it turned out.

Last year’s epic fail hurt me. The recipe was given to me by my childhood best friend Jeanne and her husband Mike. They are their favorites, I was told. Here! Make them.

And I burned them beyond all recognition. I walked away with my spatula between my legs.

Well, it’s another year, and Chewy Ginger-Cardamom cookies aren’t going to have ME to kick around any more.

The ingredients are pretentious, but I can slum them down. I wanted to show you my “organic cane sugar” in the form of my food-grade 5 gallon bucket of white Costco sugar, but I forgot to get a picture. Just like my Vietnamese cinnamon…directly from the dollar aisle at the local grocery store, the same place that you can register your dead deer after a day of hunting and buy pickled eggs.

But I still have my $12 bottle of cardamom from last year, and I’m going to use every part of it, even if I start to poop out chai.

I was bound and determined to follow the directions to the letter this time. Here I am massaging the orange zest into the sugars:

This post today is brought to you by ecology, capitalism, and creativity.

Ecology: I had ten leftover egg whites from the Eggnog Truffle disaster on the 2nd and needed to use them up. Saving the earth, one egg white at a time.

Capitalism: I bought a new Wilton star tip (the same one I used for the Almond Rosettes) to avoid the meringue problems of last year.

Let me refresh your memory. This is what it was supposed to look like:

And I really should change the name of these. Snowflakes are so 1988. Just like the cookbook it came from.
—
Snowflake Meringue Cookies
(from The Spirit of Christmas Cookbook, Volume 4)

Ingredients:

4 egg whites
1 1/2 c. powdered sugar
1 t. almond extract
1/2 t. ground cinnamon
1/2 t. cream of tartar
decorating sugar

Directions:

1. Cover baking sheets with waxed paper.
2. In a large bowl, beat egg whites until foamy. Add powdered sugar, almond extract, cinnamon, and cream of tartar; beat until very stiff.
3. Spoon meringue into a pastry bag fitted with a small star tip. Make snowflake design. Add decorating sugars.
4. Let sit at room temperature for 30 minutes.

Cookies today: 392 (that’s not an exaggeration)
Cookies this year: 594

Somewhere along the way, I picked up a pizzle iron.

(Because a bored baker in rural Wisconsin with an Amazon Prime account is a dangerous thing.)

I use it to make Stroopwafels, which I will make later this month. But I needed something else to justify my impulse purchase of the snowstorm of ’11.

Enter Pizzles.

(Shocking. Making the cookie for which my iron was named. It took me 2 years to figure this out.)

Pizzles are a wafer cookie from Italy. I never made them before, but figured no time like the present.

They have a hint of anise, but not enough to make you run away, I promise! You barely taste it, and it deepens the vanilla flavor in the cookie.

I mixed up the batter and started the long, arduous journey into counter-top desserts.

I used my cookie scoop to do these, making sure they were centered in the middle of the hot iron. (Oh, and I generally put a little coconut oil on it before I start, just to grease the iron.)

(And yes, I’m now the asshole cook that uses hard-to-find ingredients.)

After about 4 minutes, you get this:

I take them off with a non-metal spatula, and start over again. And again. And again. It’s a good thing I had some time to do these. Four minutes isn’t a long time, and yes, a few were relegated to the circular file because I wasn’t paying attention.

But these? These are worth every minute.

—

Cookies today: 87
Cookies this year: 202

It’s just not Christmas unless you make gingerbread. Even if you don’t like gingerbread, it’s like a law that you have to make something gingerbread-y, or you’ll sacrifice your ability to sing Christmas carols or look at decorations.

While I’m not a huge fan of gingerbread, I know it has it’s place. My friend Beth loves these, but never can have them because her mom is allergic to molasses and doesn’t ever make them.

(Side note: That might be the most interesting food allergy I’ve ever heard of.)

I made the dough last night, because you’re supposed to chill it in the fridge. When I rolled it out this morning, sugar plums were dancing in my head. There’s just something about an empty house on a December morning that makes you want to burn a Yankee Candle and make gingerbread men.

What, that’s just me?

Mom’s Gingerbread Cookies
(from Gooseberry Patch Old-Fashioned Country Cookies)

Ingredients:

1/2 c. shortening
2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1/2 c. sugar
1/2 c. molasses
1 egg
1 t. baking soda
1 t. ground ginger
1/2 t. ground cinnamon
1/2 t. ground cloves

Ingredients for Powdered Sugar Icing

1 c. sifted powdered sugar
1/4 t. vanilla
1 T. milk

Directions:

1. Beat shortening until softened. Add molasses, sugar, and egg, beat again, and add spices and soda. Beat again and add half the flour.
2. Add the rest of the flour, mixing well.
3. Refrigerate for three hours
4. Roll dough to 1/4 inch thickness and cut out cookies.
5. Bake at 375 for 7-8 minutes, ice with powdered sugar icing.

So after some…angular…Snickerdoodles and then the Big Bird poop atrocity of the Eggnog Truffles, I needed something to get my confidence back.

And that’s why I chose Almond Rosettes.

I knew I could make these my bitch (pardon my French), and I did.

Last year when I made them, I was legally crippled for about 2 weeks, thanks to a small star-tipped pastry injury. This year, I made a stop at JoAnn’s to get a large star tip. And it did not disappoint.

See for yourself. This was last year’s:

—

Almond Rosettes
(from The Spirit of Christmas Cookbook, Volume 4.)

Ingredients:

1 c. butter, softened
1 c. sugar
1 egg
3 T. milk
1 t. almond extract
2 1/2 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
sliced almonds to decorate

Directions: 

1. Preheat oven to 350. In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until fluffy. Add egg, milk, and almond extract. Beat until smooth.

2. Combine flour and baking powder in a small bowl and add to creamed mixture; stir until a soft dough forms. 

3. Transfer about 1/3 of dough into a pastry bag fitted with a large open star tip. Pipe 2″ diameter rosettes onto a lightly greased baking sheet. Press an almond slice in the center of each cookie.

4. Bake 8-11 minutes or until bottoms are lightly browned. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool. Repeat with remaining dough.

Cookies today: 48
Cookies total: 81

Cooking (and baking) is just following directions.

I say that a lot. If you can read at a sixth grade level, own some measuring cups and spoons, and have access to Google for those terms you may not know, you can cook just about anything.

(I tell this to JDub all the time, to which she replies that it’s not the lack of knowledge that holds her back; it’s the lack of desire.)

::sigh::

I found a recipe in this:

It fell out of my Food Network Magazine. I chose the Eggnog Truffles, partly because I like eggnog and partly because it was one of the few with a picture of what it should look like.

So, I went to work. Ten egg yolks is quite a lot, but hey, it’s a small price to pay for no bake, JDub-could-do-this, holiday goodness.

After adding all the ingredients to my glass bowl, I had to improvise a double boiler. It doesn’t quite say this in the instructions, but thankfully, I knew how to read between the lines.

It’s there that the recipe peaked.

The directions are vague and awful. This is supposed to be a truffle, which is a candy. There needs to be a candy thermometer involved and a temperature to hit. Neither were mentioned in this recipe. It said to have it simmer over a pot of boiling water for 25 minutes or so, and take it off when it is thick and glossy.

Kinda subjective, don’t you think, Food Network?

I stirred and stirred. For 26 minutes, I whisked and stirred and sweated, frankly. I had to hold on to my bowl with an oven mit.

(Honestly, all I can think about right now is just how mad I’d be if I were JDub. If I were her making this creation, I’d give up when I found out I’d have to figure out how to separate 10 eggs.)

Holding with one hand, stirring with the other. At first, I was afraid I was going to make scrambled eggs with nutmeg, but things started coming together.

And after the allotted time, I got this:

Looked thick and glossy to me, so I took it off the stove and let it cool completely. See, Food Network, this is where the candy thermometer would come in handy. Sure, it might scare off novice cooks, but so will epic easy “no bake” fails attributed to your shitty insert. What if this sent me into a culinary shame spiral from which I could never recover? Do you want my batter on your guilty hands, Food Network?

I think not.

After they cooled, I greased my hands up like a 8th grade boy at the dermatologist and went to work.

The last few were like sticky mounds of hair paste. I gave one to Disgruntled Husband and he was not impressed with the consistency.

They are in the fridge right now, where hopefully they firm up. I don’t have a lot of hope for them.

Here’s what pisses me off about this: I can cook and bake. I’m actually pretty good at it. It’s following directions, after all, but these directions were awful. I believe since it was the last recipe in the insert, it was cut brief to make their word and page count. And it makes me look bad now.

Not to mention waste a whole lot of f-ing eggs.

—

Cookies today: 12
Cookies total: 33