Some Sour News..

Some Sour News….

I honestly don’t pay mind to news reports pertaining to Mexican drug cartel activity because it does not affect me on a personal level in my daily life and I usually take the annual “this items is going to be in short supply” news with a grain of salt because it seems like every year there’s going to be a world-wide shortage of something…

That being said…I read an interesting piece in Bon Appétit today which caught my attention. An article I read suggested that the price of limes was going to skyrocket this year because of drug related turf wars among other reasons and that DOES affect me – or my ability to bake Margarita cookies in particular.

As is the case with most ingredients, I don’t worry about their origin because a majority of them are locally procured – my flour, butter, eggs, vanilla, chocolate chips, molasses and brown sugar all hail from Pennsylvania. However, my margarita cookies use freshly squeezed lime juice and lime zest and, as limes don’t grow on trees here in Pennsylvania, I have to purchase mine at the grocery store like most Americans do and the thought that a drug turf war emanating thousands of miles from here will make it more difficult and/or more expensive to get limes is annoying. Granted, the people whose lives are directly affected by drug turf wars are rightfully more perturbed that their lives are in jeopardy – as opposed to a fraction of my livelihood – but it is still bothersome.

Here’s the list of other items in peril in 2014.
http://www.bonappetit.com/entertaining-style/trends-news/slideshow/food-shortages-2014

It appears that chocolate is safe for now but you may want to pick up an extra pound of two of coffee.

Consider yourselves warned…

Holy Chipotle!

Spicy is a relative word.  As someone who orders chicken wings mild the term “spicy” means I must immediately drink something in order to prevent a reaction involving gasping, tearing and/or choking.  To my husband, something isn’t spicy unless it contains the words “atomic” or requires you to immediately wash your hands to prevent inadvertently burning your eyes – or other sensitive areas. So it was with a bit of an incredulous tone of voice that he asked, “Where did YOU find chipotle?” when I told him today’s featured cookie was….Chocolate Chipotle. 

Are the Black Buggy Baking Company’s Chocolate Chipotle Cookies “spicy”? I don’t think so. The initial flavor is deep rich chocolate (courtesy of PA company Blommer’s. Hey Blommer’s people – I’m plugging your chocolate again so return my phone calls won’t you!). Next comes the “heat” – slowly, slowly and then all of a sudden it hits you – there’s something in this cookie other than chocolate! And then, in the end, the harmony of chocolate and spicy chipotle is just perfect. No immediate drinking required.

I’m featuring Chocolate Chipotle cookies at Fisher’s Produce today, so while I can take credit for spicing up your taste buds on this dreary Saturday, how you spice up the remainder of the day is up to you.

Crazy For Cardamom

I can’t help but wonder if it’s sacrilegious to daydream about chocolate while exercising at the gym but with each mile I peddled and each magazine page I flipped another incredibly decadent chocolate recipe was splayed before me.  Truffles, ganache, flourless cake. The photos were endless but my time to execute one of these magnificent creations was not. It was cardamom night, or more specifically, “quickly come up with an Indian inspired cookie recipe for the local girl scouts troup baking demonstration” night. Thanks to the power of Google I discovered cardamom, or more specifically Nan Khatai, a cookie recipe calling for cardamom.

After plopping down an absurdly large sum for an absurdly small quantity of cardamom (I like saying cardamom), I discovered the most interesting, indescribable, aromatic spice – think lavender, lemon pepper and eucalyptus. It smells so amazing that I simply can’t imagine that Bath and Body Works has not yet mass-produced cardamom in shower gel form. While the girl scouts were an eager taste-testing bunch with honest opinions and cleaver recipe ideas of their own, and the Nan Khatai was well received, the thoughts of those endless pages of chocolate came racing back to me today. As a result, today was the day chocolate and cardamom were destined to meet in my bakery. In cookie form no less.  I was so pleased with not only how incredible the kitchen smelled but with the final result – a warm rich cocoa cookie with an indescribable zing.

Let the naming begin! Cardamom Chocolate Spice cookies perhaps and then again, perhaps tomorrow they’ll both marry cinnamon and things will really get crazy!

Chocolate and Salt??

While I’ve made dozens of chocolate pretzel cookies, it wasn’t until yesterday when I took (yet another) reprieve from my shortbread quest to bake up a batch for some friends that I really thought about what an odd combination chocolate and salt really is. 

Despite the abundant availability of cookies in our household, The Black Buggy Brownie Pretzel Cookie remains an often-requested favorite although pretzels in and of themselves are not a huge hit with the little people.  Nonetheless, what makes this particular cookie variation interesting is that it seems to satisfy two primal cravings – chocolate and salt – yet, it is unlikely you would pair the two outside of the cookie format. 

I think the pairing of chocolate and salt is a combination that would have been worthy of a George Carlin skit; “Chocolate and…salt? Who in the world first thought about putting these two @#$%$%$ things together?” followed by his making comedic light out of shaking your salt shaker over your chocolate milkshake or dipping a salt-laden french fry into melted chocolate instead of ketchup. 

Since I suspect that conjuring up those images of these unlikely pairings has had an unpleasant effect, it’s the image of tasting a soft, warm Browine Prezel cookie (where the combination of cocoa is so sweet and rich that you instinctively think that you need to grab a drink), suddenly interrupted by a crunch and then a gentle zing of salt that I’d rather invoke for you.

That being said, it’s on to shortbread – again. National Shortbread Day is January 6th and mine isn’t perfected yet.

Revenge Of The Shortbread

With the taste of the lousy Food Network shortbread recipe still in my mouth I’ve been on a shortbread making frenzy the last 48 hours. Today I realized that good friends make good guinea pigs – I mean taste-testers. While I still don’t feel I’ve baked the most amazing batch of shortbread – yet- I was happy to have a new audience to bake for and I’m equally happy to report that I’m getting pretty close. 

Although today’s batch was universally enjoyed by all, it is just slightly off in the sweetness category.  To me, when I think of shortbread I think of two commercial brands – Walkers and Nabisco’s Pecan Sandies. In all due respect to these outfits which invariably bake thousands of cookies each day, Walkers tastes like you’re eating a stick of butter and while Nabisco’s version is sweet and “buttery”, it is just a tad too dry. (NOTE: Spell check doesn’t have a problem with “buttery” but didn’t recognize “chocolatey” the other day – go figure.)

In any event I’m aiming for a happy medium – a not too dry, buttery creation that is sweet enough to remind you you’re eating a cookie but doesn’t send you into a sugar induced shock and with that goal in mind I’ll be at it again tomorrow. 

Any and all guinea pigs – I mean taste testers – welcome.

The Best Chocolate Company.

I’ve been touting a Pennsylvania chocolate manufacturer called the Blommer Chocolate Company for well over a year now and realized I never supplied their link. Here it is.  http://www.blommer.com/

Their cocoa powder and chocolate chips are fantastic and I use them exclusively in my cookie recipes.  Sadly I’m still waiting on samples I requested a year ago so while their chocolate is extraordinary, their sales representative for my area is not.  I guess the Black Buggy Baking Company doesn’t rate as an important customer!  While I’m going to continue using their products to build the Black Buggy Baking Company empire, I’ll also continue to secretly despise their customer service department – or maybe not so secretly any longer.

Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies – Part Deux

With the Christmas entertaining season wrapping up for us today I took another stab at Chocolate Candy Cane Cookies. Sadly, my taste-testing team are not big fans of mint desserts so they were of no help to me today. I envisioned making dark, rich, cocoa cookies, the kind that makes you want to instinctively reach for a glass of milk. That was the easy part. The candy cane part took a few attempts. In sum, it appears as if 8 full-sized red candy canes are the magical number to getting your cookies perfectly, refreshingly minty.

Use the Brownie Pretzel Recipe and add the candy canes in lieu of the pretzels. Let me know what you think!

http://www.wfmz.com/food/22155594/detail.html

Mmmmmm….chocolate………

Perhaps my having chocolate on the brain stems from catching a glimpse of “My Fair Lady” last evening where Eliza Doolittle is obsessing over chocolate, or, perhaps it was from having made my own concoction of hot cocoa mix earlier today with the Blommer cocoa powder I simply cannot rave enough about or, or perhaps it’s that time of the month – Christmas time that is. Either way, I’m thinking about the wonders of chocolate and despite spending the entire morning baking pie I’m venturing back into the bakery this evening with one goal – to create something rich, “chocolatey” AND spicy.  My prior attempts at chocolate cayenne cookies didn’t pass muster with the spicy division of the test-tasting team (Kirk) and so tonight I’m on a mission – to create a cookie that is so “chocolately” you need to reach for a drink and, more importantly, has a serious kick to it. So, in sum, it’s off to the spice aisle for something outlandishly hot to accompany my chocolately creation. By the way, why isn’t “chocolately” in spell check?