Amazeballs Take Two

Here is a second batch of Amazeballs I made for my husband's holiday work party.  The stick says "pwtv" which stands for Power Women TV, the company he's working with right now.  They tasted great, now I need to perfect the look.. particularly the top.  I'll be making these again soon.

Happy Chanukah

This post is a big one for me because it marks my first official year of writing this blog!  The first cookies I ever posted were Chanukah swirl cookies that I baked when going to my parents house to celebrate last year.  This year, my family came to my tiny apartment to celebrate the occasion.  I always forget how small my place is until there are 9 adults, 2 kids, and a dog running around.  It was definitely crowded, but I think the space (or lack there of) made the occasion more intimate and fun!  Anyway, it was no big shock that I'd be baking cookies.  After all, one of the reasons I got into baking is because of the "cookie contests" that my family has held over previous Chanukahs.  The rest of my family stopped competing a few years back, but I just kept on going... 

I don't have a story about the baking of these cookies, as everything went pretty smoothly.  Because of the intricacy of each cookie, they did take a number of hours (and over 3 nights) to make.  I made the icing with confectioner's sugar, lemon juice, and egg whites this time around, and a lot of my taste testers gave it rave reviews.  I think I'm finally getting this icing thing down!  Anyway, here are some pictures:

Amazeballs

I went to Florida for Thanksgiving this year, but I still found time to sneak in a little baking... ok technically I guess I can't call it baking because I didn't use my oven for this recipe, I used my freezer.  I made "Amazeballs" (named by my husband after he fell in love with them), for a Pre-Thanksgiving work Pot Luck.  They were chocolate chip cookie dough truffles with Reese's Pieces.

Now, based on the name and sound of this naughty-little-snack, you'd think that this was a quick and easy and successful experience right?  Wrong.

Brown sugar, you are the bane of my existence.

After posting some of my previous recipe experiences, some of you reached out to me with ways to soften brown sugar that had turned hard.  They were all great ideas, but most of them require at least a few hours of waiting in order for the brown sugar to soften.  When I decide to bake something, it is usually last minute, and I usually can't wait to get started.  So one fast idea stuck out in my head:  Put the brown sugar in the microwave.  Bingo.  One short step and my problem would be solved.

Fifteen seconds in the microwave.  I noticed just the tiniest difference, but I could tell it was working.  Fifteen more seconds.  A little more.  Thirty seconds in the microwave...  It was changing ever so slowly.  Being the impatient cook that I am, I came up with the brilliant idea to stick it in for five minutes while I ran down to Duane Reade to pick up a last minute ingredient.

You guessed it, when I came back up, the brown sugar had exploded.  Wait, it gets better.  I had put the brown sugar in a plastic bowl.  Why did I do that do you ask?  I'd call it a blonde moment, but since I'm no longer blonde I can't even use that excuse.  Anyway, this is what the microwave looked like:

Sad right?  That pile on the bottom was not just the brown sugar.  Nope, it was the bowl too.

After the brown sugar debacle, it was smooth sailing.  An easy mixing of ingredients and a fun fondue project.  And guess what, my husband said it was the best thing I ever 'baked' for him and I didn't even touch the oven.  It'll be our little secret.

Here is the recipe, I HIGHLY recommend it:

http://www.bakerella.com/chocolate-chip-cookie-dough-truffles/

Thank you Bakerella !

Hurricane Sandy Cookies

I hope that everyone stays safe during these next few hours and days as we wait for the hurricane to pass.  This natural disaster will be truly historic, and something that we talk about for a long time to come.  Little did we know that when Good Sandy decided to reinvent herself for Danny Zuko that Bad Sandy would cause this much damage!  Ok that's my only corny joke....

As horrible as this storm is, there are some small perks and silver linings.... like having a little vacation from work and some time to spend with friends.  I took advantage of my time off by having a little 'hurricane party' with some of my favs at my apartment!

Ok, really there were 7 friends (and 3 dogs) at this event.  We all enjoyed a 'family' potluck dinner so I contributed with my now staple dessert: sugar cookies.  I chose umbrellas for obvious reasons.  I used an umbrella cookie cutter from my 'cookie cutters throughout the year' pack.  This one was meant for April, but it seemed much more fitting to use it for this!.  It took some maneuvering to transfer the cut out dough to the cookie sheet (mainly the handles), but with addition of some flour to the dough, they held together a lot easier.

I wanted to give the cookies a fall flavor, so I added a touch of cinnamon and a splash of apple cider to my standard cookie recipe.  I added a little cinnamon to the icing as well.  It didn't affect the consistency of either recipe, and the taste was not overpowering at all, just a hint of fall.  They were quite good.

Skull Cookies

I've been reluctant to write a post because over the summer I baked these beautiful watermelon cookies and I cannot find the pictures for them.  That's what I get for waiting to write a post on them.  Well just know they came out adorable and delicious.  If I find the pictures I'll complete that post.

Moving on I guess...

Happy October!!  I needed some serious baking inspiration after those hectic summer months.  When a couple of my friends and I decided to have a dinner party, it seemed like the perfect opportunity.  It was quite the serious dinner party: a salad to start, followed by penne alla vodka served on our fancy plates, paired with a Cabernet Sauvignon, followed by some loose tea and.. my freshly baked dessert.  What was the dessert you ask?  Fancy Skull Sugar Cookies of course!

Why Skulls you ask?  My reason was two-fold.  First of all, it was the beginning of October and that means Halloween season... which I love.  Enough said.

Second, my guests at the dinner party just started their own jewelry line, Guilty Jean.  Their concept is a mix between feminine beauty, rugged masculinity, spirituality, and goth inspired punk.    [ Shameless plug : Go to their website and check them out!  http://www.guiltyjean.com/ ]  Anyway,
the majority of the pieces they feature include skulls so I wanted to make something to show my support.

I tried a new low fat recipe for the sugar cookies and needless to say, I'm not going to copy and paste that recipe to this blog.  They tasted like chalk.  I just need to stick to the original recipe... full of butter, fat, and yummy goodness.

The good news is, the cookies looked awesome.  I used Color Writer Markers to make the faces.  It was ridiculously easy to do.  

Puffed-Up Chocolate Chip Cookies

Now that it's September and it's officially "back to school" season, it's time for me to resume my quest.  This summer was very tough to find time for baking... plus the fact that I was putting on bathing suits didn't help my motivation.  I did manage to make a few fun things, and I did find an amazing low calorie recipe for chocolate chip cookies.  It's from myrecipes.com.    It's actually called "puffed-up chocolate chip cookies" because it has somewhat of a cake-like airy quality to it.  So if you like that kind of cookie, you are in luck because these turned out amazing.

Puffed-Up Chocolate Chip Cookies
For 3 dozen cookies:

Ingredients
1 1/4 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup applesauce
1 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 large egg
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
Cooking spray

Preparation
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a small bowl.  Spoon applesauce into a fine sleeve into a bowl; let stand 15 minutes.  Discard liquid.  Scrape drained applesauce into a large bowl.  Add sugar and butter; beat with a mixer at medium speed until light and fluffy (about 2 minutes).  Beat in vanilla and egg.  Add flour mixture; beat at low speed until well-blended.  Fold in chips.  Drop by level tablespoons 2 inches apart onto baking sheets coated with cooking spray.  Bake at 375 for 10 minutes or until almost set.  Cool on pan 2 to 3 minutes or until firm.  Remove cookies from pan; cool on wire racks.

For those of you who are interested, here is the nutrition information per cookie:
Calories: 78
Fat: 2.9 g
Carbs: 12.8 g
Fiber: .2 g
Cholesterol: 10 mg
Protein: .8 g
Sodium: 87 mg

Not bad ay?

Mouth Sugar Cookies

It's mid-June which can only mean 1 thing, the end of school and a looong vacation..... I wish.  For kids with autism, school is year round.  I actually had the option to take off, but I decided to stick around for the summer.  Even though I'm not looking forward to a long break from work, it's still the end of another successful school year which feels like a big accomplishment.  A large division of SLPs in the DOE (or Speech Language Pathologists in the Department of Education for those of you who don't know the lingo) got together today to celebrate with something we call "Feeding Therapy."  For our "Feeding Therapy," we had a luncheon in which we all brought our own meal... and volunteers were asked to bring dessert.  How could I say no to another opportunity to bake.  I thought about what to make for 40 hungry and tired speech therapists, and I decided to go full out 'speech dork' and try to make people smile.  I made sugar cookies in the shape of mouths.  What better way to honor SLPs and Communication, and the hard work we've done all year long.
I had some fun experimenting with how to ice the mouths.  Here are some of the outtakes.

And here is how I eventually decided to do them.

 

Wine Glass Sugar Cookies

HAPPY 30TH BIRTHDAY JUSTIN!!!!!   For my husband's birthday, 15 of our closest friends traveled with us to Ithaca (his alma mater).  We went on a Wine Tour around Cayuga Lake, enjoyed the annual Ithaca festival, shopped in the Commons, and hiked around the gorges.  First of all thank you so much to everyone who joined us, we have the greatest friends ever and we had an amazing weekend.  Second of all, hope you enjoyed the party favor cookies I baked!

Teddy Bear Sugar Cookies

I had a VERY busy week last week baking two batches of sugar cookies.  I didn't have a choice as I had two very cookie friendly events. 
1- school bake sale
2- a very special husband's birthday

These were two events I couldn't pass up!  I'll post about each separately, but note that my trusty photographer husband was not around when I was baking these, so my pictures are not as clear.  Here's the first:

My school had a bake sale to raise money for Autism Speaks, a charity dedicated to increasing awareness of autism spectrum disorders, to funding research into the causes, prevention and treatments for autism.  

The pink ones are chocolate sugar cookies with blackberry jam/chocolate icing and the brown ones are regular sugar cookies with chocolate icing

Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies

Ok I missed the boat on the Pinata cookies... but they were cute to look at right?  But I did get to bake this week.  In honor of my friend Sarah's birthday, I made Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies.  I work with Sarah so I brought a batch to work and they were gone in about 5 seconds.  I wasn't even going to write a post about them, but when I got the comment "These are the best brownies I've ever had in my life!," I thought it would be worth it to post the recipe.

Peanut Butter Truffle Brownies

Ingredients

Brownie Base                  Filling                                          Topping

6 tablespoons cocoa        1/3 cup butter, softened                3/4 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1/4 cup butter                1/3 cup creamy peanut butter        3 tablespoons butter

1 cup sugar                    1 1/3 cups powdered sugar

1/2 teaspoon vanilla        1 1/2 teaspoons milk

1/4 teaspoon salt 

1/3 cup flour 

2 eggs

Step 1:  Brownie Base

Preheat oven to 325°F degrees.  Grease an 8-inch square pan.  Dust lightly with cocoa and shake out excess.  Melt butter and mix it with cocoa powder. Then add sugar, eggs, vanilla, flour and salt. Mix to combine.  Spread brownie batter evenly in pan and put in oven to bake for 35-40 minutes.  Allow to cool completely, about 1 hour.

Step 2: Filling
In medium bowl, beat filling ingredients with electric mixer on medium speed until smooth. Spread mixture evenly over brownie base.

Step 3: Topping
In small microwavable bowl, microwave topping ingredients uncovered on High 30 to 60 seconds; stir until smooth. Cool 10 minutes; spread over filling. Refrigerate about 30 minutes or until set.  Store covered in refrigerator. 

Pinata inspiration

Click here for a sneak peek at the inspiration for my next batch of cookies!  I usually don't like to follow recipes to a tee, but these look so yummy that I may have to make an exception!!

http://www.sheknows.com/food-and-recipes/articles/958083/cinco-de-mayo-pinata-cookies

Puzzle Cake

Happy Birthday Mom!  I wanted to make a cookie creation as a gift for my mom for her birthday, so she was the inspiration for this project.  Growing up, one of my favorite things to do with my mom was to put together puzzles while we watched our favorite tv shows and chatted.  Now that we don't live in the same house, we have puzzle swaps so that we can still enjoy the hobby.  A perfect personalized gift for my mom would be a sugar cookie puzzle cake.  It's quite an ambitious task, but to be cookie queen, I have to try everything right?

Before I started, I drew out a 12 piece puzzle on a piece of paper.  This is the template I would copy for the actual sugar cookies.  I halved a standard cookie dough recipe, rolled the dough out evenly onto an 8''X11'' cookie dough sheet so that it was about 1/2 inch thick, and I popped them in the oven.  I took the cookies out about 2 minutes before the the recipe called for them to be finished.  At this point, I took a sharp knife and copied my puzzle template by slowly tapping at the dough (instead of swiping straight), and removing any excess dough that stuck to the knife.

When I finished, I put the puzzle back in the oven to cook for the remaining 2 minutes.  At this point I found that the dough still looked too soft, so I left it in the oven for an extra 2 minutes.  Must have been because the dough was baking altogether, instead of in separate cookie cutter shapes.  Once the puzzle was out of the oven for good, I ran through the puzzle with my knife again, using the same tapping strategy, and I carefully separated the puzzle pieces.  This was a tough task.  Some of the edges looked jagged, so I used the knife to try to smooth out the edges as best I could.  I put the separated puzzle pieces in the freezer to cool for about an hour.

It was time for the icing.  I used egg whites, lemon juice, and confectioner's sugar.  I halved the icing into 2 bowls, putting purple food coloring in one and sugarless strawberry jam in the other.  I kept adding more and more jam into the one half until the color was just right.  It was super thin at this point.  Perfect, I thought, to paint on the base color with a basting brush.  The icing glided right on, smooth and thin, and I thought it would be perfect.  

I popped the cookies back in the freezer for the icing to dry.  One hour, still wet.  Two hours, still wet.  Three hours... midnight.... still wet.  It was time for bed.  It would have to dry by morning right?  Ten hours came and went and the icing never dried.  I focused too much on the color of the frosting and not enough on the consistency.  Next time I might use less jam and maybe the tiniest dot of red food coloring... or more confectioner's sugar... I'll figure that out later.  For now, I had to move forward.

The good news was that even though the icing never dried completely, it did dry enough to the point where it was just sticky.  I could still easily decorate over it.   I put the pieces back together (cutting the edges of some of the pieces so that it fit) and got to work with the purple icing. I used two tips to write happy birthday over the puzzle pieces, and create a flower border.  Since the pieces were still slightly spaced apart, I easily used a knife around the puzzle pieces to separate the wet purple icing that connected each piece.  

And voila! 

I knew it would be a difficult project to take on, and it was, but it was still a lot of fun.  The best part was when I gave it to my mom and I saw how much she loved it!

Unbelievable Passover Brownies

Ok it's officially been way too long since I've posted.... so I'm sorry to the two people that actually read this blog (mom and one other haha).  And just for the record I have baked since my last post... once...   It was chocolate chip cookies and it was very uneventful (but they were so delicious!)  I am slightly embarrassed to admit that I used the recipe from the Nestle Tollhouse bag (.... but slightly proud.  Come on, we all know that recipe is amazing.)

Now that it's Passover and I have off from work for the week (hooray!), I knew I HAD to bake something.  Up until this year, I have always bought the "kosher for passover" box of brownie mix.  I have been making these brownies every year since I could help my mom mix the batter (I don't eat brownies regularly, but for some reason it's always a must for Passover).  They are always pretty good, but not GREAT.  This year, I was searching through a google document that my family made a few years ago (it has recipes, a basic grocery list, and other little things we need to remember to do for Passover).  There was an "Unbelievable Brownies" recipe posted from my sister.  And I made them.  And guess what.  You'd never even be able to tell that they are kosher for passover!  Thanks Rach!  No more "brownies from a box" for me!

 It's worth it for me to post the recipe for anyone who is interested because the brownies are pretty easy to make:

Unbelievable Brownies

Nonstick cooking spray
4 large eggs
2 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
¾ cup Dutch process cocoa powder
1 cup potato starch
½ cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional)


Preheat oven to 350

Spray an 11 by 7 inch brownie pan with nonstick cooking spray.  Set aside

In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the eggs and sugar until smooth.  Add the oil and salt.  Mix.  Sprinkle in the cocoa powder and mix to make the batter chocolatey.  Add the potato starch and mix to combine.  Scrape down the sides with a spatula.  Stir in the chocolate chips if using.

Pour into prepared pan.  Bake for 35-40 minutes.  Allow to cool before serving.

I just have one note to mention.  Usually when I bake, I bake for the minimum time it says on the recipe because my oven is pretty hot and my husband likes things soft.  On this recipe, I put the brownies back in the oven at least three times.  After I baked them a little longer than the recommended time, they came out perfect.  

Arielle

I wasn't able to bake this week because I was busy visiting my niece, Arielle... my niece who happens to be the cutest kid in the world.  So in honor of Arielle, I am posting a picture of the cookies I made for her 1st birthday party last summer:

These cookies were a huge hit at her party, and they were a big reason I decided to start this blog.  So thanks Arielle!

Also, here's a video from this weekend.   Arielle was learning to walk my dog, Topanga.

Happy Valentine's Day

     Happy Valentine's Day Blog World!  I went with lips and heart-shaped sugar cookies this time, as I had already had those cookie cutters in my house.   I had no problem creating a quick sugar cookie dough and getting these cookies baked and ready to decorate.
     In my ongoing effort to get a handle on the icing consistency, I whipped up a batch that was much thinner than my previous tries... by accident of course.  I looked at a review of the last icing recipe I used, and I saw that one woman recorded the ingredient amounts she preferred.. which were different than the original recipe.  That's what I decided to use this time.    Also, I added Strawberry Jam to the recipe, so it would naturally color the frosting as well as add some flavor.  The jam also accounted for the thinness of the icing.  I have to say, because of the jam, the taste of this batch of cookies are amazing, definitely my best tasting cookies so far.  And the thinner icing turned out to be a blessing in disguise, as it was much easier to coat the cookies with the frosting, and also, I was able to pick up a new decorating trick by experimenting.
     Here's the trick.  I used two shades of pink for my frosting.  After painting one shade as the base of the cookie, I used a tooth pick to create 3-4 lines going vertically down the cookie.  Then I took the same toothpick and swiped horizontal lines across the cookie.  The effect came out much better than I ever would have expected!  But the reason it definitely came out so great was because of how thin the icing was.
     After I allowed the base coat of the cookies to dry, I had to make more icing for the piping of the cookies.  This frosting was thicker than the last (more confectioner's sugar, less corn syrup), otherwise the decoration wouldn't have held.  I used heart sprinkles that I found in my cabinet from who knows when (probably last Valentine's Day?)  I guess I knew I'd be using them again some day!
     A little experimentation later, and I wound up with my favorite batch of cookies so far! Here they are:

   

Superbowl

     Go Giants!  Ok I'll admit it, the Superbowl will be the first and only football game that I will have watched this season.  However, growing up in my house, I have always been a Giants fan by default.  Giants gear and memorabilia have always been displayed around my house, and as a result, I know little things about the team very well (colors, logo, some of the major players).  Enough of an excuse to dedicate a batch of cookies to the team?  I think so.
    I started with this idea when my husband and I decided to host a superbowl party.  My friends are not huge football fans, but they are HUGE food fans.  I knew they'd appreciate a grand cookie gesture from me.  I decided on footballs and helmets for this batch.  The problem was, I don't have a cookie cutter in either of these shapes.  I didn't want to go out and buy new ones, so I had to come up with something.  A trustee google search later, and I found the answer.  A way to "cut cookies in any customizable shape, without using a cookie cutter."  I took a piece of cardboard (about the thickness of a cereal box) and drew and cut out a football and a helmet.  I just made my sugar cookie dough as usual, rolled it out, and placed each cut-out on top of the dough.  Using a sharp kitchen knife, I carefully outlined the outside of the cardboard cut-out.  Voila, I had helmet and football cookie shapes.  Then I just transferred it to the tray as usual.  So easy, I can't believe I never thought of it before!  And by the way, I accidentally doubled the batch of sugar cookie dough, so I wound up with almost 50 cookies!
      I knew the next part of my job would be tough, but I was ready to tackle it.... so I thought.  First I made a chocolate icing for the footballs (made of egg whites, confectioner's sugar, and cocoa) and a blue icing (made of the same recipe I used in the previous post).  I spread them on the cookies and let it dry overnight.   I made a lot less icing than I had anticipated (probably because of all the extra cookies), so I had to run to the store to buy some more ingredients to make more.  (Just an aside, I had spoken with a friend this week who told me that I used too many ingredients in the sugar cookie icing... and that I should just use egg whites and confectioner's sugar).  So when I was at the store, I decided that instead of buying a lot of ingredients, I'd just pick up some confectioner's sugar and egg beaters and try it her way.  Problem was, I didn't know how much of each item to use.  I thought to myself that it was only 2 ingredients and that I would just mix them together....
     Looking back, this was probably my first mistake.  I mixed up the icing until I thought the consistency looked right.  I started decorating the tops of my cookies, and was having a ridiculous amount of trouble getting the icing out of the tube.  My hand was hurting, the icing was glopping, I was getting really frustrated.  Like, REALLY frustrated.  I thought I had the wrong kind of dispenser, the wrong kind of tips.... I must have ruined at least 10 cookies before realized that the icing needed to be thinner.   At this point, I miiiiight have made the false claim that this was my last time baking, and that I was quitting.... so I'm sorry to my husband for freaking out on him.  I'm not going to put an actual picture of what I looked like, but it was somewhat like this:

    Anyway, I took a break, and when I got back to work, I finally realized that I should thin out the icing.  I added more egg white beater and a little water to the icing, and I was finally able to decorate the cookies the way I wanted to.  The icing was a little thin at this point, but hey, at least it was coming out of the tube.  So, did all that freaking out pay off?  Well no, I shouldn't have gotten so upset about baking cookies.... but.... the cookies came out great, I think.  Thank goodness I had so many extra cookies to practice with.  I'm not going to post the bad ones... but here's how the majority came out.

Snowflake Sugar Cookies

     This was a fun one.  I wanted to make cookies, but I didn't have an occasion, so I searched around my cookie [cutter] jar (a gift from my sister!), and I found a great snowflake-shaped cookie cutter than I have had yet to try!  I whipped up sugar cookie dough like a pro... found a great recipe online http://allrecipes.com/recipe/the-best-rolled-sugar-cookies/.  I rolled out the dough, and as soon as I started to use the cookie cutter, I realized right away that I would have a new challenge.

     The snowflake was so intricate that it would be hard to get the cut dough from the wax paper onto the tray!  After cutting 5 snowflakes, I carefully picked up the entire piece of wax paper and flipped it as fast as I could onto the tray.  Then I realized that there was no way I could maneuver it so that all the cookies would wind up sitting perfectly.  I decided to do 2 snowflakes at a time (having to re-roll pieces of the dough for each 2 cookies). This took a while, but it was worth it.  All of my snowflakes were intact!  I cooked each tray for 5 1/2 minutes (30 seconds less than the recommended 6-8 minutes).  


     The next day, it was time to tackle my biggest challenge yet... whipping up a sugar cookie frosting that would be easy to decorate with.  I found the following recipe online:

\
• 
  
• 1 cup confectioners' sugar
• 2 teaspoons milk
• 2 teaspoons light corn syrup
• 1/4 teaspoon almond extract
• assorted food coloring
• 
  
•      This recipe got 4 1/2 out of 5 stars (with almost 2,000 reviews).  Seemed like a winner.  I bought the ingredients.. (An aside:  A lady at the supermarket stopped me to ask me what I was making with the Caro Light Corn Syrup.  She had apparently worked for the company and that was one of their "least popular" products.  How random).  Anyway, I bought the ingredients, blended them together by hand, and wound up with yet another clumpy mess.  I must have made it wrong, I thought.  I made 2 more servings- this time blending in my mixer.  Same problem.  I reread some of the reviews, looking for some guidance.  Most said the frosting was "perfect as is," but someone did say they had to play around with the amounts to get the right consistency.  And another person said they doubled the milk and corn syrup.  So I thought to myself, I can fix this!  I combined the servings to make 3, and I added dashes of milk and corn syrup until the consistency looked right.  At this point, it actually looked great!  I split the frosting into 2 bowls to make dark blue and a light blue frosting.  The consistency of this frosting actually came out perfect for decorating my snowflakes.  I wish I can remember exactly how much I put of everything!  That's a task for next time I suppose.
• 
  
•     As for the taste, the sugar cookie itself it quite delicious, and I'm not sure I want to change a thing.  For the frosting, the jury is still out on using almond extract.  I think next time I make that frosting, I will use vanilla extract and try to compare.  I need some more taste testers before I can make a final decision.        
•     
•     As for the decoration, I will let the picture speak for itself!
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•     

Eleni's New York

I took a walk with my hubby and pup (Justin and Topanga) this weekend, and I came across an unexpected surprise.  We passed an adorable bakery called Eleni's New York.  I went inside (bought a coffee so I didn't like a weird stalker girl staring at everything), and fell in love.  The style, the pink and white colors, the hundreds of sugar cookies in the window... exactly the kind of bakery I would love to have.  

     Although they sell cookies, cupcakes, and coffees, the primary focus of the bakery is sugar cookies, decorated in a hundred different ways.  They had pre-made boxes with themes... (10 cookies that had to do with ballet, 20 cookies for a birthday etc.) packaged perfectly with a clear top and a ribbon.

Here is a picture I took of the store's main counter.

     After leaving the bakery and chatting with Justin, I came to a revelation, and a new direction for this blog.  For now, I'm going to focus on sugar cookies, and sugar cookies alone.  I'm going to perfect the recipe for taste (cookie and icing too), and perfect the style and technique for the decorating.  Once they are perfect, I'll start with variations.  From now on, even though I haven't yet tasted their cookies, Eleni's New York will be my inspiration.

   

Peanut Butter Follow Up

Here's the finished product of the peanut butter cookies.  Still a bit dry, but the chocolate frosting definitely helped the taste!  One of my friends even called them "addicting" :)