October 26, 2010
It is finally Autumn. The air spirals out of chilly noses in the mornings wisping into swirls of steam as children hurriedly rush to school. I’ve got my mug on my desk always filled with tea and a bit of honey, and there is that renewed sense of energy that everyone gets when the lazy days of Summer are over. The leaves are yellow and orange, one last burst of colorful energy, desperately trying to hang on to the unforgiving branches of the trees. We are in the last few days of glistening in the sunshine before the long gray Winter decides to take up residence for a while on the edge of our little lac, nestled up against the already snow-covered Alps.
August 5, 2010
Flour-based cookies seem to be my gluten free nemesis. I’ve never gotten sugar cookies right, and my chocolate chip ones just turn into a flat melty mess unless I bake them in a bowl to become a mini cookie cake – sometimes, one has to get creative and work with the failures. But these I am determined to convert, and convert with resounding success. I started working on the recepe development to adapt a family recipe for peanut butter cookies. It’s been, well, let’s just say it’s been educational.
It took six. Six batches. Yes, it took six different trials of baking cookies – mixing together dough, carefully rolling out each rounded cookie, smashing them down with a fork oh so gently, slipping into the oven and saying a little prayer to the gluten free gods. And with each new batch, the disappointment intensified. I tried different flours, different ratios, different cooking times. And I ended up with a giant bowl full of all the crumbled memories of peanut butter cookie failures, each begging me not to end their fleeting existence with a trip to the rubbish bin (don’t worry, they didn’t, the ended up on top of ice cream instead). But, by the time I got through to batch #6, I had cookies. Rich, softish peanut buttery goodness, gluten free. And the disappointments from all the previous failures turned into pure joy. They are not quite as awesome as my dad’s grandmother’s famous cookies (well, famous in our family), but they are close. Oh they are so close.
