Tidbits & Nuggets

Fudgy Cookie Trees

December was full of cookies and open houses. I experimented with the brownies I made for the shower in November and created some cookies for a cookie exchange. My nephew served as guinea pig and declared them "better than Hungry Bear cookies" This from a kid who is not big on sweets!

I was going to cut them with a cookie cutter but decided it's more efficient to cut the triangles out like the picture above. I wound up making these a bunch of times leaving off the pecan trunks and making them smaller each time. I tried cheating with the drizzle by using the royal icing I was using to decorate cookies but the icing bled a bit. Don't be lazy - melt the white chocolate and use that. It winds up much nicer. Here's the whole recipe:

Fudgy Cookie Trees

Shortbread crust
1 cup flour
¼ cup powdered sugar
½ cup butter
½ cup pecans.
Preheat oven to 350F and place rack in middle of oven. Line 13 x 9 inch pan with aluminum foil. In food processor with blade combine above ingredients–reserving enough whole pecans to use as tree trunks, or mix first three ingredients with pastry blender or in mixer and chop pecans finely before adding to crust mixture. Pat into lined pan and bake for 10 minutes.

Chocolate Layer
12 ounces best-quality chocolate (I used a mixture of Ghirardelli dark and semi sweet chocolate chips.)
3/4 cup butter
1 1/4 cups sugar
1 tablespoon vanilla
4 large eggs
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup all-purpose flour
Melt chocolate with butter, stirring, until mixture is smooth. Let cool until lukewarm. Stir in sugar, vanilla and eggs, one at a time, stirring well after each addition. Stir in salt and flour, stirring just until combined. Pour into pan and bake for 20-25 minutes, or until a tester comes out with a few crumbs attached. Let cool completely and cut into triangles.

Ganache
6 oz dark chocolate chips
6 oz cream
Heat cream in microwave for 1-2 minutes. Cream should not come to a boil but should be hot throughout. Pour in chocolate chips and let stand for a minute or two. Stir mixture until it is smooth and a uniform color.

Dip the cooled triangles into the ganache. To make tree trunks insert a pecan in the base of each triangle. Decorate with a drizzle of white chocolate, non pariels or dip the sides in more chopped pecans.

I finally got a chance to make some gingerbread snowflakes with the myriad of cutters I've accumulated and added sugar cookie stars and poinsettias. They looked pretty. So pretty that the hostess of the party took issue with two charming little girls taking them off the plate!

When decorating the stars I wanted silver and gold sugar and discovered that the big sugar crystals can be mixed with luster dust with a slightly dampened knife. The results were very sparkly.

I made royal icing to decorate gingerbread and sugar cookies. I use Wilton Color Flow Mix which can be mixed stiff to outline shapes on cookies or diluted to flow. Here are the instructions:
1/4 cup + 1 tsp water
1 lb (4 cups) sifted confectioners sugar
2 Tbsp Wilton Color Flow Mix

Blend all ingredients on low speed for 5 minutes with an electric mixer.
I use the Wilton pastry bags because they are just easier than the parchment triangles. A number 3 tip works best for piping designs.