Gingerbread biscotti and a plane to catch

Well, Raymond and I are scooting off to the Midwest for a week.

Our bags are not packed, my Portland Christmas gifts are not distributed, and I forgot to get a haircut. Still, haircut or no haircut, we're leaving tomorrow after lunch. Oh boy. I hope all of our family's presents will make it through airport security. I've read too many TSA horror stories online, and now I'm terrified of the whole process.


Raymond and I held our small gift exchange last night--just the two of us--while listening to a set of Readers Digest records called Christmas Through the Years. Raymond and his family used to listen to them during the holidays. We drank Swiss Miss coca, let the kitties play in our wrapping paper, and enjoyed each other's company...and our presents. It was perfectly cozy and relaxed. Santa brought me a book shelf. Perhaps you spied it in the above photo. Santa used all of my wrapping paper for that one.

I bought a Don Draper-style hat for Raymond, among other things. He really loves this hat. He hasn't taken it off yet. That hat will probably remain firmly perched on his head through our entire vacation. I'm OK with that. He looks handsome wearing it.


This morning, we're busy packing and cleaning to prepare for two house guests who will watch the kitties while we're gone. I love house swaps; when Raymond and I get to Kansas, we'll house sit for Elise, who is going to Arizona for the holidays. Everybody wins, and nobody has to pay for a hotel on the week of Christmas. I'm leaving some biscotti for our guests and taking some more to Kansas with me. If you've got an hour, perhaps you'd like to make some, too.


Don't worry; the gingerbread flavor doesn't overpower the cookie. Despite its name, these gingerbread biscotti taste like a crunchy Italian cookie instead of a heavy, buttery holiday monstrosity. It's cookie, not cake. The white chocolate and cardamom just add another layer of heavenly taste. I hope these gifts reach their destination. I may not be able to resist snacking on the plane. I'm terrible about that....

Merry Christmas and happy holidays to all of you there in Cyberland. Party it up good!


Gingerbread biscotti with white chocolate-cardamom icing
makes 20 crazy-sized cookies
or 30 sane-person cookies

Cookies

• 1/2 cup olive oil (the fruitier, the better)
• 1 cup sugar, minus 2 Tb.
• 2 Tb. dark molasses
  
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 4 drops clove oil
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups whole wheat baking flour
• 2 tsp. baking powder
• 1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 1 tsp. ginger
• 1/2 tsp. nutmeg

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit. Cream together olive oil, sugar, and molasses in a large bowl. Beat the heck out of it with a whisk. Beat in the eggs, clove oil, and vanilla. Set aside.

Mix together flours, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger in another bowl. Mix dry ingredients into the wet batter until just combined. Stir in the walnuts.

Grease a cookie sheet. Form 2 - 3 logs of dough on the sheet, spaced several inches apart. Make sure log is 3 - 4" wide (the dough will spread while baking.) Bake the biscotti for 15 minutes at 375 degrees, then lower temperature to 350 degrees. Bake for another 20 minutes (15 for 3 loaves.) Loaves should be a light golden brown on the outside.

Remove from oven. Use a sharp, thin-bladed knife to quickly (and gently!) slice 1/2 - 3/4" cookies. Turn the cookies on their side and bake for five minutes more. Flip the cookies and repeat. Cool on a wire baking rack.


Icing

• 4 oz. white chocolate (or an entire Ghiradelli baking bar)
  
• 4 drops cinnamon oil
  
• 1 tsp. cardamom
• 2 - 5 Tb. half & half

Create a double boiler on your stove top to melt the white chocolate. Nestle a small saucepan into a larger saucepan that's 2/3-full of simmering water. Slowly melt the white chocolate in the small saucepan.

Measure the powdered sugar into a bowl. Once the chocolate is melted, carefully whisk it into the sugar. Add cinnamon oil, cardamom, and 2 Tb. cream. Keep whisking and adding cream 1 Tb. at a time until you have the icing consistency of your choice.

Brush icing onto cookies or biscotti with a pastry brush. Let sit at room temperature for at least an hour to set.

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy:
Almond biscotti with lemon icing
Chocolate chip biscotti with orange
Pumpkin cream cheese muffins

We like pie

Hi there.

Can you tell me why December is almost halfway over? Where does time go?


How are those holiday baking plans going? You know, the plans: the demanding, over-the-top, "I will show everyone I've ever met exactly how much I love them through baked goods and they will love me forever" rigmarole you promised you wouldn't fall for this year?

Yeah, mine are kicking my ass, too. Why do I spend so much time on marthastewart.com? That perfect life is unachievable, unless your name is Martha Stewart and you've parlayed "the good life" into a career. She's a smart lady.

I'm also a smart lady, but I my life isn't Martha Stewart Living. To honor that distinction, I'm abandoning my plans to make peppermint icicles, a gingerbread cheesecake, caramels, AND a salted peanut brittle, wrapped prettily in home-made paper, with handwritten cards for all....and with only ten days before we fly to Denver. Whew! That felt good. (Raymond and I are going to Kansas and Colorado for Christmas; I'm certain the cheesecake wouldn't make it through airport security. The TSA may view candy icicles as a threat.)

The pressure to make new treats with new recipes involving expensive ingredients and clever packaging--each year--drives me insane! I always push off holiday baking 'till the last minute, with no time for a back-up plan. What a recipe for disaster.

So, instead of foisting another exotic holiday recipe on you today, I offer a recipe for comfort food, made with ingredients you have in your pantry and freezer. Have you tried your hand at turkey pot pies? Forget about Marie Calendar. If you've got an afternoon to an invest and a keen desire to clean your freezer of leftovers, you can make enough pot pies to power through the winter.


To create these pies, Kristen and I borrowed Neighbor Brian's kitchen for an afternoon. (Brian's a hardworking pharmacist who almost never cooks in his immaculate kitchen.) Kristen and I envied his clear counter space. What a good sport! Brian kept us company while we cooked, played some rockin' Beatles tunes, and offered to run to Safeway for soda and wine. We fed him lots of pot pie.

In three hours, Kristen and I baked 12 cupcake-sized turkey pies, a turkey hand pie, and a full-sized turkey pie. We shared the full-sized pie with Brian and our spouses, then divided the rest among ourselves to freeze for later.

I hope you find an afternoon to make these pies. In January, when the peanut brittle and sugar cookies are long gone, it'll be nice to celebrate leftovers and to eat a savory--not sweet--pie.*


Visionary Turkey Pot Pies
makes 12 hand pies or 18 cupcake-sized pies

Filling:

(If you're out of leftover turkey, substitute chicken for pies of equal deliciousness)

• 3 cups cooked turkey, cut into small cubes
• 1 cups celery, chopped
  
• 1 cup cooked carrots, cubed
• 1/2 cup frozen corn
• 1/2 cup green beans, cut into bite-sized pieces
  
• 1 cup cooked onion, chopped
  
• 1/2 cup fresh parsley, chopped
  
• 3 -4 sprigs fresh rosemary
• 2 cups turkey broth
• 1-2 cups turkey gravy (give or take)*

Small note: You can make this filling yourself, but if you enlist a friend to help, one of you can prep filling while the other rolls dough. You'll save a lot of time if you can prepare the dough and filling simultaneously.

Chop your turkey, carrots, celery, onion, and parsley into small, bite-sized pieces. Mix this together into a shallow pan with the frozen corn and the green beans. Toss in some fresh rosemary and a 1/2 tsp. of sea salt, and warm in an oven while you prepare the gravy.

Turkey gravy

(An approximation of Kristen's shoot-from-the-hip, no-measure recipe)

• drippings from a roasted turkey (or 1/4 cup butter)
  
• 2 cups turkey stock, strained
• 4 Tb. flour
• cornstarch (optional)
  
• 1/2 cup Riesling or other white wine
• 1/2 cup cream
• salt or pepper to taste
  

Add drippings (or butter) to a saucepan and warm over medium heat. Quickly whisk in the flour (and, for thicker gravy, 1 tablespoon of cornstarch) making sure there are no bumps or lumps.

When the mixture is smooth and begins to bubble, slowly whisk in the turkey stock and wine. Let the gravy simmer until it thickens, stirring occasionally. Remove the gravy from heat and stir in cream.

Remove the pan of fillings from the oven. Stir in a cup of turkey broth, then a cup of gravy. You may leave the filling like this or stir in up to another two cups of gravy for a "juicier" pie.

Crust:

• 4 cups all-purpose wheat flour
• 1 cups butter or shortening, cold and cut into
  
• 1 1/2 tsp. sea salt
• 6-8 Tb. cold water

Mix together flour and sea salt in a large bowl. Cut in the butter, using either a pastry cutter or two sharp knives, crossed. Mash the butter into the flours until the pieces are pea-sized. Sprinkle a spoonful of cold water over the dough, then toss everything gently with a fork. Repeat this process, one spoonful of water at a time, until the dough is just moistened.

For hand pies: Divide the dough into 12 equally sized balls. Flatten each ball on a lightly floured surface, and roll the dough from the center to the edges into a 6" diameter circle. To transfer the dough circles to a baking sheet, roll each one gently around the rolling pin, and dust the dough occasionally with flour as you roll. Scoop a 1/2 cup of filling into each dough circle; fold the dough over to make a half-circle pie and pinch the edges together. You can fit 4 - 5 hand pies onto each baking sheet.

For cupcakes: Line two cupcake pans with metal cupcake liners and set aside. On a floured surface, roll out the pastry dough to a 1/4" thickness. Use a biscuit cutter (or coffee mug) to cut out dough circles; you'll need about a 5"-diameter circle for each bottom crust and a slightly smaller round for the top crust. Each cupcake-sized pie holds about 1/3 of a cup of filling. As with the hand pies, make sure all the edges are crimped down.

Bake the pies for 30 - 45 minutes at 350 degrees, rotating the pans/sheets halfway through. Allow the pies to cool for at least 10 minutes before serving. Freeze the leftovers in heavy-duty freezer bags after wrapping each pie in plastic wrap.

*Savory, individually sized pies are the rage here in Portland, especially among the city's food carts. In fact, Whiffies Fried Pies deals exclusively in hand pies. My friend, Holly, recently shared an article that claims pie is the new cupcake in food fashion. It's about dang time.

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy:
Gouda mushroom quiche
Maple buttermilk pie
Easy tamale pie

And the winner is....

After using a fool-proof, scientific method............




In which no kitties were harmed (though they were so curious and eager to help that I couldn't get a focused picture...)



I am happy to announce the winners of the Print and Tasty Treat Drawing:



Congratulations, Christa, Lyndsey and Michele! Your names were drawn at random out of a derby hat by me, with the help of my kitty, Calpurnia. I'll be in touch soon to get your mailing addresses.

Thank you all for commenting and reading. There's a post about homemade epic pot pies coming soon!

If you liked this post, you might also enjoy:
Chocolate chip walnut cookies