Gingerbread Brownies. You will want these. Bad.

I found this recipe on Ryan's Baking Blog. He found it in a Martha Stewart Holiday Cooking magazine, which he received as "swag" while visiting the Martha Stewart show. To me, while being in this little small town, that means you're kinda famous. Ryan! You're kinda famous in these parts. I put the word "swag" in parenthesis because until I actually receive "swag" it's more of a novel concept to me than anything, born out of jealousy. All you big time fancy schmancy bloggers out there, just enjoy your "swag!" (I'll get there one day. Really I will.)

When I saw this recipe I knew I was going to make it. So it sat up at the top of my browser window for days; a tab, just hanging out and lurking, waiting to be utilized. Well, that day came - a week or so later - but it did. And I'm glad it did.

Ladies and Gentlemen, allow me to introduce, Gingerbread Brownies!

First things first, Ryan has it listed as a Chocolate Gingerbread Bar. I'm calling it a brownie. I'm just gonna go with it and I hope Ryan (or Martha) doesn't mind. I'm not understanding why it would be called a bar. Just can't wrap my head around it. So I'm gonna run with the brownie title, until a court-ordered injunction arrives. Although if a court-ordered anything arrives, I'll probably do what it says. Until then....

Gingerbread Brownies
Adapted from Ryan's Baking Blog

adapted from Martha Stewart Holiday Cookies Magazine
Makes 9 big brownies

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled, plus more for pan
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder, plus more for pan
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 cup packed dark brown sugar
1/4 cup unsulfured molasses
1 egg, room temperature
1/4 cup sour cream
1/2 cup semisweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter an 8-inch square baking pan. Line the pan with parchment, leaving an overhang on two sides. Butter paper and dust whole pan with cocoa powder, tapping out the excess.

In a medium bowl, sift and whisk together cocoa powder, flour, baking soda, ginger, and pumpkin-pie spice.

In a large bowl, whisk together melted butter, brown sugar, molasses, egg, and sour cream. Add flour mixture, a little at a time, stirring until it is just moistened (do not overmix). Stir in chocolate chips (optional: mix a little cake flour in with the chocolate chips and toss around a bit to coat them, this prevents chocolate chips from sinking to the bottom). Transfer batter to prepared pan and use an offset spatula to smooth the top.

Bake, rotating pan halfway through, about 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool in pan for 5 minutes before moving to a wire rack. Once cooled, cut into 2-inch squares. Bars can be stored in an airtight container at room temperature up to 5 days. If desired, dust with confectioners’ sugar before serving.

Preheat your oven. Yes, it's important. Get out your 8" square baking dish. Hey! I have one of those. I sprayed it with cooking spray and put a piece of parchment paper down so it was hanging off the sides. I sprayed it again with baking spray then dusted the pan - as well as I could - with Ghirardelli Ground Chocolate.  Let me say I was surprised to find I had Hershey's Unsweetened Cocoa in my house since I am of the mind that unsweetened chocolate - in any form - in blasphemous. But I didn't have much so I used the Ghirardelli to do the dusting and saved the unsweetened cocoa for the brownies. Or maybe I'm just making all that up.

I'll pause here to say I don't really know why this step is involved: the parchment and cocoa dusting. Although the brownies did release from the pan wayyyyyyyy easier than you ever thought possible. So I would suggest going ahead and following this step. But if you decide not to, and I won't blame you for a second, I don't think it will make any difference in the amazing flavor and moistness of these amazing bits of Heaven. But I'm jumping ahead...

Next comes the sifting and mixing of the dry ingredients. Here's how I do it:

I put my sifter right in the bowl where the dry ingredients are going to end up. (My favorite sifter is the type with the spinning handle, not so keen on the handle you squeeze over and over and over.)

Then I start measuring the flour. Note: Did you know the proper way to measure flour is to pour into the measuring cup either directly from the container or with a spoon? The air that is within the flour itself is an important component in baking. So you pour the flour into your measuring cup...

Then with a straight edge tool (Read: butter knife) you go back and forth, back and forth over the flour scraping off the excess. Then dump the contents into the sifter that is already placed over your bowl.

Notice that baking pan underneath the measuring cup? That is a staple to all my baking. I set that down and measure everything over it then I can just dump the pan off into the trashcan when I'm done. Virtually no mess. At least not on the counters. It's a perfect catchall for everything else too: broken eggshells, utensils that are mucky, butter wrappers, anything!

This recipe calls for Pumpkin Spice. Don't fret if you don't have any. Remember this gem of a post? Pumpkin Spice. Who knew? Problem solved.

Now you have all your dry ingredients sittin in your nifty sifter just waiting to get to work.

Work it!

Right here, the smell is incredible! Then grab your whisk and mix up that little powdery dreamscape.

Now for adding the liquid part. At this point I realized I had started with too small a bowl, so I did a quick relocation. No biggie. *In another bowl, a smaller one, we are going to mix all the liquid ingredients together. Add the melted butter.

Another note: I always break my eggs in a separate dish. I have fished enough eggshells out of batter, I could probably pave the driveway... and then some! And I just use another dish that I've already dirtied in the process. Here is the bowl I melted the butter in.

I think molasses in baked goods is always a pleasant touch. Normally I am not keen on measuring a liquid in a dry ingredient measuring cup, but I'm pretty lazy and I couldn't fathom imposing on my crystal clear clean liquid measuring cup for a lousy 1/4 of cup. Now, had the result not turned out the way it did I would probably be on my second batch using the proper measuring tool.

Mix it all up really well. I use the same whisk I mixed up the dry ingredients with.

I jumped ahead and got the chocolate chips ready. The recipe mentioned something interesting: cover the chocolate chips with a small amount of cake flour to keep them from sinking in the brownie mixture. Well, since I go through spells and a spell I had last summer was baking cakes, I just happened to have some cake flour so I thought I would give it a try.

I really do believe that if you do not add this step, I think you will be juuuuuuust fine.

This next mixing part can be a make or break step in brownies. This and the over-baking part. So let me walk you through this carefully. You are slowly going to add the dry ingredients to the liquid ingredients. So shake a little in - maybe a third of the bowl - then mix. At this point go ahead and grab a big wooden spoon or a rubber spatula. The batter gets thick and will stick in your whisk. The goal is to not mix it completely. I don't know why but a great tip I found recently is to mix until you can still see a little bit of flour. Does that make any sense at all? Lemme see if I can show you.

So we are mixing it all nice at first, gently but thoroughly. I added the chocolate chips at this point because I knew I would need to do more stirring to get them mixed in but did NOT want to over mix. It's getting thick so I'm going to grab my rubber spatula.

This is where I stopped. It's tough to see the flour because it's brown with the cocoa but you can still barely see some dry stuff in there.

I put it in the pan and smoothed it as much as I could. It was not easy with the cooking spray and cocoa the parchment was sliding everywhere and I was scared batter was heading down under the paper. So I pretty much left it as is and figured I couldn't go wrong at this point. Again, the smell is incredible!!!! Thanks again Ryan!

The recipe said 30-35 minutes, but I think I had to add at least an additional 5 - 7 minutes. Brownies are A) easy to overbake and B) hard to tell when they are done sometimes. These seemed done because the stick came out clean and the edges looked nice and dry. (Although the picture doesn't really show that.)

I let the pan cool for a bit. I'm sure I had children to retrieve from the tops of bookshelves or solicitors to scare off. The parchment paper sure did make it easy to pull up and out. Although I still can't decide if it was worth it. I don't see why not though. Sheesh! I can argue with myself all day long.

I made two even cuts in each direction making nine brownies. This was almost too big - even for me! The taste is exquisite. The gingerbread flavor is subtle but powerful. These brownies are moist and cake like. Yes, they are now added to my arsenal. Thanks again, Ryan!

Did you know... when transporting mashed taters...

...when needing to tote some of the most amazing mashed potatoes from a recipe by The Pioneer Woman, the finished product fits perfectly into one of these:

In my defense, this is the last of the cookie buckets I have around the house. Promise. Back in the beginning and the testing phases of Oh Katie! Cookies, I was using this particular cookie dough. I tried many and Nestle was the absolute best, I tell ya! Thankfully these big buckets were sold at Costco. So we had many buckets all over the house left over from those days.

In fact, this picture is from the baby's birth, at home. It was so awesome! My husband used those buckets to pour warm water over my back. Thanks dear.

 

 

Today our oldest son is having a Thanksgiving Feast at school and I signed up to make the mashed taters. Hence, peeling and cooking potatoes at 7:00AM. No worries. I love creating food that makes others happy. I used the very last cookie bucket we had left in the house and it fit perfectly.

If you don't have your potato dish set for Thursday, I highly recommend PW's recipe. It's amazing!

All that is right and wrong with the world: Coffee Cookie Dough Fudge Cheesecake

I've recently gotten more into Twitter. And in doing so I have come across some amazing recipes and some fabulous people willing to share them and walk you through how they do it.

A recent discovery is Julie of Willow Bird Baking. Julie is a bright and cheerful young lady who is passionate about all things baking. The difference between Julie and I is Julie actually invents her recipes - and they are amazing! Whereas, I am just a newbie still learning about all this baking stuff anyway. I find a recipe and can create it. Granted, with my Oh Katie! Cookies, that's been an experience of testing and trying new things out. So I guess I should give myself a little bit of credit. But I'm nooooo Julie! And that's OK.

Last week I watched a video she posted. It was for a contest, I think. It was fun to watch. Extremely informative and walked the viewer right through the steps of making amazing cheesecakes while making it look fairly easy. Correction: "Flippin Awesome Cheesecakes."

Having never made a cheesecake before, I felt empowered with this information. Sunday was a beautiful, chilly, rainy day with two out of the three kids with Oma and Opa. The perfect baking day - while drinking many pots of coffee because that's just the kind of day it was.

Because I had the ingredients for the Coffee Cookie Dough Fudge Cheesecake, I thought I got this! Then I started looking more closely at all the steps and I started feeling more and more lazy. Maybe I could just sit and watch football in front of the fire with the hubby while the baby napped instead? Fine! I ranted. I'll make it! to no one in particular.

This is an all day process. At least it was for me. Well, "all day" meaning I started around 2 and we had a slice after dinner around 7. ALL DAY, I tell ya!

Cookie Dough Fudge Cheesecake

---

Recipe by: Willow Bird Baking, adapted from Annies’ Eats’ Cappucino Fudge Cheesecake with eggless cookie dough by Family Fun

Yields: one 9-inch cheesecake
Crust Ingredients:
32 chocolate sandwich cookies, finely processed into crumbs
5 1/3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled
Small pinch of salt

Ganache Ingredients:
1½ cups heavy cream
20 oz. bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped (I combined both)

Filling Ingredients:
3 (8 oz.) packages cream cheese, at room temperature
1 cup sugar
1½ tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 tablespoons instant coffee granules
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1½ teaspoons mild-flavored (light) molasses
3 large eggs

Topping Ingredients:
1½ cups sour cream
1/3 cup sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Cookie Dough Layer Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
3/4 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
4 to 6 tablespoons water (I used 4)

Directions:
To make the crust, butter a 9-inch springform pan. Combine the chocolate cookie crumbs, melted butter and salt in a small bowl. Toss with a fork to moisten all of the crumbs. Press into a thin layer covering the bottom and sides of the springform pan (at least 3 inches up the sides). I did this using a smooth glass to press crumbs into place.

Bring the cream to a simmer in a medium saucepan. Place the chocolate in a medium bowl. Once the cream reaches a simmer, pour the cream over the chocolate and let stand 1-2 minutes. Whisk in small circles until a smooth ganache has formed. Pour 1.5-2 cups of the ganache over the bottom of the crust. Freeze until the ganache layer is firm, about 30 minutes. Reserve the remaining ganache; cover and let stand at room temperature for later decorating.

Preheat the oven to 350˚ F and position a rack in the middle of the oven. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese and sugar on medium-high speed until well blended. Beat in the flour. In a small bowl, combine the coffee granules, vanilla and molasses, stirring until the coffee dissolves. Add to the cream cheese mixture and beat until well incorporated, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed. Beat in the eggs one at a time, scraping down the bowl between each addition.

Pour the filling over the cold ganache in the crust. Enclose the bottom of the springform pan in tightly wrapped foil and place it in a baking dish. Fill the baking dish with hot water about halfway up the cheesecake pan, careful not to let the moisture touch the cheesecake. Bake until the top is lightly browned, puffed and cracked at the edges, and the center moves only very slightly when the pan is lightly shaken, about 1 hour. Transfer to a wire cooling rack. Cool 15 minutes while preparing the topping (maintaining the oven temperature.)

To make the topping, whisk together the sour cream, sugar and vanilla in a small bowl. Pour the topping over the hot cheesecake, spreading to cover the filling completely. Bake until the topping is set, about 10-15 minutes. Return to the cooling rack and let cool at room temperature for at least 30 minutes. Transfer to the refrigerator and let cool at least 3 hours, until completely chilled and set.

To make cookie dough layer, cream together the butter and sugar in a large bowl. Stir in the flour, salt, vanilla and chips. Add the water, one tablespoon at a time, until you have reached a cookie dough consistency. Line a 9-inch cake pan with parchment paper. Spoon the cookie dough into the pan and flatten to an even layer. Freeze the cookie dough layer until ready to use (at least 30 minutes).

To finish, wrap a warm towel around the outside of the springform pan to help loosen the crust from the sides. Carefully remove the springform. Transfer the cake to a serving platter. Turn cookie dough out of cake pan and place layer on top of cheesecake, pressing it gently into place. Place the reserved ganache in a pastry bag fitted with a decorative tip and use to garnish the top of the cake as desired. Chill until the ganache is completely firm, at least 6 hours.

And so it began. Beginning with the crust. My springform pan is slightly larger than what the recipe called for and I only had enough Oreos chocolate sandwich cookies for the smaller recipe.

I knew I would come up short in the crust area but I wasn't gonna let that stop me. Also, more than half of the Oreos chocolate sandwich cookies are the holiday version with the neon red (has to be poisonous) creamy center. So my crust has a slight red tinge to it. Who cares.

In Julie's video, she has the most perfect glass for compacting the cookie crumbs into the pan. I gotta find me one of those. I did the best I could with the flattest-bottomed glass I could find:

I abandoned this pretty quickly and just used my hands. You know, your (clean) hands often make the best tools in baking.

As I suspected I came up a little short on the crust department, but I really couldn't see how that would effect the final product. It didn't.

Next came a very interesting aspect of the cheesecake making aspect. One that is not found in most recipes. Typically at this point, I would put the crust into the oven and bake it for 10 or 12 minutes to set the crust. In Julie's recipe, however, and it appears to be this way in most of her cheesecake recipes, she creates a ganache and pours it on top of the crust instead of baking it.

The ganache was so simple and it was beautiful.

Soooo pretty! I will now be making a ganache and applying to everything. I think.


After pouring it over the crust and smoothing it a bit, the pan goes into the freezer to chill out for about 30 minutes. In the mean time, start making the filling. Which I have no pictures of. Pretty straight forward.

The most, the MOST important detail about making a cheesecake: your cream cheese and eggs must be room temperature. Must! There is no getting around this. If they are not, your filling will be lumpy and just plain pathetic!

Another important note when mixing your filling: scrape down the mixing bowl often. What do I mean by scrape down? Turn off the mixer, let down the bowl, and with a flat silicone spatula rub all the goo off the sides and bottom of the bowl and wipe it back on the mixing blade.

Glad we are all clear on that. Next important note on cheesecake baking (OK I didn't realize there were so many) water bath. Cheesecakes need water baths. They crave the extra moisture while baking. They just do. I didn't have any aluminum foil so I filled a large roasting pan halfway and put it just under the cheesecake in the oven. Perfect!

I felt so nervous about how long to bake it for and how to tell if it's really done or not. The directions are pretty clear: "lightly browned, puffed and cracked at the edges, and the center moves only very slightly when the pan is lightly shaken, about one hour." I still chew off several fingernails debating whether or not to take it out.

 Because I like to jump ahead, I made the first topping. There are two. So I mixed up the sour cream/sugar topping and was ready for it when it came out the first time. I applied it and smoothed it a bit. Then it went back in the oven.

This is my little scout making sure I have it all in there correctly. Yep, I do. I hope.
After this is done, it hangs out on a cooling rack for about 30 minutes. Then goes into the fridge for 3 hours. Told you it was an all day ordeal.

While that's happening, you then make the next topping: eggless cookie dough. It was so yummy and interesting! I would love to see if this batter actually bakes cookies or what they would be like. It goes into a pan then freezes.

Since I have a larger than normal springform pan, I knew a regular 9" pie pan would not work for the cookie dough topping. So here's what I did:

Tee hee. Hey, it works!












When dinner was over - and with my husband's help - I assembled everything and did some decorating with the left over ganache. Such a new and fun word!

 Here's the newborn cheesecake wrapped in her warm blankie....

 

So this is what the crust should do. And it did. On just this one part.

This is basically what it did on the rest of it. Again, I just can't possibly see how that would interfere with anything.

 At this point my husband kept glancing at me wondering why I was torturing him so, knowing I was not quite done.



There are no words from here on out.... Enjoy!

Not quite sure how I feel about this one. Velveeta in fudge??

A couple weeks ago a super nice woman that works with my husband - who knows I love to bake - handed me a recipe and said, It's gonna gross you out, but trust me, it's really good. The recipe was called peanut butter cheese fudge. Interesting. Always up for a challenge, I accepted. Until I scanned the first ingredient: half pound of Velveeta.

I think my skin crawled and I wretched. Velveeta in fudge?! She said she thinks it was a Paula Deen recipe, that it may be a "southern thing." Turns out, it just might be.

Ingredients:

1/2 lb sliced easy-melt cheese (recommended: Velveeta)
1 cup (2 sticks) butter
1 cup creamy peanut butter
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chopped nuts
2 (16 ounce) boxes confectioners’ sugar

Directions

Lightly spray the bottom of a 9 by 2-inch square pan with nonstick cooking spray. In a saucepan over medium heat, melt cheese and butter together, then add peanut butter and stir until smooth. Remove from heat and add vanilla and nuts.
Empty confectioners’ sugar into a large bowl and pour cheese mixture over sugar. Stir until completely mixed. Candy will be very stiff.
Using your hands, remove candy from the bowl and press evenly and firmly into the pan. Because of the amount of butter in this recipe, pat top of candy with a paper towel to remove excess oil. Place the pan in refrigerator until candy is firm.

To serve, cut into squares.
Servings: 36 squares
Prep Time: 10 min
Cook Time: Allow 15-20 minutes to cool in refrigerator
Difficulty: Easy
Show: Paula's Home Cooking/ Nov/Dec 2005 issue

Had to run to the grocery store to grab some crunchy peanut butter (we're a smooth peanut butter kinda family) and, the V word. I think I actually whispered to the friendly clerk, "Velveeta" while glancing around to make sure we were alone. Aisle 5. Noted. One pound box of Velveeta was smaller than I thought. Shew!

Began the process by melting a full cup of butter (2 sticks) and chopped up the pasteurized processed cheese spread and adding it to the pan to melt as well.

Eventually it began to melt and congeal as I stirred.

The amount of oil was just plain frightening.

Mixed in the peanut butter and it mixed and stirred nicely. You are almost done at this point. Wow, that was easy.

Then comes the absurd amount of powdered sugar. I have never made fudge before. Is this typical?

Mix it all together trying not to let your children see lest they want to actually ingest it.

Simple enough. Then just put it in a 9" square pan. Slather it a bit. Then into the fridge it goes.

It was actually fine. As I was cutting it in teeny tiny squares I had a crumb or two. It was actually very good. The recipe even mentions the crazy amount of oil and probably needing to wipe some off the top when you put it in the dish, but I didn't have that problem. Which is a amazing, because....

Until I began typing this - five minutes ago - I never realized the recipe only called for HALF a pound of Velveeta. Whoa! That makes a huge difference. No wonder I was so grossed out. I wonder if I'll ever make it again to find out.

Well, I just came across this, uh, interesting, picture. So why don't we all just ponder on this bizarreness of this picture and then the idea of making fudge with Velveeta won't seem so bizarre after all!

Sugar-Rimmed Margarita Cookies. Say it with me: Hell Ya!

I have no recollection of how I came across a particular website which randomly brought me to this amazing sounding recipe of Sugar-Rimmed Margarita Cookies, but I did, and I don't regret anything about it.

There was some luring of a contest, oh yes, this one. And then some cookie search thingamajig, and, well, I just don't know how it happened. What I do know is when this recipe entered my eyes and then my brain, all was right in the world.

When I scanned the ingredients list wondering what exactly would make it a "margarita" cookie, there was only one spice that I did not have. One that I had never worked with or heard of before: rubbed sage. What is rubbed sage? According to my in-depth research, it's sage.... that has been rubbed in between fingers... so to speak. I feel complete with that answer.

I even had the lime! Which is really unheard of, but for some reason I purchased a lime recently.

Without further adieu, here are the ingredients and instructions:

Makes 5 dozen or 20 (3 cookie) servings.
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Refrigerate Time: 1 hour
Cook Time: 12 to 15 minutes per batch

INGREDIENTS

2 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup (1 1/2 sticks) butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1 tablespoon finely grated lime peel
1 teaspoon McCormick® Pure Orange Extract
1 teaspoon McCormick® Sage, Rubbed
1/4 cup sanding sugar
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
Tequila Glaze (recipe follows)

DIRECTIONS

1. Mix flour and 1/4 teaspoon salt in medium bowl. Beat butter and granulated sugar in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed until light and fluffy. Add egg, lime peel, extract and sage; beat until well blended. Gradually beat in flour mixture until well mixed. Divide dough in half. Form each half into a log about 1 1/2 inches in diameter and 9 inches long. Wrap in wax paper.

2. Refrigerate 1 hour or until firm.

3. Preheat oven 350°F. Mix sanding sugar and kosher salt. Roll each cold dough log in mixture to coat evenly. Cut dough into 1/4-inch thick slices. Place on ungreased baking sheets.

4. Bake 12 to 15 minutes or until lightly browned around edges. Cool on baking sheets 1 minute. Remove to wire racks; cool completely. Drizzle Glaze over cooled cookies. Let stand until glaze is set.

Tips

Tequila Glaze: 1 cup confectioners’ sugar, and 1 tablespoon each water and tequila in small bowl until smooth. (Or omit tequila and use 2 tablespoons water.)

Test Kitchen Tip: Sanding sugar, also know as decorator’s sugar, is a large crystal sugar that will not dissolve when baked. It can be found in the baking aisle of some groceries, housewares and craft stores, and online specialty stores.

I did everything as listed.  Oh! The one other thing I did not have but easily jumped out at me at the grocery store was sanding sugar. OK, so I didn't exactly get "sanding sugar" but I did get the red colored decorative sugar and someone please tell me how that is any different? (cue crickets.) Exactly.

I mixed the dough which is very much a shortbread dough. Split it in two and rolled it up in wax paper. Into the fridge it went while I picked up my son from school then drove through the drive-thru liquor store to get the smallest bottle of tequila I could find to make the glaze. You should see the games I play when I go there. I am terrified they think I'm a lush.

In recent weeks I had a cookie order for Amaretto flavor and I was out of amaretto. I had to go through the drive-thru liquor store at 8:00AM! I was so embarrassed and nervous. Quite ridiculous really. "I bake with it!" I think I yelled, in hopes they would never *ever* guess that I ever drank alcohol of any sort. (Is this my second glass of wine or third?)

After we returned home I pre-heated the oven and got the sugar ready. Found it interesting that there is a 1/4 tsp of Kosher salt mixed with the sugar. I don't question these things. Just go with it after making a mental note. This was my first experience of rolling up a dough, chilling it, then slicing and baking. It was so stinkin easy! And made such pretty slices, especially with the brilliant red sugar (and salt!) on the "rim."

Must add this major detail: the dough was so good that it was dangerous. It was the kind of dough where you wanted to leave the last scoop in the mixing bowl just so you could eat it.

No worries. When you are slicing the chilled tube of cookie dough, you very well can't use the ends, right? (I have no idea why, but they just weren't up to par so me, my husband, and one son all ate the ends.) It tastes amazing!

I just found this pretty, after slicing.

Not perfect circle. I could have tried harder.

They seemed to wake a while longer to bake than was indicated. No biggie. It takes what it takes.

I liked the little speckles that were a part of the cookies due to the grated lime peel and the rubbed sage. And the bright red looked excellent, I think.

So the recipe gives you the option of making the tequila glaze with or without the tequila. USE TEQUILA! It's amazing! When you first make the glaze, the smell is absolutely overwhelming and you wonder if you'll get a DUI driving to get the mail. But then you (naturally) lick the whisk you use to make the glaze and it is the most subtle amazing flavor. Trying the first cookie right after the glaze is applied in one experience, and waiting a few hours while the tequila evaporates some, is entirely different experience.

I literally told my husband he could not try a cookie since he was on his way into work - the smell was so strong. Wonder how often I can use that one before he catches on.

I'm not yet really good at the fancy shmancy decorating yet. One day I might be, I really don't care. The glaze in *on* the cookie. That's what matters, right?

And here they are all ready to go to my Uncle Keith's birthday party tomorrow. Where I am sure someone will make a comment on how I am "always" baking with alcohol. Where I will then go find this box of cookies and lick off all the frosting out of spite.