Posts Tagged ‘lemon’

Time for cookie #4 in the Christmas cookie list. No, those aren’t mini bagels. And no, they’re not mini donuts either! They’re cookies!

This is a simple cookie with a lot of frills and froufrou to dress it up. It’s a nice simple lemon cookie with lemon glaze, but it’s just so pretty. And sometimes (let’s face it), that’s what holiday baking is all about.

I strayed from Martha’s recipe a bit because my dough came out incredibly sticky when I was done, so I added a bit more flour, chilled it overnight, and did a double glaze to get that great bright white color on top. I love the little white nonpareils on top since they look like snow (and add great texture), but if you really wanted to push the wreath idea, green and red would also be super fun.

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I don’t know about you – but I am so over winter. The snow has been beautiful, the root veggies have been great, the sweaters comfortable, but I am dying for sunlight and sandals and summer produce!

Thankfully, spring is en route, and these lemon bars are a perfect transition into the season. Using good winter citrus and a buttery shortbread crust, but still getting that zing found in fresh fruit desserts, they toe the line perfectly between the seasons, as we are doing right now.

My special addition here is limoncello, a traditional Italian digestif made from steeping lemon zest in alcohol and then adding sugar. We used to make it in-house at Lidia’s but you can find it at any liquor store. However, if you’re trying to save money, just sub the limoncello with lemon juice and they’re still molto deliziosa.

Bright and sunny!

Such an odd measuring spoon, but I love it.

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One of the things I miss most about living near my family is Sunday dinner.  When I was living at home, it was always something I looked forward to, and it was my weekly chance to show off a little and make something extra scrumptious and more time-consuming than any other weeknight meal.

This is one of the most thumbed, stained recipes in my Ina Garten cookbook, and for good reason.  It’s a really simple dish – just the classic pan-fried pounded chicken with lemon-butter sauce.  I just love a lemon beurre blanc and Ina’s is so fantastic, I don’t change much and it’s one of the easiest ways to learn how to work with acid and butter.

One of the other great things about the recipe is that it halves or multiplies very easily, so you can make this for 2 or 4 or 8 easily every time. I like serving a nice pasta tossed simply with good olive oil and herbs on the side, but you can also serve rice or just a fresh salad too.

When I was an intern in Meredith Corporation’s food dept, one of the most fun, exciting days was when I got to help the test kitchen prepare the Thanksgiving spread tasting panel for Better Homes &  Gardens.  Sure, it was about 98º outside in the sweltering July heat and the last thing most of us wanted to eat was turkey, gravy and all the fix-ins, but it was still so fun and, well, delicious, because we worked with recipes from Scott Peacock and his book The Gift of Southern Cooking.  Co-written with Edna Lewis, the quintessential southern soul food cook, every recipe we tried was outstanding.  Amazing.  Even the jello with cucumbers in it (yes, seriously).  I can’t even begin to describe the awesomeness of the gravy and the butternut squash soup, which is still one of my all-time favorite things I have ever eaten in my life.

After that day my ears would always perk up if I heard either of their names, or I would always save a recipe if I saw it was from either of them.  I’ve had this cookie recipe saved for awhile after seeing it in Gourmet ages ago, and finally got around to making it last night.  I love buttermilk to death (it goes in pancakes, hello), but it really is one of those odd ingredients you don’t see used much anymore.  I was excited to try it in a very simple recipe where I hoped it would really shine.

The cookies have a very soft, almost cake-like texture with a very lightly crispy bottom and the flavor is very subtle.  I added more buttermilk to the icing to really get that tangy flavor going, and the overall taste is something airy, buttery and not overly sweet.  The original recipe suggests pairing them with a glass of lemonade which turns out to be a brilliant suggestion because all it does is bring out the zest in the cookies (and icing, in my case).  If you really want to go all out, try pairing them with a Pimm’s cup made with lemonade after a heavy meal — what a perfect appertif on a hot summer evening.