Two Spoonfuls: Oreos

Okay, so you all know by now that I'm packing up my house to move to Washington (in 3 weeks!), so I'm gonna cheat a little this week. I should be working on "The Straight Dough Method" according to our friend Alton Brown. I just couldn't find the time to not only read through the 54 page chapter, but to bake bread as well. Sorry. Instead, I'm going to summon up my previously learned Alton Brown skills and make homemade Oreos, hooray!!

I found this recipe on a blog I like to read called The Cupcake Project. The writer of The Cupcake Project got the recipe from Laurie of Heaven is Chocolate, Cheese, and Carbs. Laurie got the recipe from Smitten Kitchen, who got the recipe from the book Retro Desserts by Wayne Brachman, and you're getting it from me! Now that's passing it on, eh?


Homemade Oreo Cookies

The Chocolate Wafers

• 1 1/4 Cup all-purpose flour
• 1/2 Cup unsweetened cocoa
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 Cup sugar
• 1/2 Cup plus 2 Tbs unsalted butter, at room temperature
  
• 1 large egg

1. In a medium-sized bowl, mix the flour, cocoa, baking soda and powder, salt, and sugar.
2. Beat in the butter and the egg. Continue mixing until dough comes together in a mass.
3. Take rounded teaspoons of batter and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet approximately 2 inches apart. With moistened hands, slightly flatten the dough into circles, or use a cookie cutter to shape.
   
4. Bake for 9 minutes at 375 F. Set on a rack to cool.

I used a fluted cutter for my cookies, but when they were done the shape had all but disappeared. Plain old circles would be better for me next time.


The Filling

• 1/4 cup room-temperature, unsalted butter
• 1/4 cup vegetable shortening
• 2 cups sifted powdered sugar (I tossed mine in the food processor instead of sifting
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

1. Place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl, and at low speed, gradually beat in the sugar and vanilla.

2. Turn the mixer on high and beat for 2-3 minutes until filling is light and fluffy.

3. To make a cookie, pipe teaspoon-sized blobs of cream into the center of a cookie using a pastry bag with a 1/2 inch round tip. (I just used a spoonful)
4. Place another cookie, equal in size to the first, on top of the cream. Lightly press, to work the filling evenly to the outsides of the cookie, being careful not to break the cookie. Continue this process until all the cookies have been sandwiched with cream.

These cookies were really yummy and super fun to make. I took a few of them with me on a trip to Seattle and our real estate agent gave them 2 thumbs up.

If you'd still like to know about Alton Brown's Straight Dough Method (that I didn't tell you about today), you can watch a great episode of Good Eats here:
Part 1
Part 2
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Fun Stuff


~ Interested in some more retro recipes? Check out this book, it's on my Wish List.

~The history of the Oreo Cookie

~ How to Properly Dunk an Oreo Cookie

~ Oreo Recipes from NabiscoWorld.com

~ A pattern to make your own felt Oreo

~ Want to tease the kids? How about some Oreo soap?

I'm pretty hungry now, let's see what Jenn's cooking....

Two Spoonfuls: The Muffin Method

This week, I'm going to continue with Alton Brown's book, "I'm Just Here For More Food" by talking about The Muffin Method. Generally speaking, The Muffin Method is used for things like muffins, pancakes and quick breads.

Basically, the method is as follows:

- Sift together dry goods

- Combine all liquid ingredients (including sugars - because sugar dissolves so quickly, it's considered one of the "wet" ingredients)

- Add the wet ingredients to the dry. Do not overmix! Only mix the ingredients until they come together. There should be lumps at this point and they will bake out.

So, that's it. I had to give one of Alton's recipes a try, and I went with the least muffin-ey recipe in this section of the book. I've made "Chocolate Chip Cookie #10". Traditionally, cookies are made with the Creaming Method (we'll get to that in another post), but in this case, the butter is melted so the Muffin Method is used instead.

Technically, I'm not supposed to copy Alton's recipe out of the book, so I'll just tell you how it went.

Alton is a firm believer in using weight to measure ingredients, rather than volume. It's a much more accurate way to measure, especially with things like flour that can compact differently. I use my digital scale from when I was on Weight Watchers. It's great because you can set it back to zero after putting a container on it.

Another great tip I learned in this book is to use my food processor to sift the dry ingredients. This will aerate them and keep you from having to mess with those awful flour sifter thingies, eugh.

I used a small ice cream style scooper to dish out my dough. This seems to be a very standard method, but it's taken me ages to catch on. It'll make your life a lot easier if you do it this way rather than spooning the dough. What a mess. And, your cookies will all be the same size!! yay

I loved this recipe because the butter was melted. For some reason, creaming butter into a batter just makes me get all tense & nervous. I know, I'm weird that way. haha The final result was a really yummy cookie, and it was easy.

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Now, I don't want to leave you empty handed, so here's where you can get Alton's other chocolate chip cookie recipes:

~ The Thin
~ The Chewy (This one uses the Muffin Method)
~ The Puffy

And if you'd like to see Alton's Good Eats episode where he makes all 3 of these recipes, click here for part 1 and here for part 2. Cool!
While we're on the subject of chocolate chip cookies, you might want to check out this article from the NY Times, it's a keeper.

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I believe Jenn is searing this week, let's go see what she made...

Two Spoonfuls: Good Reads

Welcome to another episode of Two Spoonfuls with Ginny & Jenn. We've decided to get the new year started with a little help from Alton Brown of Good Eats fame. Cheesy logo and theme song aside, Good Eats is a great show! Naturally, you can watch the show, but Jenn and I would like to introduce you to a couple of Alton's books. I'll be talking about the baking side of things with "I'm Just Here For More Food" and Jenn's going to tell you about Alton's first book, "I'm Just Here For The Food", a sort of general cooking primer.



First, I'm going to let you in on a little secret about me. I'm not one of those Food Network junkies, so it takes a lot to get me watching a cooking show on a regular basis. I know I have a lot to learn about cooking and baking and the way Alton presents information really works for me. It's one thing to open a box, add some eggs & maybe a little milk and throw it in the oven, but I want to know why. That's what's so great about this book. I'm learning what the difference is between wheat flour & cake flour, and how to measure it properly. Did you know that once you've opened a can of baking powder it's only good for 6 months?! I didn't.


"I'm Just Here For More Food" is divided into sections as follows:

Introduction - All about good baking habits, equipment, measuring and other basics

The Parts Department - The ingredients in the ingredients and the stuff in your pantry like flour, sugar, butter and eggs.

The book is filled with cool illustrations and diagrams that appeal to my visual side.

Then there are the methods of mixing:

The Muffin Method

The Biscuit Method (mmmmmm) and The Pie Variation

The Creaming Method

The Straight Dough Method

The Egg Foam Method

and The Custards

Along the way are tons of factoids, diagrams, notes and other little tidbits that really make this book stand out. I love a cookbook with pictures, but it's even better when you get actual helpful information and knowledge that will help you make the recipe a success.

What I've Learned So Far:

I'm only in the Parts Department section but I already know enough to notice that when I tried a recipe from my new Ben & Jerry's cookbook last week, something was wrong. I followed the directions for Blonde Brownies to the letter, I used the pan they said to use and this is what I got.

A big cookie. Not brownies. There was definitely a lack of moisture in the batter and the pan they suggested was obviously way too big. Perhaps the 1 egg should have been 2? Maybe there should have been milk? Anyway, the big cookie was really tasty, it just wasn't brownies. My point is, that now that I'm reading Alton's book, I feel confident enough to try adding something next time to make the dough into batter. I knew there needed to be more moisture in the recipe. I hope to get a lot of knowledge out of Alton's book and I plan to read it cover to cover.

Now I'm anxious to see how Jenn's doing with "I'm Just Here For The Food", because it's next on my reading list!