Finally Baking! Mmmmmm!

 

No, it's not that I am finally baking. Because I've been doing that a lot lately. It's that I finally took pictures while I was baking. So you're finally getting a baking post. These are two ENTIRELY different things!

 

I am such a sucker for beautiful cookbooks. I am all about those gorgeous food photos. Which means that the pictures are doing their job: they make me want to bake something.

 

So I picked up a new-to-me cookbook at Costco the other night. It's, "Taste Of Home Cookies". It claims 623 "irresistible delights". And instead of posting some old tried-and-true family recipe, ... this is the first one that I tried out of the new cookbook. You never know when you're going to get a new favorite, right?

 

(Looks pretty good, huh? Yeah, I think so, too.)

So here's the recipe.... and a few notes from me along the way.

Fudge-Filled Dessert Strips

 (how can you go wrong with a name like that?)

 

1 cup butter, softened

1 package (8 oz.) cream cheese, softened

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips

1 can (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk

2 cups chopped walnuts

confectioners' sugar

 

 

So, most of the time, nuts can really be optional in a cookie recipe. But in this one, they're kinda important. So I'd not opt out of that one. I used a Cuisinart hand-chopper-thingy to chop up the walnuts, and after tasting these yummies, I think the next time I make them, I will chop the nuts even finer. Grind them pretty small. But that's just me. So, chop the nuts first, and set them aside.

 

Then, you're making a standard cream cheese crust. So you mix the butter and cream cheese together until they're fluffy:

 

Yeah, that's not the KitchenAid this time. Because I was too impatient to actually wait for the butter and cream cheese to soften, I put them in the bowl and nuked them for a moment in the microwave. And since the only KitchenAid mixing bowls I have are metal..... it meant using a glass bowl, and Old Reliable, the other stand mixer, got the job.

Whoooosh. Then add the flour a little bit at a time. 

 

Bonus points if you add the flour left-handedly, so you can use your right hand to snap a photo.

 

It's a pretty soft dough by this time, and a little sticky, so turn it out onto a lightly-floured counter, and gently knead until it's smooth... just a few minutes. Divide it into fourths, cover, and refrigerate for an hour or two. (When I divided it, I flattened it into an almost rectangular shape, in preparation for rolling it later. It makes the rolling step easier.)

 

Grab another bowl, and pour in that magical sweetened condensed milk:

Whoever invented this stuff was an un-heralded genius. Seriously. Then you add the chocolate chips, and nuke this combination in the microwave. (I did a minute on high power.)

When it comes out, you stir it together until it's smooth...

Ok, well it was almost smooth in that picture, but that is bowl-licking deliciousness right there. Then you stir in the nuts, and it will be really, really thick:

 

We're talking REALLY thick. You can stand a spatula in this stuff:

Ok, pause the recipe for just a moment, and we're talkin' kitchen equipment. First, in this recipe, I HIGHLY recommend that you use either parchment paper, or Silpat mats. You'll see why in a minute. I do love my Silpats, and this is one of the few times that I removed them from the baking sheets that they're on.

Some people get excited over dumb things. Like me getting excited over a new rolling pin:

(That's one of the chilled dough portions, straight out of the fridge.

 

So this is my old rolling pin. Had it for years, have made dozens of pies with this baby, it's got the ball bearings in it, so it rolls smoothly, and it does a pretty good job. I have no complaints.

 

And this is the new maple rolling pin:

It's not a tapered one, but is straight all the way across. The green things on each end are spacer rings. They elevate the rolling pin, so you can get an even thickness of dough all the way across it. See the space here?

Am I the only one that's kind of excited about this? You don't have to use the rings; you can roll like normal without them. The rings come as a set of four rings that slide over the ends. The white rings are used on top of the green ones for your thickest doughs:

And in case you missed it in the first photo.... the rolling surface area of the new rolling pin is almost twice as long as the old one!

I'm sure there will be times I'll use the old one. But the new one makes me want to make pie crusts and pinwheel cookies, and sugar cookies, and, and, and......

Ok. Back to the recipe!

So you roll the out the chilled dough out into a rectangle, 11" x 6 1/2". If  you're not using a Silpat or parchment, you roll it out right on the baking sheet. If you use the parchment or Silpat, I would roll it on one side of the mat.

It says to spread 3/4 cup of the chocolate filling on the dough rectangle. The reality is that the filling is so dang thick, that I molded it like playdough, and laid it on top of the dough. I just guessed at the width of the filling, and centered it on the dough. Then you fold the sides of the dough up and over the filling:

Hmmm. It didn't quite fit. No matter. I just cut some of the extra off the ends and used it to fill in the gap in the middle Then you pinch it to seal the dough all the way around the filling. And then ... you take the whole flat log shape, and turn it over, so that the seam side is down. And that's why you want to use parchment paper or Silpats. Because with the mat under the dough, I just lifted the mat and turned it over to put the dough rectangle on my hand and arm, and let the mat flex to release it. I hope that makes sense.

Flipping it is also why I would roll it out on one side of the mat. Then when you flip it over, you can flip it towards the center of the mat. I was a little worried that if there were any places where the dough hadn't sealed, that the filling would ooze out all over. But that wasn't my experience. That stuff is so thick, it stayed in place, even where my dough was stretched too thin.

Bake them at 350° for 27 minutes. You want them just lightly browned. Remove them to racks to cool.

If I go to make these cookies again, I will definitely not make them as wide. Partly because of the whole wrap-around step, and partly because I think they're just a little too wide, and it makes the cookie tend to break in the middle when you pick it up.

Slice these babies into 1/2" strips. Eat the end pieces when no one is looking. Then sift the confectioners' sugar over the top. The recipe says the powdered sugar is optional, but I wouldn't skip that. They look unfinished without it.

 

The best part, is that I took this plate to my Seminary meeting that evening. I took a bigger platter to my Seminary kids the next morning, and sent one more platter with Alyssa to the Jazz Choir kids at school. So I got my baking fix in, and we only munched a few of the cookies, (waistline savings!) and we gave the rest away!

 

Everybody wins!!

I think I will make these again. But there are 622 other recipes in this cookbook, so it may be a while before I get back to these.

Hardest part? The rolling, molding, stretching, pinching, and flipping the dough. By the fourth log, I was starting to think this was more trouble than it was worth. Easiest part? Dusting with powdered sugar and slicing them up. Suddenly, it didn't seem so much trouble anymore.

I wonder which cookie I should try next......