Put a damn bow on it already!

I am done. Six pounds of English Toffee and 1013 cookies. Enough, which never seemed to be, is. More might be better, and too much just about right, but for now, enough simply is. I have distributed most of the cookie trays to those deemed worthy. That is, most of the Pedestrian Subjunctives readership. I used the Microsoft Works labels program to really geek up things. Time to move on. My son spends every Christmas with me, and has since he was two. He spends Thanksgiving with his mom. Being an every-other-weekend dad can, at times be a bit frustrating, but there are moments. One of my personal favorites involves a Christmas tradition we started when Paul was two, maybe three. After putting him to bed on Christmas Eve, I would go into the yard and scatter Milk Duds. Then, on Christmas morning, the first thing we would do is go outside and look for reindeer droppings. I didn't let him eat them. That could have icky ramifications should we, while on a hike in the woods, come across some real droppings. He has outgrown that though. But this year, for cookie tray recipients who have younger children, I have included bags of milk duds, and also of mini marshmallows, labeled Reindeer Droppings and Snowman Poop, respectively. And respectfully. Tastefully too. Paul and I watch movies on Christmas Day. Last year we had an Ed Wood movie festival: Plan Nine from Outer Space, Night of the Ghouls, Bride of the Monster, The Bride and the Beast, Orgy of the Dead, and for good measure, Tim Burton's Ed Wood. Whew! This year, assuming Flicks and Pics has them in stock, I have scheduled for our viewing pleasure, Planet of the Apes, Beneath the Planet of the Apes, Escape from Planet of the Apes, Conquest of Planet of the Apes, and Battle for Planet of the Apes. Double whew! (Wary of Wikipedia, I apologize, if necessary, for the gratuitous link.) And finally, nearly finally anyway, this particular holiday musing will close with one of my favorite things. Well, several actually, rolled into one, somewhat larger, figurative objet (d'art?). The volunteer manager for Special Olympics Oregon sent me a Starbucks gift card for Christmas, along with some hot chocolate and marshmallows. Special Olympics, coffee, cocoa, Snowman Poop. What more could I hope for? Well, I'll tell you Dear Reader: I had to register the Starbucks card on line, which required that I input a user name and a password. I am quite happy Dostoyesvsky was so prolific. A writer. OK. OK. Now, finally, I leave you with a picture of a few of the cookie trays.

Idiomatic license

Before I get into it for today Dear Reader, I must confess to grammatical transgressions. My last post, "Temporizing taste temptations, temporarily" should make English teachers, and those who love the language, cringe. The title at least. Temporize is an intransitive verb, and thus should not have an object, direct or otherwise. It also includes, in its meaning, the notion of temporariness, so the "temporarily" is redundant. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure "temporariness" isn't a word. There. I feel better now. When we last met, where were we? That's right, Frosted Oatmeal Cookies, Snicker Doodles, and arbitrary shifts in the space-time continuum. Between then and now I tried and failed to make an Oatmeal Rice Krispie cookie recipe. Then tried again, and succeeded. The recipe is from a co-worker, who gave it to me after I fell in love with the cookie. While that dough was in the refrigerator, I made the dough for what my mom always called Jelly Balls. Last year someone told me that they looked nothing like Jelly Balls and more like Thumbprints. I relented and began to call them Thumbprints. But this year, I found that when making the hole for the raspberry jelly, my index finger worked a lot better. A more symmetrical hole was achieved. Important. Now, I call them Fingerprints. Officially. For the record. Raspberry Fingerprints, specifically. A manifestation of an idea. After baking both of these recipes, I found I was at 1013 cookies. I decided that a thousand cookies was enough. What? Yes, I said enough. I quit. Sort of. The next day I got to work on English Toffee. Making my mom's recipe for English Toffee is nothing short of spiritual. The scrape of the metal spatula on the bottom of the pan. In one direction only. The careful monitoring of the candy thermometer. 290 degrees, precisely. The melting of the chocolate, and the cooling for optimum application. The finely ground almonds. It all comes together quite nicely. Maybe not to die for, but perhaps, to kill for. If you've tried it, you'll forgive me for ending that last sentence in a preposition, without an object.

Temporizing taste temptations, temporarily

I must unburden my soul Dear Reader. Plans were changed. Too passive? OK, I changed plans. On a whim, as usual. Guided by the television schedule. The Daily Show re-run and South Park, in particular. I completed baking 144 Oatmeal Cookies yesterday evening, and had posted that I would repeat that today, and frost them all tomorrow. Here is where it all went out the window. It was a ground floor window though, so no one was hurt, and nothing broken. I had some spare time. Just a skosh. A wee bit. A tad. But it was enough, I could clearly see, to make the frosting and get those twelve dozens put to rest, nestled between sheets of wax paper. But wait! There's more! I decided to make Snicker Doodles this evening. They are not from the "Heirloom" section of my trusty binder. I just like Snicker Doodles. And I love the name. It's not so much that 144 Frosted Oatmeal Cookies are enough ( is that even possible?) as it is that I need to get more walnuts, and wax paper, and that the weather today and tonight is supposed to be pretty blustery. Oh bother. Even by Pacific Northwest standards. The store is but a block and a half away from my apartment, but all the ingredients for Snicker Doodles (hee hee) are already in my apartment. Also, they will bring a little diversity to my growing collection of cookies. Digression (petite) warning: Do you care that I capitalize the names of the cookies? If you do, don't. Please. End digression. So you see Dear Reader, it's not that I lied in my last post about my future plans, which aren't even plans any longer at all, having been replaced by present plans, which were the future plans made in the past as the pre-existing past plans, which were not covered contractually, were given their unconditional release. It's just that I don't want to get my feet wet walking to the store. I did make plenty of extra frosting last night for peanut butter sandwiches, which I shall now enjoy, or, by the time you read this, shall have enjoyed.

Happy St. Valentine's Day

I must confess, Dear Reader, not only did I not post yesterday, but I did not make any cookies either. But I have an excuse. Yesterday was the first practice of the season for Special Olympics basketball. The first day of my thirteenth season coaching. A couple of the players have been on my team for the whole ride. We are the Eugene Kodiaks. There are also teams with the monikers Grizzlies, Polar Bears, Panda Bears, plain old Bears, and our new children's basketball skills group, the Malayan Sun Bears. The next practice will be after the holidays, so I can get back to baking, and writing about baking. There is a bowl of cookie dough in my refrigerator right now, awaiting its fate. Not just any cookie dough mind you, but my great-grandmother's recipe for Oatmeal Cookies. Of course, I doubled the recipe, and will prepare another double batch tomorrow. Then, on Friday, I will frost them. I've posted about this frosting before so won't go back into it again. Now, where was I when last I posted? Oh yeah. Chocolate Crackles. I cranked out 142 of them, bringing my total to 580 cookies. I'll wind this down now as the Oatmeal Cookies are either in the oven baking, cooling in a single layer on the primary cooling rack, setting in rows of four in stacks of three on the secondary cooling rack, in dough form on the second cookie sheet ready to go into the oven, or still in the mixing bowl, part of the greater, yet diminishing whole blob of dough. All this mathematical computation and inventory is good for me. It keeps my mind sharp for Fantasy Baseball. And, Dear Reader, the Philadelphia Phillies' pitchers and catchers start reporting to Spring Training two months from tomorrow.

Chocolate Crackles

Now things are getting serious. The recipe for Chocolate Crackles comes from my paternal grandmother, who always had huge cookie trays with vast arrays of cookies on Christmas Day. The chocolate dough is in the refrigerator to firm up prior to being formed into balls, rolled in powdered sugar, and baked. These are my sister's favorite. My son's too. They rate pretty highly in my book as well. Come to think of it, everybody who has ever tried them, loves them. What's not to like? It's a chocolate cookie, with powdered sugar. Be forewarned though Dear Reader: Do not wolf them down. If you're not careful, you may inhale some of the powdered sugar, and well, that just wouldn't be pretty. Even if you have a glass of milk close at hand, the convulsive powdered sugar cough is a tricky bugger, and the milk is likely to come out your nose. Not that I would know. Take your time and enjoy them. There's plenty to go around. I tripled the recipe, and I live alone.

By whatever name, tasty

I may not have posted yesterday, but I did continue my cookie production. Graham cracker crumbs, chopped nuts, coconut, powdered sugar, margarine, peanut butter, oh yeah, and a little vanilla. Form into balls and dip in melted chocolate. The recipe says they're No Bake Cookies. I've heard them also called Peanut Butter Balls, and Parafin Balls. Whatever. They're labor intensive but tasty. I cranked out 154 of them, easily surpassing 300 total cookies, or the one-fifth mark on the way to my goal of 1500. My childhood memory of my mom making No Bake Cookies is of getting a piece of the wax paper that they are placed on to dry, covered in drops of chocolate to be meticulously peeled off and eaten. Kids are easily satisfied, some times. This morning I made another Caramel Apple Cheesecake, this time for the library's holiday potluck on Tuesday. Then it was back to the cookie baking. I don't remember the Coconut Cookies, but do have a recipe for them from my mom, so what the H-E-double hockey sticks? They are a kind of sugar cookie dough with a bit of lemon extract, and then topped with coconut before baking. Ninety-five Coconut Cookies later, and I am at 438 total cookies, according to my spreadsheet. I tried one. The only cookie I've eaten, so far.

Melting Moments

No, Dear Reader, not some psychedelic flashback to, or from the 1960s. Melting Moments are the recipe du jour in in my quest for 125 dozen cookies. You can do the math, or read my last post. It's a pretty simple recipe: flour (unsifted), confectioners sugar, corn starch, vanilla and butter. That's it. I usually don't use my Kitchenaid upright mixer for cookie dough because the dry ingredients have a tendency to erupt in a powdery mist, dusting me and the surrounding area in a ghostly white. I thought if I was careful and kept the mixing speed at low...Well I was partially right, and partially wrong. Instead of an eruption there was more of what I would call a burp of flour, confectioner's sugar and corn starch. The dough is in the refrigerator for the prescribed hour to firm up. Then I'll roll the dough into small balls, place them on an ungreased cookie sheet, and stamp them flat. The stamp I use is ceramic and has an image of a snowflake. A passing nod to pagan idolatry which suits me just fine. After the 90 Chinese Almond Cookies I made yesterday, I hope to reach at least 200, maybe even 250 today. It's hard to gauge how many cookies will come from a mixing bowl containing a big amorphous glob of dough. I did triple the recipe though, and am optimistic. I remember as a kid, the trick to eating Melting Moments is to hold them in your mouth for a few seconds. They do melt in your mouth.

Worlds collide

Let the baking begin! I have begun, officially, my holiday cookie production. OK. OK. Christmas cookies. I have recipes from my mom that she used to make for the holidays, er, I mean Christmas. I grew up watching her prepare all the different recipes, planning my speedy assault on the cache once they were finished and stored in a cool, dry place. I'm sure she knew that I, and my siblings got into the cookies. Knowing my mom, she probably factored those losses into the number of cookies she would make. Anyway, when my dad retired, so did she. It was left to me to make the cookies. There are recipes from both my grandmothers and one from a great-grandmother. That one is my favorite. It's for an oatmeal cookie, frosted with a coffee and cinnamon delicacy that also works well on peanut butter sanwiches. Last year I made just over a thousand cookies. Just to see if I could. This year I'm shooting for 1500. No reason. "More" has always seemed a bit more attractive to me. I have even set up a spreadsheet to tally my inventory as it grows. I haven't yet decided whether to count dozens, or individual cookies. The autosum functions would certainly be easier if I counted individual cookies. I think I'll wait until there are actually some cookies to count, and then decide. I'm starting with Chinese Almond Cookies. The dry ingredients are sifted, the eggs slightly beaten and the almond extract added. I'm just waiting for the butter to soften a bit. Of course, I doubled the recipe. I have a three-ring binder full of recipes. The cookie recipes are all found in the "Heirloom" section. I really should create an index for the book. But then I'd be obligated to include a 504 field should I ever catalog it. Well, I'd better go cut the butter into the dry ingrients "until the mixture resembles cornmeal."