Herb Cubes

One of my favorite Hippy Tricks!

I love to cook with fresh herbs, I love to grow herbs.  However, I have terrible luck growing them indoors and it's worse in the winter!  So I buy them when I need them.  But at $2 or more a bunch, I hate to just use the little I need and then... what?  They don't last that long.  Especially once you've started chopping and tearing them to pieces.

So, this.  Chop your herbs finely (or not, depending on your preference) and portion them out in an ice cube tray.  Top them off with water and freeze.  Yes, they don't hold up that well in terms of appearance, but any juices and oils that they lose just end up in the water.

Once they're frozen solid, you can liberate your ice cube tray by just transferring them to a zipper bag.  Don't forget to label though!  You don't want a freeze full of unidentified green stuff in baggies.

This is also a great trick to help the cooking impaired in your house!  Premeasure the spices/seasonings for their favorite dished into ice cube trays, and notate how many cubes they need to add to the pot!  Perfect every time!

Christmas Cookies.

So, on Sunday, I decided to make some Christmas cookies.  But if you know me, you know that A) I try to tailor things very specifically to the people they're for and B) I don't do anything halfway.  So there would be NO ORDINARY COOKIES!  Well, except one batch, someone's favorite cookie is Sugar Cookies.

I had 4 cookie gifts to make and this is the criteria I was up against.
1) Sugar Cookies are Tom's favorite.
2) Marnie loves Chai Tea.
3) Dane specifically asked that I make my Chocolate Cherry Cayenne Cookies again.
4) I needed something Super Special for Eric, who had given me NO HINTS.

So, grab for the Cooky Book (I have a reprint of the 1963 Betty Crocker Cooky Book) but it's NOWHERE.  GONE.  Probably packed up in the basement.

But that's what the internet's for, right?

Search:  Sugar Cookies.
Found:  Allrecipes.com Easy Sugar Cookies, that though bookmarked, I can't find again because the bookmark apparently directs to All Recipes Argentina, even though it didn't 2 days ago.  And a new search yields the same error.  But at any rate, they turned out to be chewy, sweet, perfect sugar cookies.
Result:  I'm not sure Tom's kids actually got any of them, because I don't think they survived the day at work.

Search: Russian Tea Cookies.  I'm thinking that these are a pretty bland cookie on their own, but could easily be changed into a Chai Tea Cookie.
Found: Betty Crocker's Russian Tea Cakes.  We mixed some good cinnamon from Penzey's into the powdered sugar for rolling them in, subbed chopped almonds for the usual walnuts or pecans, and used Trader Joe's Spicy Chai Latte Mix instead of most of the powdered sugar in the dough.  After accidentally throwing a few on the floor, we discovered an awesome, mild, spice cookie with a hint of black tea.
Result:  Marnie loved them!  And shared with Carol who agreed!

Search: Nestle's White Chip Chocolate Cookies.  I have it here somewhere!  Ah, there's the bag of white chips.
Found:  After tearing the kitchen apart, I found the recipe I based my Chocolate Cherry Cayenne Cookies on.  I use the same recipe for the dough, but Semi Sweet Chips instead of the White, and then I add Dried Cherries, more of the cinnamon from Penzey's and ground Cayenne.  Except this time we had Cherry Flavored Cranberries instead of Cherries.  (Oops, grabbed the wrong thing in a hurry)
Result: I already know that Dane loves these cookies.

Search: Unique Cookie Recipes.  I still need something for Eric and I'm out of ideas.
Found: After a few false starts, (I didn't have parchment for Meringues, and so on) I settled on Thumbprint Cookies thinking I had to have some kind of interested thing to add to these.  And I found it in the pantry: Blueberry Limoncello Jam from Bittersweet Herb Farm.  I added a few packets of True Lemon to some water to dissolve it and added that, plus a bit of extra flour to the cookie dough and topped them with the Blueberry Jam.
Result: I haven't heard from Eric, but everyone else who's had them loved them!

So all in all, a successful cookie baking day.  I'll get some of the details of the recipes posted over the next few days, but for now, I need to get onto the laundry I've been avoiding.