Lemon Curd Cookies, or "Whoops, I set the house on fire"

Well, I didn't set the house on fire, but I did see smoke billowing from the oven and had to open the front door in sub-zero temperatures!  It was exciting, and the cookies were salvageable, which is what really matters.

So before I tell you the tale of the disastrous cookies, take a gander at the lovely side-board I got from a creepy guy with two grungy Chihuahua's in East Jesus Nowheresville Massachusetts.



It's lovely and for $70 was a steal.  The cabinet on the left side was locked and the guy who sold it to me said the key was lost years ago.  Well my dad, because he's awesome, went and had a skeleton key made for it which WORKED and we were amazed to find the cabinet full of all this:



I am sad to report that all the liquid based things here were long since gone.  I opened a few to make sure, but considering we found it with a stash of birthday cards all from 2004, it was pretty obvious that they were no good.  However the dry stuff was still good (see that clip on the silver bag?) and I've had quite a few nice cups of chai.  The seasoning is for spreads and dips, so may be used this summer.  I'll try to salvage the bottles for my home-made gifts, however the jars were full of stuff so solid and... wrongly colored, I just tossed them all out as is.

Now on to the cookies!

Lemon Curd Cookies

Ingredients:
1 1/4 cups unsalted butter
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1 large egg yolk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
zest of 2 lemons
2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 teaspoon salt

Lemon curd (you will need less than a full jar)
Confectioner's sugar (optional)




In a large bowl, using an electric mixer on high speed, cream the butter until fluffy and pale. Add the sugar in 3 additions, beating on low for 2 minutes after each addition. Beat the egg yolk, vanilla, and zest into the butter mixture until well blended.





Sift the flour and salt together onto a sheet of waxed paper. Add the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix on low speed or stir with a wooden spoon just until blended.






Scrape the dough out onto a work surface and divide into 4 equal portions. Shape into disks, wrap in plastic, and refrigerate for at least 2 hours (I just stuck them in the freezer for 15 minutes).



Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line baking sheets with parchment paper.  Remove cat from parchment paper and shoo cat from room.  Remove cat from parchment paper.  Scream in frustration and lock cat out of the room.



Remove dough from refrigerator and let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes. Roll dough to 1/8-1/4 inch thickness. Using round cookie cutters (I used a small one of about 2 inches - don't forget the cookies grow when baked) cut out dough and place on cookie sheets. Drop as large of a blob of lemon curd as you can while still being able to cover the bottom cookie with a top cookie, on 1/2 of the cookies. Cover the lemon curd and bottom cookies with the remaining cookies and press to seal. You will have to stretch the top cookie a little bit, just make sure there is a good seal.  Refrigerate unbaked cookies for 5 minutes.



If you look closely, you can see the lemon curd I used (home-made) was too runny.  If I had used more solid curd, the HORRIBLE BURNING would not have happened.  Actually, I microwaved the leftover curd for a minute and that made it the perfect consistency.  Smelled a bit funny, but yeah, it was delicious on mini croissants.



Bake for about 10 minutes or until the edges are just beginning to turn brown.  Dust with confectioner's sugar.

BROWN, YOU SAY!?  Oh yeah, they browned all right.  I didn't use the confectioner's sugar at the end.  I mean, how do you dress up that horror?  I broke the burnt parts off every single cookie and you know what?  They tasted damn good.  I enjoyed them, my fiancé pretended to enjoy them, and my co-workers enjoyed them.



I plan on making them again, only without the fire part.  Fire bad.

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And Sometimes They Work Out Just Right!

Meet our newest family member, Stephen Fry:




He's awesome and fun and only six months old.  On Wednesday he'll be getting the snip, but lets not tell him that.

He does have a habit of getting all up in my business, though.  It's a little frustrating when I'm trying to cook.



But I have trouble staying angry for too long.



In our next installment, you will see Fry help me cook lemon curd short bread cookies.  What you wont see is me constantly tossing him off the table/counters/stove/etc.  He gets everywhere!

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Things Sometimes Don't Work Out


I was a little to ambitious and tried to make four things at once!  Lets just say it turned out edible, and that's half the battle.





Lemon curd!

I love lemon curd.  It makes me happy when I can sit at my computer eating it straight from the jar, which isn't as bad as it sounds, since I'm the only one who eats it at my house.

Ingredients


5 egg yolks

1 cup sugar
4 lemons, zested and juiced
1 stick butter, cut into pats and chilled

Directions

Add enough water to a medium saucepan to come about 1-inch up the side. Bring to a simmer over medium-high heat. 





Meanwhile, combine egg yolks and sugar in a medium size metal bowl and whisk until smooth, about 1 minute. 





Measure citrus juice and if needed, add enough cold water to reach 1/3 cup. Add juice and zest to egg mixture and whisk smooth. 





Once water reaches a simmer, reduce heat to low and place bowl on top of saucepan. (Bowl should be large enough to fit on top of saucepan without touching the water.) Whisk until thickened, approximately 8 minutes, or until mixture is light yellow and coats the back of a spoon.


Remove promptly from heat and stir in butter a piece at a time, allowing each addition to melt before adding the next. Remove to a clean container and cover by laying a layer of plastic wrap directly on the surface of the curd. Refrigerate for up to 2 weeks.





My stove was being incredibly difficult (hate electric stoves!) so I took some time to make meringues.  Basically the same recipe I used before, but without chocolate (boo hoo).


Then I moved on to clotted cream and butter.  Sadly no pictures of the butter being made since I needed two hands and far more arm muscles than I possess.  It was hard and I made more of a soft creamy butter.  It was awesome on crackers but is all gone now.  I had my cleaning crew on hand in case there were any spills.





Ok, clotted cream!



Ingredients: 2 cups heavy cream.  Duh.
  1. Cook cream in top of double boiler over simmering water until reduced by about half. It should be the consistency of butter, with a golden "crust" on the top.
  2. Transfer, including crust, to bowl. Cover and let stand 2 hours, then refrigerate at least 12 hours.
  3. Stir crust into cream before serving. Keep unused portions refrigerated, tightly covered, for up to 4 days. 



Sadly the clotted cream really didn't get there.  I was cooking it for hours and eventually had to go to bed so I could survive at work the next day.  It did begin to clot, but yeah, it didn't fully get there.



But I tried, and that's the important part.  One of these days I'll make it well, but not today.


Bonus shot of meringue:





(I whipped them too much, but they still came out tasty)

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Back from Vacation/Holiday/Whatnot

I didn't announce any holiday, but I was way too busy with celebration stuff lately to blog.  Right before Christmas I got a job, so weekdays have been crazier.  And then we went away to New Hampshire for New Years and are still recovering.  But there is a lull in the crazy, long enough hopefully for a post!

DELICIOUS MERINGUES!

I dont' have the recipe at the moment, but will hopefully have the prescence of mind to add it later.  So have some pictures!






 











They came out flatter than I'd hoped, but very dry and fluffy and AMAZING.  Along with the chocolate, I added mint extract, and that really made the difference.  And this was a good way to use up some not so great nestle's chocolate chips I'd gotten before christmas.  From now on it's only the good stuff, though.

I need to make more cookies.

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