Experiment: Freezing Rice Krispie Treats

Two weeks ago, we were all ready to set off on our longest family camping trip to date. We had our bags packed, I had packed all of the food up, and we were ready to go. That was when our oldest son started vomiting! Fortunately we were able to reschedule our trip, and it turns out the vomiting was just a by product of an ear infection, but I was left with a weeks worth of camping food to try and preserve until our rescheduled trip. Everything was easily freezable except a pan of Rice Krispie treats. I had never tried to freeze Rice Krispie treats before. Were they even freezable? A quick internet search revealed that there wasn't much information available on the subject. Those who did try it stressed keeping out the moisture from the freezer as that would make the Rice Krispie treats soggy.

In order to keep out the moisture, I cut the pan of Rice Krispie treats in half and wrapped each half in three layers. First, I wrapped the halves in Saran wrap. Next, I wrapped them in foil. Finally, I took each half and placed them in a freezer bag taking care to get as much air out of the bag as possible. This past weekend we tested the first of the two packages. I let the Rice Krispie treats thoroughly thaw at room temperature while still in the freezer bag before cutting. While my husband detected a possible freezer taste to them, the kids and I thought they tasted the same. They had the same crunch as freshly made Rice Krispie treats as well.

The verdict?
While this wasn't an ideal way to consume Rice Krispie treats because of the possible freezer taste and the waste in packaging in order to keep the moisture out, I would say that it was a success!


Personal note: Thank you to all of you who have written to me concerned about my personal welfare because of the lack of new posts. I am well. Summer has just taken the wind out of my sails! I've had both boys home from school and have really concentrated on spending time with them and enjoying the weather. I must confess also that I have not cooked very much this summer. Summer in eastern WA is hot, hot, hot, and our dinners for the past six or seven weeks have consisted of salads with pre-cooked meat from Costco, fresh fruit, and ice cream cones! With summer winding down, I will be throwing myself back into cooking and my blog. Thank you all for sticking with me during my little mental vacation.

Snickerdoodles

Isn't it wonderful that a cookie with one of the best names out there, is also one of the most simple and delicious?  Who can resist these wonderfully crisp, cinnamony cookies with the whimsical name?  Mix up a batch and your family will be sure to smile!

Snickerdoodles by Joie de vivre

Yields:  About 6 dozen

Ingredients:

1  1/2 c. sugar

1 c. unsalted butter, room temperature

2 eggs

2 3/4 c. all-purpose flour

2 tsp. cream of tartar

1 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

2 Tbls. sugar

2 tsp. ground cinnamon

Directions:

1.  Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees F.

2.  Beat the butter and 1 1/2 c. sugar together until pale yellow and fluffy.  Beat in the eggs until combined.  On low speed, or by hand, beat in the flour, cream of tartar, baking soda and salt.  

3.  In a small bowl, combine the 2 Tbls. sugar with the cinnamon.

4.  To shape:  scoop out a teaspoon full of dough using a teaspoon cookie scoop.  Roll the dough into balls between your two hands.  Then roll the balls into the sugar/cinnamon mixture.  Place the balls 2 inches apart on ungreased cookie sheets

5.  Bake for 8-10 minutes.  When finished, remove cookies from cookie sheet and place on cookie racks to cool.

Rum Raisin Biscotti

Tonight, I've been invited to a cookie exchange.  I can't tell you how excited I am to be going!  When you are a stay-at-home mom, you don't need anything else to get your kicks than merely going out and talking to other grown-ups.  For this party, I created a biscotti recipe that I was really pleased with.  

The biscotti were my back-up plan after a disastrous attempt at something called Orange Snowballs.  After I threw those in the garbage, I had to come up with something whose ingredients I already had in my pantry.  This was the first time I've attempted biscotti but they turned out really well (if I do say so myself). I have been craving biscotti recently as accompaniments to my afternoon tea so I already had biscotti on the brain.  I always thought biscotti were too fussy to make.  Actually, they are a little fussy with the twice baking and all, but the dough came together quickly, and I waited overnight until the second baking which minimized the fussiness.  

 

If you've never heard of a biscotti (I mean, really now, where have you been?) it is an Italian cookie that is first baked in a log shape, then cut and baked again until dry and really crunchy.  They are fabulous dunked in a cup of tea or coffee, let to soften slightly in the liquid and then crunched up.  I dipped them in chocolate and put sprinkles on them just to fancy them up a little for the cookie exchange, but they are also wonderful plain.  

I think the ladies at the cookie exchange are going to love these.  I can't wait to see what everyone else makes.  I'll tell you all about it tomorrow and share some of their recipes too!

Rum Raisin Biscotti by Joie de vivre

Yeild:  about 60 biscotti

Ingredients:

4 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/3 cup sugar

4 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. allspice

1/2 tsp. salt

6 large eggs

4 tsp. rum extract

1/3 cup rum

1 1/3 cup raisins

2/3 cup boiling water

1 package of chocolate chips (optional)

sprinkles and other decorations (optional)

Directions:

1.  Put raisins, rum, and boiling water into a bowl.  Set aside for at least 10 minutes while the raisins plump.

2.  Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees.

3.  In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, allspice, and salt in a large bowl.

4.  In a second large bowl, whisk together the eggs and rum extract.  

5.  Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture and stir with a wooden spoon.  At this point, the dough will seem really dry and it may be easier to squish it up with your hands.

6.  Drain the raisins, and add them to the dough.  Squish this up well with your hands.  The dough will be sticky at this point from the residual liquid in the raisins.

7.  Divide the dough in two.  On a parchment lined baking sheet, shape 1/2 of the dough into a log about 12 inches long, and 3 inches wide.  Repeat on another parchment lined baking sheet with the other half of the dough.

8.  Bake for 40 minutes, switching the places of the baking sheets (put the sheet that was on the bottom rack on the top rack and the one that was on the top rack on the bottom rack) halfway through.

9.  The dough should be slightly risen, slightly browned and firm to the touch.  Let the logs cool at least 30 minutes or overnight.

10.  Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees again.

11.  Cut the logs diagonally into 1/4 inch slices.  

12.  Lay the slices on a parchment lined baking sheet.

13.  Bake the biscotti for 16 minutes, switching the places of the pans, and flipping the cookies halfway through the baking time.

14.  Remove the biscotti to a cooling rack and let cool.

15.  If desired, melt the chocolate chips in a saucepan set over a pan of gently simmering water.  Stir with a rubber spatula until smooth.

16.  Paint 1/2 of the biscotti with chocolate using your rubber spatula and place on a sheet of waxed paper.  Sprinkle with edible glitter, nonpareils, sprinkles, etc. to decorate and let chocolate harden.

17.  Place in a napkin lined basket for a beautiful presentation!

Cooking with Kids: Dog Bone Cookies

Yesterday my oldest came home from pre-school beaming.  He had been chosen to take their class mascot, a stuffed Clifford dog, home for the week.  When students take Clifford home, they also take Clifford's "overnight" bag with them filled with fun activities the kids can do.  There is a View-master with  Clifford pictures in it, several Clifford books to read, a Clifford video, a journal to chronicle Clifford's adventures with your family, as well as a recipe card for "Dog Bone Cookies" that had a dog bone cookie cutter attached to it.  

I knew that if my son wanted to make the cookies and share them with his class, we would need to make them for class today since they are out of school for the rest of the week.  So, last night, my two little ones pulled up chairs to help me make the dough for this very simple sugar cookie.

I have decided that I need to cook/bake with them more.  They love it so much but I'm often reluctant to let them help since it often takes 3 times as long.  But I knew when I gave my oldest a cup of flour to add to the bowl and he poured it in from a height of about 18 inches thus powdering himself in a fine dusting of flour as it plopped in the bowl, that cooking is not necessarily intuitive.  I know somehow that you should not add flour to a bowl from a height of 18 inches and should instead add the flour gently from a height close to the bottom of the bowl, but where did I learn that?  Probably through trial and error when I was their age.  I resolve right now to let them help me in the kitchen as often as I can so that when they are 18, they are no longer learning through trial and error, but are self-sufficient and comfortable in the kitchen.

The sprinkles on the cookies are very uneven, but again, the kids did it themselves and loved every minute of it.  They were so proud of their work.  As for the taste, the cookies were just okay.  They had a nice soft texture to them and were mildly sweet.  I'm sure there are lots of better recipes out there, but this one scored points on the ease of the recipe, and the smiles it got out of two little boys who were able to help make them.

Dog Bone Cookies  *For human consumption only!

3/4 cup butter or margarine, softened

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. vanilla

2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. salt

Cram butter and sugar.  Add eggs, vanilla, flour, baking powder and salt.  Mix.  Chill dough for at least 1 hour or overnight, placing it in a ziplock bag first.  Roll dough to 1/4 inch and cut with dog bone shaped cookie cutter.  Sprinkle with sugar.  Bake for 11-12 minutes at 375 degrees or until bottoms start to brown.

Kids' Choice Chip and Fruit Oatmeal Cookies AND French Fridays

The folks at the King Arthur Flour blog have come up with another winner in the form of their Kids' Choice Chip and Fruit Oatmeal Cookies.  Of course they had me when they professed these cookies were for every time challenged parent who didn't want their reign as the home baked goods king/queen to vanish when their teenage son comes home and "reminds" them of the hockey potluck that night and "don't you remember you promised to bake 5 dozen cookies?"

I was just that parent yesterday except it was me saying to myself, "Oh yeah, you promised to have play group over here today and wouldn't it be nice to offer them something warm from the oven?" that got me to try this recipe.  King Arthur Flour promised 10-15 minutes of hands on time before popping the cookies in the oven and I needed them to be that quick.  Play group was expected at 9:30am, I started mixing ingredients at 9:17, and at 9:31am, when the doorbell rang, I was scooping the last tablespoons of dough onto the pan to pop in the oven.  Talk about quick and I was even putting the ingredients back in the pantry as I went!

The cookies were VERY yummy!  I usually love to try new recipes but this will be one that I pull out again and again as it was just too good and too quick not to.  I will print out the recipe as King Arthur Flour blog wrote it, and then I'll also (in parenthesis) write how I adapted it.  It was Kids (Mom's) choice after all!

Kids' Choice Chip and Fruit Oatmeal Cookies slightly adapted from King Arthur Flour blog

Hands on time:  10-15 minutes

Baking time:  12-14 minutes per batch

Total time:  22-29 minutes

Yield:  4 1/2 dozen

1/2 cup butter, right from the fridge, or at room temperature

1/2 cup vegetable shortening

1 cup brown sugar, light or dark

1/3 cup granulated sugar

2 tsp. vanilla extract

3/4 tsp. salt

1 Tbls. cider or white vinegar

1 large egg

1 tsp. baking soda

1 3/4 cup all purpose flour

1 cup old fashioned oats

3 cups chips, chunks, dried fruit and/or nuts of your choice.  (I used 2/3 cup chopped dates, 1 1/3 cup chopped pecans, 1 cup dried cherries)

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.  Lightly grease or line with parchment two baking sheets.  (I did not grease or line my non-stick cookie sheets and the cookies didn't stick.)

1.  In a large mixing bowl, beat together the butter, shortening, sugars, vanilla, salt and vinegar.

2.  Beat in the egg, then the baking soda, flour and oats.  Stir in the chips, fruit, nuts, or whatever combination you chose.

3.  Drop the dough, by tablespoonfuls, onto the prepared baking sheets.

4.  Bake the cookies for 12-14 minutes, until they are golden brown.  Remove the cookies from the oven, and cool on a rack or right on the pan.  Lighter colored cookies will be chewier; darker colored, crunchier.

Your reputation as the home baked goods king/queen is saved!

French Fridays

*On a side note, a few of you expressed interest in reading French Women Don't Get Fat after my previous post.  I am very exited to invite you to a "book club" of French Women Don't Get Fat, Fridays in January.  I'll call it French Fridays.  We'll take those 5 weeks to read through the book which will be very slow but will allow for incorporation of new ideas and shedding of old ones.  For me, the timing will be perfect.  I have maintained my 34lb. weight loss for six months now.  However, I am ready, and will be MORE than ready after the holidays, to re-read this book that helped me lose the weight and to start losing more.  The format will be a discussion format either through the comments, or if you are interested, through links to your own blog if you have a lot to say.  If you don't own the book already, you can order it through my Amazon store here, or put it on your Christmas wish list and hope that Santa brings it for you.  If you are planning on joining in, just drop me a comment so I know how many to brew some virtual tea for!  Your first mission, should you choose to accept it, is to keep a food journal for the month of December.  There will be no one checking it but you so be honest with yourself.  So you had two (or six) of the above cookies, and then also had ice cream after dinner, this journal is for informational purposes for yourself so you can gauge your weaknesses (petite demons) so be honest with yourself.  Good luck with your food journal and I'll see you here Jan. 2 for our first discussion!  Bonne chance!

Magic in the Middles

The King Arthur Flour blog is a relatively recent find for me, but boy, is it dangerous!  In the past week or so since I've found it, I've made two of their cookie recipes!  If I keep this up I'm either going to gain back the 34 lbs. I've lost, or I'm going to have to start giving a lot of cookies to neighbors and friends.  This past week they featured a cookie called Magic in the Middle.  These were amazing cookies, crispy chocolate cookie on the outside, soft peanut butter inside.  The perfect combination in my opinion.  I'll just link to their recipe as I changed very little and commented on and reviewed the recipe on their site.  The only change I made was to add an extra egg yolk (as they recommended to keep the dough pliable).  My dough still cracked a little showing the peanut butter inside.  The result was merely aesthetic, but I suppose the magic is gone if you can see there is peanut butter inside.  Also, they recommend dividing the peanut butter filling into 26 balls, but I would say 32 balls would have been better as I still had enough chocolate dough left at the end to fill them.  There was a lot of hands on time with this recipe but the cookie is so good that the time was well spent.  

Class Party Cookies

When my kiddo's teacher asked if I would make 2 dozen unfrosted sugar cookies for their class party, I was of course flattered, but also a little panicked as the thought of using cookie cutters always seems kind of fussy to me.  Of course, rolling and stamping out dough does take longer than drop cookies, but the results are so cute, and the kiddos will like them so much, that it makes it worth it in the end.  I found a basic recipe for sugar cookies that I adapted a little.  The end result is a nicely flavored cookie that was easy to roll, baked up well, and will store well until the party tomorrow.

Class party cookies by Joie de vivre

Yield:  Quite a lot.  2 gallon sized Ziplock bags worth.  (7-8 dozen?)

Ingredients:

1 c. unsalted butter, softened

1 c. sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp. vanilla extract

1 c. sour cream

5 c. all-purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp.. baking soda

1 1/4 tsp. salt

1 Tbls. pumpkin pie spice

In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add the eggs, vanilla extrace, and sour cream and beat until well blended.  In a separate, medium sized bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and pumpkin pie spice.  Add this to the wet ingredients little by little, blending well after each addition.  Roll out dough a softball sized amount at a time on a floured board.  Sprinkle the top of dough a little with flour before rolling.  Roll out to 1/16 to 1/8 inch thickness and stamp out cookies using floured cookie cutters.  Place on un-greased baking sheets and bake at 375 degrees F to 5 to 7 minutes.  The cookies will be set and lightly golden on the bottom.  Cool on a wire rack.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies

I feel I am finally starting to embrace the chill in the air and the changing of the seasons.  It also doesn't hurt that Mother Nature puts on a nice show.  I have been reading the excitement fellow food bloggers are displaying over autumn and new seasonal foods, and feeling slightly left out.  There is no season whose passing I mourn more than summer.  But this past week, I decided to just throw myself in, and actually, it helped me get over my funk.  I took my boys to the pumpkin patch twice where we climbed hay pyramids, ran through hay mazes and got lost in corn mazes.  We are proudly displaying our pumpkins on the kitchen table where they await carving closer to Halloween.  I even broke out the flannel sheets this week as the nights have been cold.  All these helped lift my mood, as well as thinking about all of the hearty stews I plan on making this winter.  I was finally embracing the thought of autumn, when I came across these cookies on the King Arthur Flour blog.  What a perfect treat to celebrate the changing of the seasons and embrace the kids' excitement over Halloween.  I modified the cookies slightly to include a little whole wheat flour and changed decorating techniques to make it a little easier for myself. (They made homemade icing and piped it from a plastic baggie, I just bought the pressurized frosting in a can that has the decorating tips on it and used that)  The resulting cookie was very cute and my boys are going to flip over them.  They are extremely soft and chewy with a great spicy flavor.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies modified from the King Arthur Flour blog

Yield:  about 6 dozen

3/4 cup whole wheat flour

1 1/2 cup all purpose flour

1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. ground ginger

1 cup unsalted butter, softened

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 (15 oz.) can pumpkin

2 large eggs

1 tsp. vanilla extract

grated zest of 1 orange

2 cups semi-sweet chocolate chips, plus more for decorating

1 cup chopped walnuts

1 can each of the decorating icing in a pressurized can in orange and green

Directions:

Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees F.  Spray baking sheets with cooking spray or line with parchment paper.  Set aside.

Whisk together the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices in a medium bowl.  Set aside.

With an electric mixer set on medium speed, cream together the butter and sugars.  Scrape down the sides of the bowl then add the pumpkin, eggs, vanilla and orange zest, beating well to blend together.

Slowly add the dry ingredients, beating well to blend.  Stir in the chocolate chips and walnuts.

Using a tablespoon scoop, drop the dough onto the prepared baking sheets.  You can put them fairly close together as the dough does not spread.  You will need to mash down the dough balls a little with your spoon or fingers to make them easier to decorate  (otherwise, they bake like balls)

Bake on the middle oven rack for about 18 minutes, until the edges are lightly browned.  Immediately upon removal from the oven, press chocolate chips into the tops of the cookies for the eyes and nose.  When cool, decorate cookies with orange and green frosting to resemble pumpkins.