Last year at this time, our intrepid troupe of cookie bakers were baking The 12 Days of Cookies, attempting to bake 12 holiday cookies in 12 days. While I did eventually bake all 12 cookies, I don’t think I finished until January! This year, the group decided to take it a little easier and bake 4 cookies in 4 weeks, thereby saving what’s left of our sanity. This year, we’re baking our choice of any four of the nine cookies in the Smart Cookies: Favorite Holiday Cookies From Around the World collection from Saveur, and calling our series:

One of my favorite cookies to bake and eat, is biscotti. These crunchy twice-baked beauties are light and flavorful, packed with hazelnuts and almonds, and just perfect with a cup of coffee or tea. I also find them one of the first cookies to disappear from the cookie platter! So when I spotted this recipe in this year’s collection, it had to be the first one I baked.

First the recipe, directly from Saveur, followed, as always, by my notes.

Tozzetti (Roman-Style Biscotti)

Ingredients:

Butter, for greasing pan
3 1/2 cups flour, plus more for pan
1 tbsp. baking powder
2 cups whole blanched almonds, toasted
1 1/2 cups whole blanched hazelnuts, toasted
2 1/4 cups sugar
5 eggs
*1/4 cup anise-flavored liqueur, like
sambuca
*1 tbsp. crushed aniseed
1 tbsp. vanilla extract

Preparation:

Heat oven to 375° F. Grease and flour a 10″ x 15″ jelly roll pan; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together flour and baking powder; toss in nuts. In a bowl, whisk together sugar and eggs; whisk in sambuca*, aniseed*, and vanilla. Add flour mixture; fold. Pour into pan; bake until golden, 20 minutes. Let biscotti cool.

Reduce oven temperature to 325° F. Remove cooled biscotti slab from pan; cut crosswise into twenty 10″-long strips; cut each strip in half to form forty 5″-long strips. Transfer strips to parchment paper-lined baking sheets, spacing strips 1/2″ apart. Bake until golden brown, 20–25 minutes. Let cool.

Notes:

This recipe is very different from most biscotti recipes, in that it’s a loose batter poured into the pan, rather than a dough shaped into a loaf. That attracted me, initially, because it seemed that there would be at least one less step. The result is a more rustic-looking cookie. Compare to last year’s Bon Appetit Holiday Biscotti, a cookie I’ve been baking all year-long (without the white chocolate dip), I love it so much.

At the risk of repeating myself, I can’t stand anise or anything that even remotely tastes like black licorice. So it won’t come as a surprise that I omitted the sambuca and aniseed from this recipe. Instead, I substituted 1/4 cup of Grand Marnier and 1/2 Tbs. almond extract. I probably would have used Amaretto instead of the Grand Marnier, but my husband stashed it in the top cabinet over the refrigerator, and I didn’t feel like dragging out the tall step-stool to get it down (it’s the giant 1.75 liter bottle and damn heavy – we do everything big around here). Also, a bit of grated orange zest would not have been amiss.

And then I discovered that I don’t own a 10″ x 15″ jelly roll pan. My pans all seem to be 12″ x 17″. ->Sigh<- But you know what? Didn’t make one bit of difference. Except, of course, that I got more and bigger cookies! My yield was 45 6-inch biscotti (including the rejects) rather than the recipe’s 40 5-inch yield.

The verdict? This is without a doubt, a very tasty cookie. And since there’s no butter in the recipe (except for greasing the pan – and you can use cooking spray instead), it makes an excellent choice if you’re cutting calories or avoiding dairy for whatever reason. So it comes down to personal preference, and honestly, I’m going back to my old love.

Please be sure to visit my comrades in cookies to see what they chose to serve up!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes

Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen

Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook

Judy of No Fear Entertaining

Kelly of Sass & Veracity

Michelle of Big Black Dog

RJ of Flamingo Musings (that’s me!)

Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench

Tiffany of The Nesting Project

Courtney of Coco Cooks

I’m a little late, but here’s my contribution to the 12 Weeks of Holiday (Christmas) Cookies roundup! I made some dulce de leche (delicious milk caramel) earlier this week, and wanted to incorporate it into a cookie. For the sandwich cookies, I chose to adapt a shortbread cookie recipe out of Marye Audet’s Everything Cookies & Brownies Cookbook, called “Petticoat Tales”, and it worked out beautifully!

Petticoat Tails
(adapted from The Everything Cookies & Brownies Cookbook & used by permission)

Ingredients:

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1 cup confectioner’s sugar
1 tsp. vanilla
2-1/2 cups all purpose flour
1/4 tsp. salt

Preparation:

Cream together the butter, confectioner’s sugar, and vanilla. Blend in the flour and salt. Wrap and refrigerate overnight (I was impatient and only chilled the dough for a couple of hours).

Preheat oven to 400º F.

Roll teaspoons of dough into balls (I used a round teaspoon measuring spoon) and place on cookie sheets. Flatten the balls with the bottom of a glass, dipped in sugar, to 1/8″ thickness.

Bake for 8 – 10 minutes, or until lightly browned.

Notes:

I had a little difficulty with the “glass dipped in sugar” part. The sugar wouldn’t stick to the glass, but the cookies did. To remedy that, I put some demerara sugar in a small plate, placed the cookie balls in the sugar and flattened slightly with my fingers. I then placed the cookies on the (ungreased) cookie sheet, sugar-side up (spaced about 1″ apart), and flattened them with the glass. Worked like a charm!

Also, allow the cookies to cool completely on the cookie sheet after baking. I wanted these to be really pale to contrast with the dulce de leche filling, so I baked them for the minimum 8 minutes. They were fully baked and perfectly crispy – exactly what I was looking for!

But then, I expected no less from my friend, Marye. Check out her books and check out her blog, Restless Chipotle for awesome writing and recipes!

To make your own Dulce de Leche, see my recent post on Apple Cream Napoleons with Dulce de Leche. It’s super-easy, but admittedly a little time-consuming. Still, you can’t beat it for flavor and versatility – and it’ll keep for weeks. Once you make it, you’ll look for all kinds of ways to use it, too!

Dulce De Leche

We’ve been spending a lot of our time lately clearing out the DVR, watching or erasing a ton of stuff we’ve recorded, and I ran across a really old Melting Pot that we recorded on Cooking Channel. Hosting, were a really green Rocco DiSpirito and Cat Cora – they were so cute! Anyway, the theme of the show was citrus, and the last thing Cat made were these adorable pear-shaped orange-almond cookies, that were – get this – no bake! Okay, they spend a very small amount of time on top of the stove, but that’s it! I thought these would be just perfect for Week 2 of our Twelve Weeks of Holiday (fine, Christmas) Cookies series.

Just don’t ask me to pronounce them.

Orange-Scented Almond Cookies: Amygdalota me Orange
(adapted from a recipe by Cat Cora on Cooking Channel)

Ingredients:

3 cups blanched almonds
2-1/2 cups confectioners sugar
1 tablespoon orange water
1/4 cup orange juice, plus more, for shaping

Preparation:

Grind the almonds in a food processor until ground fine. Add in 2 1/2 cups of sugar. Put the almond mixture into a large saucepan on medium high heat. Add in the liquids and warm until sugar is dissolved and the mixture becomes a cohesive ball. Put aside to cool.

Once cool, shape tablespoon-sized portions of the mixture into 1 1/2-inch-high pear shapes, wetting your fingers with the juice. Dredge each cookie in confectioners or granulated sugar to coat.

Wrap individually in cellophane or place in a box with a lid. Let stand for at least 3 days before serving.

Notes:

If you like marzipan, you’ll love this cookie, and if it weren’t for the 3 day drying period, this would be the fastest cookie, ever. The big advantage is that you don’t have to heat up the oven at all!

The 12 Christmas Cookies series snuck up on me, this year, mainly because the group decided to start now, and – very wisely, I might add – to post one cookie a week instead of one cookie a day.

So, I’m starting off simple, with my favorite chocolate chip cookie in the world. I’ve never made another chocolate chip cookie recipe that could beat it for flavor and texture – chocolaty, chewy, and crispy. It keeps well in an airtight container or plastic storage bag, and freezes well. Although it’s not a fancy schmancy “holiday” cookie, I don’t think any cookie platter would be complete without a really good, rich chocolate chip cookie.

The “Neiman Marcus” Chocolate Chip Cookie recipe started making the rounds of the Internet (such as it was), as an urban legend, about 15 or more years ago, back when the Internet as we all knew it, consisted mostly of e-mail and dancing babies. I’m betting that most of you have never heard the story, having been way too young to remember green screens and DOS, so a quick retelling. The story goes something like this:

A man and his young daughter were eating lunch in a Neiman Marcus restaurant, and ordered their chocolate chip cookies for dessert. They loved the cookies so much, that the man asked their waitress if they could have the recipe. She replied that they could have the recipe, but it would cost them two-fifty. The man thought that $2.50 was pretty reasonable and the waitress gave them the recipe. When he received his Neiman Marcus bill sometime later, he noticed a restaurant charge for $250. Outraged, he called customer service and was told that they could not remove the charge and he was stuck with it. Now apoplectic, the man told them that as revenge, he would e-mail the recipe to all his friends and relatives and urge them to do the same. The End.

This recipe makes an enormous quantity of cookies, so feel free to halve or even quarter the amounts. I quartered it and ended up with 30 cookies. The calculator is your friend.

“Neiman Marcus” Chocolate Chip Cookies
(makes approx. 112 cookies)

Ingredients:

2 cups butter
2 cups brown sugar
2 cups white sugar
4 eggs
2 tsp. vanilla
4 cups flour
5 cups blended oatmeal *
2 tsp. soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
24 oz. chocolate chips
8 oz. milk chocolate candy bar (grated) *
3 cups chopped nuts (I made these with California Walnuts)

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 375º F.

Cream the butter and both sugars. On low speed, add eggs and vanilla till completely incorporated.

Add the flour, oatmeal, salt, baking powder, and baking soda, mixing till combined, then add the chocolate chips, grated milk chocolate, and nuts.

Roll into balls about the size of a ping pong ball and place two inches apart on a cookie sheet. Bake for 10 minutes. Cool on the cookie sheet for several minutes before removing to a rack to cool completely. Or not. A cold glass of milk or hot cup of coffee at this point would be awesome.

Notes:

* To make “blended oatmeal”, measure the amount of oatmeal and run through the food processor or a blender on high, till ground to a fine meal consistency.

* The “original” recipe called for an 8 oz. Hershey Bar. Now, you and I know that Hershey Bars haven’t come in an 8 oz. size in probably 10 years. Also, this time, I didn’t have any Hershey Bars, so I used some Hershey milk chocolate Kisses. In order to grate the chocolate, put it in the freezer for about an hour, then pulse it in your food processor.

Well, of course it’s too early for Christmas, so why wait to make these fabulous cookies? Make ‘em for Halloween or Chanukah, or anytime at all!

My Framboise Brownie Cookies are included in Gourmet Girl’s Holiday Cookie Crawl. If you’d like to vote for me, you can click here. I’d appreciate it! Thanks!

Before my PhotoHunt post, I’d like any of you who are either in the Phillipines, or who have contacts in the Phillipines, to see the following message and pass it on to your friends. Maybe in this weird, roundabout kind of way, we can reunite a lost pet with its family: Philippine Animal Welfare Society (PAWS) – MISSING DOG NAMED: FERGIE animaladvocates.multiply.com

Fergie went missing last Saturday morning Dec 19, 2009. She’s last seen in the area of Gen. Ordonez(Molave) St. Marikina Heights, Marikina City. Our family is hoping and praying that she’s in good hands and we can still recover her. Her adopted brothers and sister are waiting for her to come home.

Now, on with the This is my Twelfth and final post for The Twelve Days of Cookies project, baking twelve recipes from the Bon Appetít Holiday Cookie-a-Day collection. As further connection to Twelve, I baked them at Twelve o’clock midnight, for exactly Twelve minutes! Come on – it doesn’t get much more twelve-er than that!

Christmas Cutouts with Vanilla Icing

Ingredients:

Cookies

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 large egg
• 2 tablespoons sour cream
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Additional sugar

Icing

• 4 cups (or more) sifted powdered sugar (sifted, then measured)
• 3 tablespoons (or more) whole milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Colored sugar crystals, sprinkles, and/or decors

Preparation:

For cookies:
Sift first 3 ingredients into medium bowl. Using electric mixer, beat butter and 1 cup sugar in large bowl to blend well. Add egg, sour cream, and vanilla; beat 1 minute. Beat in dry ingredients in 2 additions until just blended. Gather dough together; divide in half. Flatten each half into disk; wrap in plastic and chill 1 hour. (Can be made 1 day ahead. Keep chilled. Soften dough slightly at room temperature before rolling out.)

Line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper. Sprinkle work surface and top of dough disks with additional sugar. Working with 1 disk at a time, roll out dough to 1/4-inch thickness (dough will be very soft). Using assorted 2- to 3-inch cookie cutters, cut out cookies. Transfer to prepared sheets, spacing 1 inch apart. Gather scraps and roll out on sugared surface; cut out more cookies. Repeat until all dough is used. Chill all cookies on baking sheets at least 15 minutes and up to 1 hour.

Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake cookies, 1 sheet at a time, until light golden at edges, about 12 minutes. Transfer cookies to racks and cool completely.

For icing:
Combine 4 cups powdered sugar, 3 tablespoons milk, and vanilla in medium bowl. Stir until icing is well blended, smooth, and spreadable, adding more milk by teaspoonfuls if too thick or more sugar by tablespoonfuls if too thin. Using small icing spatula or table knife, spread thin layer of icing atop each cookie. If using colored sugar crystals, sprinkle over cookies before icing sets. If using food-safe colored markers, let icing dry about 30 minutes; decorate cookies as desired. (Can be made 3 days ahead. Store airtight between sheets of waxed paper at room temperature.)

*My Notes:

To begin, I will repeat for the umpteenth time: I am not a food stylist! Nowhere on my résumé does it say “food stylist”. Why I chose a decorated cut-out cookie for my twelfth post in this series, is absofreakinglutely beyond me. Call me a masochist.

This is another very soft cut-out cookie, but at least they warn you this time, and it softens up out of the fridge in just a couple of minutes.

Seeing as Christmas is over, I didn’t feel compelled to make Holiday shapes, opting instead for the cow and the moose. These are large cutters, so I took Alton Brown’s advice and, using a spatula, transferred them to the cookie sheet with the cutters still in place, lifting them off afterward. This is a pretty smart maneuver to use with any cut-out cookies that might go wrong on you in the process. Thanks, Alton!

The cow and the moose, by the way, represent (very) little private jokes with my husband, going back to our trips to Ireland and western Canada, respectively. No, I’m not going to share them with you – you already think I’m an idiot. Why make it worse?

By the next time we meet, I will be another year older, and so will the Earth! My most heartfelt and sincere best wishes for you and yours – Have a Happy, Healthy and Peaceful New Year!

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. Bedeebedeebedee, that’s all, folks!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project

Hi, there! I’ve finally gotten around to Day 11 of The 12 Days of Cookies project. As a reminder, this is where our little Merry Band of Bakers endeavor(ed) to bake 12 cookies in 12 days from the Bon Appétit’s 2008 Cookie-a-Day collection!

This is also my post for PhotoHunt: Fast. How’s that? Well, I actually timed myself to see just how Fast I could bake this recipe. I needed a drop cookie recipe that can be whipped up quickly (like, so I could go to bed at a reasonable hour!).

White Chocolate, Cranberry, and Macadamia Nut Cookies

Preparation:

Notes:

First, mine spread more than the ones on BA’s site. I don’t know why. Also? 15 minutes was too long to bake these. The first batch came out over-baked. Not burnt, mind you, and still quite edible, but too brown and too crisp. Which might have something to do with their spreading and being thinner than perhaps they ought to have been. They just baked way too Fast! When I took the time down to 10 minutes, I got the softer, chewy texture I was looking for.

Oh. How long did it take me? It took 29 minutes to put this batter together and get the first two trays into the oven. I didn’t do any prep (except for taking the butter out of the fridge to warm) – I did it just like you might do at home, starting with thinking, “Hmm… Think I’ll bake some cookies…” all the way through loading up 2 baking sheets. Do we think that was Fast?

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. And don’t forget to come back tomorrow (maybe!) for the twelfth and final installment!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project

I’m on the home stretch, and finally getting to Day 10 of our 12 Days of Cookies project, where our little band of intrepid bakers are baking and blogging 12 cookie recipes of our individual choice from Bon Appétit’s 2008 Cookie-a-Day collection!

Hazelnut Shortbread Sticks

Preparation:

Notes:

Love this cookie! Crispy, tender, and light, and the milk chocolate with toasted chopped hazelnuts really set it off.

They’re also very quick to prepare and bake – just what the doctor ordered for that last-minute cookie emergency. And yes, there are cookie emergencies. Really.

I actually melted the chocolate in the microwave (50% power for about 90 second, stopping to stir every 15 seconds), which made for an even faster and less fussy/messy experience.

I would absolutely make these again, and so should you.

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. And don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the eleventh installment!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project

Yes, I’m a day behind, but I will catch up! I promise! Didn’t you enjoy yesterday’s French macarons? Twelve cookies in 12 days from the Bon Appétit 2008 Holiday Cookie-a-Day collection – that’s the goal and I refuse to disappoint you!

First the recipe, then my notes.

Hazelnut-Butter Cookies with Mini Chocolate Chips

Preparation:

Notes:

Let’s start with my changes, which were not made out of preference, but rather because I didn’t want to go shopping. I didn’t have any hazelnut butter in the house, but I did have almond butter (which my husband bought awhile back purely out of caprice), and so I used that. I also didn’t have any mini chocolate chips, so I used regular-sized ones. In the end, we decided that these changes had no affect on the outcome.

Well, maybe the mini chips would have fit better in these little, ittty-bitty, bite-sized cookies. If you look at the cookie photo on the Bon Appétit site, they look enormous. They are not. These cookies really don’t spread much, if at all, and the one-inch spacing on the cookie sheet is more than enough.

I don’t know whether to call this a dough or a batter, but either way, once you manage to get the nut butter stirred up, this comes together really fast and easy. In fact, it probably took me twice the time to get the almond butter stirred up, than it did to put the whole recipe together!

When you’re ready to bake, you should absolutely let the dough/batter warm up for at least 30 minutes. When it chills, it gets hard as a rock. I tried to scoop some out for the first cookie after 15 minutes, and not only did I nearly bend my measuring tablespoon, I managed to fling a wad of the stuff across the room. You could put an eye out! Be patient. Or wear goggles.

I also reduced the baking time from the recommended 12 minutes to 10 minutes.

The verdict? This is a rich and tasty chocolate chip cookie. It’s got a lot of flavor, and I suspect you could use any of the smooth, natural nut butters in this recipe. It’s quick to put together and isn’t high maintenance. Of the nine cookies I’ve baked for this series so far, my husband rates this is as a top 3 contender (along with the biscotti and pecan lace cookies). I would definitely bake this cookie again. I’ll just make my husband stir the nut butter.

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. And don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the tenth (and maybe the eleventh!) installment!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project

Welcome to Day 8 of The 12 Days of Cookies! Again, we (no, not the royal “we” – the group) are baking 12 cookies in 12 days from the Bon Appétit 2008 Holiday Cookie-a-Day collection. Why, yes, we are insane. Thanks for asking.

My offering today is a fairly simple recipe, and really delicious. Oh, and if it hasn’t snowed in your area yet, we can fix that – just watch the powdered sugar fly!

First the recipe, then my notes.

Coconut Orange Snowballs

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cups sweetened flaked coconut

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 1/4 cups sifted powdered sugar (sifted, then measured)
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3/4 teaspoon coconut extract
• 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tablespoons grated orange peel
• 1/2 teaspoon salt

Preparation:

Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake coconut on rimmed baking sheet until light golden, stirring occasionally, about 12 minutes.

Using electric mixer, beat butter, 1/2 cup powdered sugar, and both extracts in bowl to blend well. Beat in flour, orange peel, and salt. Stir in coconut. Cover and chill at least 1 hour and up to 1 day. Soften dough slightly before shaping.

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line 2 large baking sheets with parchment paper. Using 1 level tablespoon dough for each cookie, roll dough between palms of hands into balls. Place on prepared sheets, spacing 1 inch apart. Bake until golden on bottom but pale on top, about 18 minutes. Transfer cookies to racks; cool 5 minutes. Place remaining 1 3/4 cups powdered sugar in bowl. Roll hot cookies in powdered sugar, covering completely. Cool cookies on rack. Roll cookies in powdered sugar again, coating generously. (Can be made 5 days ahead. Store airtight between sheets of waxed paper at room temperature.)

Notes:

Living in the tropics, I was ready for something a little lighter and more tropical, after all the cranberries, nuts, and chocolate.

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. And don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the ninth installment! (I should live so long.)

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project

How convenient, right? Here we are on Day 7 of The 12 Days of Cookies, our quest to bake and blog 12 cookies in 12 days from the Bon Appétit 2008 Holiday Cookie-a-Day collection, and we’re gaining momentum!

First the recipe, then my notes:

Cranberry Orange Drop Cookies

Ingredients:

• 2 cups (packed) dried sweetened cranberries (about 10 ounces)
• 1/3 cup orange juice
• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 1 cup (packed) golden brown sugar
• 1 large egg
• 1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 teaspoons grated orange peel
• 3/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 3/4 cup chopped unsalted natural pistachios
• 1/2 cup coarsely chopped fresh or frozen cranberries

Preparation:

Butter 3 baking sheets. Combine dried sweetened cranberries and orange juice in small bowl. Let stand until dried cranberries soften slightly, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes.

Whisk all purpose flour, ground cinnamon, baking powder, ground ginger, baking soda, and salt in medium bowl until just blended.

Position rack in center of oven and preheat to 350°F. Using electric mixer, beat room-temperature butter and golden brown sugar in large bowl until smooth. Add 1 egg, minced ginger, vanilla extract, and grated orange peel and beat until well blended, about 2 minutes. Beat in flour-spice mixture. Stir in chopped walnuts, chopped pistachios, coarsely chopped fresh or frozen cranberries, and dried cranberries with any juices that have accumulated.

Drop cookie dough by rounded tablespoonfuls onto prepared baking sheets, spacing tablespoonfuls about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake cookies, 1 baking sheet at a time, until golden and almost firm to touch in center, about 18 minutes. Cool cookies on baking sheets 5 minutes. Transfer to racks; cool cookies completely. (Cookies can be made 2 days ahead. Store cookies in airtight container at room temperature.)

Notes:

This is one terrific cookie. The combination of Craisins (sweetened dried cranberries) and fresh cranberries (I used some I’d stashed away in the freezer before Thanksgiving), with the orange zest, walnuts, pistachios, and ginger, make this a standout drop cookie.

I changed nothing about this recipe, so I’ll just offer this one tip in the name of efficiency. You can chop the nuts and fresh cranberries altogether in the food processor. Just drop the walnuts, pistachios, and cranberries in the food processor, and in about 10 – 15 pulses, it’s all done, mixed together and ready to dump in the batter.

Another tip I picked up somewhere along the way (probably on Food Network) regarding the ginger: I don’t know about you, but I buy fresh ginger for something, and wind up throwing away half of it, because I don’t use it up before it goes bad. Try this – when you buy ginger, cut it up into one-inch or two-inch pieces, peel it, and put it in a freezer bag and put it in your freezer. When you need ginger for a recipe, take out a piece and grate it, frozen, directly into your recipe.

Well, that’s it for Day 7 – a whole week’s worth of cookie recipes tested in real home kitchens, before you break the first egg. Thanks for stopping by!

Please visit my partners in holiday baking, below, and see what they’ve got in store for you. And don’t forget to come back tomorrow for the eighth installment!

Andrea of Andrea’s Recipes (honorary member and our founder but not participating this year)
Claire of The Barefoot Kitchen
Courtney of Coco Cooks
Di of Di’s Kitchen Notebook
Judy of No Fear Entertaining
Kelly of Sass & Veracity
Michelle of Big Black Dog
RJ of Flamingo Musings (hey! that’s me!)
Sandy of At the Baker’s Bench
Tiffany of The Nesting Project